Authors & Publishing
How Readers Actually Find and Buy Books in 2026: An Author’s Guide to Amazon, Ads, Websites and Video
Most advice about selling books mixes three different things: what Amazon and Google actually document, what experienced authors have found works, and what sellers of tools and courses would like you to believe. This guide keeps them apart, so you can decide where your time and money go.
The short version
- Amazon documents that Best Sellers Rank is based on customer activity compared with other books, with recent activity counting more. It does not publish a formula. Anyone selling you “the algorithm” is selling a guess.
- What you control is mostly the listing a reader sees (cover, title, description, price, reviews you earned honestly), whether the right readers are sent to it, and whether you own a way to reach them again.
- Amazon Ads is the one paid channel with Amazon’s own documentation. It charges per click, has no stated minimum, and promises no result. Treat it as a test with a cap, not an investment plan.
- Videos, trailers, affiliate links and outside traffic can help readers find a book. No source we could verify says any of them directly improves Amazon organic rank.
- An email list and a simple author website are the assets you keep if a platform changes its rules.
The page and the list
Cover, title, subtitle, description, price, honest reviews, your website and your email list.
Rules, not formulas
Metadata limits, royalty options, KDP Select terms, ad pricing and review policy. Not a ranking formula.
“A9”, “A10” and guarantees
Claims with no documentation behind them. Test them against your own numbers or skip them.
What “bestseller” actually means
There is no single bestseller list. The word changes meaning with the list, the category, the format and the time window.
| Where you see it | What it measures | Evidence |
|---|---|---|
| Amazon Best Sellers Rank (the number on a listing) | KDP says ranks are “based on customer activity of your book relative to the activity of other books.” Recent activity counts more than older activity. A title can appear in up to three category lists. Each format has its own rank. Ranks refresh at least daily, and changes can take up to two days to show. | Documented KDP “Sales Ranking” help page |
| Amazon category “Best Seller” labels | A label for a top rank inside a specific category. Categories vary hugely in size, so the same label can mean very different amounts of sales. Amazon’s own pages we could verify do not publish the exact criteria for the label. | Convention |
| USA Today Best-Selling Books | Weekly retailer sales data across outlets, ranking the week’s top 150 titles with all formats combined. Check its current status before you plan around it. | Convention published reporting |
| New York Times lists | A statistically weighted survey of stores. The exact weighting is not public, and the methodology has been revised over time. | Convention published reporting |
Two practical points follow. First, Amazon says rank is not an accurate way to compare books across categories, and that a single sale can move a low-volume book a long way. A high rank for a few hours is not proof of a successful book. Second, KDP warns that purchases or borrows from accounts trying to manipulate its services can lead to account termination and lost royalties. Do not buy your own rank.
A bestseller label is a snapshot of one list. A sustainable author business is repeat readers.
How readers actually find books
Readers arrive through a handful of routes. Only some of them are in your control.
- Search or browse on Amazon
- Recommendation or a friend
- An author, newsletter or creator they follow
- An ad or a promotion
- Your book’s page, where they decide
Every route ends on the same page, so the page is where most improvements pay off. Amazon’s help text says relevant keywords “can boost your placement in search results on the Amazon Store,” and that sales history and Best Sellers Rank are also factors. That is the extent of what Amazon documents about book search. How its recommendations work is not documented in the pages we could verify.
