Kindle Vella for Authors—Everything You Need to Know to Get Started
/If you want to find out whether the Kindle Vella serial experience is for you, this article will help you understand exactly what Kindle Vella is all about, the pros and cons of the relatively new platform, lessons learned from a successful case study, and how to incorporate Kindle Vella into your overall publishing strategy. This article describes everything you need to know to get started with Kindle Vella.
By Michelle Segrest, Indie Author and President of Navigate Content, Inc.
When Kindle Vella was introduced in July 2021, I was intrigued, but not yet convinced that it was something that I would enjoy as an author or a reader. I didn’t quite know if it would fit into my specific book publishing profile or if it would even be successful. But let’s face it, when Amazon puts its power and money behind something, it’s rarely a bad idea to at least give it a try.
And for me, the timing was perfect.
I had recently taken a year-long worldwide sailing voyage that began in Northern Germany and ended in Suriname, South America (yes, that means I crossed the Atlantic Ocean in a sailboat). The voyage was dramatic, to say the least, and I had a compelling story to tell. However, in the two years since the voyage had ended abruptly and without explanation for my more than 12,000 social media followers, I had not had the motivation, the courage, nor the mindset to sit down and write the full story to share with the world.
When I learned that Kindle Vella was a platform on which I could share short episodes (or chapters) one at a time over a long period of time, it became clear to me that this was the perfect way to finally share my story. It seemed I was always late to the party, but this time, I could be on the ground floor of something new and exciting.
And it was so easy to get started. First, upload an image (no cover design required). Next, write a short blurb. All set! And then just start writing—one chapter (or as Kindle Vella calls it, “episode”) at a time. No formatting required, and no startup expenses.
In this article, I’ll share with you my Kindle Vella experience, a few lessons learned, many pros and cons of the platform, and I’ll also show you how it can fit into your overall publishing strategy. If I don’t answer all your questions in this article, you can schedule a quick consulting call, and I’ll give you some one-on-one coaching to help you make the most out of your Kindle Vella journey.
What is Kindle Vella?
Kindle Vella is a new platform from Amazon that allows readers to read serial stories one episode at a time. It’s kind of like Netflix for books! Readers can read the first three episodes for free to discover whether they want to continue. If they like the story and want to read further, they can purchase tokens to unlock episodes.
The cost of the tokens is based on the word count of the episode (which can be no fewer than 600 words and no more than 5,000 words). A 5,000-word episode costs about 50 cents in tokens to unlock, so that’s the very high end. The author earns half of that amount as a royalty, and Amazon keeps the other half.
Readers can engage with the author by way of likes, comments, author notes and crowns (which are for readers to reward authors by selecting their favorite story of the week).
The best strategy for authors is to end each episode on a cliffhanger to encourage readers to unlock the next episode. Authors can upload several episodes a day, one a week, three a week—any frequency they see fit. However, readers like consistency, so it’s a good idea for authors to get on a regular posting schedule.
Amazon requires that the content is 100% original and cannot have been published anywhere else. After publishing to Kindle Vella, the chapters can be published elsewhere, but only if they are behind a paywall. Kindle Vella content cannot be made available for free anywhere else, and Amazon is watching this very closely.
The platform is still in BETA as of the writing of this post (March 11, 2022), and currently only available to readers and authors in the United States.
Kindle Vella Pros and Cons
I now have three stories on Kindle Vella. One of them (my sailing adventure memoir) is complete and now has been published to KDP, even though it’s still live on Kindle Vella. I’ll explain how this is possible a bit later. My two other stories are currently being written and I’m posting them as I go. However, eventually, they will also be published as ebooks, paperback, hardcovers and possibly audio books.
I want to share with you some of the pros and cons about the Kindle Vella platform. Let’s start with the pros!
1. Authors can get paid royalties and bonuses WHILE they write their stories! This is huge! While the royalties have been minimal, the monthly bonuses have been quite lucrative. My monthly bonuses have gone as high as $5,600 in one month, and that was before I was even finished writing my first story! The bonuses are not always that high, but some Kindle Vella authors have reported making anywhere from $10 to more than five figures in one month. Just like with KDP, authors get paid two months after the money has been earned and the money shows up included with your regular KDP royalty payments.
2. Kindle Vella allows authors to create a consistent writing routine. This was a game changer for me. Because I knew I had readers waiting for the “rest of the story,” I was very motivated to give them fresh new episodes every week.
3. It’s easy and inexpensive to get started. There is no cover design needed, and no formatting required so there are virtually no upfront expenses. However, I do recommend hiring a great editor. Readers are paying for these stories, and they deserve high quality.
4. Authors can speak directly to their readers through Author’s Notes. At the end of each chapter, authors can speak directly to their readers and share their writing process and their inspirations. They can ask for direct feedback that can help to guide the story in a completely new direction. This was especially helpful to me because I was telling a story of bucket-list travel adventure, but it was also a deeply personal story that was unsettling at times. I was able to warn readers that the next episode may be graphic or upsetting, for example. Also, this helped me to learn whether the readers wanted more adventure or more personal details. It truly helped me guide the story into a new direction. I originally thought I was writing a story about sailing. I learned from my readers that I was writing a story about survival! Game changer!
5. You can edit episodes at any time. This is really helpful, because readers will find mistakes and typos almost always! You can edit episodes, but then they must go back through the Kindle Vella approval process. Old episodes remain live until the updates have been approved.
