Why I’ve Chosen to “Go Wide”

First, some brief context for those who may not understand the phrase. Many indie authors enroll their ebooks in Kindle Unlimited (KU), which makes digital copies of their work exclusive to Amazon. Going wide means you’ve opted out of KU and your ebooks are available on other retailers.

Don’t get me wrong, KU has some benefits. They’ll pay you a small amount per page read, rather than only for outright sales. An author enrolled in KU has access to Kindle countdown deals, which aren’t offered to those outside of KU. But a book in KU can only be sold on Amazon.

Which brings me to the first reason I opted to go wide. I don’t like to limit myself to one platform. It’s a personal choice for many authors as to which route they go, but when I was preparing to release Hunted, I learned a few of my friends refuse to buy from Amazon. That made the decision easy for me—if I know people who won’t buy from Amazon, I’m missing out on those potential sales. (Disclaimer: Most of said friends aren’t readers and have not read my books.)

A few months ago, I embarked on a little project to see just where my sales were coming from. Now that Hunted has been published for a couple years, and The Relics of War series is fully available, I figured it was time.

My books are available on 5 different platforms: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Apple/iTunes, and Google Play. Yes, it’s a bit of work to get each account set up initially, but once it is, adding books is simple (for the most part. I find Apple’s process a bit tedious, but it is what it is.)

So far, 89% of my total sales come from ebooks. That’s a huge amount. I also broke down my sales by retailer.

Yes, Amazon still holds the majority of my sales, but a full 20% have come from other sources.

Now, if I discount the in-person sales (which are physical copies) and hardcover/paperback sales (most of which have come from Amazon), 18% of my ebooks are still sold somewhere other than Amazon. It may not seem significant now, but I think that number will increase over time.

Since I discovered the trick to participating in Kobo’s and Barnes & Noble’s promotions last October, their percentages have steadily increased. And I believe they’ll continue to do so as I work on my marketing game.

And those promos I mentioned? It’s a recent thing, and really only came into play for the last 3 months of my 26 months of data. In that time the B&N numbers went from a paltry 4% to 14%, and Kobo went from 0 to 2%. It’s slow, but it is progress.

As I’ve continued through my publishing journey, some other factors came to light that I would never have considered previously. Due to the exclusivity contract with KU, if a book is found on another retailer, Amazon will pull the listing, sometimes without contacting the author first. Some time ago (I believe it was in 2021), there was some trouble with book pirating, and ebooks being offered for sale on Apple/iTunes by parties who were not the author.

Amazon took down their KU listings immediately, and the authors were forced to scramble as they tried to figure out what happened and why. I haven’t heard any more about this for a few months, so I hope it was resolved. But this is another reason why I’m glad I chose to go wide. Not only am I the one putting my books up for sale on sites like Apple’s, but I don’t have to worry about Amazon taking my books down for a KU violation I wasn’t responsible for.

I also use first chapters and my novella as newsletter builders, which is another item that can trigger a KU violation. The TOS is pretty explicit in its terms; the ebook can’t be available anywhere except Amazon, even if it’s free. It just seemed a bit too harsh for me in the beginning.

Anyway, to conclude a longish post, I’m happy with my decision to go wide, and I’ll keep releasing my books in that manner. 18% of my current ebook readers don’t buy from Amazon – and that’s enough to keep me on this path.