Amazon provides opportunities for authors to have input on their book pages through Amazon Author Central. Watch out that this opportunity doesn’t bite you.
Recently, a reader emailed to say that when she went to order one of my earlier mysteries, two author names showed on the page. I should notify Amazon that the other person wasn’t me.
Actually, I replied, I am Nancy Cane. That’s the pseudonym I’d used for my earlier romance novels. However, this name does not belong on my mystery titles.
I went to the URL the reader had sent me, and sure enough, when you scrolled down, both Nancy Cane and Nancy J. Cohen were listed under Authors.
Accessing my account at Amazon Author Central, I clicked on Books, selected this title, and requested a correction. It’s not as easy as it sounds, because each title has several editions. I had to request a correction on each edition by filling out a form.
All was fine until I got a response from Amazon that they’d made the corrections I had requested, totally removed my Nancy Cane author page and merged it into my Nancy J. Cohen author page. However, this author page had a TOTALLY DIFFERENT URL and was missing 4 of my videos, my 400+ Likes, my events, plus it had an outdated bio.
All over the web (and in my ebooks), I have given this link as either http://www.amazon.com/Nancy-J.-Cohen/e/B001HD1ELI/ or https://www.amazon.com/author/nancyjcohen. Now this link goes nowhere.
Panic set in. I spoke to a rep on the phone who said he’d notify the technicians to see if they can restore my original page. This can take 3 to 5 days, if they ever respond. I hope they fire the guy who misread my corrections and totally screwed things up.
If they can’t restore it, I have to go around to my numerous sites, including any self-published works on Amazon, and change the URL. I’ll also have to campaign to readers like yourselves to Like my page again, add in all my lost videos and events, etc. Let’s hope they can restore the original. What they can’t restore in my faith in them. I don’t dare request any more changes through Author Central or they might mess up again.
I’ll let you know what happens.
How upsetting! But they broke it, they should fix it.
Let’s hope it is possible to fix.
I’m so sorry to hear about your unfortunate experience, Nancy. That is really a bummer. But I can relate. I have had great luck getting answers to general questions. People call me back within 5 minutes, which amazes me. BUT. I ran into a problem with my 2nd book, Swamp Ghosts. I made a change after it had first been uploaded to Kindle, and no matter what I do, I can’t get the revised version to download on MY device. I deleted the original version off my Kindle, deleted it from the Cloud, and generally got rid of it everywhere I could imagine. Then I PAID for a new version, downloaded it to my Kindle, and it is the same version I had to start with! 🙁 I spoke to all sorts of people, all of whom said I had done everything right, and the last person I spoke to said she was referring my problem directly to the folks at Kindle, rather than anyone connected to amazon.com. I was supposed to hear from them, via email, in two or three days. Ten days later, I got an email from them saying they were very glad they could help me with my problem, and that was the end. Huh? I still don’t have the current version of my book on my OWN Kindle, two months after publication, so I can’t read it and be sure it is totally correct.
MOST of the time…95%, at least…I’m very pleased to be working with amazon and with KDP. But once in a while, a problem comes up where things go to hell in a handbasket. Sounds like that’s where you are right now. And it’s been my experience, in general, that once things go that far off, it’s next to impossible to get them fixed. But in your case, I HOPE I’m totally wrong, and they figure out the error of their ways and put your stuff back like it belongs. That’s a much bigger issue than I’m dealing with, since it inconveniences not just you, but your fans, as well. Plus, it could directly cost you sales. Sending you lots of positive thoughts, here, and loads of good luck. Keep us posted.
Jeez, I don’t know why you wouldn’t be able to download the newest version of your book. That’s weird.
And yes, my problem could cost me sales if people click on my Amazon Author link and get an error message. Hopefully they’ll be smart enough to go there and put in my book title. If they click on my name there, it will take them to the old version site. But guess what? I have QR codes on my printed materials, and they go to my non-functioning author page. Plus, losing all those Likes bothers me. That could hurt me in their algorithms. But losing the URL pains me more.
It ALL hurts. Someone is going to miss out, someone is going to give up, and someone will forget about it. There’s three lost sales, right there, and how many times a day will that happen? Amazon needs to make this right. And OH, I would hate losing those Likes, too. Have you read David Gaughran’s book on amazon’s algorithms? Fascinating stuff that changes every day. I so wish I didn’t have to think about any of it. All I want to do is WRITE. I’m sure you feel the same way. But here we are stuck in Self-Marketing Land, trying to make sense of it all. And it’s changing so fast in traditional publishing, it might as well be the same place. Good luck, Nancy! I sure hope it gets sorted out for you. Keep at ’em!
Thank you, Marcia. I at least changed the link on my website today to my Amazon author page. If they reinstate the old one, I’ll change it back. But at least folks can get to the right place, albeit not from my link elsewhere. And I updated the bio they had, couldn’t stand to see it so outdated.
Thanks for letting us know. Hopefully everything works out.
Wow…I’m having trouble with Amazon Author Central myself but my problem is with the descriptions. Sometimes, all by themselves, the descriptions on my books will switch back to earlier versions – and when I say early, I mean like A YEAR AGO. Either that or they will look totally messed up (spaces, sentences cut off, etc.) and I have to go back and try to fix the HTML in the editor over and over until it sticks. This happens for no reason at all since I always check to make sure corrections pan out and then, when I check back two days later, it’s all different. THIS has been happening a lot and sending messages to Amazon doesn’t seem to fix it. Also, one day, the first book that I wrote just disappeared of my Amazon Author page and it’s my best seller. I had to write to them about that and it took a day or two for it to come back.
Also, the “highlights” on one of my Amazon book pages just disappeared. Actually, this happened to both of my books at one point for several months and then, for one of the books, it appeared again but not, of course, on the page of the book that sells the most.
very frustrating.
Yes, it is frustrating. It’s annoying that we can’t email replies to their customer service messages either.
The resolution: Author Central restored my previous URL so that it works, along with my current one, and both point to the same author page. So at least my QR codes and links are all functional again. This fix didn’t restore my Likes but I’m halfway to getting them back through pleas to friends and fans. So you can click on that link above now and it should work.