When I got started: September 2009. I barely dabbled, publishing one Kindle book and having 8 sales From Sept-Dec. 2009. This was back when publishing physical books was done on CreateSpace and publishing for Kindle was separate.
From 2010-2020 (10 years!!) I had 114 sales in total – over 10 years! This was mostly from non-fiction Kindle books. I barely dabbled in creating and selling Kindle books during these years. I published randomly in spurts. For a few of those years, I sold physical items on Amazon FBA. Published primarily in Niche 3.
in 2021: 35 sales (5 new books added in Q4) I had closed my FBA business and decided I wanted to build a more passive income stream and I didn’t want to deal with physical inventory, so I picked up publishing on KDP again. I started with lined journals – doing minimal research and going for quantity. Needless to say, the journals flopped. I’ve since unpublished them, with the exception of one that sells once in a blue moon. I participated in a Q4 publishing challenge and that re-ignited my desire to publish on KDP more. I published mostly in Niche 2.
in 2022: 503 sales (21 new books added throughout the year). I was thrilled with the jump in sales from previous years. There definitely was something to this KDP thing! lol. I started publishing in Niche 1 and continued publishing in Niche 2 with a little bit of Niche 3.
in 2023: 866 sales (35 new books added throughout the year). More progress! I published in Niches 1 and 2. I took a course all about Niche 1 and dove in!
in 2024: 2,125 sales from 70 books (published 34 new books) Have a total of 169 books published, around 80 of them are good QUALITY books. I published more in Niches 1 and 2. In late 2024 I stumbled upon a group of like-minded Amazon publishers and joined their group and it’s been a great experience so far!
2025 – I’ve already had more sales in January 2025 than in January 2024 – so the sky’s the limit! So far I have 3 new books published this year (Niche 2).
I crunched some numbers for my 2024 sales and here’s the break-down:
I’m publishing in 3 different niches:
Niche 1: 53.6% of sales + email list of 7 people
Niche 2: 32.4% of sales + email list of 450 people
Niche 3: 13.8% of sales
Niche 1 are popular non-fiction books in a niche that everybody seems to be jumping into – there’s plenty of room 😉
Niche 2 books are in a lesser-known, but popular among certain people, non-fiction niche.
Niche 3 are books that I haven’t touched or added to in years, all in the same sub-niche. They keep selling with no intervention from me. They don’t even have A+ content! Someday I’ll go back and update them which may lead to more sales. And I really “should” add more books here. In the meantime, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it 😉
Things I’m focusing on in 2025 to grow sales:
- Publishing MORE books
- Staying “in my lane” and doing more of what has worked for me – NOT getting distracted by shiny objects (for the most part 😉 )
- Updating existing books with things like front/back matter in books and A+ content.
- Running “lottery ads” (very low bid ads)
- Making faceless videos to promote books.
- Consistently e-mailing my lists.
Now I’d like to hear from you!
What questions do you have about KDP publishing?