Leaving KU, Part II: Your Other Options – Major Retailers and Library Services

If you've read part one, thank you! I hope it was helpful, and I hope that Part II and Part III will help you further in your decision-making process.

I mentioned briefly that going “wide” means taking a different marking approach a is a bit of a mindset shift. A lot of people in KU spend tons of time on PublisherRocket trying to find the perfect keywords for their book in hopes of climbing the Amazon Best Seller Ranks, making it to the top of search results, and getting into the “Also Boughts” of their “competitors.”

Note: I do NOT consider other authors to be my competitors, no matter how closely they align with my niche—sapphic thigh high fantasy. Readers can read my books in 10 hours. I cannot ever hope to write, edit, format and publish a book in 10 hours. Other sapphic thigh high fantasy authors are who I send my readers to so that they can keep getting their fix while I write the next one, but Amazon encourages this “competitor” mindset, and this is a mindset you have to break out of if you are to be a “wide” author!

Another mindset shift you have to get over is the assumption that all other retailers are just Amazon with a different logo. Many believe they will have to learn how to manipulate, game, work, and massage multiple algorithms, assuming that Kobo, Barnes & Noble, etc, have as sophisticated a system. Amazon started as a bookseller, yes. But that was never their end goal. They were always a technology company first and foremost, unlike other booksellers, who prioritize books first and foremost. That means that other retailers don't have an overwhelming number of variables in their algorithms.

But then, how do these other retailers know when to show your book and how high up in the search results to place it? Most of them (please sit down for this) actually read your book. They scan the contents of your book and count up the number of times “magic” is mentioned, the number of times “swords” are mentioned, the number of times the word “spaceship” appears! Some of them use AO3 type tags! Some of them have non-standard categories or niche categories that let you get VERY specific and let readers search via micro-genres.

This part II is meant to give a brief overview of some of the most popular KDP alternatives—the major retailers and library services. I will get into smaller retailers and direct platforms in Part III. It certainly won't cover all of them, and it isn't meant as a step-by-step guide for each of them. They all have their quirks. I. But for now, I just want to give you enough information for you to get closer to making an informed decision about what is best for your circumstances and your author career.

Some of these major retailers have affiliate programs, too. Books2Read and StoryOrigin both let you add affiliate links when you make your Universal Book Links. I think BookFunnel does, too, but I'm not 100% on that. I don't use BookLinker, so I'm not sure about that one. Please do your own research on this, though. It's definitely worth it if you are going with other retailers to try to get into their affiliate programs and use those affiliate links!

(By the way, even if you do choose to stay in just Amazon, I suggest using a Universl Book Link tool because they do geo-location and will redirect a reader to the correct store for their country of origin.)

One more caveat, this is meant to discuss ebooks only, but I might mention that some platforms also allow you to publish physical books or audiobooks. The focus is still on ebooks.

Aggregate vs. Going Direct vs. Direct Sales

“Going wide” can look like a lot of things. It can be as simple as uploading 1 manuscript to 1 place and auto-magically having your manuscript appear on dozens of storefronts. It can mean creating seven different versions of your ebooks and uploading each to a different retailer. It can mean creating two versions of a manuscript, one for the aggregate publishing platform and one for your direct sales channel. It can mean making your ebooks available on Ream, Patreon, or Ko-Fi via membership subscriptions.

For the “wide” author, there is much freedom to determine what is best for you; for you to weigh the financial cost against the time cost and make the choices that fit into whatever restraints your life has.

But what are aggregate publishers? What does it mean to “go direct” versus “direct sales”?  

Aggregate Publishers

Aggregate publishers are how many, many indies first get their toes wet when they decide to go wide—whether it's with their debut or with their 30th novel. These platforms have contracts with dozens of other retailers so that you can upload your manuscript to just one place and have it appear on every retailer you select from their choices.

Some of these take a small percentage out of your royalties, some of them charge a monthly subscription fee. If you're just starting out and don't have many books, it might be a good idea to go with a deduct-from-royalties model. But if you are expecting to sell a high volume of books to the point where the cost of the subscription is less than the royalties lost, then the subscription model might be for you.

You have a few different options when it comes to aggregate publishers, too. I'm going to go over the three that are most popular.  

Draft2Digital

Draft2Digital does a lot more than just distribute your book to multiple retailers! It also has a very convenient converter that can get your book into a decently formatted epub file from rtf, docx, or otf files. It also has a cool feature that lets you update your backmatter without re-uploading your ebook! It also lets you share royalties if you are a co-author. One of its best features, which is free to use even if you don't distribute through them, is their books2read universal book links pages.

They also do Print and Audiobooks, if that's something you're interested in. Another cool feature is they allow you to split your royalties with other contributors, so it makes it easy if you are an editor of an anthology or if you have co-authored a book or want to pay royalties to an illustrator.

