How I got kicked out of Kindle Unlimited and (almost) lost $50,000 overnight

Update – I’m back in! I raised enough of a fuss that they changed their ruling – read to the bottom to find out what happened.

For the last year, I’ve been telling everyone they should be in KU, because it’s the best and easiest way for new authors to make money with their writing. When other publishing gurus warned against putting all my eggs in one basket, or the danger that Amazon could change something someday that would screw up my income, I smiled and counted my money.

Despite skepticism about the way I’ve been publishing and building my platform, my income grew quickly, and for the first time in years I started to feel relaxed, as I had passive income coming in with very little work that was enough to support my wife and I.

This month I probably would have broken my goal of $10k/month from Kindle sales. I’m about halfway there, on the 15th of May. 

Unfortunately… Amazon is a jealous, vindictive God.

I had one old book in my KDP account I thought wasn’t on any other platform, so I put it in KDP Select. 2 days later I got an email saying that book was found on Google Play (no idea how it got there, but might have done it years ago). I think it was still on my Smashwords dashboard, which I haven’t logged into for years – I’d unchecked all the other options but probably had no idea what Google Play was at the time.

So they are going to kick ALL my books out of Kindle Unlimited for one year – which means the $200+ in page reads I’ve gotten consistently for the past 3 months will disappear in a few days. For context, in the image above, all that blue will go away (pagereads), leaving me with just the red (books sold).

Without KU, my income will go from $300 a day to $100 a day (From $10K to $3K a month… so I’ll actually probably lose much more than $50K over the next year.)

IF I’m really being kicked out, and I can’t beg my way back in, I’ll need to spend the next few months taking my books wide and doing tons of promotion to build up non-amazon streams to try and replace the KU income I’m losing.

I’d rather NOT do that, because it’s a pain in the ass, and I’ve been a loud advocate of new authors going all in with KU. It sucks they’re booting me out for a mistake that lasted two days (the book on Google Play was taken down immediately, by the way – and they know it – so that’s not the issue).

But I also understand they’re a huge company dealing with tens of thousands of authors and employees probably all have to follow a strict rulebook. This is exactly why people say not to go all in with Amazon, and I get that (but I don’t think you should limit your earnings today based on what theoretically could happen tomorrow).

This isn’t a cautionary tale warning you against Amazon. I still seriously think new authors will see better results going all in with KU. Only a few authors make money wide, but it’s harder and you really need to know what you’re doing, have a big backlist, and have a platform of followers. Plus, this is only happening to me because this isn’t my first warning – I do lots of experiments with my books and screw up some times.

I’m still hoping to be forgiven, but if that doesn’t happen I’ll start moving all my books wide to recoup as much income as I can. Luckily this won’t be so difficult for me, because I have a big list of active fans, but it still sucks because I’d rather just be writing more book and publishing on KU for maximum income. 

Here’s the first letter I wrote to Jeff Bezos after KDP Support gave me a firm “no.”

Dear Amazon…

I’ve been a long time, active supporter of KU – I have an email list of 35K authors I routinely tell them KU is the best option for new writers. My KU income has grown to 8K a month and would have passed 10K this month… except I made a mistake with an old book and am getting kicked out. I put up a book I published years ago into KU, because I was sure it wasn’t being sold anywhere else, however Amazon found a version on Google Play I didn’t know was even there.

I got Google Play to delete it immediately. The crossover happened for only a couple days. Nevertheless, KDP support is refusing to forgive the mistake and insists ALL of my books will be pulled from KU for the next year (losing me 50K in income). I’ve spent all my time making videos about why KU is the best choice, and why the argument “not to put all your eggs in one basket” is invalid, and now I’m being proved wrong. If forced to leave, I’ll have to spend the next year teaching authors about going wide and building stable income on ibooks, kobo and other platforms instead of KU. My resources reach hundreds of thousands of authors and I have over 600,000 views on YouTube.

