List on Google Play Books with StreetLib. No up-front fees. Earn on every sale across 75 global stores. No worries about Amazon price-matching
When it comes to “going wide” there’s no better way to do it than with StreetLib. Not only do we have the widest global ebook distribution of any aggregator, but we are the only aggregator to help you distribute both print and audiobooks.
Today we’re taking a look at the global ebook store Google Play Books, for which we are an official distributor, and the only aggregator offering Google Play distribution with no up-front fees.
Why bother?
Well, with 75 global outlets Google Play Books is an essential place to be if you are serious about going wide and going global.
But there’s a lot of misinformation out there about how Google Play Books works and which countries it’s available in.
We often hear it said Google Play is worldwide and available on any Android smartphone, so let’s put that nonsense to bed right away.
Google Play Books is NOT available on any Android smartphone and it is NOT available in every country. To be able to buy and download ebooks from Google Play you need to be in one of the official Google Play Books countries.
The good news is that there are 75 of them. Here’s the list:
Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Czech Republic, Denmark, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Guatemala, Honduras, Hong Kong, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Singapore, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom, United States, Uruguay, Venezuela, Vietnam.
Looks impressive, right? And it is. That’s far more countries than Apple or Amazon. But the bad news is, that’s not even half the world.
And this is only for buyers. This is where your ebooks will be available.
If you are an author or publisher then you can only get into Google Play Books from 36 of those countries.
And when it comes to getting paid for your sales that number shrinks still further. For sales in many countries Google Play will only pay by US dollar wire transfer, while in South Africa although you can set up a seller account you can’t get paid into a South African bank!
This of course is where StreetLib comes in. Because with StreetLib you can sell your ebooks in all 75 of the Google Play Books countries, no matter where you live, and we have a raft of payment options to make sure you get paid.
And best of all, we won’t charge you a penny up front to get your ebooks into the Google Play Books store.
How much will you earn? Well, we pay to you whatever the retailer delivers on your sales, minus our 10% commission.
That means not just no up-front fees but no risk. You only pay as you sell.
How much? That depends what you sell, where you sell, and what list price you choose.
For ebook sales in the USA Google Play Books pays 70% for sales at a list price between USD $2.99-$9.99, which means you collect 60% after we take our commission.
For Canada, more of the same. For sales between CAD $2.99-$9.99 Google Play again pays 70%, so you collect 60% after our commission.
For Australia the payout is 70% (60% after our commission) for list prices between AUD $3.99-$11.99.
For list prices outside those bands, and for all other territories at all list prices, Google Play Books pays 52% for ebook sales, which means you receive 42%.
Worried about Google Play Books discounting your list price and landing you in trouble with Amazon? Worry no more!
For some while now Amazon has been abiding by EU rules and not penalising authors if Google Play discounted its list prices to below the list price on Amazon.
But that was still a problem in the US, where an author would set a price at $2.99 on Amazon and Google Play and Google Play would discount to $2 and Amazon would either price match or send out an email warning you were in violation of Amazon t&cs.
The great news is, Google Play Books no longer discounts, meaning so long as you match your Google Play and Amazon list prices you won’t have any problems.
If you chose to list your audiobooks to Google Play via StreetLib then there’s a single royalty rate across the board, regardless of where sold or at what list price.
Google Play pays us 52% and we take a 20% commission for audio sales, so the StreetLib payout for audiobook sales on Google Play Books is 32%.
With 75 global ebook stores Google Play Books is a must for any author serious about building an international readership, and with StreetLib it doesn’t matter where you are. You can still sell on Google Play even if Google Play Books isn’t available in your country.
And of course Google Play Books is just one of hundreds of retail, subscription and library outlets worldwide that StreetLib can get your books into, all with no upfront fees.
StreetLib. Your global gateway aggregator for the 2020s.
