Indie Writers! Follow Me to a Site That Pays 93% Royalty Instantly and 11 More Features Amazon Can't Touch!

There is little doubt, that when it comes to the independent publishing revolution, Amazon was it's launching point. Not that other publishers didn't pave the way and even bring important contributions Amazon couldn't, but the sheer volume of sales alone makes them the inarguable champion, so far.

The sheer volume of traffic available, the linked category searches, sales rankings, reader uploaded reviews and author pages, Amazon's site offers a wide range of services for authors that can be hard to beat, but you're paying for them. Not to mention, even with Amazon's "promotional gravity" most authors find they are still selling their books on their own through blog promotions, social media and email.

In fact, there may be trouble brewing.

In the beginning, Amazon was like a lot of digital frontiers, you could do what you want, as long as you kept your nose clean, but lately, there are issues.

• Competitors offer better royalties.
• Problems with "standardized views" in the Kindle Reader programs have cut authors revenue, drastically.
• Amazon seems to be promoting their own titles over indies.
• Amazon is also known for shutting down accounts without appeal for accusations of copyright infringement, or quality control.

In the early days, if you weren't on Amazon, no one wanted to touch it, but these days, readers are pretty savvy to handling digital book files, and other sites are offering some pretty good deals.

I've been working on one of these platforms for a couple of years and it's finally starting to pay off. The platform is Steemit, and I think it has some serious advantages over the "establishment" (there's irony for ya) Amazon site.

1. Payhip lets you keep more of the profit.

At 70%, Amazon's royalties may seem generous, especially if you come from the trad pub world, where 15% is awesome, but, at Payhip, you keep 93% of the sale price, every single time, without any special qualifications.

2. Payhip pays you instantly!

It's fairly standard in ebook publishing to receive royalty payments monthly, so Amazon is not out of line in their process, but with Payhip, you literally receive your money within minutes of the download.

Payhip works with paypal and in every case, within just a few minutes of a download, I have ready, available money in my paypal account.

3. There's also no minimum payout!

You read that right, every sale, whether it's 10 cents or $10 pays out immediately. That's because the payhip platform simply takes their small percentage off the top and deposits the sale funds in your account. No more waiting for 20 more books to sell and wondering if you'll get a check this month.

4. Payhip hosts any type of file download.

With Amazon, users can get epub files, period. So, if they don't have a Kindle, or want to use a Kindle reader app on their phone, tablet, or computer, they're out of luck. On Payhip, you can include several different variations, add image files and video, or audio, even group books into zip files for box sets and collections. The platform is also ideal for course offerings, music and indie video downloads!

5. Quicker upload speeds!

With Amazon, there is a lengthy review process, which is great for making sure your content is well put together, but if you're an experienced digital publishers, it's probably not something you really need. Your files, cover images, and downloads are available as soon as you put them up. You could conceivably create and sell a product in just a few minutes from beginning to end.

6. Instant edits and changes

With Amazon, finding a typo can mean taking a book offline for a day, or more, while the new file is approved. Not with Payhip. You can upload and swap files almost instantly and have upgraded content ready for clients. Not only that, but changes to book descriptions, titles, profile, etc. are also immediately available.

7. Set literally any price on any product, anytime!

With Amazon, you only give your books away when they say you can, and you have to be locked into a 90 day exclusive contract to do it! On Payhip, I could have ten different prices on the same day. Not only that, but I can set a "zero plus" or "minimum plus" price if I want to allow customers to set their own price! No matter what length, how many other places your book is published, or how long it's been since your last price change, you're in control!

8. Build your email list as you sell!

The Payhip platform is designed to build an email list for you! Every download has an email gate, and you can access the emails and customer data! Inside your Payhip dashboard, you'll find an email update system that allows you to message your customers, based on purchases, the whole group, or selected names. It also includes social media connections for those with that data connected to their email! So, sell to 100 customers, add 100 to your email list!

9. Analytics that actually show you something!

On Amazon, you get your sales stats.....nope, that's it, that's all, there is no more! But, what about conversion? How many people are looking at your titles? You'll never know, ever. Without paying for additional premium, third party tools, it is impossible to get this data on Amazon. Payhip shows me how many visitors have looked at each book, and how many sales I've had. It also breaks it down by each book and by day, week and month.

10. Customizable sales pages for each book.

With Amazon, you get one size fits all, and a lot of competing adds and data. With Payhip, you'll have a subdomain for your "store" page with a short bio and sales links to each book. Then, each book page has a separate URL with space for a full synopsis, large cover art, sample downloads and purchase button.

11. Marketing tools.

In addition to allowing you the ability to set promotional prices, or do giveaways, the payhip platform also gives you some promotional tools. On your sales page, you have the standard social share buttons, but to incentivize it, you can also add a discount for sharing your content! Also, custom coupon codes can be generated for each book at any time for special, trackable promotions!

12. The Payhip affiliate program!

Turn your customers, friends and other writers into an online sales staff, with Payhip's affiliate program! Yes,it's true, you can sell books through Amazon affiliates, but with Payhip, you can recruit and sign up your own sales force! Offer any commission you want, or use it to split royalties with a co-author. All you need is an email to generate an affiliate link that will automatically share the royalties between two PayPal accounts.

13. Private product pages and limited edition downloads!

With Amazon, products are either on or off. With Payhip, setup a page to deliver a product, with a private url that doesn't publish to your profile page for gated content! Set up classes, or book series and share the download link for the next segment only with your customers! Plus, you can limit the number of downloads for special promotions, premiers and limited edition products.

Like to check it out?

Here's my sales page!