Category: Amazon

If you’ve read my post on navigating KDP and IngramSpark for print books, you’re probably wondering: what about the ebook?

Because there’s no physical product to print, the ebook game is all about digital real estate—which online stores carry your book, and how it gets to them. You have two main options: upload your book to each store yourself, or use a "distributor" (a service that sends your ebook to multiple stores on your behalf in exchange for a small cut of your sales). Most authors actually end up using a mix of both strategies to get the best results.

Here is a breakdown of how to navigate your choices.

Selling on Amazon with KDP

For most authors, Amazon’s Kindle store is where the vast majority of ebook sales happen. KDP (Kindle Direct Publishing) is your direct path to these readers. It’s completely free, you upload the ebook yourself, and Amazon pays you your royalties directly. KDP sells your ebook in Amazon’s Kindle stores around the world, but only in Amazon’s stores.

While you’re setting up your ebook on KDP, you’ll be offered an optional program called KDP Select. It’s very important to understand this program before you click "enroll."

The Perks: KDP Select places your ebook in Kindle+ (formerly Kindle Unlimited), Amazon’s popular reading subscription service where members read books at no extra cost, and you are paid based on how many pages of your book subscribers read. Many authors enroll to reach Kindle+ subscribers, who are voracious readers much more willing to try a new author because the book costs them nothing extra. Enrollment also unlocks Amazon’s promotional tools, allowing you to run free days and limited-time discounts. This program tends to be highly effective for fiction genres where readers go through several books a month.

The Catch: Amazon requires exclusivity. For 90 days at a time, your ebook can be offered only through Amazon and public libraries, entirely ruling out other ebook stores. (Note: This exclusivity only applies to the ebook format, so your print books can still be sold anywhere). Enrollment renews automatically unless you toggle it off.

If your goal is to have your ebook available everywhere readers shop online, you should skip KDP Select.

Reaching Readers Beyond Amazon

Not everyone uses a Kindle. A huge audience buys ebooks from Apple Books, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Google Play Books, and others—or borrows them digitally through their local library. You can either place your ebook in those stores yourself, or let a distributor handle the heavy lifting.

Option 1: Managing Individual Storefronts

This hands-on approach means opening an individual account with each and every store. Because there is no middleman taking a cut, this route usually earns you the highest royalty per sale. However, it takes time and effort to set up and maintain these accounts. Every time you want to run a price promotion, fix a typo, or update your book description, you have to log into each separate account and make the changes manually. In my experience, authors who aren't heavily marketing their books see very few sales from these secondary stores, making all that extra admin work hard to justify.

Option 2: Using Draft2Digital (The Recommended Route)

For most indie authors, Draft2Digital is the sweet spot. You upload your book just once, and Draft2Digital blasts it out to the major non-Amazon stores, library apps like Libby and Hoopla, and Bookshop.org.

• You manage everything from one dashboard and receive one consolidated payment.
• They take a fee of about 10% of the retail price of each sale.
• New accounts pay a one-time activation fee, and there is a small annual fee, but only in years when the account earns very little.
• They provide a beautiful universal web page for your book that links to every store carrying it, which could be handy for marketing.

Note: Google Play Books isn’t included in Draft2Digital’s network, so if that store is important to you, you can easily just add that one manually.

Where IngramSpark Fits In

You might already know IngramSpark for print books, but they also offer ebook distribution. If you do not plan to do any marketing and simply want to set your book up once and leave it, IngramSpark is a viable alternative to Draft2Digital for reaching those non-Amazon stores. Just keep in mind that they will take a percentage of your sales, and you have no direct control over exactly where the book gets distributed. I’ve occasionally seen authors pull in a few passive sales through IngramSpark when they had no luck on Draft2Digital.

However, there are a few important rules to keep in mind:

• Importantly, you would NOT want to only distribute your ebook through IngramSpark. While it would get distributed to Amazon, doing it this way means you lose access to the pricing and marketing programs offered directly through KDP. Plus, it can be difficult and time-consuming to add Amazon directly later if you change your mind.
• IngramSpark can deliver your ebook to Amazon only if you haven’t published any ebooks on Amazon yourself in the past 12 months. If you’re using KDP for your Kindle ebooks, IngramSpark will send your ebook to the other stores, but not to Amazon.
• If your ebook is already for sale on Apple Books, you have to remove it there before IngramSpark can list it for you, and your existing reviews will be lost.

Because moving an ebook between distributors can be a headache, it’s worth picking your path carefully from day one.

The Cheat Sheet

Start with KDP to capture the massive Amazon market, and decide right away if the KDP Select exclusivity is right for you. Then, choose your strategy for the rest of the world:

• For Maximum Royalties: If you are actively marketing and want to keep as much of each sale as possible, open your own accounts with Amazon and the other major online stores, and use Draft2Digital to fill in the gaps.
• For Broad Reach with Ease: If you want maximum reach with minimal headaches, use KDP for Amazon and Draft2Digital for everything else.
• For Low Maintenance: If you simply want to set it and forget it, and aren't planning to ever market your ebook, use KDP alongside IngramSpark.

If this all still sounds a bit overwhelming, ebook conversion and title setup are services I offer right alongside print formatting. If your book is getting close to publication, get in touch!