The Amazon listing: what is documented
| Element | What the rules say | What to do with it |
|---|---|---|
| Title and subtitle | Documented The title must match the cover. Title plus subtitle must stay under 200 characters. Sales-rank claims, promotional wording and repeated generic words are prohibited. Title and subtitle are locked after publishing (changing them needs a new edition). | Get the title and subtitle right before you publish. A subtitle should tell the right reader what they get, in words they would use. |
| Keywords | Documented Up to seven keywords or short phrases. KDP recommends words readers would actually type, such as setting, character types, plot themes and tone, and advises against words already in your title or categories, subjective quality claims and time-sensitive wording. Keywords can be edited after publishing. | Type your candidates into Amazon’s search box and read the suggestions, as KDP suggests. Revisit them after a few months using what your ads reports show. |
| Categories | Documented You pick up to three, and they must reflect the book’s real content. A book can appear in up to three Best Seller category lists. | Choose categories where your readers browse, not only the smallest category you could top. Misleading categories are a metadata problem. |
| Description | Documented Treat it as a short sales pitch. HTML is allowed. It cannot carry contact details, reviews, promotional material or keyword lists. It can be edited after publishing. | Open with the reader’s problem or promise. Put proof (reviews, editorial reviews) where Amazon allows it, not in the description. |
| Cover | Practice Amazon documents the cover file requirements, not what converts. | Check that the cover reads at thumbnail size and signals the genre at a glance. Compare it with the top titles in your category, then test changes by watching your own sales and ad click-through, not by opinion. |
| Pricing and royalties | Documented The 35% and 70% eBook royalty options exist. The 70% rate applies to sales to customers in listed territories and subtracts a delivery cost (KDP gives an average of about $0.06 per unit, varying by file size). Price changes are allowed. | Pick a price from what comparable books charge and what you can afford in ads. Change one thing at a time so you can see what moved sales. |
| A+ Content | Documented Available for published KDP books through the Marketing page, built from modules, created per Amazon store, and reviewed before it appears. KDP’s A+ guidelines bar pricing, discounts and language that directs customers to purchase. | Use it to show the book’s promise, series order or an author note. It is presentation, and Amazon does not document it as a ranking factor. |
| Author Central | Documented Lets you build an Author Page, add a bio, see your Best Sellers Rank and reviews, see how many customers follow you, and (US only) add editorial reviews and view BookScan sales. | Claim your books, complete the page, and put real endorsements in editorial reviews. |
Reviews: what you can and cannot do
Documented Amazon’s Community Guidelines and promotional-content rules say reviews cannot be created, edited or removed in exchange for compensation, including free products or gift cards. They also list friends, relatives and business associates of the creator among those who should not review, and they treat review swaps between authors as prohibited. Amazon allows reviews of free advance copies, but you cannot require a review or try to influence the opinion. A relative can still tell their own followers about your book if they disclose the relationship. Amazon can change these pages, so read the current text before you plan an advance-reader program.
- Ask readers who finished the book to review it, with a plain note in the back matter and an email to your list.
- Send advance copies to readers who might genuinely want the book, and ask only for an honest opinion, never a positive one.
- Do not pay for reviews, swap reviews, or ask friends and family to post them.
- Do not tie any gift or discount to a review.
Pricing, launch and KDP Select
Documented KDP Select is a free, 90-day enrollment for Kindle eBooks. It renews automatically unless you switch off auto-renewal, and you can cancel within three days of the start date. While enrolled, the eBook can be distributed only through KDP and public libraries, though print and other formats can be sold elsewhere. Enrolled titles earn a share of a monthly Global Fund based on pages read through Kindle+ (the subscription’s current name on KDP’s pages). Amazon’s own page puts total KDP Select author earnings for September 2026 at $69.3 million, a figure Amazon reports itself.
Each 90-day term allows one promotion type, not both:
| Promotion | Documented rules |
|---|---|
| Kindle Countdown Deal | Documented Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk only. The title must have been enrolled at least 30 days. US list price must be $2.99 to $24.99, must drop by at least $1.00, and must stay unchanged for 30 days before and 14 days after. A deal runs from one hour to seven days and must be scheduled at least 24 hours ahead. You keep your normal royalty rate at the lower price. |
| Free Book Promotion | Documented Up to five free days per term. You earn no royalties on free days. Free downloads count toward the Free list, not the Paid list rankings. |
Practice Whether exclusivity is worth it depends on your book. If most of your sales and reads already come from Amazon, the trade is small. If you sell meaningfully through other stores or direct from your own site, exclusivity has a real cost. Count that before you enroll, and note the auto-renewal.