But if all you want to know about them is what their cost is, it's 10% of your list price. That means if you distribute to a retailer that gives you 70% royalties, D2D will take 10% of your list price from that 70% royalties. So if your ebook is priced at 4.99, you get 70% minus $0.49.

They also let you schedule your promotions in advance. Multiple at a time, too! At the start of the year, I scheduled out all of my sales (Pride Month sale, my birthday sale, my holiday sale) on all of my books at once.

What retailers do they distribute to? If you are in the US, you will recognize a fair few of these. But there are some international sellers that you might not be aware of!

When you are setting up your book on Draft2Digital, you can toggle any of these on or off to pick distribution just to the places you want to distribute. Now, you might be thinking, “Why would I want to distribute to Vivlio? Tolino? My book isn't in German, French, or Spanish.” Maybe not, but is your book a retelling of a popular German folk tale? Does it take place in France? Is it in a secondary world based on Belgium? Is it a non-fiction history book that details certain events in one of those countries? Maybe you should consider it! There are plenty of readers in those countries that read in English, too.

What a lot of experienced and savvy “wide” authors do is upload their books directly to some of the “major” retailers, and then use Draft2Digital to get to some of the other markets and library services. It acts as a sort of “catch all” for what you can't get to.

I'm gonna disclose what I do here, but that doesn't mean it's the right choice for you. I upload directly to Amazon, B&N, and Kobo. Those are my three biggest sales channels from what Draft2Digital offers, and then I upload to Draft2Digital for the rest. This lets me get more royalties but still takes some of the headache and hassle off my plate. I do know authors who also go direct to Apple, but their upload system just is too much headache for me.

Please do note, however, that Draft2Digital does not distribute to Google Play.

Publish Drive

You get your first book free, now! That's right. You get to keep ALL your royalties and pay ZERO in a monthly subscription if you are only uploading one book. 3 books or less is $13.99/mo, and the price goes up from there depending on your catalog. Like I said before, if you make more than a certain amount per month, this avenue might be worth it. Do the math and find out if you lose more than $15/mo to royalty fees or not.

They also allow you to set up Amazon ads in their dashboard, can book Written Word Media promotions in their dashboard, and handle the distribution of review copies. There's a lot going on here. If you have a huge backlist, I suggest giving this a look.

But where do they distribute? I went into details about each retailer in Draft2Digital's network, and I won't repeat myself, so I will just share what I know about the ones that PublishDrive reaches that Draft2Digital doesn't.

StreetLib

This one is massive and really for people who want an international presence in Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese-speaking nations. They have a free plan where you keep 70% of your royalties (they take 30%) and you can have 10 total titles on their platform. This option is ebook only. Their Pro Plan is $99/year, and you keep 85% of your revenue (they take 15%). You can have 100 titles and distribute audiobooks and print books. The pro plan has some other perks, too.

I do not currently use Streetlib, but it might be great for you! I would suggest hitting Amazon, Google Play, Kobo, Barnes & Noble directly so you can keep the largest percentage of your royalties, using Draft2Digital to hit Tolino, Odilo, Overdrive, to keep more royalties, and then using StreetLib for the rest if you are interested in hitting a larger international audience.

My Thoughts

There is a lot of overlap among the three here, it's up to you to choose if you want to “go direct” (publish directly to that retailer using their own website) or use an aggregator, and if the latter, which aggregator to use.

My advice is always “go direct” on Amazon. If you are based in the US, I also suggest always going direct with Barnes & Noble. But as I said in part I, I don't know your situation. Maybe you just want to not worry about any hassle at all and just use Draft2Digital and be done with it. Weigh your options and pick what works for you and the vision you have for your author career. Maybe you write books you know will sell more internationally and in the Italian-speaking market and decide Streetlib all the way, the royalties you will get from that market will outweigh what they take from your Amazon sales because you aren't focused on Amazon. If it works for you, I'm all for it!

While writing this, I did learn about another one called Xinxii, but I have never used it and I asked my author friends and can't find anyone else who has used it, so I feel uncomfortable giving my thoughts on it. It looks like it supports many major retailers and several international retailers not covered by any of the three above!

Major Retailers

I'm assuming you already know how Amazon works and the process for uploading directly to KDP. But I'm also assuming that since you are in KU, you might not know how other platforms work. I'm not gonna walk you through step by step for these retailers, but I do want to highlight some of their benefits and why you might want to upload directly, rather than using an aggregator, aside from just “you keep all of your royalties.”

One of the things I do want to compare here is what countries each store operates in. Amazon operates in a total of 13 countries. United States, United Kingdom, Australia, China, Canada, France, India, Germany, Ireland, Japan, Spain, Mexico and Italy. There are 193 nations that are currently members of the United Nations. Just putting that out there.

