Amazon Adds Book Lending to Kindle Features

Amazon has announced book lending as part of their e-book offerings. This includes both their Kindle and Kindle DX devices as well as all of the software installs of Kindle for PC, MAC, and mobile devices. Unlike the Nook however, lending cannot be accomplished from the device itself, but must be done through the ‘Manage your Kindle‘ online website. Full detailed instructions are available on Amazon’s website: Lending Kindle Books.

Just like Barnes & Nobles Nook device, the loan is for 14 days and becomes unavailable to the owner while it is out on loan. The recipient has 7 days to accept the loaned book. This is also restricted to US customers only, though the Kindle has become available recently in the UK.

What does this mean for authors?

All books have become eligible automatically, however if you are using the 35% royalty option, and have not opted into lending through other devices, you may disable lending within your Amazon Digital Text Platform (DTP) account. If you have chosen the 70% royalty option, your book must remain eligible for the book lending program. Honestly, I don’t see a good reason NOT to allow loaning, and for 35% revenue, seems very much worth it.
Finally, just in case you were wondering, there is no way for authors/publishers to know whether their book was sent to another person, as it all occurs after the initial purchase and is between users. There is also no revenue generated from a book loan, and thus no royalties unless the person who received the book on loan decided to purchase a copy themselves.

NovelRank Feature Upgrades for the End of 2010

Christmas Candles 2010

To wrap up 2010, I’ve made some new improvements to NovelRank, so I thought I should give the community an update. I hope you are having a wonderful holiday break and that your sales, especially for e-books, have been huge after Christmas Day!

Here’s the list:

The facebook ‘like’ and twitter ‘tweet’ buttons have been updated for the book details pages, and when tracking a new book
When a book is reactivated from its inactive status, it will now take 3 times longer before it may become inactive again, to reduce the amount of false positives
Kindle book sales estimates are more accurate when sales rank drops below 6000
Sales estimates updated retroactively for those books affected by the above change **
When a book has more domains added for tracking, user pages that track that book will automatically be updated with the new domain info
More capacity available for tracking Amazon.de books in the future

If you received a new Kindle or Nook this holiday, consider picking up a copy of my newest e-book, 50 Conversation Starters for the Modern Age, for $2.99 and strike up a conversation with a stranger this season! You can even blog about it. :)

Happy New Year!

* Update 1:13pm PST (9:13pm GMT)

The initial round of ‘sales estimate’ updates were skewed very high. The formula has been fixed and reapplied.

* Update 3:18pm PST

Did a bit more tweaking based on feedback, trying to never overestimate. Done for real this time!

New Book Launched: 50 Conversation Starters for the Modern Age

I’m proud to announce that I’ve published my second book! It’s only available in e-book form and is priced at less than $4! The book focuses on 50 questions that anyone can use to stir up conversation, whether with a group of friends or introducing yourself to a set of strangers.

To that effect, I’ve launched the book’s website as well, which can be found at 50 Conversation Starters .com. It includes a preview of the book as well as all of the links to purchase the book on Kindle, Nook, or in ePub format (every other device). Of course, my biggest hope is that NovelRank users who may enjoy the book and pick up a digital copy will also grace me with a review! I hope everyone has a fantastic holiday, no matter where or how you celebrate it.

If you have any feedback on the website, please let me know in the comments below.

Add your Author or Book Blog to Amazon Kindle Marketplace

Did you know that besides books, magazines, and newspapers, the Amazon Kindle can also subscribe to blogs? From some of the most popular blogs on the web to smaller websites, you can have the content delivered directly to your Kindle. More importantly, for NovelRank authors, you can have your book or author blog available for your fans and readers, direct to their Kindle!

Yes, Amazon charges a small monthly fee ($1.99) to the Kindle user to subscribe to your blog, but 70% of the revenue is shared directly to the blog’s creator (that’s you). So, besides providing a service to your fans, you also are generating a little more revenue for all that brilliant blog content! Excited? Time to learn more.

It’s really easy actually. Head to the Kindle Publishing for blogs page. You can’t simply use your Amazon account, and will have to create a new account. You can use the same email address as your Amazon account, but you will need a different password (I don’t know why, it just does). Once your account is created and you confirm your email address by clicking the link that is sent to your email inbox, you will be logged into your new account!

Click the ‘Your Blogs’ link in the top-right and add a blog. You will need the RSS feed to your blog, fill out some info, and provide some screenshots, but the entire process should take less than 15 minutes. Once your blog is added, it takes less than 24 hours before it is added to Amazon, and less than 72 hours before it is available in searches on Amazon.com. Then, tell people!

If you want to see an example, or you are a Kindle user and want to do a 14-day sample, you can get the NovelRank blog on the Kindle! I wish I could make it free or $0.99, but Amazon is currently setting the prices.