Should You Stay With Kindle Direct Publishing Select?

Is there a more prominent question to be asked and resolved right now for indie authors?  There certainly isn’t a more pressing time, as many of us are coming up on our first renewal window.  And, as that window approaches, I’m seeing more and more authors take a stance on this issue.  Question is, what areyou going to do?

In case you’re new to the game, or you’ve lived under a rock for the last three months, Kindle Direct Publishing is the means by which you can publish your ebook on Amazon.  About three months ago, KDP announced the select program, whereby an author could take advantage of a huge promotional tool in exchange for your ebook being listed exclusively on Amazon.  The huge promotional tool is the ability to list your book for free for five (5) days during your three month KDPS agreement with Amazon.  Going free, in and of itself, is just the first of a one-two punch.  The second punch is that your free downloads “transfer” over to your paid ranking when you come off of free.  Thus, you do not get any royalty credit for the free downloads (obviously), but you do get credit in terms of where you rank when your free period is over.  To be clear, this can be HUGE (which is why I put it in caps, okay?)

PROVEN RESULTS

Let’s start with this–I have experienced and witnessed some amazing results in the KDPS program.  First, as to my own book Enemy in Blue, I have gone from being in the 20,000-30,000 ranking range to the 1,000-2,500 range.  That’s going from maybe a couple books sold a day to around 50.  Second, I was part of an Indie Book Collective event where one of the authors (Nina Bruhns, Catch Me If You Can) experienced an almost unimaginable jump.  Her book reached the top 10 in all free books, came out onto free and reached the top 30 in all of paid, and her backlog of books is now completely kicking ass.  She is selling tons of books.  Would that have happened without KDPS?  Maybe, but it certainly didn’t happen before KDPS.

If the results were a one-off, I’d let you know that and probably counsel against KDPS.  However, the results are not anomalies, which leads me to my conclusion that KDPS is the most significant marketing tool that we indie authors have at the moment.

CHANGING LANDSCAPE?

I ended the last second with the caveat “at the moment” because things can change on a moment’s notice with Amazon.  From my own personal experience, I seemed to get a bigger “transfer” based upon the number of downloads in my first free giveaway than my second.  There are rumblings that Amazon is not giving as much credit for free downloads in KDPS now as they were at the beginning of the program.  Essentially, they are making it more difficult to climb the rankings based solely upon your downloads. This could make the value of the primary benefit of KDPS less attractive.

Adding to the changing landscape is saturation in our target markets.  This is purely speculation, but I think there’s an upper limit to what people are willing to throw onto their devices.  If they have 50 books that they have downloaded for free, are they really going to add the 51st, 52nd, etc.?  Even if they do, will they ever read them?  This also begs the question, are people going to become accustomed to getting books for free?  Will they still pay $2.99 for a book when they know that it may go free in the next several months?  Is that the world we (as indie authors) want to create…and do we have any say in it to begin with?

I think a very interesting indicator of where readers are headed is the report generated by Kindle Nation Daily with respect to the successes of their sponsors.  Here’s the link to the results: https://spreadsheets.google.com/spreadsheet/pub?key=0AlfzLsx6vYzodHZaUWJ6QS0tdC1Rb1pFay1sNW5pSHc&gid=18  If you take the time to analyze the results over the last few months compared to the last year, for instance, you’ll see two things.  First, many more authors listing their books for free and paying for advertising space to do so.  Second, the numerical jump in ranking for books that are free versus those that are paid is significantly different.  To me, this means that readers are becoming accustomed to free rather than paid.  (Now, this may largely be a result of the shift in who advertises on Kindle Nation Daily, i.e. more free books, but it is the only empirical data we have as to results from advertising).