Kobo and Kobo Plus

Quickly gaining traction not just in Canada, but in other markets, too, thanks to them having the first color e-reader with their Kobo Libra Colour and their Kobo Plus subscription. As I mentioned before, $7.99 USD for ebooks, and $11.99 for ebooks & audiobooks, which is way less expensive than having a KU & Audible subscription. In addition to their Kobo Plus subscription plan, they also have “VIP Membership,” which is $10/year (and they frequently ahve 50% off sales). VIPs can save up points to get books for free and they also get 10% off full price indie books (you still get your full royalties, don't worry!)

Their subscription service pays per minute read. I am going to do some quick math for you. Please keep in mind that I firmly believe that I am too pretty to have to do math, but I'll try my best.

Stars and Soil is 439 Kindle Pages. The October 2024 KENP payout was 0.0043775 per page. Someone who read all of Stars and Soil would result in me getting $1.92 USD.

The Kobo Calculations are based on total minutes read that month and total subscriber revenue that month, so their rate does fluctuate. I'm going to give last month's numbers, though, which I calculated to be around 0.004 per minute.

Using an average reading speed, it would take around 900 minutes to read all of Stars and Soil, and that would be $3.75 USD in royalties. A quick read (7hrs and 19 minutes according to the calculator I found) would result in $1.75 in royalties.

A speedy reader would get me less royalties in Kobo than in KU, yes. But an average reader? A slow reader? A reader that lingers on the smutty scenes and reads them over and over for half an hour?

True, there are not currently as many readers in Kobo Plus as there are in KU. But you're here because you've seen enough of your readers say they are considering switching to Kobo Plus.

I've also seen several BookFunnel group promos specifically for books in Kobo Plus, and readers on Threads and BlueSky asking for Kobo Plus recommendations. I mentioned in my last post that I shared a promo graphic calling attention to the fact that my books are in Kobo Plus, and Kobo Writing Life re-shared it.

And they don't have an exclusivity clause. You can be in Kobo Plus and sell your books anywhere else you want.

But what if you're just trying to get sales? What are the royalty splits? Like Amazon, you will have to consider what your price point is. If you are $2.99 or above, you will get 70%. If you are below $2.99, you will get 45%, a whole 10% more than you get with Amazon! More countries, more royalties for your series starters! They also have a 6% affiliate program for ebooks, 5% commission for Kobo devices, and $1 per Kobo Plus subscription!

They also have their own promotions you can apply to be a part of. If you sign up and don't see a “Promotions” tab on your dashboard, email them, and they will enable it for you!

Here is an email from the most recent promotion I was approved for:

Image of an email from Kobo Writing life. Subject: Your promo submission has been approved! Body: Hi, Thank you for submitting Stars and Soil for our Great Reads Under $5/£5 promotion from December 04, 2024 to December 19, 2024 in the following region(s): Canada, United States of America, United Kingdom. We're pleased to let you know your submission has been accepted! You'll be able to find the details of this promotion in your Kobo Writing Life Dashboard. During the promotional period, we'll deduct a percentage from your royalties from each sale made. For example, if the price rate was 10% and you would normally earn 70% for your book, during the course of the promo your earnings will be 60% rather than 70%. The royalty rates you earn for each unit sale will be clearly outlined in your monthly sales reports. If you have any questions about this promotion, please let us know by emailing us at writinglife@kobo.com. And don't forget to tell your readers! All the best, The Kobo Writing Life Team

They have two kinds of promotions: flat fee or royalty percentage. As you can see from the image, the “Great Reads Under $5/£5” promotion is a royalty percentage promotion. I'll get 60% royalties for the duration of the promotion rather than 70%. You can think of it like an ad you only have to pay for if you make the actual sale.

Their “Flat Fee” promotions range from $40 – $80. You keep your full royalties and are given a link to pay for the promotion.

As I've mentioned, Kobo is a Canadian company. But they are available in 17 countries (four more than Amazon!) and have plans to continue expanding to other regions and nations.

Some of the things that I really like about Kobo: I can schedule sales in advance, their dashboard for reporting sales and reading time in Kobo Plus is clean and easy to understand, they allow for “pretty pricing” and easy conversation of currency for prices in other markets, and their support team is on point. I've only had the pleasure of emailing them a support ticket once, but they were prompt, kept me up to date while they figured things out, and appreciated my “Anakin in a pod racer screaming 'it's working'” gif as my token of gratitude when the issue was resolved.

Honestly, I see no downsides to being on Kobo or Kobo Plus. It currently does not have the readership of KU, but it's growing, and it's growing it regions that don't have KU.

Small note to hold onto and will be addressed further late: Kobo is the best way to reach Overdrive. Kobo and Overdrive used to be owned by the same parent company, and while they no longer are, they still have a good relationship.

