You have a lot of options where you can put your books aside from the very famous Amazon. Find out other self publishing alternatives to Amazon that will let you earn more money.
Today's question has three answers and you are going to want to stick around for the third answer. It is a secret as to which alternative to Amazon is the best one. So you are definitely going to want to stick around for that.
Let's get into it. The question that was sent in today was, what are self publishing alternatives to Amazon? The person who is asking this has a problem which is we see there is an awful lot of alternatives to Amazon and we are wanting to get as many sales as possible.
But then when we start to research the process, we realize quickly why we are having this problem. It's because we feel overwhelmed at all of the different options and that leaves us feeling hopeless. Not getting our book out on any of the markets.
We definitely do not want to find ourselves in that position. This is what we are going to end up hitting today. But before we get into the answers, grab a copy of my free Self-Publishing Secrets Checklist to help you get started with your self-publishing journey right away.
Let me give you a little bit of my own story. When I first got started self-publishing, I wanted to see more sales. I noticed that my sales were not as high as they could be.
At the same time, I realized that other people were getting a lot better results than I was getting. But I became a bit overwhelmed by all of the available options. There was no clear data telling me which alternatives to Amazon would be the right ones for me without risking.
Check out this related article: Is Self-Publishing Books Through Amazon A Good Idea?
Because I knew that if I didn't find the other alternatives, I would be leaving money on the table. And perhaps, I would be doing a lot better than I was doing if I had thought through or researched a little bit better.
To find out alternatives to Amazon that could be better than what I was currently doing. But then I came in contact with someone who was a fantastically successful self-publisher who understands that the self-publishing game is not about writing necessarily high-quality books.
Earn More With Extended Distribution
But rather about understanding how to market those books and put them onto the distribution channels that will make you the most money. One of the surprising points that she had commented to me was that you can put an average book and blow away a fantastic book.
Just based on the marketing and the distribution channels that you are choosing for that specific book. That was the point when I went over to ACX for my audiobooks and Ingram Spark for additional paperback books at the time.
The result was I started seeing more money flowing through these other platforms instead of Amazon. The whole principle of running ads on Amazon became less effective. Before, it was crazy easy to run ads and to make money.
Now, the strategies have changed. You still need to be running your ads, however, it's a lot more difficult. So the money coming from these other networks combined was greater than my Amazon ads that I was making.
I was feeling fantastic that with this extended distribution I was able to bring in all of this extra cash that wasn't coming in for the books that I had. I'm still in the process of moving my books over and testing out new things.
I was recently checking out eBooks on Ingram Spark. I am continually running experiments. But let's get into the answers for today on what are self publishing alternatives to Amazon?
The first one is Lulu and Ingram Spark We need to focus on what exactly they do best. Lulu is fantastic for our hardback books and Ingram Spark is great for our paperback books. You can use them for both but that's what they are especially good at.
Check out this related article: What Are The Best Self Publishing Houses In India?
The next thing is for our eBooks, we can use Smashwords and also Ingram Spark. With Smashwords, it will ensure maximum distribution so that our books are hitting as many markets as possible. We are finding readers who are hungry for our exact book.
But only want to read it if it's on Kobo or Apple Books or maybe Google Books. We are using these networks to distribute it. They are aggregators that get it out maximum distribution to as many channels as possible so that we can see those sales coming in.
Kindle Books First
The third answer which is the secret answer of the day is what is the best? There is no best. You should be using a whole series of different services, different networks, and publishing areas to get your books out.
But you should not go for something away from Amazon. You should make sure you use Amazon as your base. Then we move from there to the other ones.
So for all of my customers and students, I tell them very clearly that they need to get their Kindle book out. I have been recently talking with one of my students and her question was what about marketing and all of these other distribution channels?
How about producing this and producing that? My key issue is we need to get your Kindle book out first. Then we can move on to the other ones and that's very important.
Check out this related article: What Is The Truth About Kindle Publishing?
But you should not stop when you get your Kindle book out because you will be leaving a lot of money on the table that you could make otherwise. So once you do get that Kindle book out, we are just going to go step by step. And we're going to get the rest of them out.
So, that is something you are definitely going to want to consider when you are going about doing it and figuring out these alternatives. Have you published your book outside Amazon or one of these other alternatives?
If yes write the word "Yes" below in the comments and if you have never done it, write the word "No" below in the comments. After you've done that, check out my other blogs and videos for more answers to your self-publishing questions.