STILL THE BEST GAME IN TOWN

Things can change on a dime.  Just look at what KDPS did to our world.  As things currently stand, it is a must to use the KDPS system as an indie author.  Nowhere else are you going to get 5,000, 10,000, or 20,000 downloads of your book.  Even if 1-2% of those people actually read the book, you’re still better off.  Further, no other distribution system (i.e. Apple, B&N, Smashwords) provides usany marketing tools of anysignificance.  Will all your ebook eggs be in one basket for 3 month periods?  Yes.  But, is there really only one basket that’s going to lift you to success as an indie author?  Eh, kinda.  At least right now.  I don’t see many authors gloating about how they sold 1,000,000 books on Smashwords or B&N.

In sum, I simply don’t think there’s a better way to expose your book right now, and I don’t think there’s a better way to climb the bestselling ranks.  Could that change in a year?  Sure.  Could that change in a month?  Absolutely.  Until it does, I’ve got to stick with KDPS.

Is What You’re Doing Really Marketing Your Book?

Interesting article referred to me by another author, entitled “The Uncommon Truth About Marketing Your Books.”  It poses a valid question–are we marketing our books, or just networking?  I really had to take a step back and consider my approach to getting exposure for my book.  Read the article and let us know what you think.  Specifically, are you marketing on Twitter or networking?  Or both?

http://www.passiveincomeauthor.com/the-uncommon-truth-about-marketing-your-books/#comment-150

Indie Author Report–Advertising with Kindle Nation Daily

Goodreads.  Facebook.  Bing.  Twitter.  Countless websites that have varying degrees of dedication to indie authors.  All of these are options for your precious advertising dollars.  And, all of them can be money pits.  Over the course of the next few months, I’m going to try to relay to you which ones work, which ones don’t, and why they have worked or not for me.  The first one on the list is Kindle Nation Daily (“KND”).

KND seems to be one of the biggest, if not the biggest, website dedicated solely to books on the Kindle.  They have over 48,000 likes/followers on Facebook, and state the following with respect to their traffic:

“One way or another, we connect with over 84,200 readers every day.

In the past 30 days there have been 158,200 unique visits to our website, totaling over 349,800 page views. Over the past three months Kindle Nation Daily’s website traffic places it among the top 40,400 websites in the world, and among the top 8,200 websites in the U.S.

48,200 of you connect with us through Facebook, 26,700 though our email newsletter, and 2,025 through Twitter.  Between eInk Kindle  subscribers and subscribers to our free Kindle Fire app, over 9,100 of you are subscribers to the Kindle edition of our blog.

In the past 30 days you have visited 646,000 Amazon pages and purchased over 14,500 Amazon items directly from our website — and that’s just the paid items.”

Those are some big numbers.  That’s why I decided to take out an “Option A,” Special Sponsored Post with Facebook Triple Play (SSP-TP) advertisement with them.

When I say “them,” I am really referring to Stephen Windwalker, the founder/CEO and “chief bottle washer” at KND.  He was my primary contact, and from a customer service perspective, he was very good.  He responded relatively timely to emails (would give him an A-/B+ there, but I know he is inundated with correspondence).  From a customer accommodation standpoint, I give him an A+ for two reasons.  First, when I purchased the SSP-TP package, KND sent me three days when my ad would run.  I wanted to change those days a bit due to another event I was in, and Steve was happy to make that change.  Second, there was an issue with my ad not running on one of my days.  I emailed Steve about this and he immediately took ownership, and extended me the benefit of three more days of advertising due to the error.  THAT, my friends, is excellent customer service.

Another aspect of KND which I found to be of superior quality is the sponsorship tracking data provided on their website.  Steve has provided the results of advertisements taken out by authors for approximately the last year in a handy spreadsheet (click here to see).  That level of transparency is ridiculous, and almost unheard of.  You can take those results and do two things.  First, see what authors are using KND, and what their results are.  You’ll find that top selling indie authors such as Richard Bard use KND.  Second, look at the results, and the corresponding pricing during the events, to calculate what type of advertising may work best for you.  This is much better than the Google Adwords trial and error money pit.

For my advertisement, I priced my book at $0.99.  That decision was based on several factors, including the fact that my book would be part of a $0.99 single day event during the ad, Steve’s own recommendation, and my gut.  I made the $179.99 cost of the ad back and then some.  In full disclosure, I don’t think the advertisement was wildly profitable from a purely monetary perspective.  But, you know that profit isn’t everything, especially early in a career (or, you SHOULD know that).

