amazon best seller listNow that my first book  is up at the Kindle store, I have been reading a ton about Amazon rankings, trying to tweak the category listing for my title to give it broader exposure. I knew the book was not going to be a best-seller. It is a niche category, and I knew that. But it was a book I wanted to read myself, so I figured it would be a good test project for me to learn the ins and outs of the Kindle process.

The good news: I am beating out my chief competitor. Normally, I am all for ‘readers buy many books and there is no competition, just a shared marketplace.’ But my book is a formatted and edited version of a public domain classic. I sought it out after purchasing an $18 new translation which was riddled with typos and un-usable on my Kindle. In this case, that author’s book IS my competition. People may buy two books in one category, but they won’t buy two books which are the same title. They will buy one or the other, and I want them to buy my typo-free one instead of her error-filled disaster (no offence, fellow author; but your book does have a ton of typos and OCR issues!)

So, last week I checked and my book was up to #5 in its category. It’s now holding at #17, and her book is at #36. Yay, I guess.

But how did this happen? I haven’t the foggiest clue, because here is the clincher—I have yet to sell a single copy. As a public domain text, it is not eligible for Kindle Unlimited, so there are no borrows. And I know her book had at least one sale, since I bought it. So…what gives? I have no clue. I read a blog post which suggested you could divide the book’s sales rank by 100,000 to get an estimate of how many copies per day it sells. By that calculation, my book sells 0.16 copies a day and hers sells 0.13.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I am glad to be ‘beating’ her. I am just not sure how that happened for a book which has no sales.

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"I’m a journalist, a teacher and an e-book fiend. I work as a French teacher at a K-3 private school. I use drama, music, puppets, props and all manner of tech in my job, and I love it. I enjoy moving between all the classes and having a relationship with each child in the school. Kids are hilarious, and I enjoy watching them grow and learn. My current device of choice for reading is my Amazon Kindle Touch, but I have owned or used devices by Sony, Kobo, Aluratek and others. I also read on my tablet devices using the Kindle app, and I enjoy synching between them, so that I’m always up to date no matter where I am or what I have with me."

3 COMMENTS

  1. Many thanks for laboring and creating this proofed and clean text. I am sure it was a labor of love. Amazon has far too many Kindle texts that are so badly done, even the first page is littered with typos.

    Now for some words of advice from someone who has been putting carefully proofed reprints on Amazon since 1999. It’s not pleasant, so get ready for bad news.

    Keep in mind that category listings probably matter less than search results. Readers are more likely to just describe what they want in the search field at Amazon and see what pops up than to wade down through categories. It’s faster, easier, and usually works.

    I just did both an Amazon advanced and general search for the keywords: Jewish women devotional. What came up, sorted by the default relevance and at the head of the list is what I assume is your competitor’s book from Schocken.

    Your book, even though it has the same title is not on that first page even though (and this is critical) there are four books on that first page that are listed as “currently unavailable.” Why list books they can’t buy but not list one they can? That makes no sense—or does it?

    First, there’s a slight chance that you’ve failed to add those keywords to Amazon’s list, but two are the three terms are in your title and the third almost is (devotion versus devotional) Also, words in a title seem to outrank keywords in how Amazon sorts search results. So that’s not likely to be the reason why it’s not only not ranked at the top or not listed on the page but not even included in a list that includes books that can’t even be bought.

    Not, far more likely that another reason is driving those strange search books. Your version is $2.99 for Kindles. The version that is topping the list is one that’s $20.86 in hardback and $14.95 in a Kindle edition. Think money.

    It’s that huge difference that’s driving Amazon to not only list that other edition at the top of the list but to drive your edition totally out of the search results.