Barnes and Noble

If you grew up in a mid-sized city or decently sized town, you probably had a local Barnes and Noble store that you either spent too much time at or spent too much time begging your caregivers to take you to. It was a mix of both for me, with many weekends of high school spent browsing the shelves with my best friends.

You've probably had dreams of being an author signing books at the front of the store while sipping on their coffee surreptitiously.

If you upload your book directly to B&N you have the option of also making paperback and hardcover copies (including with dust jackets!). If you want any hope of signing one of those dust jackets in their stores, you're gonna wanna be a “wide” author and have the ebook available on B&N, too. Not saying the KU exclusive authors haven't had book signings at B&N, but from my experience and the experience of my friends, being not-exclusive-to-KU gives you a huge leg up on your local store wanting to host you for a Q & A and signing.

B&N has a 70% royalty rate. And there is no funny business if you price your book lower than $2.99 or higher than $9.99. You get 70% no matter what. They also have an affiliate program like Amazon has. If you can join their affiliate program, when you link to your own book, you can get up to 2% of that in affiliate sales.

I'm gonna mention this here because it's something you should consider before going direct with Barnes and Noble. You need to make a “Vendor Account,” and you have to have either an SSN, meaning you need to be a US permanent resident or citizen or have an EIN, meaning you need to have an LLC registered in the US. Once you choose to make your vendor account either with an SSN (which would make you a Sole Proprietor) or an LLC, you can't change that. If you write erotica or smut or stuff you don't want your real name attached to, you'll want to register as an LLC, which can cost a pretty penny in some states to set up or can just be a quick internet quiz in other states. If you aren't a US resident or a US citizen or don't have a registered business in the US, you can still reach B&N; you will just need to do it through an aggregator.

Barnes and Noble only operates in the US. If you are going wide, I do suggest having your book on here if you believe you have a US market. They have their “nook” line of e-reader devices that are very popular with their readers, and they frequently put out promotional lists that feature indie authors. They rarely stock indie books in-store, but their ebook ecosystem is fairly considerate of indie books.

Google Play Books (Partner Center)

I am shocked that you can't get to Google Play Books via Draft2Digital, but such is life. I, personally, publish directly to Google Play Books. It seems a little confusing and daunting at first, and getting set up to be able to accept payment can be arduous, but actually uploading the books and getting your metadata up is easy.

It's the pricing that can be a pain! You can set prices by territories or countries, or regions. Or you can set a “WORLD” price and just have it all be the same price. But I am an advocate for “pretty pricing” (where you set the price to be $X.99 or $X.49), so going through the entire list of territories and all the regional currencies can take a long time.

One thing I like about Google Play Books, however, is how easy it is to set up promotions and discounts. One of the easiest systems because you can select multiple books at once! When I had my birthday sale, I created a promotion, and then selected which books would be part of that promotion, rather than having to set up the promotion on each book individually. You can also set up Promo Codes for some territories!

Supported Countries:

That's 75 nations. And Google Play Books is part of Google Play, which is pre-installed on all Android phones out of the box. And how many people own Android phones?

You might be asking, but how many people read on their phones? Real e-book readers use ebook devices! There are several brands of e-ink e-readers that come with Android out of the box. I know readers who will get a new Boox e-reader and install GPlay Books, Kobo, Kindle, Nook, Libby, Hoopla, Campfire, and BookFunnel apps within seconds. They don't have a preference for stores, they just get the book wherever they can, and the Boox lets them read from every retailer they have. And that includes Google Play Books.

They also have a really cool way of organizing series. You can organize it by main series entries, and also auxiliary books. So, if you have a novella that is a side story, you can class it as an auxiliary book rather than trying to worry about numbering it 2.5 or something like that.

If I am only ranking major ebook retailers, Google Play and Kobo tie for “most amount of royalties outside of Amazon.” It's a shame that you cannot reach them through Draft2Digital, though.

Most of the countries in which they are available give 70% royalties. Those countries are Argentina, Australia, Austria, Bahrain, Belarus, Belgium, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Czech Republic, Denmark, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Guatemala, Honduras, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lebanon, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Norway, Oman, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Poland, Portugal, Qatar, Romania, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Slovakia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States, Uruguay, Uzbekistan, and Venezuela. Every other country has a 52% royalty rate. These revenue rates are in effect regardless of the price of your book. You can list the book for $0.99 and still get 70% royalties in most countries and 52% in the rest—either way, better than what you get on Amazon if you price at $0.99.

They also do not have “delivery fees” either. So, more countries than Amazon, a better royalty share, and your very lengthy door-stopping fantasy books won't have $0.10-$0.50 deducted for “delivery fees.” I think it's worth it to upload directly to Google Play Books, even if it's gonna be time consuming if you want to Pretty Price for all the territories.

They also have a 7% affiliate program. Get that double dip!

