Publishing Books On Amazon: Can I Revive 13 Dead Books?

About this video

Dale Roberts describes reviving his neglected Dale L. Roberts fitness backlist before launching Amazon Keywords for Books. He says he published over 40 fitness titles between about 2014 and 2016, plus 34 translations in six languages, but had not published under that brand since about October 2016 while focusing on Self Publishing with Dale, so covers, descriptions, and keywords drifted out of brand alignment and sales slowed. He first culled the herd, having previously delisted about five titles and then delisting 12 more he viewed as redundant or non-performing, left four titles largely as-is apart from descriptions and keywords, and ended with a 22-title overhaul, 13 of which needed new covers. He ordered ebook and ACX covers through Fiverr designer Rebeca Covers — 26 covers in total, taking roughly a week and a half — and regrets not also hiring her for print covers, which he recreated himself at an hour to two hours each. He updated one title per day over about two weeks, refreshing metadata, descriptions, keywords, and interiors with Grammarly, and rebuilt a poorly reviewed seniors book as a large-print second edition with larger pictures and font size 16 to 18 in response to reviews. He says he then ran Amazon Advertising campaigns starting slowly and, as a creator claim, saw a positive return so far. He deliberately updated in place rather than delisting and republishing as second editions to avoid losing reviews and Amazon relevancy/history.

Key takeaways

• Audit a backlist for brand congruency before a new launch: update covers, descriptions, and keywords rather than letting older titles contradict current advice
• Cull titles that no longer align or do not perform, but update in place when possible to preserve reviews and Amazon sales history/relevancy
• Provide matching covers for ebook, print, and audio/ACX — do not stretch an ebook cover for ACX — and hire out all formats instead of recreating print covers yourself
• Work through a large overhaul one title per day and use reader reviews as fix instructions, as with the seniors book rebuilt in large print with larger images
• His three mistakes: waiting far too long to fix declining titles, not hiring out every aspect of cover design, and mistakenly delisting one good title

Episode details: published September 14, 2020 · 11:50 long. Summary written by Self Growth Videos from the episode itself. Business results and any income figures mentioned are Dale L. Roberts’s own claims, shared for education — they are not typical or guaranteed.

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