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Publish on Amazon: Kindle, Paperback and Hardcover

Publish on Amazon

Who Is This For?

  1. Publish on Amazon is a service for authors who want their Markua or Leanpub Flavoured Markdown books published on Amazon by Leanpub. We make all the decisions — categories, keywords, description, pricing, cover design — and deliver a finished product.

Premium Omakase Service. $1999

Publish on Amazon is a premium omakase service where we handle everything for you. It's $1999 USD (or the equivalent in your local currency). This is a one-time fee, and it includes formatting your book so it looks good on Amazon, publishing your book on Amazon in paperback, hardcover and Kindle formats, and 10 free paperback copies including shipping. We make all the decisions — categories, keywords, description, pricing — so you don't have to. You earn 80% of the publisher revenue that we earn from Amazon as royalties on your book.

Omakase means we make all the decisions. We design the wraparound covers for paperback and hardcover, choose the categories, keywords, description, and pricing, and publish the Kindle, paperback, and hardcover versions of your book on Amazon. You don't have to think about any of it.

Note that Publish on Amazon is also included in our GlobalAuthor Pro bundle! So if you also want 31 TranslateAI translations of your book, a course created from your book with CourseAI Pro, and more, check out GlobalAuthor Pro!

Price

The price of the Publish on Amazon service is $1999.

Sign in to select a book and add Publish on Amazon to your cart.

How Long Does It Take?

  1. We will typically get this done in 14 days. Amazon has a short review process on their end, so we can't guarantee a specific date, but we will either have your book live on Amazon or give you a progress update within 14 days.

Why Did We Build This?

  1. The Publish on Amazon service is the easiest way to get your Leanpub book published on Amazon in paperback, hardcover and on Kindle using Amazon KDP.
  2. You just click a button, and we do everything else. We publish your book on Amazon in print in paperback and hardcover, and as a DRM-free ebook on Amazon Kindle.
  3. Publish on Amazon can be used with any Leanpub book which is written in Markua or Leanpub Flavoured Markdown. The value is convenience.

Do I Need To Use This?

  1. No. You can use our print-ready PDF export and unbranded ebook export to put your Leanpub book on Amazon yourself. Publish on Amazon is an optional omakase service — we make all the decisions and handle everything.
  2. Many Leanpub authors are successful people who are just too busy to deal with Amazon KDP. With one click, they have us do it all.

What Portion of the Amazon Royalties Do You Get?

  1. You earn 80% of the publisher revenue that we earn from Amazon as royalties on your book.
  2. We take 20% of the publisher revenue from Amazon, since there is an ongoing cost for us to do the accounting and payment of the publisher revenue we get from Amazon, etc. Since this expense will stretch years into the future, it doesn't make sense to only have an upfront cost for this service.
  3. In terms of the actual numbers, Amazon's publisher revenue math is a bit complicated. On some ebook sales (e.g. some of them between $2.99 and $9.99) Amazon pays up to a 70% publisher royalty rate. On other ebook sales (e.g. below $2.99 or above $9.99) it is up to 35%. We say "up to" since there are other factors which affect Amazon's royalty rates as well, such as a "delivery charge" based on the file size of the ebook. This delivery charge can be subtracted from the 70% royalty rate, and it can be 20 cents or more, so it does have an effect. Also, for print books, yes, all the publisher royalty math is more complicated, as there are more costs involved. Producing and shipping physical objects is more expensive than just sending a file to a customer.
  4. Regardless of the complexity, our deal is simple: we will pay you 80% of the money we get from Amazon for your book. We will send you royalties in USD via PayPal, or royalties in USD or a number of currencies via Wise. (Wise is a service which allows us to send you royalties in your local currency, and it has great exchange rates.)
  5. One of the benefits of the Publish on Amazon service is that we do all the Amazon stuff for you, so you don't have to think about it. If you want to think about all the Amazon stuff, then this service is not for you: that's what our print-ready PDF export and unbranded ebook exports are for!

How Do You Price the Kindle Version?

