Amazon Allows Pre-Orders Now

[Zero Angel]

Hey everyone!

Got an e-mail from Amazon today saying that they are now allowing pre-orders on KDP published books.

Need to have a final draft or manuscript of the book and the pre-order can be up to 90 days in advance of publication.

Here's Amazon's official help page explaining:
https://kdp.amazon.com/help?topicId=A3P7F81795P0RA&ref_=pe_445910_119439090_3

Looks like a good way to ensure opening sales of your works register at once for bestseller status, not to mention the ability to promote your book more effectively.

 

[PaulineMRoss]

One thing to be cautious of, from those who've had pre-order capability before: on Amazon, pre-orders affect your ranking when they're made but NOT on the actual day of release. So if you typically have 1,000 fans likely to buy a new release, if 500 of them pre-order, that will affect your ranking before release, but only the other 500, who buy on the day of release, affect your ranking on the day of release itself. Without pre-order, you'd get all 1,000 registering on the day of release. So you could end up worse off with pre-order than without (in terms of ranking).

 

[Telcontar]

Interesting. I didn't read the fine print when I got the email, but it certainly seems counter-intuitive if its going to work that way. Smashwords has a similar program (which I discovered on my most recent publication) and they explicitly state that all pre-orders will count towards the first day's sales: a very sensible and useful approach.

 

[MichaelSullivan]

Interesting. I didn't read the fine print when I got the email, but it certainly seems counter-intuitive if its going to work that way. Smashwords has a similar program (which I discovered on my most recent publication) and they explicitly state that all pre-orders will count towards the first day's sales: a very sensible and useful approach.

Yes, and no. The question is "count toward what." Amazon always "counts" the "purchase" when the item is bought by the reader which includes pre-orders, kindle unlimited downloads, Kindle Owner's Lending Library downloads.

But the "big best-seller lists" like the New York Times and USA Today counts the sales on release day for tallying for their releases.

So yes, Amazon rank - when purchased...bestseller lists on release day.

 

[Telcontar]

Hah! I think you might be the only one here currently worried about bestseller lists, Michael. Me, I'm far enough from them that for all practical purposes they don't affect me - whereas my Amazon rankings can have a direct impact on sales as they affect how often Amazon displays your book as an "perhaps you would also like" suggestion to buyers. Thus, if preorders don't help bump the ranking, I'm not sure I see the usefulness to the small-time folks offhand. But of course I haven't looked into it a great deal yet.