How Many KDP Books to Make Money
Setting Realistic Expectations for Publishing through Amazon KDP
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How many books do you have to publish through Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) to make money? Quite a few aspiring authors and self-publishers ask this question to validate their journey into self-publishing via KDP. In my previous post, I discussed the profitability and work that goes into Amazon KDP, but I never said specifically how many books you'd need to publish to officially "make money."
But how you define "making money" makes all the difference, because let's face it, you only need one published book to make money. Sell one copy and you can check "make money" off the list.
For the sake of this article, let's place value on the "make money" part of publishing through KDP. In my opinion, once you can consistently drive $1,000 in profits every month, you're on track to earning a modest part-time living from book sales.
Can one book drive enough sales to earn $1,000 per month? Sure, but it's going to require more marketing and promotion than ever. Assuming that one book is your first foray into the world of self-publishing, chances are likely you're going to be grinding out those sales.
Being a new author comes with more challenges than being an established author with a deep backlog of books. Don't lose heart though, because it is entirely possible to make a substantial living from one book. Again, it's going to require a lot of work.
Let's explore exactly how many books it'll take to drive at least $1,000 or more in sales per month.
Key Factor #1: The Amazon Best Seller Rank (ABSR)
New authors and self-publishers should study the market before ever putting pen to paper, but I understand some authors are going to write what they want to write regardless of its profitability. If you're in it for the craft and don't care about making money, then don't study the market. Otherwise, if you want to make consistent money, you must put in the time and research your niche.
The first key factor for making money through KDP is proof of concept, and the easiest way to measure that is through the Amazon Best Seller Rank (ABSR). Visit the region-specific Amazon marketplace you plan to target for readership. In my case, I visit Amazon.com for US sales. Find any number of books related to your niche. I know this might be a tall ask if you're a genre-bending author, so land on an overarching theme for your book so you can place your book next to similar books.
Scroll down the page to the Product Details section where you'll get all the pertinent metadata, including the ABSR. If you do not see an ABSR, this product has had no sales. However, if you choose wisely a book from your niche that's hitting the top of the best-seller lists, then you'll get some number, any number.
That's the ticket: Amazon provides a rank for any products that have sold at least one copy. But ABSR doesn't remain constant; it's always ebbing and flowing with the constant increase in products and fluctuation in sales.
All hope isn't lost though because Amazon gives everyone a fighting chance based on the categories they choose for their publication. Amazon has a unique categorization system for all products with ebooks separated into the Kindle Store category, print books under the Books category, and audiobooks falling under Audible Books & Originals.
Pick the right categories, you could place your book in the ideal position for more customers to see your content. When you categorize your book, you're placing it alongside similar books in your niche. When you sell books in that niche, Amazon serves your book to more customers who buy other books like it. And it works the other way around too.
Amazon further separates those main product tags to the Category level with a broad descriptor like History or Literature & Fiction. Then it further breaks down into a Subcategory level where you uncover a more segmented approach to the niche. It could be like History > US History or Literature & Fiction > Genre Fiction.
Then the Placement level is the most granular view of a niche. You'll find the further you go down the browse path of Category, Subcategory, and Placement, it gets easier and easier to place on Amazon Best Seller Lists.
Key Factor #2: Supply & Demand
The next key factor asks two questions:
● Is there a demand for your content?
● What's the current supply?
When you're researching, pay closest attention to the placement category compared to the overall ABSR. The lower the Placement ranking and the higher the overall ABSR indicates less competition.
For instance, right now the Best Sellers list for Governmental Accounting right now. The browse path is Kindle eBooks > Business & Money > Accounting > Governmental. The example book has an overall ABSR of 165,450.
Here’s what we can surmise from that:
This isn't a very competitive niche
It won't take many sales to hit the #1 spot in this placement.
Looking at the other books in this niche, it might not be very popular, therefore, not the best category to break into.
Keep in mind, you don't want to just choose some random category that has nothing to do with your book. KDP can reject your selection and has been known to suspend or even terminate accounts based on improper category use. Though it's tempting to park your book in a category with no competition, it's not really worth it because you're confusing Amazon's algorithms and putting your work in front of the wrong people.
The exact opposite of the first example would be Psychological Fiction, with the browse path as Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Genre Fiction > Psychological. The top spot in this placement has an overall ABSR of 5. Yep, 5!!! And, if you scroll through this placement, you'll see it's very stiff competition.
Side note: I'm using the free browser extension DS Amazon Quick View to get a snapshot of the selected categories and ABSR for each. If you want to use this browser extension beyond Amazon US, you'll have to pay $25 for lifetime access.
But, how many sales does it take to get to a set ABSR? The fine folks at Kindlepreneur have been working with thousands of authors and trad pub companies for years, so they can estimate how many sales it gets to hit a certain ABSR. Visit DaleLinks.com/Calculator to get access to this free tool.
For the first example, the overall ABSR of the #1 book in the category was 165,450. It sold roughly less than one book a day. So, if you can sell at least one to two books a day, you'd hit the #1 spot and get more preferential treatment from this placement. However, remember to verify there's a demand. Based on the rank of the rest of the books in that bestseller list, the demand is very low.