  1. We price the Kindle version the same as the minimum price of your Leanpub book at the time of publication.
  2. So, the publisher revenue on Amazon from the Kindle version will be roughly 70% for prices between $7.99 and $9.99, and roughly 35% if the price is above $9.99.
  3. Leanpub books are never cheaper than $7.99, and most Leanpub books should be priced between $14.99 and $39.99. (If your Leanpub book is priced below $14.99, we strongly encourage you to consider raising your price.)
  4. The reason we price the Kindle version the same as the Leanpub version is that we don't want your Leanpub readers to be sad if the Kindle version is cheaper. Also, we don't price the Kindle version higher than the Leanpub version, since we don't want your Kindle readers to be sad either. Also, Amazon forbids it, so even if we wanted to do it, we couldn't!

How Do You Price the Paperback and Hardcover Versions?

  1. This varies based on the length of the book and the price of the Kindle version. We want there to be a price difference between the Kindle version and the paperback and hardcover versions, but we don't want the paperback and hardcover versions to be too expensive.
  2. We also try to maximize publisher revenue, since we pay you 80% of the publisher revenue we get from Amazon. So, we try to find the price which maximizes publisher revenue, while still being a reasonable price for the paperback and hardcover versions.
  3. What this typically means is that most paperback versions are in the range of $19-$29 USD on Amazon.com, and most hardcover versions are in the range of $29-$39 USD on Amazon.com. For the other Amazon stores (.ca, .co.uk, .de, etc.), we convert the USD prices to the local currency, and then make small adjustments to make nicer looking prices. Finally, for the various Amazon stores in the EU, we currently keep all the prices the same for consistency.

What Dialects of Markdown Are Supported?

  1. Publish on Amazon works with books written in Leanpub Flavoured Markdown, Markua 0.10 or Markua 0.31.

Do You Add an Index to My Book?

  1. Only with Global Author: we only add an index to your book if you get Publish on Amazon as part of a Global Author bundle. When purchased standalone, Publish on Amazon does not include creating an index.

What's Included in Publish on Amazon?

  1. Leanpub will publish your book on Amazon in paperback, hardcover and Kindle formats.
  2. We will send you 10 free paperback copies of your book (including shipping) to your address anywhere in the world. Additional copies are available at cost plus 20%, calculated at Amazon's USD exchange rates. (We'll email you to get your mailing address for the delivery.)

Do You Send Me Any Books?

  1. We will send you 10 free paperback copies of your book to your address anywhere in the world. (We'll email you to get your mailing address for the delivery.)

What if I want additional books?

  1. If you want additional books, we can order the heavily-discounted "author copies" from Amazon and send them to you or to a conference you are presenting at, etc. The cost is the Amazon author copies cost in USD at Amazon's exchange rate, plus 20% to cover our costs. So, if you want $500 USD of author copies (if this is the price of printing + shipping) sent somewhere, we can do this for $600. Alternatively, if you want us to sell multiple copies to a conference you are speaking at, we can do this as well. For example, assume the conference is in Germany, and they are going to purchase 100 books: we can invoice the conference for the agreed-upon price, and deal with any VAT reverse charge complexity. Our cost for this is 20% of the invoice price. So, if we are selling $3000 USD of books which cost $500 to print, you will receive $3000 minus our $600 processing fee minus $500 printing and shipping cost = $1900 USD.)

Why is Publish on Amazon Expensive?

  1. Publish on Amazon is for authors who really value their time. It takes time to use Amazon KDP, to make separate wraparound covers for the paperback and hardcover, to choosing prices in all the different currencies, and to get royalties from Amazon in a bunch of currencies, etc.
  2. Now, if you want to micromanage your book on Amazon KDP, we recommend you just use Amazon KDP directly. It has no upfront cost, and it's a great service. (We use it ourselves for the books which use our Publish on Amazon service.) So, if you want full control and 100% of the publisher revenue (instead of the 80% that we pay with Publish on Amazon), you can just use Amazon KDP yourself--and we even provide a button to get a print-ready PDF (for paperback and hardcover) and an unbranded ebook (for Kindle) to make this as easy as possible for you! We don't believe in lock-in at Leanpub, and we want our authors to be able to put their books on Amazon themselves as easily as possible. But even easier than making a print-ready PDF and using Amazon KDP is just checking a checkbox or clicking a button and having us do everything for you.
  3. But if you're a busy professional and you want to save time by having us to do everything for you, then Publish on Amazon is the service for you. We do all the work, and you get 80% of the publisher revenue from Amazon. We think that's a great deal.
  4. Chances are your time is better spent writing your next book, or promoting your current book, or doing expensive consulting for people, or just taking a break, than doing all the work to get and maintain your book on Amazon. So, we think it's worth it.
  5. But, again, the best way to buy Publish on Amazon is as part of the Global Author Max bundle.

