Imagine yourself a bestselling author on Amazon, raking in fame and fortune as a top romance novelist. Now, imagine your brand is gone in an instant, and why? Because you dedicated your energy to cheating, money-chasing, and skirting the rules rather than building a long-term brand.
Just this month, this is exactly what happened to a notorious book-stuffer who recently lost his Amazon publishing account in one fell swoop. Will he get it back? Maybe. Maybe not. But no doubt, he's crying now, especially because he was exclusive to Amazon and thus, had all of his eggs in that particular basket. (Commandment of control, anyone?) Based on his author rank, this person was probably grossing six figures a month. Now, he's earning nearly nothing, because all of his print and ebooks are gone from the Amazon store. (His audiobooks remain, because they're not part of the KDP ecosystem.)
What did this guy do to torpedo his career? It's hard to say what exactly cost him his account, but only because he was engaged in so much questionable activity that we can only guess.
This guy was reviled by scores of regular authors, not because of his success, but rather because of the questionable things he did to achieve that "success." He stuffed his books to artificially inflate their page counts, in order to trigger obscene Kindle Unlimited borrow-payouts (up to 15 bucks a pop) for books priced at 99 cents. He engaged in questionable practices to get positive reviews. (Rumor is, an illegal Tiffany jewelry giveaway was what finally did him in.) He coached other "authors" on how to exploit the weaknesses of Amazon's Kindle Unlimited system. His assistant coached "readers" on how to flip through these stuffed books to trigger a maximum payout, whether the "books" were actually read or not.
Want to know the sad thing for this guy? Before he went to the dark side, he was a regular bestselling romance author with a growing, enthusiastic fanbase. He didn't need to cheat to make money, but apparently, the temptation of quick and easy cash was too much for him to resist.
And while he was raking in his ill-gotten gains, ethical authors were (and still are) paying the price as practically all of the visibility, money, and All Star bonuses were scooped up by him and "authors" like him. Oddly enough, a ton of these stuffers are still operating, obviously betting on the fact that this will never happen to them.
Maybe they're right. Maybe they're wrong. Either way, they're chasing money at the expense of building a brand that lasts.
Below are some links that offer more details:
In summary, money chasing is a glorious thing...until it bites you hard in the a$$.
Just this month, this is exactly what happened to a notorious book-stuffer who recently lost his Amazon publishing account in one fell swoop. Will he get it back? Maybe. Maybe not. But no doubt, he's crying now, especially because he was exclusive to Amazon and thus, had all of his eggs in that particular basket. (Commandment of control, anyone?) Based on his author rank, this person was probably grossing six figures a month. Now, he's earning nearly nothing, because all of his print and ebooks are gone from the Amazon store. (His audiobooks remain, because they're not part of the KDP ecosystem.)
What did this guy do to torpedo his career? It's hard to say what exactly cost him his account, but only because he was engaged in so much questionable activity that we can only guess.
This guy was reviled by scores of regular authors, not because of his success, but rather because of the questionable things he did to achieve that "success." He stuffed his books to artificially inflate their page counts, in order to trigger obscene Kindle Unlimited borrow-payouts (up to 15 bucks a pop) for books priced at 99 cents. He engaged in questionable practices to get positive reviews. (Rumor is, an illegal Tiffany jewelry giveaway was what finally did him in.) He coached other "authors" on how to exploit the weaknesses of Amazon's Kindle Unlimited system. His assistant coached "readers" on how to flip through these stuffed books to trigger a maximum payout, whether the "books" were actually read or not.
Want to know the sad thing for this guy? Before he went to the dark side, he was a regular bestselling romance author with a growing, enthusiastic fanbase. He didn't need to cheat to make money, but apparently, the temptation of quick and easy cash was too much for him to resist.
And while he was raking in his ill-gotten gains, ethical authors were (and still are) paying the price as practically all of the visibility, money, and All Star bonuses were scooped up by him and "authors" like him. Oddly enough, a ton of these stuffers are still operating, obviously betting on the fact that this will never happen to them.
Maybe they're right. Maybe they're wrong. Either way, they're chasing money at the expense of building a brand that lasts.
Below are some links that offer more details:
In summary, money chasing is a glorious thing...until it bites you hard in the a$$.
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