Apple Books

Half the world has an Android, and therefore Google Play Books. The other half? Probably Apple, and therefore, Apple Books!

It used to be that you had to use special Apple software only available on Mac/Macbooks if you wanted to publish directly to Apple. That is no longer the case, you can publish on them directly even if you are a PC user using Microsoft Edge. Personally, I still find their interface to be a hassle. For my own peace of mind, I have elected to publish to Apple Books using Draft2Digital and accept the slightly lower portion of royalties. But that's just me, if you are an avid Apple user, it might be worth it to publish directly. From what I hear, they have frequent promotions that authors can apply to be part of right from their dashboard.

But what about their reach? What countries can you sell your books in?

Not quite as extensive as Google Play with only 51 countries, but it does have a few that Google doesn't have, like Cyprus and Malta!

And as for royalties? 70% regardless of price and no delivery fees. If you are going wide, I do not think you would be mistaken to publish to Apple. Apple also has a large user base that likes to listen to audiobooks, so if you have audiobooks available on iTunes/Apple, it's a good idea to also have the ebooks there, too. They also have an affiliate program that is 7%. If you can get into it, do so! Earn more for referring people to buy your own books.

I know that they have promotions you can apply to similar to Kobo, but I don't upload directly to them, so I've never applied or seen them.

I wish I could tell you more about them, but as I do not upload there directly, I can't.

Smashwords

Smashwords was originally an ebook aggregate publisher and also its own storefront. It got purchased by Draft2Digital, and now Draft2Digitial is the only way to publish to Smashwords.

It has a vibrant community of erotica and erotic romance readers, as it was once a safe haven for writers who had books that were too hot for Amazon. Many literotica authors have eschewed Amazon entirely and have chosen to monetize their longer works or story anthologies on Smashwords.

There is a bit of uncertainty about how welcome erotica and erotic romance will be once the Draft2Digital/Smashwords merger is complete. But I don't think that the D2D staff will forget what made Smashwords worth buying in the first place: all the money it makes from smut. Per their own announcement, they will keep the Smashwords Erotic Fiction Certification System, which allows erotica authors to self-certify the presence or absence of various “taboo” aspects. This system ensures that customers who want to see those various aspects will see it and those who don't want to see it, won't.

As mentioned earlier, Smashwords hosts a July “Summer/Winter” sale and a December “Winter/Summer Sale” (it is international, and many Aussies shop on it! So they are considerate of their southern hemisphere reader base). Draft2Digital makes it SUPER easy to enroll your books in this sale. Seriously, it's just 2 clicks. You pick which books you want and which percentage you want the discount to be. They provide promotional graphics for you to share if you want to tell your readers/newsletter subscribers/etc about the sale.

When I've put my books in the sale, I usually get 500- 1000 downloads of the books I discount to “FREE” and several hundred of the books I discount by 50-75%. And I write trans-inclusive sapphic fantasy, the readership for that is very niche. If you write M/M romance? If you write shifter romance? This might very well be your largest sales channel during July/December.

Smashwords does not have a line for e-reading devices. They have an app, but they do not have any sort of DRM on their books so that readers can use the devices that they want.

Via the Draft2Digital dashboard, you can create one-off coupons (perfect for gifting reviewers copies of your books), coupons that expire after a certain amount of time, or permanent coupons that can be given to newsletter subscribers when they first on-board to your mailing list. I've had reviewers request their free copies via Smashwords coupons several times.

Now, their royalty rate is currently confusing. They are still migrating books from Smashwords to the Draft2Digital model. Books that are still via direct upload to Smashwords are getting an 85% royalty, and royalties are paid out via PayPal, which takes a transaction fee. After that PayPal fee, it comes out to about 79%. Books that are uploaded to Smashwords via Draft2Digitial are paid out via whatever method you choose in Draft2Digital, including direct deposit. But it shakes out to, no matter what, your royalties being around 77% now. It will soon be impossible to upload directly to Smashwords if it isn't already.

Draft2Digital purchased Smashwords in 2022, and the migration and merger are ongoing more than two years later. There's a lot still up in the air, but I still suggest using it if you want to publish widely, especially if you write erotica. As potential bans on LGBTQ+ content loom in the US, it might also turn out to be a safe haven for those stories, whether they contain NSFW scenes or not.

My Thoughts

I, personally, think you should pick and choose which sales channels you want to go direct with, and which ones you are okay with leaving in an aggregate publisher. That's gonna depend on your genre, your niche, and the kinds of readers you are targeting. If you purchase your own ISBNs, it's easy to start with a book in Draft2Digital, and then take it out and publish it direct on other retailers if you want later once you see how sales are. If you use the free ISBN from retailers, this will be a lot harder to do, as it won't automatically link up old reviews if you have any. I have heard of some authors having success with mailing Barnes and Noble to get their reviews back after taking their books out of Draft2Digital and publishing direct. But that's not a guarantee.

