Amazon Advantage

The Benefits of Advantage for Books

The Advantage program provides all the business, marketing, and vendor support you need to maximize the sales of your books on Amazon.com. Here's a list of some of the important benefits you'll receive as a member of Advantage:

Leverage Amazon’s remarkable selling power
With tens of millions of customers, Amazon.com is one of the world’s leading online destinations. We are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. Amazon has the unique ability to match specialized, niche, or "hard to find" products with the customers most likely to purchase them, and Amazon.com has a world renowned reputation for service, reliability and security.
Exposure for your product page
The Detail Pages for Advantage items perform identically to other "owned inventory" pages on Amazon.com. To customers, there is no difference between Advantage and non-Advantage products. Auto-merchandising, customer discounting and marketing placement logistics are the same.
Better terms for Professional books
Publishers selling higher-priced professional, technical, and medical books may qualify for our Advantage Professional discount. Click here for more information on Advantage Professional terms, and to apply.
Enroll all your titles
Add as many books, CDs or videos to your Advantage account as you like--your entire catalog! Your low annual fee includes unlimited title enrollment. Amazon buyers and distributors may not buy every product in your catalog. Advantage is a means for selling your entire backlist on Amazon. You can even list Not Yet Published titles so customers can place pre-orders, greatly increasing initial sales velocity.
Your book shows “In Stock” and available to ship to customers immediately!
Customers prefer to have their product ship quickly. Placing your products in Amazon’s fulfillment center ensures the In Stock 'ready to ship' message which increases the sales potential of your titles. With Advantage, we keep your book in stock at our distribution centers for fast shipping anywhere in the world, usually within 24-hours. Advantage titles also qualify for Free Super Saver Shipping, Amazon Prime, Fast Track, 1-Click ordering, and other features that customers take into consideration when they're making a buying decision. If we are currently sourcing your books through a distributor, you can still join the Advantage program and supply all or part of your inventory directly to Amazon.com to increase the availability of your titles.
Improve prominence in search results
When you enroll in Amazon.com Advantage, your title's availability upgrades to "In Stock" and ready to ship. Titles with immediate availability usually appear higher in customers search results. This prominent positioning makes it more likely that customers will view and buy your book.
Control your product page on Amazon.com
On the Internet, information sells. The more a potential customer knows about your book, the more likely they are to buy it. When you join Amazon.com Advantage, we make it easy for you to include sample passages, customer reviews, add cover art, author bios, and more to your book's detail page. When a customer visits your page, they can see your book cover, read a sample passage, read about the author, see customer reviews, etc. If your item already has a detail page on Amazon.com, Advantage will enable you to easily correct important details and add enhancements. These critical elements bring your work to life on the Internet and allow you to personally hand-sell your title to our customers. Every customer that clicks through to your detail page drives traffic, which makes your product surface higher in recommendations and helps gets your book in front of more potential customers.
Low inventory commitment, automatic reordering, and limited returns
Advantage is a very simple, efficient way to distribute your books on Amazon.com. Amazon has great forecasting tools, so your books stay in stock with very low returns. Our initial order is as little as two units and we keep just enough quantity in stock to fill anticipated customer orders. We continually adjust the number of copies we order from you based on the recent sales performance of your titles. When our inventory shows that we're running low on your product, our ordering program will automatically send you e-mail requesting more copies. This way, we keep your title on-hand and available to ship immediately, but you'll never have a surplus of books on our distribution center shelves that aren't selling.
Amazon.com provides fulfillment and customer service
Access Amazon’s world-class customer service and fulfillment support. We handle the payment, shipping, and all customer service issues, including returns.
Low Cost - No Exclusive Contracts
The Advantage program costs $29.95 per year for unlimited title enrollment. The commission rate is 55% – you keep 45% of the List Price, which you set. You are responsible for shipping your items to us when we reorder. There are no exclusive agreements, so you aren't limited in how or where you market and sell your product. With a two-unit consignment commitment, your risk is minimal.
Automatic, accurate, invoice-free payments
With Advantage, payment to you is quick and easy. At the end of each month, Amazon.com automatically pays you for the copies that sold during the previous month--without invoicing. For example, if a book sells in April we will issue payment for it at the end of May. Payment can be made to you via Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT) or check. All sales, inventory, and payment information is at your fingertips in your Advantage account, so you can always check online to see how your items are selling and how much we owe you.
Manage your online business 24 hours a day
When you join Amazon.com Advantage, you get access to our secure server, which is updated daily with full sales reports for all the titles you've enrolled in your Advantage account. You will be able to see unit sales for the last 3 months, current inventory, the status of the last order that Amazon.com placed with you, the amount of your next payment, and more. The online sales and inventory reports are updated daily and you always have access to them.

Programs to help maximize your business on Amazon.com

Search Inside the Book -- Search Inside enables customers to preview the content of a book. It gives customers the information they need to find exactly the right books and make informed purchasing decisions. “See Sample Pages” takes them to different sections of the book, like the Front and Back Cover, Index, Table of Contents, "Surprise Me," and more. Participating in Search Inside is like allowing a potential customer to flip through the pages of your book, instead of letting it sit shrink-wrapped on the shelf. The unit growth for the titles enrolled in this program usually outpaces those that aren’t in the program by several percentage points, so we encourage authors and publishers to enroll. Advantage vendors are automatically approved for Search Inside the Book. Read more about Search Inside here (www.amazon.com/searchinside).

Upgrade -- A new innovative online book program based on Search Inside The Book that allows customers to "upgrade" their purchase to include complete online access to the book they purchase. This program applies to past sales as well. Amazon Upgrade re-uses the digital files that have been created for Search Inside the Book, so publishers don’t have to do any incremental work after they sign up for the program.

AmazonConnect -- A powerful new communication tool for authors, AmazonConnect provides authors with online tools to send messages directly to their readers. Messages appear on the book detail pages and on a customer's gateway home page. AmazonConnect gives authors the tools to communicate with readers directly and efficiently, increase readership, and build a readership community. All Advantage authors are eligible to participate in this program. Read more about AmazonConnect here.

Amazon Shorts -- Amazon Shorts features previously unpublished short-form literature for sale exclusively at Amazon.com. Fiction and nonfiction pieces on a wide variety of topics are available in a digital format only for just $0.49. This is a great way for authors to maintain a more direct and frequent communication with their readers. All Advantage authors are eligible to submit work to this program. Read more about Amazon Shorts here.

Paid Placements -- To help you optimize sales on Amazon.com, Advantage vendors have access to our world-class marketing programs--including new product e-mails and product pairings--at a special price.