Amazon vs. Smashwords: Opinions?

[holmes_iv]

Really pissed at amazon.uk, which for the past two months ignored the changes in my banking information, and has just informed me it will take another eight friggin' days to pay me my November royalty remittance.
Is Smashwords any better? What are the distribution numbers compared with kindle?

 

[lovecraft68]

Really pissed at amazon.uk, which for the past two months ignored the changes in my banking information, and has just informed me it will take another eight friggin' days to pay me my November royalty remittance.
Is Smashwords any better? What are the distribution numbers compared with kindle?

Smashwords is very good about paying you and their customer service is excellent they actually answer your questions

They pay through pay pal, but it is quarterly not monthly. But sad to say they are nowhere near the market amazon is although if you use them to put you on barnes and Noble you can do pretty good there, but again it is a quarterly pay out.

 

[NaokoSmith]

My blogpost on publishing here, on Amazon and on Smashwords.

I don't think Amazon ever actually paid me for my 'depraved filth' (unsolicited Amazon review of my werewolf story )

 

[R. Richard]

Smashwords is very good about paying you and their customer service is excellent they actually answer your questions

They pay through pay pal, but it is quarterly not monthly. But sad to say they are nowhere near the market amazon is although if you use them to put you on barnes and Noble you can do pretty good there, but again it is a quarterly pay out.

Amazon is VERY difficult to get information from. Smashwords will answer w-questions. Amazon pays monthly, to your bank account, which you already knew, Smashwords pays quarterly. However, you can check affiliate sales in Smashwords.

 

[Zeb_Carter]

I must be lucky. I have never had a problem with Amazon. When I changed my bank info my next check went right where it was supposed to, when it was supposed to.

As for the other question...Amazon is Amazon, they don't distribute to anywhere else except to the other Amazons around the world. You can check on those sales in your dashboard.

Smashwords distributes to: Sony, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Apple, Diesel, Page Foundry, Baker & Taylor Blio, Library Direct, Baker-Taylor Axis360, Flipkart and Oyster.

 

[sr71plt]

Why not both?

 

[FallingToFly]

I've had a lot of trouble with Smashwords NOT answering formatting questions, etc, and being generally unhelpful about what is "wrong" with my one (free) ebook, despite multiple double and triple checks of the format in order to make it cross-compatible with Amazon. I've never published through Amazon, and honestly, Smashwords sort of killed my drive to put anything else up for a while.

 

[sr71plt]

What is probably wrong with your single free-read Smashwords books is that it's just one and for free. What's in it for Smashwords to give you great service on posting it?

I can't speak to the difficulty of one over the other, because my publishers deal with that, but I'll repeat, "why not both?" My books go up on a lot of distributor sites, including these two. Getting as many points of sales as possible is one of the secrets of having sales. That's why going the mass market route in the mainstream and having your cheaply produced paperbacks on Wal-Mart shelves across the world is a gold mine for the author.

 

[chaz57]

I Amazon

 

[lovecraft68]

I've had a lot of trouble with Smashwords NOT answering formatting questions, etc, and being generally unhelpful about what is "wrong" with my one (free) ebook, despite multiple double and triple checks of the format in order to make it cross-compatible with Amazon. I've never published through Amazon, and honestly, Smashwords sort of killed my drive to put anything else up for a while.

Smashwords is lax on formatting questions because the first thing they say when you get started is to download their free style guide which should answer your questions.

Also when they reject a book from going premium they are usually specific with the issue.

 

[49greg]

Speaking as someone who is a customer at both those places rather than a supplier, I like Amazon because I CAN buy books there. I have never been able to get smashwords to work when trying to buy a book. I even emailed them and was told that I should use google chrome since that worked best. I was using google chrome. So I tried two other browsers and two other credit cards. Every time I tried to buy, I was re-directed to the beginning. So I gave up. I only get the freebies there, and haven't been back in months.

 

[Zeb_Carter]

I format my book for Smashwords. Once published there, which is almost immediately, I strip out the Smashwords items in the notices up front and publish at Amazon the exact same Word file.

Falling, if you would like me to take a look PM me for my email.

 

[FallingToFly]

Thanks Zeb, I will do that. I actually DID download, read and follow to the letter their style guide, then hired one of their editors to reformat it (I did actually plan to sell this thing originally!)- still no joy (and the editor made no changes that my computer could find).

I've just gotten someone to build me a specific template which is designed for epublishing (I have no idea what exactly it is, but if it works as promised I can convert any text document into this template and it will auto-format) as I do have other things I would eventually like to publish. Just maybe with a little more prejudice towards Amazon than Smashwords, lol.

 

[Zeb_Carter]

Falling, sent you my email addy.

I have basically stuck with the lit format for a story...it is acceptable by both Smashwords and Amazon. I have used the doublespaced first line indent method before, but I actually don't like the way it looks in any of the ebook formats...epub, mobi, etc.

I prefer the block paragraph style. I find it easier to read and breaks up the text. The doublespace indent style gets all crammed together and the only break in the text flow is the indent. A pain to read when you get old.