CreateSpace (CSP) and Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) Become One

Not a surprise to many self-published authors to hear that Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing (for ebooks) and CreateSpace (for paperbacks) are merging. Amazon has owned CreateSpace for many years, but all this time authors have had the ability to upload and sell their ebooks and paperbacks through each service independently.

This is the official word on the marriage:

We’re excited to announce that CreateSpace (CSP) and Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) will become one service. As a reminder, KDP now offers Expanded Distribution to sell your paperbacks to physical bookstores in the US, as well as the ability to sell your paperback books on Amazon.ca (Canada) and Amazon.com.au (Australia) (Amazon.mx (Mexico) coming soon). With these features, KDP’s paperback distribution will be on par with CreateSpace’s distribution. KDP also offers features that aren’t available on CreateSpace. These include the ability to purchase ads to promote paperbacks on Amazon.com and locally printed author copies in Europe.

As a result of these enhancements to KDP and our ongoing efforts to provide a more seamless experience for managing your paperback and digital books, CreateSpace and KDP will become one service. On KDP, your paperbacks will still be printed in the same facilities, on the same printers, and by the same people as they were on CreateSpace.

In the coming weeks, we’ll start automatically moving your CreateSpace books to KDP. Your books will remain available for sale throughout the move and you’ll continue to earn royalties. Once we begin this process you’ll be unable to edit existing titles or create new titles on CreateSpace. To learn more about the move and review the latest, visit here.

If you have a release planned soon or you would like to start the move yourself, you can move your entire CreateSpace catalog to KDP in just a few steps. To get started on your move to KDP, log in to your CreateSpace Member Dashboard. During this transition, you can contact KDP customer support by email and access phone support in English.

There are a few payment and printing fee differences associated with the move. Any royalties earned while your books are on CreateSpace will be paid according the CreateSpace’s payment schedule, 30 days after the end of the month in which they were earned. After you move your books to KDP, new royalties earned will be paid on KDP’s payment schedule. KDP pays royalties on a monthly basis 60 days after the end of the month in which they were earned. As a result, you’ll be paid in October for any royalties earned in September on CreateSpace and be paid in November for any royalties earned on KDP. In addition, some low-page count books will see an increase in printing fees when they are printed in the UK and EU. We’ve already sent an email to the small number of accounts affected by this change. Learn more about KDP’s printing costs here.

We’ll be in touch with more updates in the coming weeks. It is still Day 1 for independent publishing. As Amazon’s recent shareholder letter noted, there are more than a 1,000 authors who earn more than a $100,000 a year from their work with us. We could not be more optimistic about the future of independent publishing and this change will allow us to innovate faster for you.

Best Regards,
The CreateSpace and KDP Team

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MS Word for CreateSpace Paperbacks, Free Course Limited Time Offer

Happy 2015! Brand new Udemy course just released – Make Paperbacks with CreateSpace: Sell More Books on Amazon – featured 1 week for FREE January 1st – 7th. All the training in the comfort of your own home as a New Year’s gift. (Share with a writer you love.)

Everything you need to format MS Word for CreateSpace paperbacks. Making books is easier than ever. The course helps you:

• save time
• save money
• design your book the way you want it
• sell books with CreateSpace, Amazon’s print-on-demand company
• have readers enjoying your printed book all over the world!

Offer expires January 8th. To redeem the course for FREE, use coupon code HAPPY2015 or copy and paste the URL, https://www.udemy.com/make-paperbacks-with-createspace-sell-more-books-on-amazon/?couponCode=Happy2015.

And if you enjoy the course and the free gift, please do the courtesy of leaving a course review at Udemy.

Thank you and Happy New Year.

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CreateSpace vs Ingram Spark Explained

Thank you to Giacomo Giammatteo for explaining the major differences between CreateSpace and Ingram Spark for self-publishing paperbacks. This article makes it very clear, pointing out your options. Giacomo is the author of gritty crime dramas about murder, mystery, and family. And he also writes non-fiction books including the “No Mistakes” Careers series.

I have done a few posts on printing for the self-published author, but the more I play around with social media, the more confusion I see among indie authors. Most of the confusion stems from misinformation or old information regarding the two biggest players in the indie author printing game—CreateSpace and Ingram (either Spark or Lightning Source).

First, to clear up a simple thing that always bothers me—it’s Lightning Source, not Lightening Source. There is no ‘e’ in the name, just like there is no ‘e’ in the lightning that you see during a storm.

And to clear up a few other misconceptions—there are lots of options available to indie authors. In Choosing a Self-Publishing Service, Mick Rooney and I covered quite a few possibilities, and Mick’s site The Independent Publishing Magazine has plenty of articles on those options. But for this post, we’re only going to deal with two options—CreateSpace and Ingram Spark.

What To Compare

Determining what to compare is a major consideration for a blog post. If we go into detail on all the choices, it would require a book to do a proper justification. We don’t have time for a book, so I picked what seems to be the biggest concerns for most indie authors…(continue reading this article by Giacomo Giammatteo).

 

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Matte vs Glossy CreateSpace Covers

What kind of CreateSpace cover does your paperback need? There are pros and cons to each. Matte is often preferred for novels, gloss often preferred for non-fiction. This video and photos below speak volumes.

The matte cover is on the left. The text is a bit easier to read and overall aesthetics may be better. But the glossy cover has richer tones, most noticeable in darker colors.

Save 87% Format MS Word for CreateSpace

In the 2nd photo, the sheen is more obvious as seen at an angle with light in the background. Small scratches and fingerprints come out from the thicker layer of gloss in the laminate. However, the cover curl is already worse with the matte book, which is a concern because it’s 2 months newer than the book on the right.

Again, you can see from the back cover (on left) how different the richness of the colors comes across. It’s surprising how much more prominent the darker areas show. This may be a deciding factor if your cover has rich or dark colors compared to one that has mostly lighter colors.

At an angle, the scratches and fingerprints are less desirable. But the durability over time and the ability to wipe it clean with a wet cloth might make up for that.

In the end, it boils down to personal preference. For now, CreateSpace recommends matte for novels and glossy for non-fiction, so that’s my plan. Hopefully soon, they’ll let the buyer select the choice instead of leaving that with the author.

Do you have a clear preference? Let me know in the comments.

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CreateSpace Digital Proof Streamlined

Love what CreateSpace has done for the digital proofs of books. Gone are the days of waiting on snail-mail to see what a book will look like pre-publication (although that can still works wonders for editing, etc). Now you can get a feel for everything online thanks to the new design. Here’s a video showing the digital proof process in real time.

What are your thoughts?

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