Amazon KDP has helped changed the game when it comes to self-publishing. Gone are the days when you would have to be pulled in 10 or 20 different directions by a publisher, all wanting different things from your creative vision.

Now, it’s just you, your work, and a simple uploading process that stands between you and being a published author!

However, with that, increased freedom also comes a ton of extra responsibility for the sales of your book. You’re not just an author now. You’re also a graphic designer for the book cover, an editor, a sensitivity reader, and an illustrator for the inside of the book.

And, of course, you need to be a marketer too!

Well, while Amazon may not be able to fix or even assist with all of these problems, it can certainly help you with that last option.

After all, every good marketing researcher will tell you how valuable a good coupon is to sell books!

This guide will help explain pretty much every core aspect of Amazon KDP’s coupon system, how to put your books on offers, as well as some of the benefits that you may reap from this strategy.

There’s a lot to cover, so let’s get started!

Can You Offer Coupons For Your Books On Amazon KDP?

Before we even start getting into the weeds of this topic, we should probably answer the main question that many people are asking at this point: Can you even offer coupons on Amazon KDP?

Many people, even though they often explicitly shop through Amazon for deals on items and other books, rarely consider that they can offer coupons and discounts themselves. Especially if they have just started!

Well, luckily for all self-published authors, Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing (Or KDP for short) does offer a few different avenues for giving potential reading customers discounts. Mainly, through the Kindle Countdown Deals (also known as KCDs) service, which you can set up through KDP as a published author.

Kindle Countdown Deals

The KCD allows customers who are looking at your book to see what the standard price for your book is, and what the discounted price for the Kindle book is.

Plus, it also shows a countdown, as the name suggests, for how long the discounted price will last.

For you as the author, the KCD will also show you the number of royalties that you will still get back on purchases of your book at this price.

(It should be noted that if you’re not in a country where you cannot purchase Amazon goods from either Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk, you may not be able to buy or view the KCD offers in your country.)

How To Offer Coupons On Amazon KDP

So, how exactly do you go about giving your books a little discount with the KCD?

Well, first you’re going to need to make sure that your e-book is eligible in the first place!

Eligibility

For your book to be able to have the KCD attached to it, it must only be available through amazon.com or amazon.co.uk. The book must also have been part of the KDP Select listings for at least 30 days before it can be considered.

The listing price for the book before the KCD is applied should also fall within the following price ranges, depending on where it is available:

  • $2.99 to $24.99 (if buying from amazon.com)
  • £1.99 to £14.99 (if buying from amazon.co.uk)

The book discount pricing also has to stay unchanged for 30 days, once the book has been put on the KCD.

(If you’re looking for more details on the exact eligibility, make sure to check out Amazon KDP’s guidelines at their website here.)

Getting Discount On Your Books

If you meet these basic requirements, then you’ll be able to start adding discounts to your work.

  1. On Amazon KDP, go to the ‘Marketing’ tab that you should have on their website.
  2. In the ‘Run a Price Promotion’ option, select the ‘Kindle Countdown Deals’ option. After that, you click on the option that says ‘Create a Kindle Countdown Deal’.
  3. Once you’ve selected your chosen Kindle book, press ‘Continue’
    1.  You’ll then be asked to fill out all the relevant information about the KCD, such as price reduction, duration of the deal, the number of digital price increments you want to set, as well as the digital marketplace you want to sell it from (either amazon.com or amazon.co.uk)

Pricing

The discount that you apply has to be at least 1 dollar/pound less than its normal selling price and run for the specified amount of time.

While you can have the offer running for as little as an hour, you should have the KCD for at least a few days, with the maximum being 7 days.

The Comprehensive Coupon Guide For Amazon KDP

Benefits Of Coupon Offers On Amazon KDP

So, why might you want to consider using this service? After all, you won’t be making as much profit back with each purchase through this system, so what are the advantages of doing this for your recently released book?

Well, quite a few, as it turns out!

Finding New Readers

Let’s not beat around the bus: Getting a new book can be a lot for some readers, even if they’re on Kindle!

Diving into a completely new book series, especially if the work is from an author that they haven’t read before, can feel like something on a gamble.

Many readers don’t want to waste their time and money on books that they may not enjoy, or even up to a certain standard. And given the wildly varying levels of professionalism on Amazon KDP works, that’s an understandable concern!

The lowering of the price can help remove at least one of those barriers to entry for your books, and potentially spawn a new fan reader!

More Reviews

When it comes to listings and recommendations on Amazon and Amazon KDP, reviews are everything. The more reviews that you get, the more KDP’s algorithm registers that there is interest in you.

So, the more readers that read your book, the more likely they are to drop a review for the book on your page.

Greater Sales

Alongside reviews, greater sales numbers are one of the major factors that indicate to Amazon that your book is of interest to a wider market of people. And greater sales numbers tell Amazon’s algorithm that you are potentially reliably good-selling author to keep pushing for the site.

Great Advertising For New Works

This is a particularly great strategy if you’re writing a sequel work in a Kindle series that you are working on.

If you’re in the final steps of editing the latest entry into a series, you may want to drum up a little interest in it, especially if you’re reaching out to totally new customers.

A KCD offer on the last or first entry is a great way to introduce those newcomers to your work, just in time for the next entry to be released!

Final Notes

So, as you can see, not only is their plenty of good reason to consider running a promotional offer r coupon discount for your Kindle books, but it’s surprisingly easy too.

So, next time you’re wondering how to drum up interest in your Kindle books, consider this as a great option!

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