Amazon

Kindle Direct Publishing

Internship Summer 2022

UX Design

User Research

Product Design

Web/Mobile

Kindle Direct Publishing is Amazon.com's e-book publishing platform associated with the Kindle Reader. During the 2022 May Kindle Direct Publishing Summit, anecdotal feedback was given that self-publishing is overwhelming for new authors. One top author in 2019 said learning how to self-publish was more complicated than getting a Ph.D. in Physics.

The Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) website seems to be missing a significant opportunity to drive customer acquisitions and provide better experiences for new authors.

Title

UX Designer, Researcher

Timeline

May - August 2022

Tools

Figma, UserTesting

At a glance
Product Preview.

Outcome: A proof of concept that would inspire a redesign of KDP's current landing pages.

See how it was done

About Kindle Direct Publishing

Explore Amazon's self-publishing service where independent authors can upload manuscripts and sell on Amazon Marketplace or the Kindle Reader.

Publish with Kindle Direct Publishing

Learn how easy it is to publish with Kindle Direct Publishing. In just three steps, you can have your books uploaded to Amazon.

Earn more with Kindle Direct Publishing

Learn how you can get your book noticed! As an independent author, Amazon offers special tools that help you earn more and get noticed.

The
Problem.

00

A redesign of the Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) landing pages is needed to help new print and digital authors better understand benefits, processes, tools, and resources prior to logging.

KDP needs to fix the outdated look, the mobile optimization, the information displayed, and the development flexibility of it's pre-login page. Our vision for this project is to use the Amazon Kindle’s Gutenberg design language to create a visually beautiful landing page experience that is flexible and informative. Currently, Kindle Direct Publishing has a help center, publishing resources, publishing tools, a community forum, and a pre-login page. 

User flow of a new author visiting the current KDP pre-login page

Discovery
I turned to blogs, stakeholders, and secondary research for more context.

This was the start of my UX process and design strategy. My goal was to get a good baseline of our needs.

The
Research.

01

There are apparent pain points on the current KDP Landing Page.

At first glance, there are outdated designs, irrelevant information, and non-mobile-optimized pages. It is important that I research other information and talk to other people to gain more info.

Outdated pre-login page

02

Understanding the existing needs of our product

We know there are two groups that will benefit from the redesign. Not only does it benefit authors, but the redesign will benefit the team internally.

Aspiring Authors

  • "I want to know what I need to have ready to start publishing so I can publish my book quickly once my manuscript is complete."
  • "I want access to the tools and information I need to publish my book so I can be successful on KDP."

Design Managers

  • "I want designs to be scalable. The landing pages need to be consistent and meet accessibility best practices."
  • "I want designs to utilize the KDP brand standards shown in our visual playbook."

03

Web insights

I investigated KDP and author forums to understand a prospective author. We needed to make trust a priority for new authors

"The main decision is whether you feel okay trusting Amazon 100% with 'your babies.'"

A few questions that bloggers and prospective authors brought up on different forums were:

  • How can you trust Amazon for your product?

  • Is Amazon the right choice for your demographic?

04

Marketing insights

The marketing team heavily emphasized that the pre-login page needed a scalable and updatable page.

"The new page must be beautiful and adjustable. This will make us different from the old KDP."

The pre-login page is a significant opportunity to drive SEO through mobile-optimized pages.

With this in mind, I knew the page needed to drive marketing apart from looking beautiful and modern. This became a guide for the hierarchy and content of many of the page modules.

05

Creating a competitor analysis

Lastly, I turned to competitors to see what they were doing well and what KDP was lacking.

Insight #1

To enhance KDP's user experience, it's essential to emphasize key features such as Bookshelf, Reports, Community, and Marketing, ensuring that users fully understand the platform's capabilities. Providing visual representations of KDP's advantages and disadvantages could be highly effective in conveying information. Addressing the need for transparent pricing would further contribute to improving KDP's overall appeal to both existing and potential users.

Insight #2

During my analysis, one noteworthy observation was the number of clickable options, potentially overwhelming users. Additionally, I identified a valuable tool in the form of the royalty calculator, which could greatly benefit authors by offering insights into their potential earnings with KDP.

With all this in mind...

How might we create a more reputable pre-login page?

How might we visually set up authors for success?

How might we create a level of trust with our authors?

06

Building personas around our authors

To get a better representation of what type of authors we are designing for, I looked at existing KDP author archetypes. The hobbyist and aspirant.

Meet the Hobbyist Author

Katie is an author who is motivated by her interest in romance novels. After 3 years on-again/off-again writing, she is ready to upload her book but has no idea how to. Her main goal is to make money and gain recognition.

Pain Points:

  • They do not trust the website upon first look.
  • They are met with too much inaccurate information
  • They do not get the most out of the information provided.

Meet the Aspirant Author

Robert is a social media personality who is an aspiring novelist. He really enjoys writing and thinks his memoir is worthy of publishing. His main goal is to gain recognition on social media.

Pain Points:

  • They do not trust the website upon first look.
  • They are met with too much inaccurate information
  • They do not get the most out of the information provided.

07

Defining design criteria

01

Mobile optimized

02

Highlight marketing

03

Highlight Tools

04

Changeable modules

05

Informative

06

Feature success

07

Highlight key features

08

Consistent branding

What does success look like?

  • Creating a pre-login experience that authors can trust.

  • Creating a comprehensive pre-login page that exhibits concise, relevant, and important information.

  • Using the best UX/UI practices.

  • Implementing visually beautiful and modern content.