Perhaps one concern I have with KND is that with the mix of free Kindle books they advertise, do those advertisements cannibalize purchases of paid books?  I saw one comment from a reader on KND’s Facebook page, and she essentially wrote, “Thank you KND for these great free Kindle books.  Since I bought my Kindle, I haven’t had to pay for a single book I’ve read.”  Yowch.  I’m sensitive to the fact that readers may start expecting their Kindle books to be free, and wonder how much of KND’s target market expects that as well.  Promotion of increased prices would be ideal.  However, I’m certainly not going to blame KND entirely or even in large part for what may be attributed to market forces.  It is something to watch, and I’m not sure you would have much success advertising on KND at price points above $2.99.

In short, I was very happy with KND’s customer service, very happy with the data available to me before I paid a chunk of money to advertise, and content with the results.  Enemy in Blue has held onto a low 1,000s rank since the KND ad (and the Indie Book Collective event referenced in my last post), and is now a top 10 seller in Legal Thrillers on Amazon.  Will I use KND again?  Absolutely–I intend to with my second book, the release of which is imminent!

The Power of Numbers

Writing can be extremely solitary.  In fact, many authors would argue that solitude is a necessary part of the writing process.  However, there’s no doubt that once you exit the writing phase and enter the marketing/promotion/sales phase, solitude is the last thing you need.

Point in case?  A couple months back, I wrote a blog entitled, “How to Get your Book Downloaded 5,141 Times in Two Days.”  I thought that number was pretty damn snazzy, especially since I went it alone on those two KDP Select free days.  Fast forward the calendar to February 2, 3, 4, and I’m involved in a free event with the Indie Book Collective.  The mastermind behind the IBC is Carolyn McCray, author of several books including 30 Pieces of Silver.  (I almost called her a criminal mastermind, because her level of intelligence and insight is freakin’ criminal, but that’s another story).  She organized an event where approximately twenty-five authors cross-promoted, linked their arms together, and lifted each other to the tops of their respective genres.

My personal outcome?  12,600 books downloaded in just over two days (about 2.3 days).  The outcome of some of the other authors?  Nina Bruhns and Catch Me If You Can reached #1 out of ALL free books.  Ann Charles and her Deadwood  series had tens of thousands of downloads, and the series is now doing extremely well since coming off of free.  The moral of this story?  There is power in numbers, especially for indie authors.

HOW TO BECOME A PART OF THE “NUMBERS”–AND HOW TO MAINTAIN YOUR WORK/PROMO BALANCE

Perhaps the most important thing for an author starting out on this journey is to link up with other authors.  Traditionally, I believe the writing group fulfilled this need.  At least for me, the writing group is nice, but not on a large enough scale.  I want to bounce ideas off of 50, 100, 500 authors, and social media is the best place to do that.  So, to become a part of the numbers, start with a few things.  First, join a group like the Indie Book Collective, which not only has an amazing core group of authors, but provides educational online classes and seminars to help you hone your marketing and promoting skills.  Second, go onto Goodreads and join a couple of the writing groups on there.  You can join liking and tagging groups, marketing for authors groups, etc.  I would suggest starting with two, as following more than that can get overwhelming.  Finally, once you get to know other authors, see if any of them will invite you to Facebook groups.  Right now, I’m in three that all serve different purposes, and that all include amazing authors.  (If you’re interested in being invited, send me a message).

A word of caution.  You will need to strike a balance between how many groups you get involved with, and how much time you are able to dedicate to your writing.  These groups can quickly suck several hours out of your day…hours you could have spent writing.  Another potential concern–joining multiple groups and not contributing to them is almost worse than not joining them at all.  Only join as many groups as you can contribute to on an every other day basis.  If you break this rule, I promise you’ll only stress yourself out, and possibly lower your credibility with the people in the groups.