    That’s not my surmise. When I first noticed that happening with one of my books almost fifteen years ago, I wrote a letter to Amazon’s legal department and one of its lawyers called. She not only admitted that was happening but conceded that it was deliberately programed into how their search results are displayed. Her sole excuse was that, if would-be buyers clicked around enough, they would eventually find my edition. The search results were set up to totally hide less expensive editions when a significantly more pricey one was available. But not every way of getting to a book is blocked. That’s Amazon’s legal fig leaf.

    I’ve seen that happen repeatedly with my books, so much so that when (living in Seattle) I met an Amazon software developer, I complained about that to him. His reply was “Don’t trust Amazon search results.” Good advice.

    Nor is that confined to books. A bit over a year ago, I looked for a specific Bluetooth headset, searching by manufacturer and model number. A lot of third parties sold it and all were in the $120 range. But knowing how deceitful Amazon results are, I tried all sorts of tricks to bypass search results, including “bought instead” links. One of those led me to a web page where the maker of the headset itself was selling that model headset for $40 less than those $120 listings. All were third parties selling on Amazon, but the pricer ones were been displayed in search results and the good deals being hidden. That is Amazon.

    I could go on and on about that. It’s clearly a deeply embedded Amazon policy, one its lawyers will defend and one they’ve been using for at least 15 years. They’re not going to change because it’s deceptive. That would be imputing to Amazon what is doesn’t have, an internal system of ethics and integrity. If they can get away with something they will.

    They’re only going to change if the federal government goes after them for deceptive trade practices—unlikely in the Obama administration. Or if a major press outlet goes after them in a major expose with numerous examples. That’s also unlikely given how little investigative journalism today’s press does on any topic but Republican presidential candidates.

    I’m sorry to have to tell you this and I wish I could offer a solution. Apart from pricing your books far higher than your competitors, there’s little you can do to change Amazon’s search results. At one time, I thought of pricing the hardback edition of my books obscenely high to drive them to the top of search results, so I could sell the paperbacks. That was one way to game this sick system. But my hardbacks were selling so poorly, I decided to drop them altogether.

    The one bit of encouraging news is that Google search results aren’t biased by prices. For a time, Amazon was hiding my marvelously well done reprint of Across Asia on a Bicycle because it was selling for about $12 and someone else had a crudely done reprint for about twice that. What helped me was that bicycling websites were recommending my edition enough that on Google, an Amazon link to my title was the top hit on the planet, while at the same time Amazon was refusing to even include it in search results. Google and those bicycling sites were doing enough that my edition was still outselling that overpriced edition by quite a bit. This Amazon policy is not only vile, it’s foolish for Amazon itself. Faced with overpriced editions, people don’t buy at all.

    So the one consolidation I can offer is to suggest that you do your best to get various websites, particularly those for Jewish women, to recommend your book. Clicking on those links in a Google search will generate a high Google ranking that’ll drive customers to you despite Amazon’s nasty schemes.

    I hope those who follow Teleread will realize that I do have reasons not to be an Amazon fanboy and this is one of them.

    Best wishes with your book. You might also release it through Smashwords. With but one upload, that’ll get it on almost every other major ebook retailer including Apple, Kobo, and B&N. There’s no reason to give Amazon all your sales.

    –Mike

  2. The Amazon algorithm privileges newly published books in the rankings. I shot to number seven in Asian American literature on the basis on one sale on day one. Ignore any formulas for calculating rank as it takes a lot more sales to be no.99 in Contemporary Romance than it does to be no.9 in Asian American literature.

  3. Michael, thanks so much for your detailed and thoughtful response. The good news is, my book is no longer a zero-sale! Yup, I sold my first copy this afternoon. Yay!

    I think my ultimate plan is to do as you say and get it out to some blogs and hope for word of mouth to carry it. I also have some other books I plan to put up there. Over time, I should have enough content that they will hopefully cross-promote each other some.

    This particular title really was a labor of love for me, as you said. I never expected it to be a best-seller and make a million dollars. But I admit, it does feel nice to have that one sale 🙂 Whatever small audience this book may have, I hope I can find it.

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