Or rather, how not to do it.
The person I hired loaded my files into KDP. Then I held my breath and hit “Publish.”
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!
First, I changed my mind about the subtitle.
I unpublished the novel, removed the subtitle, and republished it. KDP keeps old listings on Amazon forever in order to sell used copies, but they reluctantly agreed to remove the listing since I hadn’t sold one copy. I was never so glad to not be an instant publishing sensation.
THEN I DECIDED THE SUBTITLE WASN’T SO BAD AFTER ALL.
Anyone hear me?
Then, the day the books appeared on Amazon, I sent all the ebook/paperback/hardcopy links to my advanced readers, not knowing that in a few days the formats would combine into listing anyway. SO I SENT THE NEW LINK TO EVERYONE, and they just love hearing from me constantly.
(Now that I load my own books, I see they can be linked before publishing.)
What I did right:
1. For this first publication, Canada was not listed as an option from which to order my author copies, and ordering from the USA would be very expensive.
But I knew there was a KDP printing press in Canada.
So I contacted KDP and they added Canada as an option for me, saving me buckets of shipping costs and time.
2. I published my book a few days before the official launch date, allowing me time to tweak this and that, i.e. the blurb, author bio, etc.
3. After two or three months, I pulled the book from the market to rewrite and republish it. Yes, I did everything all over again, which was really my smartest decision.