In sum, can you do this writing and sales thing without really getting involved with other people?  Eh…you can, but you aren’t likely to have success.  Team up with people, truly help other people, and your success(es) will be amplified–I promise.

“Confessions of a Publisher: ‘We’re in Amazon’s Sights and They’re Going to Kill Us’” by Sarah Lacy

Really, REALLY interesting article here by Sarah Lacy of the Pandodaily.  In short, pretty much what we as indie authors have sensed, and why we look skeptically at people that want to submit to traditional publishers anymore.  I think a follow up question is this.  Do you think indie authors will get crushed under Amazon’s thumb someday?  (Think getting 30% of your sales price rather than 70% because there is no other game in town).

http://pandodaily.com/2012/01/17/confessions-of-a-publisher-were-in-amazons-sights-and-theyre-going-to-kill-us/

“Why Authors Tweet,” NY Times Article

Why do you tweet?  It’s pretty established that Tweeting does not necessarily increase sales in a substantial fashion.  H0wever, there’s no doubt that it keeps you and your work at the shiny front (rather than the cobwebbed rear) of minds.  Read this NY Times article entitled “Why Authors Tweet,” and then let me know why you tweet.  Very interested to hear!

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/08/books/review/why-authors-tweet.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1

How to Get Your Book Downloaded 5,141 Times in Two Days

Has anything shaken up the book industry as much as KDP Select in recent memory?  Low sales in December are being blamed almost entirely on the KDP Select program.  Despite admonitions regarding joining the Select program, I decided to roll the dice and see what good, and bad, would come from the program.  Here are the early results.

BRIEFLY, WHAT IS KDP SELECT?

I don’t want to spend much time on this, because all the information is available on your KDP page.  Basically, the Select program is this: (1) you give up all rights to distribute your EBOOK anywhere but on Amazon (does not apply to paperbacks, doesn’t apply to any ebooks which are not enrolled); (2) consumers with Amazon Prime and a Kindle device can borrow your book for free (has to be a Kindle device, not just a Kindle app); and (3) based upon the number of times your book is borrowed, you get a slice of the monthly pie, which is currently $500,000/month.

TIMING IS *ALMOST* EVERYTHING

Part of the Select program is the ability to choose dates on which you want to promote your book for free.  (As an aside, you can just change your price to $0.00 in KDP.  I believe the only difference is that you won’t know, with exactitude, when the price change will take place).  I chose December 27-28 to have two free days.  Did I base my selection on extensive market research?  Wish I could say yes.  Rather, I picked those days because it seemed logical to me that people would have new reading devices from Christmas, and would want to download new books.  Call it prescience, call it dumb luck, but people downloaded Enemy in Blue like it was a new Grisham book.

Enemy in Blue had around 800 downloads as of 8am MST on the 27th.  Literally, every time I clicked the refresh page on my KDP monthly report, the number seemed to go up by around 100 downloads.  I can tell you it was a feeling like no other, and I envy the big time writers that are used to this type of success on a yearly basis!

I think this issue of timing begs the question of whether now is a good time to run your free days?  If push came to shove, I’d say hold off for a bit until people have had a chance to run through the books they just undoubtedly downloaded.  How long is that?  No idea, but my gut says that people’s readers are loaded with books right now.

IF TIMING ISN’T EVERYTHING, WHAT ELSE IS THERE?

I honestly believe timing was not everything.  If my book had a big goose egg for reviews, I don’t think people would have downloaded it, free or not.  If I hadn’t started #AmazonLikes several months ago, Enemy in Blue wouldn’t be liked and tagged as much as it is.  If I hadn’t done the countless other things (blog tours, interviews, building a Twitter following, etc.) written about here on my blog in other posts, no 5,141 downloads.  Finally, one more thing because this post is just as much about me assuring myself that I had some part in this near-miracle, but if I hadn’t taken optimization classes for every detail of my Amazon page, then “no go,” my friends.

