eBook Distribution – Narrow or Wide

Once your eBook is compiled, it’s time to think about eBook distribution.

When I looked into distributing my first eBook, I found this excellent post on Reedsy: The Complete Guide for New Authors by Reedsy (2021). In a nutshell, you need to decide if you want to stick with Amazon exclusively—narrow distribution—or if you want to spread out to other eBook stores like Apple Books, Kobo, or Google Play—wide distribution—and, if you decide to go wide, if you want to use an aggregator or go solo.

An aggregator submits your book to various stores, platforms and libraries and compiles sales reports for a cut of your royalties.

Based on my publication and promotion strategy, I prefer

• No exclusive lock-in
• Wide distribution into most British English-speaking countries
• More niche, less mass market.
• Reasonable royalties
• To work with a platform where I can start small and grow bigger
• An aggregator with no subscription fees

For most indie publishers based in New Zealand, distributing wide using an aggregator for some but not all stores makes sense. I decided to follow the Reedsy Ebook Distribution Infographic and went wide, submitting my ebook to Amazon, Kobo and Google Play directly. For Apple Books, New Zealand publishers need an aggregator, and I chose Draft2Digital. Kobo covers the OverDrive library network, others libraries are covered by D2D.

Now, this hybrid approach can get messy when it comes to updates and versioning of an eBook. If you add an aggregator into the mix, you need to be extra careful to avoid adding your books twice to a sales platform accidentally. Plus you need to opt-out of KDP select—the KDP select option binds you to Amazon exclusively. Most stores will automatically adjust their prices to the lowest competitor, but a spreadsheet can help you to keep track on what is where at which price, and help you with cover and eBook updates.

I looked at the excellent Reedsy Spreadsheet—I feared I had to do something like this myself—and turned it into a versioning checklist.

This is an approach to get started. Once you have a bigger book catalogue and more sales, using one aggregator to cover all stores might make sense!