I started with my first two books on Draft2Digital for everything except Amazon/KDP. Those two books are still on Draft2Digital for all major retailers except for Amazon. But going forward, all the books I have published and will be published directly to Amazon, Kobo, Barnes and Noble, and Google Play. I'm letting Draft2Digital handle the rest, and yes, that includes Apple. I know they have a good royalty rate and a 7% affiliate, but my peace of mind is worth more when it comes to how much I'm gonna give up to have to interface directly with an Apple product.

Subscription Services and Libraries

I've already gone into the intricacies of

Everand

Formerly Scribd, is $11.99/mo and you get ebooks, audiobooks, magazines, podcasts, and sheet music. A heckuva lot more than you get for KU. They have an app on the Apple App Store and on Google Play. They even have an Apple Watch app so you can control your audiobooks on the go. The only way that I know of to get your books on Everand is via an aggregate publisher. After Kobo Plus, this is where I see a lot of readers of KU thinking about moving to. They have a nice preview function for people who are not subscribed to Everand. You get paid as if a reader has purchased your book via a retailer after that reader reads a certain percentage of the book—Scribd says 10%, but I do not know if that applies to all Scribd services (Scribd is the name of Everand's parent company). They do have restrictions on some explicit content.

Dreame

Dreame caters to English-Speaking Southeast Asian women under 40. Extrapolate what that means from there. They pay on an episodic model. Users do not buy books, they buy virtual coins that allow them to unlock each “episode.” A book is divided into 1000-word segments, $1.00 USD pays for 100 coins, 1 coin unlocks 100 words. Doing the math, which I shouldn't be doing since I'm too pretty, a reader will pay $1.00 per 10,000 words. The author royalty for that is 25%. You would get $0.25 per 10,000 words a reader reads. An average fantasy novel is around 100,000 words, you'd get around $2.50. If you are listing directly, that is. If you're using Publishdrive, they will either take their cut or it will come out of your monthly subscription.

Hoopla

Hoopla operates on a cost-per-checkout model based on a tiered system, with newer titles getting about 7% of their list price, and backlist titles getting around 5%. Any time someone checks out a new release, you will probably get around $1.50, and older releases around $0.99. Users can access Hoopla by using their local library card. There are no waiting lists for items in the library. Patrons on Hoopla can check out X many items per month, with X being determined by their local library. The library that the patron is visiting hoopla via will determine the length of a checkout. I, personally, love Hoopla and use it all the time.

cloudLibrary

Very similar to Hoopla in that the local library determines the number of checkouts and the length of checkouts. Unlike Hoopla, there are no instant checkouts. Patrons must place a hold if someone else has checked out the book. cloudLibrary is available in 17 countries right now. I can't tell you any more about it from a patron's perspective, as my local library does not use it. This used to be called Bibliotheca and still is in some places; Bibliotheca is just the company and cloudLibrary is the brand. The best resource I can share for determining how much you will make here comes from PublishDrive. I am assuming that it will be similar if you reach cloudLibrary via Draft2Digital, minus their cut.

BorrowBox

A library app in Australia, Ireland, New Zealand, Ireland, and the United Kingdom. It's like Overdrive but international in other English-speaking nations. I cannot find any information on royalties for this.

Baker & Taylor They actually provide both ebooks and print books to libraries globally and are the largest distributor of physical books to libraries. I cannot find any information about their royalties or if they operate on a cost-per-checkout model. But there's a good chance your local library has purchased from them in the past or will in the future.

OverDrive & Libby

Overdrive distributes to over 38,000 libraries in 70+ countries. It's the heavy hitter when it comes to library ebook distribution. OverDrive is the librarian-facing software, and Libby is the reader-facing software/app. Overdrive used to be both, but it recently split.

Readers can sign up to be “notified” when a book is made available to the library. Librarians can see how many of their users have requested to be notified for a title and make their purchasing decisions based on that. I have Libby and used Overdrive when it was also the reader interface. It's really easy to have Libby send books directly to your e-reader devices. The wait time can be pretty long for popular books, but I'm a low-income reader, and if Libby doesn't have something in a wait time, I am fine with, I check Hoopla. Otherwise, I read when Libby tells me a book I placed on hold is available. The Libby app itself is also a good e-reading app and can be used on Boox e-readers and other android-OS e-ink devices.

You can get to Overdrive (and, therefore, Libby) via most aggregators, but the way to keep the most royalties is to use Kobo. When you are uploading your book to Kobo, on the very last step, it will ask if you want to publish to Overdrive. If yes, it will ask you to set a price. Those aggregate publishers will take a percentage. However, when you publish to Overdrive via Kobo, you keep everything. Kobo does not take a cut.

