How to Publish with KDP: Part Thirteen

/ harmonykentonline

Image courtesy of bigstock.com

Hello SErs. Harmony here.  As promised, here is  part thirteen in the post series dedicated to taking a step-by-step look at how to get your finished manuscript from your computer and on sale on Amazon in both ebook and paperback.

If you’d like to take a look back at the previous posts in this series, please click on the links at the end of this post.

So, here’s Part Thirteen: How to Upload Your Paperback.

Access your KDP dashboard. You will see something that resembles the image below >>>

 

 

 

At the top of your list of books (if you have any here yet), you will see two options:

  1. + Kindle eBook
  2. + Paperback

Select the second option: +Paperback.

The following ‘paperback details’ page will open >>>

 

This page is where you input such things as the language of the book, the book title, a subtitle if it has one, set a series number if it is part of a series, the edition number (which is optional), the author name–along with any contributors, the book description, keywords, categories, confirm that you own the copyright, and the reading age. At the very bottom of the page, you can choose to save and continue or save as a draft without continuing.

Note: Unlike e-Books, paperbacks do not have a pre-order option on Amazon.

If you save as draft, Amazon will save the information and return you to your dashboard.

If you save and continue, Amazon will take you to the ‘edit paperback’ content’ page >>>

At this point, Amazon will ask you to either input your own ISBN catalogue number, or it will offer to assign one to you for free. If you choose an Amazon ISBN, this number is only valid for the KDP published version and not for use on other platforms.

For ease, I allow Amazon to allocate my ISBN to me.

This page is where you set up your print options. For example: black & white interior with cream paper, black & white interior with white paper, premium colour interior with white paper, etc.

Also, you will set your finished book size here. This is called the Trim size.

For a list of industry standard sizes, see HERE.

Top Tip:

Avoid choosing any trim sizes that Amazon lists as non-standard. This is because any non-standard book size will have a limited and much reduced distribution platform.

Generally, I choose 5.25 inches X 8 inches. This is the size the majority of traditionally published paperback novels come in. Of course, this final choice is up to you. I would, however, avoid overly large (comic-book sized) trims–unless you’re publishing a comic book!

Once you’ve chosen your trim, bleed (the above link will show you more about bleed), and size, you’re ready to upload your PDF manuscript. See the image below >>>

 

Although Amazon will accept other formats, such as RTF, HTML, and DocX, I would strongly advice AGAINST uploading these file formats for a paperback. Unless you know HTML very well, that is.

For ease and simplicity, along with at-a-glance access to your PDF for checking the formatting and knowing that what you see is what you get, then I would go with a PDF file every time.

Once you’ve uploaded your PDF, Amazon will then ask you to upload your paperback cover. (See Part 7 A (Using Amazon’s Cover Creator Tool for Paperback) : https://wp.me/p7OGru-2jY  and Part 7 B (Making your own PDF book cover to upload to Amazon) : https://wp.me/p7OGru-2kf)

When Amazon has processed your interior and cover, you have the option to use the online previewer to view what the finished book will look like. This is where you can check your margin settings and ensure you don’t have orphan words or lines at the end of a chapter.  (See part 14 for more on this.)

The next page is the ‘Kindle Paperback Pricing’ page, and this is where you will set your book price, set the markets (countries) where you want it on sale, opt in to expanded distribution or not (see below), and read the Ts & Cs.

 

A note on expanded distribution:

This option allows Amazon to send your book to other booksellers and libraries. Here is where having a standard trim (book) size becomes so important.

You will find the check box right below your first price box (see above and below).

Find out more about how expanded distribution works HERE.

Once you’ve input all the information, you can either select ‘Save as Draft’ or ‘Save and Publish’.

Take great care here! I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve hit publish when I wanted the book to stay in draft mode for a while, lol. And once you’ve hit that ‘publish’ button, it goes into a queue for Amazon to review the file for quality, and you cannot undo the publish.