6. You can still publish your story to KDP. This really gives an author some great options. But there are rules. Once the story is complete, the author must wait at least 30 days to publish to KDP. At that point, the story can be live on Kindle Vella AND available on KDP as an ebook, paperback, and hardcover. Each chapter can only be included in one long-form publication. So, for example, my episode on my visit to Morocco is in my Living Life Sideways travel memoir on KDP so it can’t also be included in an anthology of travel essays that I want to publish. However, if I delete the story from Kindle Vella and then wait 60 days, I can do whatever I want with it! One important caveat….if you want to publish a series of books from your Kindle Vella story, each book must contain at least 10 Kindle Vella episodes. You can’t publish a book with only one episode or only eight episodes, for example. So, be sure to strategically plan the length of your Kindle Vella episodes so this doesn’t cause a problem for you later when you publish your series.
There are a lot of good reasons to publish your story on Kindle Vella, but there are also some things that are not wonderful about the platform. Let’s talk about the cons of Kindle Vella.
1. It’s not yet international. At the time of this posting, Kindle Vella is only available to authors and readers in the United States.
2. Some readers don’t like the platform. This is a matter of taste. Many readers are simply accustomed to reading an entire book in one sitting or at their own pace. Many readers didn’t like having to wait a week to find out what’s next. I let my readers know that my story would eventually be posted on Amazon and available to them in other formats and then asked them to join my email newsletter so they could get updates.
3. You must train your readers to use the platform. Every time I posted an update on social media or in my email newsletter, I reminded readers how to use the platform. They found this very helpful. I also included links directly to my story for the following reason….
4. The Kindle Vella platform is not search friendly. Unless you have a top story, readers may have difficulty finding your story. Help them by providing links in all your promotions and communications!
5. You can’t connect your story to your Amazon Author page. At least not yet, which is a disadvantage.
6. Kindle Vella is not for all genres. Kindle Vella was designed for serial fiction genres. My sailing survival story is nonfiction, but I wouldn’t recommend nonfiction stories. My story was a success because it reads like a novel, and I also had a lot of readers waiting to read the “rest of the story.” However, I would not publish another nonfiction story to Kindle Vella. The genres that do great are romance, fantasy, dystopian, mystery, paranormal, sci-fi, etc).
7. The episodes cannot be published anywhere else. I had to actually take down some of my sailing stories from my blog because they were flagged by the Kindle Vella approval team. They are checking this, so be sure you don’t have your story published anywhere else. Kindle Vella wants original content! For this reason, you can’t take your already published books on KDP and publish them on Kindle Vella
8. Unreliable Notifications. There is a notification system for when new episodes are published, but it’s not a good system. You must constantly update your readers to let them know when new episodes have been published.
9. Marketing and promotion the author’s responsibility. Amazon has done some promotions for the platform, but mainly featuring only the top stories that don’t really need the publicity. The bulk of the marketing and promotion is up to the author. Also, Amazon Ads do not support Kindle Vella at this time, which is discouraging. You can place Facebook ads to promote your Kindle Vella story, but I didn’t find them to be very effective. My most effective promotion has been on social media and in my email newsletter.
Lessons Learned About Kindle Vella That Will Help You
My experience with Kindle Vella has been successful. I’ve made more than $14,000 so far on the platform in less than seven months and gained hundreds of new readers. But I learned some very valuable lessons from my mistakes along the way. Here is some sound advice.
1. Post shorter episodes. Each episode can be no fewer than 600 words and no more than 5,000 words. Most of my episodes were closer to 5,000 words and this was simply too long for this platform. The authors that post shorter, more frequent episodes are finding the most success, by far. Also, with more/shorter episodes, you have less complications with the 10-episode rule (mentioned earlier) when it’s time to publish your series in KDP.
2. Be consistent with your publishing schedule. In the beginning, I just published episodes as I wrote them. One week I would publish one episode on Monday and the next week I’d publish three episodes on Thursday. Serial readers don’t like this inconsistency.
3. Create more engagement with readers. This wasn’t necessarily a mistake because I loved engaging with the readers through the author’s notes. But I could have done more of this!
4. If you plan to release later to KDP have a strategic plan. This is really important, particularly with regard to the 10-episode rule.
5. Tease your final episode to the next book in the series on KDP. It’s always a good idea to cross promote. I do recommend that you let your Kindle Vella readers know that you plan to publish later to KDP so they have options if they don’t enjoy the platform. It’s also a good idea to let KDP readers know that you previously published this story in Kindle Vella—just in case they already read it!
How to Incorporate Kindle Vella into Your Overall Publishing Strategy
The best part about Kindle Vella is that you can incorporate it into your overall publishing strategy. Here are a few takeaways to remember.
You can delete your KV story, wait 60 days, and then do anything you want with your KV content
You can keep your KV story live, wait 30 days, then republish to Digital and Print on Amazon.
When repurposing to Amazon as a book, you can publish as a series, but you MUST include at least 10 episodes in each book (each episode can’t be a single book, for example). The 10 episodes do not have to be in order when released in book form.
You can only include each episode in one other book if the KV story is still live on the platform (it is unclear whether this includes a box series or audio as a second book)
You can take feedback from readers to clearly define additional categories to place your books.
Kindle Vella is a new platform for authors and readers that can help you earn more passive income while getting your books written!
KV will help you identify your key audience and test the quality of a book with early feedback.
There is virtually no $$ investment (I highly recommend paying for an editor).
You can repurpose your Kindle Vella story into a successful KDP publication.
Make money while writing!
Still have questions about Kindle Vella or need help getting started? Schedule a one-on-one coaching call with me right now!
