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How to move your books from CreateSpace to KDP Print
Moving all your books from Createspace to KDP Print is now as simple as following a five-minute process Amazon refers to as Verify > Link > Move.
In my earlier post announcing the news of Createspace merging with KDP Print, I mentioned that Amazon had promised us an easy way of moving all of our books at once. Well, I’m pleased to say that the company has delivered, letting me move all of my books at once in a matter of minutes!
So, here is a detailed guide of how to move your books from CreateSpace to KDP Print (luckily, I took screenshots as I was racing through the process).
1. Log Into Createspace
When I logged into Createspace, I got a prompt to move my books to KDP Print. Being the risk taker that I am (ha ha), I clicked on it right after grabbing a screenshot for you.
KDP Print describes the 3 steps as Verify > Link > Move but in truth you enter straight into step 2 if you follow this route. You end up on a page which will guide you through the other two steps, with Step 1 shown as completed:
2. Log into KDP Print
Step 2 is pretty much as simple as clicking “Log in” to log into your KDP account. You enter your login details and are taken back to the previous screen, with a nice green tick confirming that the two accounts have now been linked to each other. You are also asked to move your books by clicking the big yellow button at the bottom of the page. I drew a deep breath and clicked on it.
3. Move Your Books from Createspace to KDP Print
After watching a cute scribble animation for a couple of minutes(tops)…
…I ended up on my Bookshelf. Success!
4. Unlink/Link Books
However, you may have noticed in the above screenshot that the newly imported paperback edition of Musiville is missing its link to the Kindle eBook.
Yep, even though your books have now been moved to KDP Print, you still need a fourth step: link the print and Kindle editions, if this has not happened automatically. A missing link will result in you having two copies of the same book on your Bookshelf; one for Kindle and one for the paperback. This will have no impact on your book pages or the shop; it only influences how books are displayed on your Bookshelf. However, it did bug me, and I wanted the editions correctly linked.
After scratching my head for a few seconds, I realized that one possible reason for a duplicate listing occurring is an earlier attempt at creating a paperback. Even if you had left this lingering as a draft, KDP will remember and won’t let you link the imported edition until you have unlinked the previous one. This is not the only reason, though, as I also had two of my books inexplicably unlinked after importing. Thankfully, both situations are easy enough to remedy.
For Musiville, I first needed to go to my existing book and unlink the Draft paperback I had created in the past.
I was asked to verify my decision, which was as simple as clicking OK.
After that, I was able to link the new edition with the existing one. I had to do this for a couple of my titles, as you can see below, but the process didn’t take more than an extra 5 minutes or so.
The only book I had trouble with was my Greek translation of the Tao Te Ching. I was wondering how Amazon would handle this, as Greek is not yet supported by Kindle. My worst fear was that it would get stuck on Createspace, where it would forever linger in some weird book-purgatory status. Thankfully, I needn’t have worried. The book was imported into KDP Print along with the rest of them, but put on hold; presumably until KIndle supports Greek.
So, it looks like this is what we have all been waiting for: Amazon to create an easy, fast way to import all of your books from Createspace into KDP Print at once!
Update
My author friend, Effrosyni Moschoudi, had this to add:
“Only 1 category was showing so I added a second one. I could also add two more keywords as only 5 were on there. And I had to change the option to worldwide rights/distribution as only some territories had been picked. For each book, launch the previewer, and if the content is different, upload the book again. Best to do it ourselves before it has to be done automatically in big batches. I expect the customer service will be inundated if there are problems. So best we do it now on our own.”
kimwrtr said:
Reblogged this on Kim's Author Support Blog.
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kimwrtr said:
Thank you, Nicholas. I had just completed this before seeing your post and thought I should have made screenshots and made notes so I could post it on my blog, but I hadn’t. Thank you for taking the time to do it.
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Lol–like you, I almost didn’t! I had almost clicked the button when I was all like, “oh, oh, screenshot! Screenshot!” 😀
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gibsonauthor said:
Reblogged this on s a gibson.
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harmonykent said:
I still haven’t got my links for moving, lol. For sure, I’m bookmarking your post for when I do. Will also add this to my Friday week in review post this week. Thanks, Nicholas 🙂
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Huh, weird. Are you on amazon.com or .co.uk?
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harmonykent said:
Am with .com … but no sooner posted my comment here than I got the link and made the switch, lol. … As you said, it was so easy. Just had to relink some of the ebooks to paperbacks and all done! I know one author got his weeks ago, so I was starting to fret. All sorted now 🙂
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Yay 😀
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The Story Reading Ape said:
Reblogged this on Chris The Story Reading Ape's Blog.