Kindle eBook pre-orders (up to a year ahead) and sharing a free preview link are also listed on KDP’s promotion page. A launch plan is mostly sequencing: a finished listing, an email list to tell on day one, a small set of honest early readers, and a modest ad test once the page is ready.
Amazon Ads for books
Documented Sponsored Products ads promote your book to readers searching for books like yours, on Amazon, Kindle and Goodreads, and send clicks to your book’s page. Pricing is cost per click: you pay when a reader clicks, you set the bid and a daily budget, and your bid and the ad’s relevance to the search decide whether it shows. Amazon’s pages state no minimum budget or bid. Sales and Kindle Edition Normalized Pages (KENP) are credited for 14 days after a click. Sponsored Brands requires three or more titles under one author name. Amazon makes no guarantee of results, and says nothing about ads changing organic rank.
How the mechanics work
| Piece | What it is |
|---|---|
| Automatic campaign | Documented Amazon picks the targets from your book’s details. Amazon suggests starting here and waiting about two weeks before getting more advanced. |
| Keyword targeting | Documented You bid on search terms. Match types are broad, phrase and exact. Amazon’s examples include genre terms, similar authors and book ASINs. |
| Product targeting | Documented You target specific books or categories instead of search words, then use the search-term report to find which books produced clicks and sales. |
| Negative targeting | Documented You block terms or books that spend money without sales. |
| ACOS and TACOS | Convention ACOS is ad spend divided by ad-attributed sales. Amazon’s author guide defines TACOS as ad spend as a percentage of total sales. |
The honest economics
Practice Before spending a cent, work out what one sale is worth to you. For a single eBook, the royalty on one sale may be a few dollars. If a click costs 40 cents and one click in ten becomes a sale, one sale costs about four dollars in ads, which can exceed the royalty. Ads can still make sense when a book has sequels (a reader who buys book one may buy book two), when pages read add income, or when the goal is finding your readers rather than earning back every dollar. Decide the loss you can accept, set a daily cap, and review the reports about every two weeks, as Amazon suggests. Do not keep a campaign running because it “might work.”
Research tools such as KDP Spy
Third-party KDP Spy (formerly Kindle Spy) is a browser extension for Amazon book research. By its own description it analyzes categories and keywords, estimates daily sales and revenue from sales ranks, and tracks competitor books. It says it is not affiliated with Amazon and that its revenue and sales figures are estimates and projections. At the time of writing, its site listed a $79 launch price against a $197 regular price, with a 60-day money-back guarantee. These are the vendor’s claims.
The useful way to think about such tools: they turn public sales ranks into rough estimates, which can help you compare niches or spot crowded categories. They cannot show you Amazon’s ranking formula, because the data they use is what Amazon shows publicly. An estimate is a starting point for a decision, and no tool can verify that a niche will sell for you.
Amazon has not published a ranking formula for books. Any article, course or tool that presents one as fact is guessing.
“A9”, “A10” and other folklore
Myth You will see claims that “the A9 algorithm” or “A10” ranks books by rule X. In the Amazon pages we reviewed for this guide (KDP help, Amazon Ads guides, Author Central), none describes a book-ranking algorithm by those names or states those rules. Where Amazon does speak, it says rank reflects customer activity relative to other books, that keywords help relevance, and that sales history matters. Plan around what is documented, and treat the rest as hypothesis to test with your own numbers.