When you set your Overdrive price, that is the price that a library will pay to be able to have your book in their circulation / catelog. There are restrictions on how many times a book can be lent out and how many concurrent checkout there are. After that library has used up their alloted number of checkouts, they must purchase the book on Overdrive again. It is suggested that you set your Overdrive price to be 3 times your regular retail price.

Other Avenues -

There are a number of serialized platforms, like Ream, Tapas, Royal Road, and, well, I would say Vella, but that's gone, Amazon decided it wasn't profitable enough. For some of these, you are paying a monthly subscription to the author directly (Ream, or memberships via Ko-Fi, for example), some, you are paying a subscription to the platform in exchange for tokens (Tapas) and Royal Road, I believe integrates with Patreon? I could be wrong on that, I haven't really set up on Royal Road. But there are other ways to make your book available via subscription services. I might get into that in a Part IV if I decide to write it. But I thought I should put it here just to call it out.

My Thoughts on Library and Subscription Services

I love libraries. I am low-income myself and rely heavily on Libby and Hoopla to do most of my reading. I cannot afford a KU subscription right now, but I have been hinting to my partner that a Kobo Plus subscription would be a great Christmas present. Since 2012, I have lived within easy walking distance of a library and when it's not too hot or too cold, I do go there (my service dog Shadow in tow). I think they are vital. I want my books available in them for many reasons, most of them what I would call “principles.” But also because not everyone can afford a KU subscription. $11.99/mo is a lot for some people. Are you going to be making large amounts of money from them? Probably not. You aren't selling directly to readers; you're selling to librarians. What you can do is ask your readers to request your books at their local libraries. The more requests they get, the more likely they are to stock your books.

When it comes to subscription services, Everand and Dreame are the big ones right now, but Dreame is only somewhat kinda a subscription service. A lot of authors are using Patreon, Ream, and Ko-Fi to create their own “mini subscriptions” where their back catalog is part of the subscription. If your book is in KU, you cannot make your backlist available for free to your Patrons/Ream Subscribers/Ko-Fi supporters.

Killing the “Amazon Mindset”

At the start, I briefly mentioned this as it relates to how you view and interact with the other store fronts and what you can expect from them. Something I want to expand upon further, however, is how you view the sales you make on those platforms.

After being in KU for so long, some authors can get very, very invested in the Amazon Best Seller Rank. With each new Countdown Deal and promotional event, trying to break a previous record. Each sale can be seen as a means of further training the Amazon algorithm to like and promote and prioritize your book over others. Those sales might get you into the “Also Boughts” of other books, might get you onto the front page and top 100 in a category.

But when you sell wide, you will have sales in other stores. You might be tempted to curse that someone bought your book on B&N, where that sale does NOTHING to promote you on Amazon! If all those sales you had gotten on other retailers had just happened on Amazon, maybe this promotion would have been when you ranked in the top 3 digits overall!

But I promise that is not the case. That is not a productive way to view your sales on other retailers. Those are sales you would not have gotten otherwise. There are some readers who will purchase books from any retailers, and there are some readers who will roll their eyes in annoyance and buy the book on Amazon even if they have a Kobo and then do the whole song and dance of trying to get that Amazon book to work on their Kobo Clara. It happens, I can say, as one of those readers myself. Most of my reads are library reads, and when I do make a purchase, I prefer to buy my books (biased, I admit it) either on Campfire or Kobo. I will reluctantly purchase ebooks from Amazon if I have to. But there are a lot of readers who do not want the headache of getting your Amazon-only book onto their Tolino or Boox devices. They'll just skip your book.

Those sales on Kobo, Tolino, Google Play, etc, are most likely not sales you would have made otherwise. Do not think of them as sales that “should” or even “could” have happened on Amazon.

Expanding on this further, I have seen a lot of wide authors in this Amazon mindset still prioritize promoting Amazon during sales. This can look like making posts that look like this:

Fake social media post with a cat glaring as an avatar and the handle being @ReallyAwesomeAuthor, the post reads My book is ON SALE for only $0.99! Amazon: link new line Everywhere else: link

That avatar is my cat, Didi. She is no longer with us, but I try to memorialize her as the demon that she was. Do you see the issue with this post, however? This really awesome author prioritized Amazon over all other retailers. Yes, that's where many people will go, and it does seem simplest to not make them click TWICE to get to the site.

But what this post tells all the other retailers is that you won't drive traffic to them. And this will make them less likely to promote you. That Kobo promotion my book was chosen for? If Kobo had seen me posting like this, do you think they would want to include my books? If Barnes and Noble was deciding whether or not to host you for a signing event, and they peeped your social media and saw that? What do you think they would do?

Fake Social Media Post from a user with the handle ReallyAwesomeAuthor and a cat photo avatar; the post says Oh my gosh already at 30 sales on Amazon thank you; can I get to 50 and then provides the link.

