Changing the book title causes a 2nd edition, right?

[LilyBLily]

Sort of thinking out loud here.

I'm finally moving ahead with changing the title of my oldest romance. Removing two words and replacing them with one. Big change!

As far as I understand it, I will have to call this a second edition and assign it a new ISBN and of course place a notice on the sales page that it was formerly called ____. My main concern is getting the reviews to transfer over. Obviously I'm changing the title in the hope of increasing sales, and I'd hate to lose the reviews I have (yes, even the negative ones).

After two hours of ebook validation hell I got the ebook file into shape to put on Amazon (it's in KU), but I admit I quail at redoing the print book pdf since I do not generally format my books myself. I'm not sure what Calibre will produce as a pdf compared to what a paid formatter has done for me in the past, but it does produce them. Or is it possible to revise the original pdf directly? In theory, I could sell both editions at once, the old one in paper and the new one in ebook, but I'm betting Amazon would not like that. Regardless, keeping the reviews is the big issue.

Do I go through Author Central or KDP support? Do I ask for Amazon's help before I upload new files?

There's no rush. Thoughts?

[alhawke]

You do not have to change the ISBN for the ebook. You do for the paperback if you wish to change the title.

A paperback title cannot be changed unless it's republished as a completely separate book. So you might have the odd situation of having a different title listed in the connected paperback, if you want to keep the reviews. How do I know this? I changed the title for my Hawthorne Witch Series by deleting "complete collection" for the ebook, but couldn't change it for the paperback version (reason is I have more books now and it's really not "complete" anymore).

In theory, I could sell both editions at once, the old one in paper and the new one in ebook

If you use a different ISBN, it becomes a different book. You can then sell both on the market. So if you run into title problems with the paperback but still want the old book for reviews, this is an option. Presumably, you could sell the paperback separate with a different ISBN and ask Amazon too de-link the two books.

Amazon can definitely sell two different ISBNs even with the same title--so a rep once told me when I considered selling a different ISBN separate from an aggregator.

[TimothyEllis]

I'm finally moving ahead with changing the title of my oldest romance. Removing two words and replacing them with one. Big change!

As far as I understand it, I will have to call this a second edition and assign it a new ISBN and of course place a notice on the sales page that it was formerly called ____. My main concern is getting the reviews to transfer over. Obviously I'm changing the title in the hope of increasing sales, and I'd hate to lose the reviews I have (yes, even the negative ones).
.....
There's no rush. Thoughts?

None of that is necessary for the eBook.

Change the title on the eBook cover, metadata, and front matter.
Change the version number in the metadata.
Upload the new version.
Upload the new cover.
Submit.

That's all you need to do for the eBook. Then post on your social media the book name got changed, but nothing else.

The paperback on KDP basically needs the same, but the ISBN has to change. So it needs a new paperback submitted. Then you unpublish the old one.

As long as you do the new paperback normally, linked with your eBook version, the reviews will stay with the new paperback. eBook and Paperback, when both done through KDP share reviews and ratings.

I did this with 3 books in a series of 6. Changed the titles and covers, while changing the covers of the other 3 as well. No need for a second edition. It's a cosmetic change only. I hadn't done paperbacks though at that point.

[Post-Crisis D]

If the book (eBook or paperback) has an ISBN, then a title change is considered a significant change that merits being classified as a new edition, which means a new ISBN will be needed.

For the eBook, Amazon regards a change in title as a new edition as well.

Each time you make significant changes to your book, it is considered a new edition. Significant changes include updates to the core book details (author name, cover, title, etc.) and manuscript updates that result in page count changes by more than 10%. Updates to certain book details, sometimes called metadata, also require a new edition. These book details include, title, primary author name, ISBN, trim size, and ink and paper type.

Source: https://kdp.amazon.com/en_US/help/topic/GW7J4WEKBVU25YEC

See also: https://kdp.amazon.com/en_US/help/topic/G200736410

[TimothyEllis]

For the eBook, Amazon regards a change in title as a new edition as well.

That means you change the Edition Number on the first submission page up by 1. That is supposed to trigger the update button for readers.

That's all that means.

Changing the title on eBooks is no different to fixing typos. You up the edition number when you submit it again.

[LilyBLily]

Thanks for all these replies. I see I need to add the old title to the frontmatter, so must go another round with the epub validator. Not my favorite thing to do, and one of the online validators I tried kept claiming I didn't have any closing </a> in a couple dozen files. Boo.

 

[LilyBLily]

I took the plunge. Amazon says the book is now live. It's taking a while for the changes to show in the Amazon.com store even though they now show on my Bookshelf. Fingers crossed the reviews stay.

Just to complicate everything, I also revised my A plus Content page and manually updated the blurb page on every book in the series. We'll see if any of those changes stick. There's always been a lot of messiness with those kinds of changes. Somehow, Author Central fights with KDP Bookshelf, and my poor little sales pages pay the price in lost formatting and often in lost coherence, too.

[LilyBLily]

Update: The correct title for the ebook is now showing in the Amazon store, with all the reviews. All the blurb updates I made yesterday to the other books in the series are currently active on their book pages, although I wonder if any of these will stick.

Meanwhile, I decided to go through Author Central to add more content to some other book pages. This time around, I used two spaces between sentences and paragraphs, and they seem not to be sticking together. It'll take some days to determine if Author Central has decided to screw up these efforts regardless. Not to mention possibly overriding what I changed via KDP yesterday.

There's more to do, but since I'm currently hiding in the house because of a heat wave, plenty of time to do it. 

[alhawke]

Good to hear it worked!

Meanwhile, I decided to go through Author Central to add more content to some other book pages.

Author Central can often fail. If it doesn't show up in a few days, I'd redo the changes direct through KDP.

[TimothyEllis]

Good to hear it worked!

Meanwhile, I decided to go through Author Central to add more content to some other book pages.

Author Central can often fail. If it doesn't show up in a few days, I'd redo the changes direct through KDP.

KDP overrides Author Central. Every time.

So if you're updating through AC, and then have submit a new version of the book, what is on KDP for the blurb will overwrite whatever you last changed via AC. And if that's an old version, you'll lose the new one, because AC will get overwritten as well.

[LilyBLily]

What I put on AC was editorial reviews and from the author stuff. I don’t think I can upload that content through any other portal.

I don’t even remember where I found the way in for the A plus content edits.

[Bill Hiatt]

This is just another example of Amazon liking like it's multiple companies when it's really only one. Maybe it's better now, but I can remember being profoundly annoyed by the lack of coordination between AC and KDP. As I recall, they didn't even accept the same html. Given how long they've been part of the same system, there's really no excuse for that.

[TimothyEllis]

What I put on AC was editorial reviews and from the author stuff. I don’t think I can upload that content through any other portal.

I don’t even remember where I found the way in for the A plus content edits.

Author stuff isn't the same, and can only be done there, so not a problem. It's the blurb which gets overridden by the KDP one.

A+ is off the marketing tab.