How Does It Work?

You just click a button, and Leanpub takes care of everything else.
  1. Buy the Publish on Amazon service, either with Leanpub royalties or money.
  2. We'll email you to get a few things we need: a high-resolution author photo for the back cover, your mailing address for the 10 free paperback copies, and any preferences you have about your book's description.
  3. We take it from there. We fix any spelling or formatting issues, format your book for Amazon, design wraparound covers for paperback and hardcover, choose categories, keywords, description and pricing, and publish all three versions — Kindle, paperback and hardcover — on Amazon.
  4. We email you when your book is live on Amazon.
  5. We send you 10 free paperback copies of your book to your address anywhere in the world.
  6. If your book was in GitHub or Dropbox mode, we convert it back and send you our changes via a Pull Request or your Dropbox folder.
  7. Once a month we give you a sales update. Amazon pays royalties near the end of each month, and we pass your 80% share to you the following month.

How Can I Update the Book on Amazon Later?

  1. Sometimes authors (especially Leanpub authors!) want to update their books, even after they've been published on Amazon. If you have used our Publish on Amazon to get your book published on Amazon KDP, and you would like us to update the book on KDP, just let us know. We give you 3 free updates, and then updating your book costs $149 each time, since we with a larger update, the number of pages might change, and then we need to produce updated covers for the new sizes, ensure the barcodes are in the right place, and deal with the KDP UI to upload everything, etc.

Are You Affiliated With Amazon?

  1. No! We're just fans of their KDP service. It's really easy for our authors to use it themselves (we provide a print-ready PDF export to help with this process), but it's even easier for our authors to just click a button to pay Leanpub to do all the work. Hence, this service.

More Questions?

  1. Great! Email us at hello@leanpub.com, and we will be happy to answer them.
  2. However, the best thing to do might be to just try the service, since there's literally no risk...

100% Money Back Guarantee

  1. If you're not happy with the results, or if your book is not a good fit for the service, we'll fully refund your money.
  2. Yes, our 60 Day 100% Happiness Guarantee applies here, just like it does with all Leanpub purchases!
  3. Now, this is technically risky for us, since we will have done a bunch of manual work. But we're so confident in our services and in our authors that we're happy to offer our full money back guarantee for all our services.
  4. You can only find out how good the service is by trying it, and because of our 100% money back guarantee there's literally no risk to do so!
  5. So, there's no reason not to try the service, is there?

The Leanpub 60 Day 100% Happiness Guarantee

Within 60 days of purchase you can get a 100% refund on any Leanpub purchase, in two clicks.

Now, this is technically risky for us, since you'll have the book or course files either way. But we're so confident in our products and services, and in our authors and readers, that we're happy to offer a full money back guarantee for everything we sell.

You can only find out how good something is by trying it, and because of our 100% money back guarantee there's literally no risk to do so!

So, there's no reason not to click the Add to Cart button, is there?

See full terms...

Earn $8 on a $10 Purchase, and $16 on a $20 Purchase

We pay 80% royalties on purchases of $7.99 or more, and 80% royalties minus a 50 cent flat fee on purchases between $0.99 and $7.98. You earn $8 on a $10 sale, and $16 on a $20 sale. So, if we sell 5000 non-refunded copies of your book for $20, you'll earn $80,000.

(Yes, some authors have already earned much more than that on Leanpub.)

In fact, authors have earned over $15 million writing, publishing and selling on Leanpub.

Learn more about writing on Leanpub

Write and Publish on Leanpub

You can use Leanpub to easily write, publish and sell in-progress and completed ebooks and online courses!

Leanpub is a powerful platform for serious authors, combining a simple, elegant writing and publishing workflow with a store focused on selling in-progress ebooks.

Leanpub is a magical typewriter for authors: just write in plain text, and to publish your ebook, just click a button. (Or, if you are producing your ebook your own way, you can even upload your own PDF and/or EPUB files and then publish with one click!) It really is that easy.

Learn more about writing on Leanpub