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bridgittelesley said:
Reblogged this on 🦉Pizzazz Book Promotions and commented:
Thanks Nicholas! This is going to come in very handy! Bridgitte
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Sarah Angleton said:
I have not yet been prompted to make the switch, but I have been dreading it. This is reassuring. Also, I’ll be saving this post for later reference. Thanks!
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
A pleasure! Worked like a charm with me, but I’ll be updating this page based on people’s feedback, so do check again in the future 🙂
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Willow Croft said:
Thanks. It’s the oddest thing that it feels a little sad. Goodbye Createspace. 😦
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Just a little sad? I almost started a new title on CS just for old time’s sake 🙂
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Willow Croft said:
Awww. That could be an interesting grassroots protest campaign! All the books could have the same time “Bring Createspace Back” or something a lot more catchy! 🙂
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Love it 😀
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Anna Dobritt said:
Reblogged this on Anna Dobritt — Author.
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Annette Rochelle Aben said:
Woke this morning and KNEW I had to do the same.. This is confirmation that my work is ahead of me AND I appreciate seeing how easily it can be accomplished. Cheers
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Yay! Synchronicity at work 🙂
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Marcia said:
Sadly, I have done this several times, and it never finishes Step 3, even though it clearly shows it has found all 9 of my books. It says “This may take a few minutes.” Well, the first time I tried it, I left it pending for 24 hours. Nothing ever happened. I’ve tried it several times since, and it sits for hours with no action. I have no idea what to do next, except maybe to do these one at a time, myself. Any thoughts?
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Marcia said:
EUREKA! I tried it one more time and it went through in about 30 seconds! Woohoo! So glad I kept trying. (Perhaps it was simply too many transactions happening at once, before.) Then I made sure to link each ebook & paperback, because like you, it bugged me to have them separate. I’m easily confused, these days. 🙂 Now it works perfectly. THANKS so much for these clear, concise directions. I was about to give up, but you made it sound so simple, I figured it was worth one more try. And it was. 🙂
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Marcia said:
I spoke too soon. Everything moved over and linked up nicely, yes, but my link to order Author copies is missing from the drop down menu. *sigh* I guess I should have placed one last order from CreateSpace before moving.
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Oh! Are you in Canada?
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Marcia said:
WAY far from Canada, down in sunny and still very hot Florida. But all is well, now. I just walked away from it for a bit, and it healed itself. 😀 Funny how that works sometimes. I’m very glad your post inspired me to go ahead and try this one more time, because, with the exception of that little hangup, it went through SO very fast and easy. Now it’s no longer hanging over my head like the sword of Damocles! Yay. Thanks, Nicholas! 😀
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Yay! So glad to hear that 😀
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Yay! I love me a happy ending 😀
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tracikenworth said:
Reblogged this on Where Genres Collide.
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Tracy Campbell said:
Hi Nicholas,
First, thank you so much for posting these easy-peasy steps!
Second, I was all ready to give it a try . . . but as a Canadian author, I’m
wondering if I’ll encounter any problems ordering author copies?
Do you have any insight to offer?
Thanking you in advance for your time.
Tracy
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
I’m afraid, I don’t know. You should be fine if you’re registered with amazon.ca, but Canadian authors have long complained of getting short-sticked by Amazon, so I wouldn’t be surprised if there was some sort of hiccup or other when ordering author copies 😦
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Tracy Campbell said:
I am registered with amazon.ca, and I also have my author page on amazon.com.
Perhaps I’ll just wait and let Amazon move the book. Thinking out loud. Grin.
In the past, when I’ve contacted Amazon asking questions, I receive vague answers.
In any case, thank you for your honest advice, and thank you again for this informative post which I’ll keep for future reference.
Enjoy your day.
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Thank you, you too! KDP support and vague answers sadly go hand-in-hand. It’s why I loved Createspace so much.
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Tracy Campbell said:
Me too!
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Jemima Pett said:
I don’t actually want all my books to move to KDP Print. I’ve been trying to ‘lose’ some old editions for years. I suppose I should just delete them and have done.
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Jemima Pett said:
Well, I didn’t delete them. Silly move. But they now sit in my KDP account as Draft Unpublished, and they aren’t linked to anything. The button to ‘complete set-up’ is live, but I shall just ignore it.
Advice to anyone else… delete things you don’t want transferred first.
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
Oh, right! Thank you for sharing that 🙂
KDP actually lets you filter your books, so you only see the Live ones. Keeps the Dashboard uncluttered 🙂
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Nicholas C. Rossis said:
You could do that. Or you could move them to KDP and leave them in Draft mode (or Unpublished).
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