I’m hoping I can continue to be a loyal KU supporter, rather than being kicked out and singing a different tune that will impact thousands of authors. 

Please help! Derek Murphy

Dear Amazon #2

Here’s my last ditch attempt to change their minds…

Dear Amazon, I found out this week that all my books will be removed from KU, because I had a duplicate copy of an old book on Google Play. I understand the reasons, and even though it was an accident and the book was immediately removed from Google Play, I understand why you need to follow the rules in most cases.

But to make sure you have all the relevant details, here are some additional reasons you should let me continue to use KU to promote my books. First, I’m one of a handful of self-publishing experts with a large following. I have over 600K YouTube views and 50K active followers on my email list. I’ve been featured on CNN and over a dozen publishing podcasts, and have a collective reach of over a million authors. For the past few years, I’ve been strongly recommending KU to every new author (most of my colleagues teach authors to go wide instead.) I don’t think it’s a stretch to say I’ve been personally responsible for thousands of new authors enrolling their books in KU.

My success in KU – getting up to 10K/month in income in less than 14 months – would have been a beacon for all writers and would have driven tons of authors into the program for years to come. Instead, I’m afraid my getting booted from KU will have the opposite affect and be used by naysayers as a cautionary tale of why authors should avoid KU.

Plus, once I’m kicked out, I’ll be forced to go wide and build up my income on iBooks, Kobo and Nook. I’ll spend the next year focusing on marketing books on those platforms, and I’ll build up my income elsewhere. That means all of the new visitors to my publishing related websites – over 50,000 a month – will be encouraged to go wide instead of putting their books into Kindle Unlimited.

The self-publishing community is small, and new authors often arrive on one of my sites very early in their journey. As I said, the majority of self-publishing experts already warn against KU. I was one of the few supporters – and it feels especially ironic to suffer the back hand of Amazon’s brutally impersonal policies after I’ve spent so much time convincing authors to trust Amazon with their writing.

*Not to mention my list of 35K young adult readers just becoming consumers who I was previously sending towards Amazon in droves, which will now be sent to other platforms.*

I made a mistake, which was immediately rectified, and I think having all my books pulled from KU for one year (losing over $50,000 in earnings) is an overly severe punishment. If Amazon decides to fine me $50K despite this apology, I’ll spend the next year helping authors publish elsewhere instead – and we both lose. I’d prefer that didn’t happen, as I am otherwise a very happy KU supporter and advocate.

Sincerely,
Derek Murphy

 Youtube Channel

My Website

Update 1

The original email said I’d be kicked out within 5 days.

It’s been about 5 days and my books are still in KU, even though I’ve had no positive responses from KDP or Amazon.

My page reads have dropped to under 30K/day – which is less than they’ve been for the last three weeks – so that could indicate my books are being delisted from the program, or it could be normal market fluctuations. Hard to tell at this point.

I’m operating under the assumption that my books will be kicked out and I’ll need to rebuild the lost income on other platforms – which is fine. It’s more work, but it might be better for me anyway. Here’s what my plan looks like:

• Do some aggressive listbuilding and grow my fans list to 50K
• Make all my books free on all platforms for a couple weeks
• Ask list to post reviews on ALL platforms until I have 100+ reviews on each book, everywhere
• Publish 5 more books by the end of this summer.
• Build natural traffic to 500 visitors a day to fiction blog

Done well, I should be at least at 5K/month, and hopefully up to 10K a month in book sales (in which case, I’m not sure I’d really even want to go back into KU after my year banishment is over). It’s more work and harder to keep track of everything, but at least I would’t have to worry about angering a monotheistic deity of commerce; I know none of this is Amazon’s fault – I’m the one who broke the rules – but since I do a lot of experimentation with my books and platform, maybe I need to serve a less demanding and exacting publishing platform, who won’t enforce unilateral punishment for accidental rule infringements.

