Help me brainstorm? Amazon (kindle) vs. Clickbank (publishing)

To me the difference is has much to do with the the expected pricing and perceived value on the two platforms.

For example, if I was aiming to get wide exposure in a mass market niche where I see that Kindle ebooks are selling, what I will do is put up a series of "tips" or short booklets that sell for $1.99-$5.99 knowing I will get very wide take rate and INSIDE that guide, along with great content I will promote either my list and/or upsell to membership site or higher-end information package.

So, you get the benefit of the Amazon reach to feed your sales funnel - in this case with buyers.

On Clickbank, you have a different set of assumptions - here you have products that are largely > $29, highly niche focused driven by affiliates that like their commissions to be higher than anything they would ever earn off of a Kindle Ebook.

So, it's not an either or for me...it's more a matter of a) What product do you have now - is it a $47, niche-focused infoproduct (CB) or is it a 20-page ebook that will appeal to mass market with some ideas around back-end products or list building (Amazon).

As you can see, you could easily combine these where you have a (Example) 30-Day Weight Loss Program for $97 that you sell on CB and you feed your direct leads with a $1.99 Kindle ebook on How to Lose 5lbs in 5 -days (again just an Example).

Hope that helps,

Jeff

Also, serious ClickBank affiliates may not be willing to promote a product which is also available on Amazon, where their ClickBank cookie won't help them, the price may be different, and so on.

Well, that's one of the benefits. Whether it's the main one is subjective.

Many vendors make the mistake of imagining that simply listing their product in the ClickBank Marketplace is going to produce affiliates without doing anything else. Typically, it isn't: you still have to promote your product to potential affiliates, to get them on board.

Why is that a disadvantage?

Amazon is effectively a shop, and retail customers go there "because it's Amazon" and inspect the range of products available. No retail customers do that at ClickBank. Retail customers end up "buying something at ClickBank" because the product to which they've been attracted outside of ClickBank happens to be being sold there. It's a whole different system.

ClickBank has been there longer than Google, and turned over well over $2 Billion in that time. It's about as well-established as you can get. I don't think you need to worry too much about that one.

(I don't know enough about marketing on Kindle to comment on those parts).

Amazon won't have a problem with you aggressively branding and marketing your books. Spamming is another thing but you won't have a problem marketing. In fact, you NEED to market pretty hard (yourself as a brand and your book) in order to have the best chance for success on Amazon.

Why can't you name the product two different things and sell them in both market places?

I agree with jbsmith.

If you want affiliates, Amazon isn't really the place to be. I mean, sure they have lots of affiliates but most of them are promoting the higher priced products. You won't get affiliates just for your ebook on Amazon like you will on clickbank.

Plus the other problem is that you can't really track sales on Amazon like you can on Clickbank. You have no access to the thank you page OR the customer data.

I'm not sure what you mean by "aggressively promote products" If you mean that you would be putting affiliate links in your kindle books than that will probably get you into trouble. If you mean aggressively promoting your book then that's different. But either way, by the way you have that paragraph bolded, it seems like you're pretty worried about running afoul of the rules, so you probably will.

Seems like you would want to put your high priced product on Clickbank, then do some lower priced ebooks (still of good value) to drive people to your product or list where you try to sell them the higher priced product.

Oh, and you can put your ebook on Clickbank AND Amazon KDP, you just can't enter it into the KDP select program.

Given the disparity in prices charged and dollars earnt... why not use kindle as a means to funnel buyers to your CB / higher priced product?

It's not an either / or scenario as most people think.

And as far as CB no longer being the biggest seller of digital products...

CB is just a payment gateway with built in affiliate system.

Unless you have super conversions, your product will not automatically attract a swarm of affiliates. You still have to market the product and work on building your affiliate network and program.

sal

The collective wealth of the warriorforum never disappoints.

I'm thankful that I asked for you guys to aid my brainstorming, and fortunate that such a respected assemblage of marketers responded.

I thank you for your invaluable time; I found what I was looking for and more.

Much love