If your title retails for $2.99 and you make about $2 per sale, you'd get roughly $60 per month. That's a far cry from the $1,000 per month milestone. Remember, this ABSR indicates one market. For ebooks, KDP reaches thirteen Amazon regions. For paperback books, it's twelve regions, and hardcover is about nine regions.
Just because it doesn't perform well on Amazon US doesn't mean it doesn't perform better in the other regions. Or, for that matter, it may not even perform well at all on Amazon and is more suited for other platforms or direct sales. Just because it doesn't do well on Amazon doesn't mean it can't still make money elsewhere.
I always have to add that because many authors get frustrated they can't make it on Amazon. There is life off Amazon, folks.
For the second example, the ABSR was 5, which would require 3,950 sales per day. Wow! Based on the rest of the ABSRs of the books in that placement, the demand is definitely there, but there's an overwhelming supply. Cutting through the noise is going to be tough.
For an ebook priced at $2.99 with a rough profit of $2, you'd get $7,900 per day.
Quick Side Note: Reader checkouts influence the ABSR of KDP Select-enrolled books. For someone like Frieda, reader checkouts make up for a lot of the ABSR. The more readers check out her book, the higher it'll place in the bestseller list. Higher placement provides better discoverability on Amazon, leading to more sales and more checkouts.
You'll want to find the categories that find a balance between those two examples. Yes, competition is fine, and you should expect it. But, if you're a new author, you'll want every advantage you can get to break out above the pack.
That's not to say you should throw your hands up, toss your manuscript in the trash, and find another career. It just means that if you're writing for a highly competitive market, be prepared to do everything it takes to get to the top and stay there.
But you don't need to be a chart-topping indie sensation like Freida McFadden (see image above) to make a substantial living. Freida could definitely coast on one book, but anyone familiar with Frieda's work will notice she's fairly prolific.
Is that the key to making money through KDP?
Key Factor #3: One Book vs. Many Books
I think it's unfair to use Freida as an example, especially if you're just breaking into the business. She worked on her craft and has built a successful book-selling brand from years of hard work. Not all new authors should compare themselves to Frieda, for that matter. Can you aspire to reach her status? Sure! But should you expect to sell 3,000 copies per day out the gate with no brand, no email newsletter, no following, and no connections? No.
Amazon isn't willing to invest any time into products that don't convert sales on their platform. The more products you sell, the more Amazon will reward you with new customers. The less sales you make, Amazon is less inclined to merchandise your book in front of browsing customers. They want proven winners with consistent sales.
If you had one ebook priced at $2.99 and made about $2 per sale, you'd need 500 sales within one month. That breaks down to about seventeen book sales per day or a 9,000 overall ABSR.
It's possible to get that, but you'll need all your marketing and promotional plans on standby for your book launch. You'll need:
Professional book cover design
Fully edited marketing copy for your book description
Three categories
Relevant keywords in your backend
Next, an email list is an absolute must today. Places like MailerLite and Mailchimp offer free access for up to 1,000 subscribers. More recently, ConvertKit offered up to 10,000 free subscribers.
Seed your email list through premium promotional services like Cravebooks or Written Word Media. Or do it the old-fashioned way and place a call-to-action across social media, on your website, on your business card, in your book, and anywhere someone will listen to you.
Once you have a few email subscribers, connect and network with other authors in your niche. Sometimes, it seems impossible, but if you do enough digging, you'll find the best way to connect with an author through their website or social media.
Should you not be a fan of cold prospecting, you can use premium services like StoryOrigin or BookFunnel, where they have marketplaces for authors willing to collaborate through newsletter swaps and group promos. Line up collaborations that fire off at regular intervals and avoid doing a bunch all at once. You want steady and consistent sales, so Amazon takes note.
Last, you're going to want to establish presence anywhere you can. Marketing and promotion are all about being visible. How you're visible is entirely up to you. Consider a website, blog, social media, in-person conferences, virtual summits, podcasts, and more. The possibilities are endless.
Let's say you just want to push the easy button and don't want to fuss with all those previous options. Can you publish a certain number of books to make money?
Back to our first example of the book with a 165,000 ABSR. If you could duplicate the same success of $60 for the one title per month, then you'd need seventeen books. I'd recommend if you want to go the prolific route that you don't spread yourself thin with too many genres. Instead, build an author brand that is reliable and consistent with a particular niche.
Is it possible to do it with a multi-genre author? Sure, but it's much harder because readers won't be able to predict what you'll launch next. If you become the go-to resource in your genre, you can win big. Once a new reader picks up your first book, they're naturally going to want to read the rest of what you offer. That'll add up in due time.
One other complexity I haven't addressed is sales across all iterations: ebooks, paperback, hardcover, and audiobook. So, if you have four versions of your title and get one sale per day of each, you'll be getting closer to $240 per month (if the profit per sale was $2 each). That means if you had mediocre performing titles published in four iterations, you'd only need four to five books to hit that $1,000 per month benchmark.
Final Thoughts
So, how many KDP books do you have to publish to make money? It depends. What are your financial goals in your author business? Because once you define how much you want to earn, work backwards from there to know where you need to go next.
To help you decide on the next best steps, I put together a deep dive piece into the cost of self-publishing over here. See you there!
My issue is that I must do everything virtual. Do you have any advice for an author in that space?
Very informative, thanks 😊