What does and does not move rank: a claim check
| Claim | What we can verify |
|---|---|
| “Book trailers boost your Amazon rank.” | Myth No authoritative source we found says a trailer changes organic rank. A trailer can be a reason someone clicks through to your page, which is a different claim. |
| “Sending outside traffic to your Amazon page raises rank.” | Practice Not documented either way. Amazon says rank reflects customer activity, so readers who buy count as sales. Treat outside traffic as a way to find buyers, not as a lever on an algorithm. |
| “Affiliate links improve your ranking.” | Myth Not documented. Associates links earn commission (physical books were listed at 4.50% on an Associates page that is itself over a year old, so check your account). They are a revenue arrangement, not a ranking signal. |
| “More reviews raise rank.” | Practice One seller guide says reviews are not part of rank, and KDP’s help does not list them. Reviews affect whether a reader buys, which affects sales, which affects rank. Never manipulate them. |
| “Keywords help search placement.” | Documented KDP says relevant keywords can boost placement in search results, alongside sales history and rank. |
| “You can guarantee a bestseller.” | Myth KDP warns against sites that guarantee a return on investment. No honest vendor can. |
Amazon Associates: read the rules first
Documented Associates must disclose the relationship clearly near the link, and Amazon’s policy points to the FTC’s Endorsement Guides. The FTC says wording such as “paid link” next to an affiliate link is adequate, and that “commissionable link” is probably not clear enough. Amazon’s participation requirements also bar offering rewards for using Special Links, buying through your own links, and promoting with Special Links offline, including in email. That last point matters for authors, because many sell through newsletters. Read the current Operating Agreement before building a program around it.
Your author website and email list
Practice A retailer page rents you space. A website and an email list are the parts you own. They also let you say something no listing can: what you write, who it is for, and how to hear when the next book is ready.
- One clear line at the top of your site saying what you write and for whom.
- A signup that names what subscribers get (a short story, a sample chapter, a bonus scene, a workbook).
- Buy buttons for every retailer, in one obvious place.
- Real reviews beside the buy button, never invented ones.
- A page for each book with the same cover, blurb and links.
- A short About page that gives readers a reason to trust you.
Our other guide goes further on this: Self-published author websites: 5 problems worth checking. Its email-list figures come from a self-reported survey and do not prove that a list caused higher earnings. Collect only the information you need, say how you will use it, and follow the FTC’s CAN-SPAM rules for commercial email.
Search: how Google fits in
Documented Google says appearing in its AI features needs no special files, markup or schema: a page needs to be indexed and eligible to show a snippet, with no additional technical requirements. Its guidance asks for helpful, reliable, people-first content, and says E-E-A-T is not itself a ranking factor. Google’s Book structured data is a feed-based feature limited to providers with a wide selection of books, so a single author’s page should not expect a Book rich result. Practical steps: give every book its own page with a clear title, a real description and a link to buy; keep important text as text; link your pages together; and verify the site in Search Console.
Social, video, trailers and YouTube
Practice Social media is a place to meet readers, not a retail rank lever. Pick one or two places where your readers already are and post something useful or interesting to them. Short video can work for discovery on some platforms and takes sustained effort. A book trailer, a reading of the first page or a short “why I wrote this” can give a reader a reason to click, and they can live on your website and email too.
Documented YouTube’s own pages list different Partner Program tiers. One tier lists 500 subscribers, three public uploads in 90 days, and either 3,000 watch hours in a year or 3 million Shorts views in 90 days, with earlier access to fan funding and Shopping rather than full ad revenue. The standard tier in YouTube’s help pages is higher (1,000 subscribers plus 4,000 watch hours, or 10 million Shorts views). Help pages also state that entry thresholds for new creators are changing from February 1, 2027. Because the numbers differ between pages and are changing, check YouTube Studio’s Earn tab for your channel. For most authors, ad revenue from YouTube is a distraction. Use the channel to help readers find the book and your site, and keep the link in the description.
Podcasts, interviews and earned media
Practice A podcast interview or a feature in a niche newsletter reaches an audience that already trusts the host. It rarely creates a visible spike, and it can build the reader list and credibility that later promotions rely on. Pitch shows your readers listen to, with a specific angle that helps the host’s audience. Give every guest spot a link to a page on your site that has a signup, so each appearance leaves you with something you own.
