Your Comprehensive Guide to Amazon Pricing on PublishDrive

Back in April of 2017, our partnership with Amazon changed, giving our users better royalties and other benefits.

To help you better understand these changes, we’ll be breaking down exactly how Amazon pricing works through PublishDrive, the differences between the two pricing structures, and how to apply them.

What You Need to Know About Amazon Pricing on PublishDrive

PublishDrive offers two pricing structures for books distributed to Amazon: Enhanced Plan and Standard Plan.

Each plan has specific conditions and benefits. The right plan for you depends on the price of your book and other factors. Let’s take a look:

(Note: Feel free to skip ahead to view the quick comparison table at the end).

Enhanced Plan

Which Books are Eligible

• Book must have a DLP (digital list price – i.e., the price you set in the PublishDrive platform) equal to $2.20 – $12.50.
• Since the final retail price may vary due to different currencies, the price will either be slightly bumped up or down to fit in the following ranges:

If a print version of the book exists, the ebook price must be at least 20% lower.

Where Your Books will be Available

Books in the Enhanced Plan will be available in the following Amazon stores:

• Amazon.com
• Amazon.co.uk
• Amazon.de
• Amazon.fr
• Amazon.es
• Amazon.nl
• Amazon.it
• Amazon.ca
• Amazon.com.au

Which Territories You’ll Reach

Delivery Cost:

Books in the Enhanced Plan will also incur a delivery cost for every sale. This is calculated based on the size of the ebook file and the store the book was ordered from.

Essentially, the larger the file, the higher the delivery cost. The cost is then deducted from the net sale price before your royalty is calculated.

Here are the delivery costs for the different stores:

Amazon Lending Services

Books in the Enhanced Plan are automatically opted into Amazon’s Lending Services.

Price Matching

Books in this plan are also automatically opted into Amazon’s price matching. What does this mean? If your book is for sale (either the print or ebook version) on another retailer’s website at a lower price, Amazon may calculate your earnings based on the lower price.

Royalty

You’ll earn either a 50% or 60% royalty*, depending on the country of purchase:

• 50% Royalty: Andorra, Austria, Germany, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Spain, Switzerland
• 60% Royalty: USA, Canada, United Kingdom, Australia, Belgium, Federated States of Micronesia, France, Ireland, Italy, Monaco, Netherlands, New Zealand, San Marino or Vatican City

*These royalties reflect the final amount with our standard Royalty Share pricing option. Users enrolled in Subscription pricing will receive a 10% higher royalty.

How Royalties are Calculated

Taking all of the above into consideration, Enhanced Plan royalties are calculated based on:

• Country of purchase
• Size of the book file and the store it was purchased from
• VAT (when applicable)

Here are some examples:

Example 1

Example 2

Standard Plan

Which Books are Eligible

• Books in the Standard Plan can have a DLP equal to $0.65-$235.*
• The price of the ebook can’t be higher than 100% of the print version.
• Since the final retail price may vary due to different currencies, the price will either be slightly bumped up or down to fit in the following ranges:

*Keep in mind that the size of the ebook file influences the minimum price. The smaller the file, the lower you can set your price. Here are the settings that are used:

Where Your Books will be Available

When using the Standard Plan, your books will be available in ALL Amazon stores.

Which Territories You’ll Reach

There are no territory restrictions for books in the Standard Plan. You can reach any territory served by Amazon.

Delivery Cost

There are NO delivery costs with the Standard Plan.

Amazon Lending Services

Taking part in Amazon’s Lending Services is optional, and your books will NOT be opted in by default.

Price Matching

If the book (print or ebook version) is available for free on any other store, Amazon will not pay royalties for the book.

Royalty

You’ll earn a 25% royalty* of the net sale value.

*This royalty reflects the final amount with our standard Royalty Share pricing option. Users enrolled in Subscription pricing will receive a 10% higher royalty.

How Royalties are Calculated

Due to VAT, your final royalty will depend on the country of purchase.

Here are some examples:

Example 1

Example 2:

Quick Comparison of Enhanced Plan vs. Standard Plan

*These royalties reflect the final amount with our standard Royalty Share pricing option. Users enrolled in Subscription pricing will receive a 10% higher royalty.

Your Options for Using These Pricing Plans

You can either use the Enhanced Plan ONLY or a combination of both:

Enhanced Plan Only: Any book that does not meet the conditions of the Enhanced Plan will not be distributed to Amazon.

Combination of Enhanced and Standard Plans: All books that meet the conditions of the Enhanced Plan will be sold through the Enhanced Plan in countries where the plan is available. For other countries, the Standard Plan will be applied instead.

NOTE: If the price of a book doesn’t meet the requirements of the Enhanced plan, then you’ll earn a 25% royalty from all territories it’s sold in.

The combination option is switched “on” by default. Here’s how to change your settings:

1. After logging in, go to Stores and Imprint
2. Find the imprint you want to change, and click on Modify
3. Find Amazon
4. You will see a smaller switch button: “Use Standard plan where enhanced is not available” – if the Standard plan is turned off it means you are using Enhanced only. If it is turned on, it means you’re using a combination of the two plans.

P.S. Have you Tried Amazon Advertising Yet?

In case you missed it, we recently released Amazon advertising as part of our built-in marketing suite. This allows authors to create and manage Amazon’s Sponsored Products ads directly through PublishDrive. Want to give your sales a quick boost? Try it out today! The tool can be accessed in the Marketing section of your dashboard.