In short, way back when I started writing this blog, I analogized the writing process to building a house.  I started the analogy with a reference to putting in your foundation.  All those efforts listed in the last paragraph?  The foundation.  Without it, simply no way people would have downloaded Enemy in Blue so much.  Remember, even a free book costs time.

RESULTS SINCE THE TWO FREE DAYS

Obviously, a huge question is whether the success in those two free days has spilled over to the following paid days.  Short answer, it has.  Enemy in Blue was ranked #552 in paid books at its peak, which amounted to over 200 books/day.  Sales have slowly decreased each day thereafter, with some of that necessarily flowing from the New Year’s break.  (I don’t think many people wake up on January 1 with whiskey on their breath and say, “Durnit, I wanna read a book!”).

It remains to be seen what impact all the downloads have on Enemy in Blue.  Hopefully, it will result in reviews, and word of mouth.  Seems like a given, with that number of downloads.  Also, I’m currently ranked #31 in Action and Adventure as a result of the whole effort, and peaked at #19.  I believe that a big list such as A&A can drive further sales, as opposed to some of the strange, extremely niche lists that I see next to other books.  I’m keeping track of sales on a daily basis, and will update the blog with that information in the future.

IS IT WORTH IT?

I’m frequently getting asked how Enemy in Blue shot up the charts, and whether Select has been worth it.  Obviously, for me, it was.  However, I would stick to my caution that without the proper elements (good cover, great reviews and not just 5 of them, likes and tags, best product description possible), I don’t think you will see tremendous success with the Select program.  Plus, you will be limited selling on Amazon for 90 days.  My suggestion would be to build that foundation for your book, and once you get there, pick a couple weekdays to offer your book for free.  I have seen my best sales figures on Thursdays/Fridays.

One more tip from my time spent analyzing all this–having multiple books is another catalyst to success in using free days.  Point in case?  J.A. Konrath.  The guy is a beast of an author.  He has nearly written more damn books than I have on my bookshelves!  A couple of his books were free at the same time as Enemy in Blue.  I watched all of his books, free and paid, rise to the tops of their various bestselling lists.  And, they’ve stayed there.  So, if you can use the free days to help promote multiple books in a series, for example, then Select absolutely seems worth it.

LINGERING QUESTIONS

I would be remiss if I sat here, writing this post, and failed to disclose that I’m hesitant to even publish it.  I mean, I’ve just experienced success, but who’s to say that wasn’t a flash in the pan?  Some cosmic alignment.  I’m certainly not sitting here with any notion that “I’ve made it.”  In fact, if anything, I’ve got more of a knot in my stomach now, as I watch my ranking oscillate.

That disclosure aside, here are some of my unanswered questions:

(1)  How do you get the initial “burst” of downloads when your book goes free?  This is the burst that puts you on a bestseller’s list, and being on those lists undoubtedly builds your momentum.

(2)  How often should the free “tool” be used?  As a part of the Select program, you can schedule five (5) free days in a 90-day period.  Should that be your limit of free days in a quarter?  At what point is more not better?  I’ll be testing this in the next few months to further hone the results.

(3)  The critical question–what is my royalty going to be calculated at for the borrowed books?  If I’m making 40%, instead of 70%, is it worth it?  Will it just result in a way for Amazon to pay lower royalty rates, while at the same time locking up its monopoly?  Call me neurotic, but businesses exist to maximize their own profits.

WRAPPIN’ IT UP

If you came here looking for an easy answer and now hate me, don’t forget your New Year’s resolution was to go easy on other people, k?  Bottom line though, and we always know it, is that hard work underlies nearly all success.  Take some time to read the other blog posts on here, put some sweat and blood into your foundation, and then give Select a shot.  If you have any questions/additions/comments, please add them to this blog post, and I’ll try to respond as quickly as possible!

Here’s to our mutual success in 2012!