Paid promotion and newsletter deals
Third-party BookBub Featured Deals are the best-known example. By BookBub’s own description, authors submit a discounted book, editors choose among submissions, and a flat fee that varies by category and region applies if you are selected. BookBub says the book needs a discount of at least 50% off its recent price and that it selects a minority of submissions (a post of its own says about 25%, with the rate varying over time). It cannot guarantee results. Newsletter promotions generally work best for a book that already has reviews, a strong cover and, ideally, a sequel for readers to buy next. Always check what a promotion service says it will do, what it does not promise, and what it costs per expected sale.
Scams and what not to spend money on
Writer Beware (run by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America) documents publishers and service providers that overcharge or mislead authors. One guide describes marketing packages priced from $2,000 to $12,000 that deliver little beyond a catalogue listing. Walk away from:
- Anyone who guarantees bestseller status, rank or sales.
- Services that sell reviews, or “review swaps” and “launch teams” that pay or pressure for reviews.
- Unsolicited offers from companies you did not contact, especially from “publishers” who want your fee up front.
- Lump-sum “marketing packages” that will not itemize what you get.
- Sites or services that promise to move rank with bulk purchases or borrows. KDP warns this can end your account.
- Awards, “book fair” slots or press-release services where you pay to be listed.
Before paying anyone, ask for itemized pricing, a written scope of what they will and will not do, and references you can contact. Alliance of Independent Authors maintains a Watchdog Desk and a list of vetted services.
DO NOW, TEST, ONLY IF FIT, SKIP
| Priority | Action | Effort, cost, how you’ll know |
|---|---|---|
| DO NOW | Fix the book page: cover at thumbnail size, subtitle, description, seven keywords, three honest categories, Author Central page. | A few hours, free. Watch the page’s conversion and your sales for a month. |
| DO NOW | Start an email list with a named bonus, and add the signup to the back of every book. | A weekend, free to low cost. Count subscribers per week and how many open your first email. |
| DO NOW | Ask finished readers for honest reviews, within Amazon’s rules. | Minutes per week, free. Count new reviews, not stars. |
| TEST | A small Sponsored Products test: automatic first, then keyword and product targeting from the reports. | Set a hard daily cap you can afford to lose. Review every two weeks against what one sale earns you. |
| TEST | One price or one cover change, one at a time. | Free to low cost. Compare sales and ad click-through before and after. |
| TEST | Short video or a trailer on your site and one social channel. | Time-intensive. Measure clicks to your site and signups, not likes. |
| ONLY IF FIT | KDP Select, if you sell mostly on Amazon and your book suits Kindle+ readers. A newsletter promotion when the book has reviews and a sequel. | Count what exclusivity costs you elsewhere, and the promotion fee per expected sale. |
| ONLY IF FIT | An author website beyond a one-page site, once you have more than one book or sell direct. | Real cost and upkeep. Worth it when the site has a job: capture emails, sell direct, or anchor a series. |
| SKIP | Guaranteed-bestseller services, paid reviews, bulk purchases, “algorithm” courses, pay-to-be-listed awards. | Costs money and can cost you your account. |
Small budget and larger budget
Under about $100 a month
Spend your time before your money. Fix the page, build the list, ask for reviews, run one tiny ad test with a hard cap, and do one thing at a time so you learn what moved sales. Keep notes: what you changed, the date, what happened.
More to invest
Add a proper test plan: ads with separate budgets for new targets, a professional cover or listing review, one paid newsletter promotion at a time, and an author website that captures email and sells direct. Keep a cap on each experiment, and write down in advance what result would make you stop.
Measurement: know what worked
Practice Amazon shares rank, reviews and sales reports, not who bought where. To know which effort mattered, use what you can see: KDP sales and KENP reports; the Ads search-term and targeting reports; Author Central rank and follower count; and links you create to your own site, tagged with the campaign that sent each reader (a simple UTM label on your own pages works). Write down the date of every change. Judge a change after enough time, and never on a single day’s rank.
