book description

No One is Immune to Scams

Posted on by Brenda Poulos
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Last week, I had a terrible online experience. I am sharing what happened in hopes that you will be able to escape this kind of scam.

I went on my product page on Amazon books (you should do this periodically, authors) to make sure everything was still working properly.

It wasn’t.

Somehow, someone had been able to access my site. There among my books, was a fake book cover, with an unknown author name, and a book description copied from a book I published in 2018.

I notified both KDP and Amazon. Each told me that it was the other that I needed to seek help from. Each sent me links of articles to read and forms to fill out. They asked for screenshots, isbn numbers, and so on.

I ended up doing my own research, finding their fake publishing company name in Indonesia and booksellers in Florida responsible for selling the fake book (however, they are now listed as out of business).

I’m not sure what will happen with all of this, but I encourage you to be vigilant in checking your own site(s) on a routine basis. 

No one is immune to scams.

Choosing Your Subtitle

Posted on by Brenda Poulos

A subtitle should tell the consumer additional information that cannot be conveyed by the title alone.

You’ll want to choose one, if possible, because it gives you an additional chance to add more keywords on Amazon.

Keywords are simply the words a person would type in the search bar to identify the kind of book they are looking for.

Authors are allowed to choose ten keywords. These will come from the title, subtitle, back cover blurb, and book description you write for your Amazon sales page.

I wrote down dozens of ideas for the subtitle for my soon-to-be-released book, Justice for Jessie. I decided on Forgiving the Unforgivable because it further described my book, along with being “catchy”—at least to me. It was also short and sweet, making it more memorable. 

Remember: Your subtitle should represent the genre in which you write, mine being Christian Suspense.