Ideate
As part of my final proof of concept, my design process included a site map, low-fi wireframes, and mid-fi wireframes.

My main goal was to prepare web pages. They were designed with the intent of being transferable to mobile platforms and editable in the future for further iterations.

The
Iteration Process.

08

Mapping out the pages and user flow

The final site map was broken down into a landing page and its three subpages: Earn, Publishing, and Writing Resources.

Low-fidelity wireframe
While designing the low-fi wireframes, I created two versions for the About page and the Publish page to get a good idea of what I should be aiming towards. I was told to break out of the old design, explore different options, and explore where to put different components.
Mid-fidelity wireframe
I received feedback on the mid-fidelities and a point was made to scale down the pages. I took this feedback by combining the Publishing and the Product Page together and distributing further information to the Landing Page. By doing so, I was able to condense more information and call attention to more important modules.
Design
The Final Pre-login Pages

A detailed overview of my hi-fidelity proof of concept

The
Landing Page.

Scroll to view the wepage

KDP Spotlight

Creates more trust with the authors

During a user interview, a notable piece of feedback stood out: the interviewee expressed a strong appreciation for the autonomy that KDP offered. The interviewee found the modules on the landing page to be reassuring. These modules triggered a sense of nostalgia, taking her back to her initial publishing journey, a time when KDP felt overwhelming. Opting for KDP was a deliberate choice because she could “be my own author AND publisher.”

The
Publish With Us Page.

Scroll to view the wepage

"Publish with us"

Introduces the publishing stages

This section allows users to scroll through the publishing steps. This approach creates a progressive journey where users navigate through the process. The decision to limit these stages to three and arrange them in a downward-scrolling manner aims to simplify the publishing experience for novice authors. Recognizing the large amount of information they'll encounter, I designed a streamlined process that eases their entry into the system. 

Kindle Create

Informs you about publishing tools

I debated between download options, concise information, or links to other pages. I chose direct download links. In user interviews, both interviewees were unfamiliar with Kindle Create, a downloadable software for formatting manuscripts. To enhance user experience, we could show Kindle Create screens as an example, clarifying its functionality.

The
Earn More With KDP Page.

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Calculator

Calculates royalties

Previously, this module was buried in the help section on the KDP page. I relocated it to the earnings page, given the importance of pre-login visibility for KDP earnings. This decision was influenced by stakeholder feedback and author interviews that stressed the need for clarity in the earnings process. It aligns with the personas I introduced, highlighting the significance of monetization, even for hobbyist authors. This underscores our commitment to prioritizing earnings and transparency.

10

How I designed for developers

While working on these pages, it's important to remember the developers who play a key role in making these pages a reality. As mentioned earlier, using KDP's Gutenberg Design Language and Amazon LEGO content creation systems was essential for making this work well on both mobile and web.

#1

The LEGO system uses basic pre-made elements. I designed using column components.

#2

Consistent headers and text to create a consistent hierarchy of information.

#3

Easy design that involved no extra coding beyond the web design system.
User Testing
We conducted two 30-minute interviews with established KDP authors to uncover insights about their initial experiences with signing up for KDP.

These interviews were both positively received and provided constructive feedback. The authors offered valuable pointers and introduced additional considerations that could guide future iterations.

11

Insights on the new author perspective.

Authors value simplicity and ease, feeling confident in managing their work independently. This insight will continue to shape our subsequent iterations, building upon the already solid foundation we have.

“There is no gatekeeper, you might have an amazing idea that you want to get to an audience. You don’t need anyone to give you approval. You don’t need anyone to decide for you, it’s just that easy. You can go through these few steps and your book can be live in 72 hours.”

- Interviewee #2

12

Goals for the future

Publisher Tools

  • We should assess the necessity and importance of these tools, considering how publishers perceive their effectiveness in terms of attracting more customers and achieving success.

Statistics and scalibility

  • One interviewee told us that they would love to know more about author spotlight and maybe if we could expand on it. They gave a piece of feedback that maybe we should highlight how many books have been published with KDP so far. I think it would be great to have maybe a counter of how many books are published to date and how many authors are creating right now

Marketing and promotions

  • There were conflicting views on how promotions can be utilized. One author said they really liked having the information at first glance while the other didn’t care for it.
  • More user testing should be followed up to see if this should be pushed.

Talk to more authors

  • I know we talked to established authors about their thoughts, but it would be amazing to get more insight into new authors who don’t know anything about KDP.

13

My future recommendations

  • Further author testing to justify new design decisions
  • Incorporate and build these designs in LEGO for mobile optimization
  • Figuring out if components can be mobile-optimized
  • Using feedback to reiterate and test new ideas (i.e. Author Spotlight)

I recommend that we also recognize the significance of mobile optimization, which is why we plan to leverage Amazon's web development system (LEGO) for building.

14

The final product update and personal reflections

My time at KDP has been a valuable learning experience in the UX process, granting me substantial responsibility in areas such as scheduling, design, and study creation for testing purposes.

Through this journey, I've gained insights into the delicate balance between the design, research, and testing aspects of UX. I've discovered the importance of time management to ensure that studies and research progress concurrently and meet deadlines.

A year after my internship concluded, the KDP team has revamped its landing page. My proof of concept served as a starting point, and it's gratifying to see numerous elements and research reflected in the final product. I appreciate the team's confidence in me to contribute and publish a professional-level product, and I'm delighted to witness them utilizing my previous work to reimagine the brand.

Scroll to view the wepage

Scroll to view the mobile version

Check it out!

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