I’m incredibly grateful to be making ANY money with my fiction; and I’m almost incredulous that I have nearly 1000 positive reviews after only a year and a half of publishing fiction. So this isn’t exactly a travesty of justice. I’m very happy with where I am, KU or no, and it will be an exciting challenge to see how fast I can bounce back from this.

I was just starting to think I might be able to hit six-figures this year with writing, now it’s going to take a bit longer, but like I said – still grateful. This is good money. My plan is to publish 20 novels and hit 50K a month in the next three years.

PS) I’ve been watching Michael Beckwith videos; one idea I like is asking “What idea is the universe trying to express through me? What is seeking to emerge in my life? What is the universe up to?” … then listening for the answer. I used to be a listener, but I’ve mostly decided the Universe has no “goal” for my life – it just says “yes” to the goals I set for myself.

But it’s possible being in KU conflicted with the bigger goals I’d set for myself. Listening without deciding allows my mind to drift to what I REALLY want out of life – the big stuff.

After listening, Michael asks, 

“What must I become, to manifest the vision that I am beginning to see?”

This resonates with me, because for the past month or two, I’ve been growing lazy and complacent. My fiction was earning good money with very little effort. I didn’t need to work harder or push myself. I’ve been eating junk food and watching TV all day because screw it, can’t I just take a couple months off? My goal was 10K a month with fiction and I was getting close.

However, my actual goals, what I really want in life, are bigger and still pretty far away. I want a huge cabin in the woods; a camp for writers; a castle. I want savings and investments and security, I want to protect my future and health from unforeseen changes. 

So I’m going to focus less on the specifics of my small, limited goals (finish a course, make X amount of money) and focus more on the lifestyle I want to experience in my life. I’m not a hustler, but I also won’t feel good about myself if I spend all day and do nothing to build value.

Another mantra I love is “Only Good Lies Before Me.”

So now I’ll start making it true, by working my ass off and increasing my book sales to make up for my loss in pagereads income from KU.

Update 2 (I’m back in!)

I got two letters from Amazon today. The first was this:

Final comments

I was able to get them to change their minds because I’ve built a large platform and got it in front of someone who could make a reverse decision. I don’t use my notoriety for much so it’s nice that it worked in this case. And I am glad they gave me another shot.

Yes, going wide would be more stable and I could probably build up the income – but it takes more work and managing, and it’s much harder without a large body of work (I still have only a handful of books, when I get to 20 I might start publishing differently). A friend sent me this link on the CreativePenn, about how Liliana Hart publishes wide and does well – but all I took from that article was that Hugh Howey stayed in KU, made a small fortune and disappeared over the horizon on his boat. I don’t want to be a full-time working author, I want to casually earn a good income while on vacation.

That said, in the letter above, they say if it happens again, I will be “suspended from re-enrollment into the program.”
So instead of just a year, it might be for good next time. I’m going to be as careful as I can, and I’ve definitely learned my lesson, but I also screw up a lot. Hopefully it doesn’t happen soon, which would be embarrassing.

Which is better? For me personally, KU is better and easier to see profit faster.
For established authors who have 20+ books and are depending on a stable income, going wide is probably smarter – and I may do that in the future, and I look forward to doing it and doing it well. It’s just not the right time for me. Right now I need to be writing my ass off to build up my backlist before I do something else to anger Amazon.

PS) Thanks for all the support! And thank you Amazon for listening and being flexible!

Read these next:

• How to use BookFunnel and Instafreebie if you’re in Kindle Unlimited.
• How to write a blurb, back cover copy or sales description for your book that converts

LEARN FROM MY MISTAKES!

Go from zero platform to #1 bestseller in 90 days or less with my book, Guerrilla Publishing. Download now for free and get access to my new companion workbook and book launch roadmap (this is advanced stuff you won’t find anywhere else).

The 3 secrets to book marketing, and a haunted castle tour. Totally free. Get it here.

Derek Murphy

I’m a philosophy dropout with a PhD in Literature. I covet a cabin full of cats, where I can write fantasy novels to pay for my cake addiction. Sometimes I live in castles.