When you self-publish your book, you’ll likely want to do so at Kindle Direct Publishing so that it appears on Amazon.com. KindleDP is a division of Amazon.
The first step is to create an account at KindleDP. Begin by going to https://kdp.amazon.com.
A new page will pop up on your screen. Look for two yellow ovals in the upper right side of the page.
If you have an Amazon.com account, click the top yellow oval. You can sign in using your Amazon.com account. As KindleDP is owned by Amazon.com, linking the accounts is a great way for a seamless experience once you publish your book.
If you don’t have an Amazon.com account, click the bottom yellow oval. You’ll have to sign up using either your email or a mobile phone number where you can get texts. Once you do that, you’ll be asked to confirm your identity, usually by responding to an email or by typing in numbers texted to your phone.
In both cases, sometimes you have to go through additional steps just to prove you’re not a bot. A common one is to retype a combination of letters and numbers that a bot can’t easily read or to click on boxes containing some object like stoplights, a task bots are poor at doing.
Even if you have an Amazon.com account, you still may want to create an account that is separate from your existing one. Usually this is done for tax purposes – your Amazon account is something you use personally but you want your KindleDP account to be connected to your company. If you go this route, you’ll need an email and probably a mobile phone number that is different than the one you used for your personal Amazon account.
Once KindleDP is satisfied that you really are who you say you are and that you’re not a bot, you’ll be asked to read and check that you agree with its Conditions of Use. You can read it if you like. If you don’t agree with it, though, that’s tough – unless you click the box saying you do, you can’t use KindleDP.
While lawyers and some outlier authors will disagree, the reality is you don’t have much to worry about. Amazon wants to sell books, so it’s not in the business of ripping you off. In fact, compared to other companies, you’ll probably get your best royalties and distribution services through KindleDP. You also get to keep the rights to your book, something you lose when you go with a traditional publisher and often with a small, little known print on demand company. But it’s up to you. If you don’t like the conditions of use, you’ll just need to find a new publisher.
Once you’ve set up your account, the screen automatically will go to your Bookshelf. This is a library of all the books that you’ve published with KindleDP. Right now, it should be empty because you haven’t uploaded anything yet.
Next, you’ll want to enter your author, payment, and tax information.
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My name is Rob Bignell. I’m an affordable, professional editor who runs Inventing Reality Editing Service, which meets the manuscript needs of writers both new and published. I also offer a variety of self-publishing services. During the past 15 years, I’ve helped more than 400 novelists and nonfiction authors obtain their publishing dreams at reasonable prices. I’m also the author of the Storytelling 101 writing guidebooks, four nonfiction hiking guidebook series, and the literary novel Windmill. Several of my short stories in the literary and science fiction genres also have been published.
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