Kindle Sales on Fire

Amazon is reporting sales of at least 1 million Kindles per week.  Where are you at to get your book on those new devices?  CNET article here: http://m.cnet.com/Article.rbml?nid=57349658&cid=null&bcid=&bid=-266

Pricing Your Book to Sell

This question is difficult.  What do I price my ebook at so that it will sell?  I’m sure some math whiz could reduce the answer to probabilities, statistics, and formulas…but, that’s not me, so I did what I do best.  Trial and error.  I was the first one to jump out of the plane.  I swam in shark-infested waters for you.  I was the damn penguin!  Enough of the pity party–here’s what I found.  (As an aside, the following is all about pricing of ebooks.  I think pricing of paperbacks is much more nebulous, and gets into word count which I don’t want to fret about in this post).

YOU NEED TO BE REALISTIC WITH YOUR PLACE IN THE UNIVERSE

Perhaps you’re about to release your first book, and you’re looking at authors selling copies of their ebooks for $7.99, $8.99, $9.99!  You put that price into your royalty calculator, and by God, you would earn a chunk of money  just by selling a thousand books.  You smile to yourself and say, “What’s so hard about this author gig?”  Wipe that smile away, mon frere.  If you price your book in that neighborhood, I GUAR-UN-TEE you’ll soon be looking at the bottom side of the 400,000′s in your sales rank.  You’re new, and even if you aren’t new, you probably aren’t well known enough to command those prices.  That gets me to our first rule:

ANY PRICE $3.99 AND ABOVE IS FOR WELL KNOWN AUTHORS

People simply are not going to pay more than $3.99 for an ebook from an unknown author.  Shoot, even people that know you may hesitate to pay that much.  Why?  The biggest reason is that your universe, the universe of the unknown author, the independent author, the grinder (and make no mistake about it, I’m in there too) is very, very big.  And, what’s it full of?  Many, many books by other, similarly situated authors, at prices well below $3.99.  Supply and demand, Watson.

I know what the protest may be.  ”$3.99 is nothing!  It’s less than a drink at a bar!  It’s less than a hot dog at a baseball game!”  I know.  I agree.  It’s mildly ridiculous.  However, it’s reality, and that trumps.  To prove this reality, I toyed with the price of my book over the course of several weeks.  From $0.99 to $3.99.  Anything over that was so clearly a graveyard even I dared not tread that ground.  I used a nifty Google Adwords coupon, and drove traffic to my book’s Amazon site.  The result?  A significant drop off in sales when priced at $3.99.  Probably a magnitude of around 100-200% less sales.  Why?  I’m no psychiatrist, but in addition to the universe argument set forth above, I think people start comparing your book to what they can get for $3.99.  They can get that latte.  They can rent a movie, or two.  They can buy used books for cheaper.

Still, I wasn’t quite persuaded.  I thought, maybe I don’t have enough reviews.  Or, maybe my Amazon page wasn’t luring enough people in to buy the book.  So, I went and took a look at the Amazon Top 100 lists, in conjunction with some successful authors I have come across on Twitter.  Lo and behold, all of their books were priced at $2.99 or below.  The vast majority of them were priced at $0.99.  Leads us to the second rule:

JOHN LOCKE, YOU ARE MY FATHER

First, if you don’t know who John Locke is, Google is your friend (okay, one hint, add “author” to your search).  Second, that heading sounded like Darth Vader in my head–hope that puts it in perspective.  John Locke is the king of independent publishing.  John Locke sells all of his fiction for $0.99.  John Locke has one book with 469 reviews, which is flippin’ mind boggling.  He has reached a pinnacle of writing where his name is so well known that he could price his books higher, if he wanted to.  And, they would still sell.  Why hasn’t he?  No clue, but that’s irrelevant.  If John Locke prices his books at $0.99, where do you think you should price yours?