Same with posts like these. If you want to post sales numbers during promotions (something I really don't understand but seems to be really popular), try to post all sales combined. 1. It will look better just from a pure numbers standpoint, and 2.) Other retailers DO look at your social media when deciding if they want to promote you. Sharing the sales numbers for just one retailer and setting a goal like this and implicitly telling your readers you have a preference for which retailer they should purchase on (and with Amazon & $0.99 promos, it isn't even the one that will get you the most royalties!). That's a bit unfair to readers and undermining the work you've done to be a successful wide author.

I get it. The Amazon Mindset says that your path to success lies in the Amazon Algorithm and doing whatever you can to appease and please it. But as a wide author, you cannot let your focus ONLY be on the Amazon algorithm. Without the extra boost you get just from being in KU and from page reads, you will never win the Amazon Algorithm as an indie author. I mean, you knew that on some level, I assume. That's probably a reason you joined KU/KDP Select to begin with. But you're considering going wide, and this is the tradeoff.

But it's also a bit freeing. As a wide author, your ASBR does not determine your income. You have other revenue streams; other ways to make sales. If you have a book launch on the same day as two KU Giants release theirs, you do not have to panic that the algorithm will hate you while everyone rushes to buy the BookTok book of the week. You can still top the charts on other retailers.

Plus, you can get just as much of a high from the Best Seller Numbers in other stores that have them (not all stores have them). An additional bonus is that some retailers don't cut your royalties down to just 30% when you discount to $0.99.

Fake Social Media Post from a user with a ReallyAwesomeAuthor handle and a cat picture for an avatar; the post says My book is on sale for just $0.99; You can find it at any major retailer and some smaller ones; link to book A pretty ok demonstration of how to post the link to your book without giving preference to Amazon and making it known to potential readers that you are not Amazon-only

I see a lot of authors leave KU, try out wide for a few months, see that 96% of their sales are still from Amazon, and go back into KU. The reason for this is that they are still in the Amazon Mindset. They aren't doing what they can to give their book the chance to succeed elsewhere. If they did as much promotion of their other retailers as they do for Amazon, those numbers would be much different.

A pie chart; about 35% of the chart is yellow and is labeled Amazon KDP; about a quarter of the chart is green and labeled Shopify; there are six other smaller slices that are unlabeled

This is the month so far for me. We are about halfway through November, and Amazon is only about 35% of my sales. You can also see about 25% of my income so far is from Shopify, which are direct sales. I haven't imported my direct sales from LemonSqueezy yet, but that would probably put my direct sales into the “35% of my income for the month” range. The other slices are other retailers like IngramSpark, Kobo, Barnes and Nobles, Apple, Smashwords, and Google Play.

Yes, Amazon is more than the other retailers combined. But it's not the majority of my sales. If you leave the Amazon Mindset behind and slowly learn to understand the other retailers, you can get something like this, too. Stop giving preferential treatment to Amazon in your sales pitches and promotions, and they will naturally stop being the overwhelming majority of your sales. Start learning the pros and cons of the other retailers, and you can make Amazon less than half.

(Small update: It's now 11/22, and I've noticed that, yes, this is the lowest month I've had for a while in terms of royalties and units sold for Amazon, and it's the best month I've had in Barnes and Noble, my direct store, and Google Play. I can't help but think that's correlated to all the readers talking about leaving Amazon after seeing Bezos' reaction to the election results.)

(This pie chart is from the SaaS product called ScribeCount, I get into it in more detail in Part III!)

Final Conclusion of Part II

This was way longer than I thought it was going to be. I am sorry for the gaps in my knowledge, or the places in which I am inexperienced. Regardless, I hope this was helpful.

My advice is to either start with Draft2Digital for one book and see how your sales are on various sales channels, and then do the rest of your books directly on the sales channels/retailers you feel most confident with, leaving the rest in Draft2Digitals hands. This method is especially good if you have some sort of chronic condition or disability that makes juggling multiple retailers prohibitive. This is a situation where the costs and the benefits are weighed. That 10% of the list price being taken by D2D might be worth it to protect your limited time or limited spoons.

I, personally, have a lot of time and not a lot of spoons. I balance this out by being choosy about what platforms I upload to directly and which I leave to Draft2Digital, and I am not worrying about my previous titles that are still wholly in D2D.

Part III will be coming soon, and it will have a deep dive into other smaller retailers like Campfire and your options when it comes to direct sales as well as some other considerations like “How do I keep track of sales?” and “Oh my gosh METADATA” and the ever-pressing “But my backmatter?????” issue.

Stay tuned for Part III!

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[Last update: 11/22/2024. update to include additional information about Kobo VIP program and promotions, and further expanding on the concept of Amazon Mindset]