A 30-day plan
- Days 1 to 3: audit the pageCover at thumbnail size, subtitle, description, keywords, categories. Claim the books in Author Central and complete the author page.
- Days 4 to 7: set up what you ownA simple author site with a clear line about what you write, a signup with a named bonus, buy buttons, and a signup in the back of every book.
- Days 8 to 14: gather honest early readersEmail your list and finished readers, within Amazon’s review rules. Do not pay or swap.
- Days 15 to 21: a capped ad testStart an automatic Sponsored Products campaign with a daily cap you can lose. Do nothing fancy for two weeks, as Amazon advises.
- Days 22 to 28: read the reports and decideUse the search-term report to add what worked and block what did not. Decide whether to continue, change or stop.
- Day 30: write down what you learnedWhat you changed, what moved, what it cost per sale and what to try next.
How Be My Tech fits (and when it does not)
Everything above you can do yourself. If a step needs a second pair of hands, here is what we offer, and what we do not.
- If you are heading to agents rather than self-publishing, the Query Package Consistency Check is a fixed $99 focused check for contradictions across your query letter, synopsis and agreed opening pages. It is not an edit and it does not find every issue.
- If your book needs a home online, we scope author websites by conversation, based on where you are with the book. See how we approach it.
- For anything else, tell us about your book. If we are not the right fit, we will say so. Please do not email manuscript files.
We make no promise of sales, rank or a bestseller. Start with the Authors page if you are unsure which step you are on.
Questions authors ask
What actually makes a book a bestseller?
It depends on the list. Amazon says its rank reflects customer activity relative to other books, weighted toward recent activity. Newspaper lists use their own sales surveys. Nothing guarantees a place on any of them.
Do book trailers or videos improve Amazon rank?
We found no authoritative evidence that they do. They can help readers discover or trust a book, and can live on your website, email and social channels.
Is Amazon Ads worth it for an author?
It can be, with limits. Amazon documents cost-per-click pricing with no stated minimum, and promises no results. Set a cap, work out what one sale is worth to you, and review the reports every two weeks.
Should I enroll in KDP Select?
Only if exclusivity for your eBook fits how you sell. Enrollment is 90 days, renews unless you turn auto-renewal off, and limits the eBook to KDP and public libraries. Count what you give up elsewhere.
Can my friends and family review my book?
Amazon’s guidelines list friends, relatives and business associates among those who should not review a creator’s product. They can recommend the book to their followers if they disclose the relationship.
What does KDP Spy tell me?
Estimates drawn from public sales ranks, by the vendor’s own description. It cannot reveal Amazon’s ranking formula, and the vendor says its figures are estimates.
Do I need an author website?
You can sell without one. A simple site and an email list are the assets you keep if a retailer changes its rules, and they give readers somewhere to follow your work.
Sources checked (October 2026)
- Amazon KDP: Sales Ranking
- Amazon KDP: Metadata Guidelines for Books
- Amazon KDP: Make Your Book More Discoverable with Keywords
- Amazon KDP: eBook royalties
- Amazon KDP: KDP Select Benefits, How to enroll in KDP Select and Kindle Countdown Deals
- Amazon KDP: Promote Your Book
- Amazon KDP: Advertising for KDP books and Amazon Ads: The author’s guide to Sponsored Products
- Amazon KDP: A+ Content and Author Central
- Amazon: Community Guidelines (reviews) and Promotional Content
- Amazon Associates: Participation Requirements and FTC: Endorsement Guides, what people are asking
- Google Search Central: AI features and your website, Creating helpful, reliable, people-first content and Book structured data
- YouTube: Join the Partner Program and Changes to the YouTube Partner Program
- KDSPY (vendor’s own claims) and BookBub: how the selection process works (vendor’s own claims)
- Writer Beware (SFWA)
Platform rules change. Dates and numbers above are as stated on the pages linked, checked in October 2026. Where we could not confirm a detail on a primary page, we say so.