Depends on who you are, but definitely not higher than $3.99.  The answer also depends on what you want.  When my book was priced at $0.99, I had a month where I sold just about 150 copies.  All of a sudden, I had a moment of panic and said to myself, shit, what if 75 of those 150 don’t like it, and write bad reviews?  I wanted to turn the flow of water down a bit to see some of those reviews come through, and to continue to feel out the market for whether my book was well-received.  You may have other reasons to price your book above $0.99.  What if you have a $0.99 event coming up?  May want to keep that price at a normal list price until just before the event, so that the participants get a great deal.  This leads to my final rule:

BEING ABLE TO CONTROL PRICE IS A BENEFIT OF PUBLISHING INDEPENDENTLY

I thank the damn stars every day that I’m able to control the price of my book.  If, for instance, Enemy in Blue had been traditionally published, that would not have been the case.  And, the book would have been priced much, much too high for a first-time author.  I also wouldn’t have had enough control to throttle sales up or down.  From one control freak to another–relish fact that you can change price whenever you want.

A couple of miscellaneous notes on pricing.  First, it seems that Amazon has gotten much better at changing prices in a timely fashion, after you make the change in KDP.  In Smashwords, it is instantaneous, which is brilliant.  In Amazon, what used to take 24-48 hours now takes less than 12, and sometimes less than that.  I tried one other thing that didn’t seem to work, at least not yet.  I priced my Amazon book at $2.99, and priced my book on Smashwords at $1.99.  I wanted Amazon to match the lower price, thereby displaying a percentage off of my list price.  The thought process is that people like to see they are getting a deal.  After about 5 days, Amazon still has not matched the price, so this doesn’t seem to be a reliable method of lowering the price of your book.

The conclusion?  Remember what universe you reside in, don’t price more than $3.99, and if you really want to expand your readership, $0.99 is your key.

Gifting an Ebook–a Great Way to Give and Save this Holiday Season

This one’ll be short and sweet.  Sales of tablets and e-readers are through the roof this year, and with the release of the Kindle Fire, that is only expected to continue into the holiday season and beyond.  Amazon has, for all intents and purposes, given readers and authors a mechanism to gift on the cheap.  How?  Gifting a person’s favorite ebooks.

Now, for some of the major published authors, their ebooks may not be much less than their traditional paperbacks.  This is a quasi-travesty, since the cost of putting together an ebook is much less (i.e. nearly no cost, other than upfront formatting costs) than doing the same with a paperback.  Indie authors have capitalized on the inability of traditionally published authors to set reasonable prices by doing just that–setting reasonable prices.  You can literally find, and gift, books by indie authors for $0.99-$3.99.  Or, if you’re a numbers/figures guy or gal, for about 60-90% less than traditionally published authors.

How do you make sure you aren’t gifting crap?  First, there are a lot of traditionally published books that are crap.  Just harken back to high school and college, where you were forced to read a  bunch of ‘em.  Second, rely on reviews.  Once you get 15, 20, 50, 100 people saying a book is good–that’s a fairly reliable indicator.

Finally, on to the actual gifting process.  It’s easy as 1, 2, 3:

(1) On Amazon, when you search for a book and then click on the ebook version, you will see a button on the top right called “Give as a gift.”

(2) For the technology impaired, click on that button.

(3) You will be directed to a screen where all you have to do is enter the email address of the person to send the gift to.  Boom, you’re done, and you did it for cheap.

A couple more awesome perks.  You can do all your ebook shopping now, and set your delivery date for whenever you want, such as 12/25/2011.  Your loved one will get a host of books to fill his/her new reader on the day they get the reader.  What’s cooler than that?  You can add a personalized message to your gift.  Finally, you’re doing the environment a favor by not having a book printed, boxed up, and then shipped on some gas guzzling vehicle.

*IMPORTANT NOTE* Okay, this has all been important, but this is super important.  The recipient of your gift does not have to have a Kindle to get the ebook.  Amazon has a Kindle app that can be used on basically any platform, as far as I know.  So, even if the person has a Droid phone, for instance, all they have to do is download the Kindle app, and voila, their gift will be readable.

This is a frontier of book consumption.  If you’re a reader, I can’t imagine a better way to gift this holiday season.  If you’re an author, well, you better start spreading the word about this!

Finally, a shameless plug for my books , Enemy in Blue  and Allegiance, which fit the bill as great gifts.  Over 100 great combined reviews, and under $5 for both.