That’s it from me for today. I hope you’ve found this post useful. I’d love to hear from you in the comments below, and I’ll see you all again on Friday, August 21st, where we’ll be taking a look at how to preview and review your paperback file.

Past posts in this series:

Outline: https://wp.me/p7OGru-29c

Part 1 (Software for Writing) : https://wp.me/p7OGru-29t

Part 2 (General Formatting Necessities) : https://wp.me/p7OGru-29J

Part 3 (Ebook Conversion) : https://wp.me/p7OGru-2ah

Part 4 (Paperback Formatting) : https://wp.me/p7OGru-2eS

Part 5 (Image Software for Making Book Covers) : https://wp.me/p7OGru-2gi

Part 6 A (Using Amazon’s Cover Creator Tool for eBook) : https://wp.me/p7OGru-2gQ

Part 6 B (Making your own ebook cover to upload to Amazon) : https://wp.me/p7OGru-2hQ

Part 7 A (Using Amazon’s Cover Creator Tool for Paperback) : https://wp.me/p7OGru-2jY

Part 7 B (Making your own PDF book cover to upload to Amazon) : https://wp.me/p7OGru-2kf

Part 8 (Setting up your KDP account) : https://wp.me/p7OGru-2kF

Part 9 (An overview of your KDP Dashboard) : https://wp.me/p7OGru-2lq

Part 10 (Uploading your eBook) : https://wp.me/p7OGru-2pL

Part 11 (Previewing your eBook) : https://wp.me/p7OGru-2qc

Part 12 (Editing your eBook): https://wp.me/p7OGru-2Aa

To make it easy to browse back and forth, I’ve set all links to open in new tabs. As this series progresses, I will update the links for you so that each post includes links to all past posts in the series.

©Harmony Kent 2020

 

(If you’re reading this post on or after August 21st, 2020, then here’s the link for Part 14 in the How to Publish with KDP series: https://wp.me/p7OGru-2Kf. Please note, the link won’t work until August 21st, 2020.)

38 thoughts on “How to Publish with KDP: Part Thirteen”

  8. Another great post to the series, Harmony. I can never decide between cream or white and I’ve alway gone with 6×9 because its easy to remember. This is slways the fun part for me because I can finally hold the finished product.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  9. Reblogged this on The Write Stuff and commented:

    Today, Harmony Kent shares Part 13 of her super-helpful series, How to Publish With KDP. This one is focused on uploading a print book to Amazon, and I think you’ll find it well worth checking out. Please consider passing it along, too, so others can take advantage of this information. Thanks, and thanks to Harmony for this great series! 🙂

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  10. Since things change frequently on Amazon, I have been saving this series for future reference, in case I find I can’t do it the way I have been. From your images above, it would appear that the minimum price range has changed, though perhaps that is based on size and page number? At any rate, I plan to refer to these posts if I get stuck with my next print book, for sure. Thanks for a super helpful series, Harmony. Sharing! 🙂

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  11. Hi Harmony – I have followed your post and found them helpful. They helped to prevent unnecessary steps and errors. I just finished uploading the 2nd edition of my first book. Perhaps you can answer this question. When you go through the steps, you set up the categories you want your book listed under. You select two and Amazon selects the third. Yet, when the book went live, the categories were different than the ones I selected. Did I do something wrong, and how do I correct it so they are listed the way I wanted them. Thanks for any suggestions.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    • I’m so pleased you’re finding these posts helpful, Chuck. I understand what you’re going through regarding the categories. The dashboard only lists a fraction of those you will find on the actual site. I’ve emailed them on this issue numerous times, only to find them—in true Amazon fashion—tremendously unhelpful. I can assure you that you’re not doing it wrong. It’s their system, unfortunately. All I can suggest is that you email the KDP help team. Best of luck with everything 😊

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

We'd love to know what you think. Comment below.

Please log in using one of these methods to post your comment:

Gravatar
WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Cancel

Connecting to %s