The biggest mistake authors make when
launching their books on Amazon is their failure to properly subcategorize
their books. If you want to reach best-seller in subcategories; i.e.
best-selling Christian romance book, then the author must tell Amazon how to
categorize his or her book. Here is some helpful information from my book How to Launch a Christian Best-Seller.
How to Categorize Printed Books on Amazon
For the purpose
of the next discussion, I am going to address specifically how to get printed books
categorized on Amazon and raise the possibility of reaching best-seller status.
There are
different ways a book can be categorized. Categories are different from tags.
Tags are what people reading a book do to label how they think a book should be
listed. But that is not the same thing as what an author needs to do to get his
book categorized to reach best-seller status.
I am going to
go into specific detail here because many people have missed best-seller status
simply because their books were not categorized narrowly enough in the
subcategories.
Most authors
are familiar with the Amazon Bestseller Rank. Unfortunately, most authors will
never hit the top one hundred best-seller status on Amazon. But that doesn’t
mean one can’t make the best-seller list in the subcategories or
sub-subcategories on Amazon. It is possible for a debut author to reach
best-seller status in one or more subcategories on Amazon. The problem is that
most authors know nothing about how to do this.
What does being
on the Amazon Bestseller List mean? Most people would say it means a book
reached the top one hundred in sales at a given time. To do a book launch in
the John 3:16 Network, the author should track sales for a 24-hour period.
Sometimes there is a slight lag, but not so much that the highest ranking won’t
appear during or shortly after that 24-hour period.
I encourage
authors in the Network to take a “screen shot” several times during the day to
try to record their lowest ranking toward number one in one or more
subcategories. To take a screen shot, if you are using Windows, hit
control/print screen together, go to a blank Word document, and hit Control-V.
Your screen shot will appear and you can save it as a Word document.
How do you get
your book categorized on Amazon in subcategories? This is crucial for a debut
author to have a chance to claim “best-seller” status.
Amazon has
several platforms in place to help authors. One of these is their Author
Central Program. If you do not have an account, the site will prompt you to set
up one. The link is
https://authorcentral.amazon.com/gp/home.
Here is a screen shot of the page.
You will see
the tab about halfway down the page called “Give Us Feedback.” If you click on
this, it will take you to another page. You will see “Contact Us” and
underneath that, it will say, “Select an issue.” You want to click on “my
books.” Underneath that, it will say, “select details.” Choose “update
information about my book.” Beneath that another window will open, and you want
to “browse categories.” Under that another window will open, and you should
choose, “I want to update my book’s browse categories.” There is a “Did You
Know” tab and you can read more about categories, the inside-the-book program,
and other important related topics.
Beneath that,
you will see the number 2, and the question, “How would you like to contact
us?” You can either email or phone Amazon. I would email them first. You will
explain to them that you would like to update the categories of your book.
How do you know
what categories to use? On printed editions of your book, you are allowed two
categories. Don’t assume Amazon will do it the way you want. It’s best to be
pro-active on such an important point and give them what you want exactly the
way you want it.
To know what
categories in which to list your book, you need to be familiar with how Amazon
categorizes books. Go to
http://amazon.com and
look on the left-hand side for the search browser. Click on books.
Here is a
screen shot at what you will be taken to (some versions of this e-book may not
display it):
You will notice
on the left-hand side the category “department,” and underneath it “books.”
Listed underneath books are all the main categories on Amazon beginning with
“arts and photography” and ending with “travel.”
You will notice
that under “arts and photography” are listed 387,013 books. That means in order
to reach best-seller status in this category, you will have to beat out 387,000-plus
books.
Let me go down
to the category “parenting & families,” which has 88,692 books. If you
click on that, you will see it breaks down into subcategories of adoption,
aging parents, family activities, family health, family relationships,
fertility, parenting, pregnancy & childbirth, reference, and special needs.
Children of Dreams reached number
eight in the subcategory of adoption, out of 1,641 books. That means my book
has been a bestseller on Amazon in adoption books.
In the email
that I sent to Amazon, I listed one of my categories as parenting &
families/adoption. Since I could list two for my printed copy, I listed the
second category as “parenting & families/family relationships/motherhood.
The category for motherhood has 4,550 books. I also reached best-seller status
in this at number eleven.
Obviously, the
more books there are in a category or subcategory, the harder it’s going to be
to get into the top one hundred, so the narrower the subcategory, the more
successful you will be.
That brings me
to the second part of this discussion on categories, which is important. You
must categorize your printed edition and your Kindle edition separately. With
Kindle, you also get two categories. It is much easier to reach best-seller
status on Kindle than with a printed book. Why? There are fewer Kindle books
that you are competing against than printed books. Not every book has been
published in Kindle.
According to the latest information from
Amazon, here is how to get your categories set up for a Kindle e-book.
Second, sign
into your account.
Third, click
the "actions" button for the book you would like to update
Fourth, scroll
down to number three, target your book to customers
Fifth, click on
add categories. That will open up to a new screen, add or change categories
Sixth, click on
the plus button in front of these main categories to open up subcategories and
sub-subcategories. Make your selections.
Seven, click on
save.
The screen will
return to the default page, where you started. Please notice that this is also
where you make other changes to your e-book, including editing your book
details.
To learn more about how to have a successful book launch, you may purchase How to Launch a Christian Best Seller.
our books and read them, and that’s where the John 3:16 Marketing
Network comes in. It’s authors helping authors through the use of
online social networking to help with book launches and promotion.
