Authors FAQ

BingeBooks overview

What is BingeBooks?

Bingebooks is an online community where readers can discover great books, purchase books in multiple formats at a variety of retailers and connect with authors. Membership is free to all book lovers (including authors).


Who’s eligible to join as an author?

Any author with at least one published book that’s found on a book retailer site can join BingeBooks. Apply here.


Are there any fees or hidden charges?

No.


Who’s behind BingeBooks?

We’re a group of 120 indie authors, plus a team of technologists and marketers, who saw a need in the marketplace for a book discovery site for readers programmed and operated by authors.


What’s in it for me as an author?

BingeBooks offers a new venue for authors to sell more books, attract new readers and gain visibility for your author brand. See these benefits of signing up.


OK, I registered. Now what?

Let's get you grounded. Head to our welcome page for authors. Make sure you choose or upload an appropriate cover image (1920 x 340 pixels) for your author page.


How do I sell more books and attract more readers on BingeBooks?

Here are some ideas on how to grow your readership on BingeBooks. Also, make sure the Genres and Tags fields are filled out on your author and book pages!


How do readers find out about BingeBooks?

In lots of ways. Most of our growth has been spurred through word of mouth from both users and authors — and we’d love it if you shared BingeBooks with your readers. We have a marketing budget to attract new readers through advertising. A lot of our traffic comes from organic search, so we encourage you to write articles (with juicy keywords) on your author page that will attract readers to your pages. News publications and bloggers have begun writing about BingeBooks, and our CEO has appeared on a ton of podcasts. We're also about to launch newsletters with book recommendations that will draw readers back to the site. Finally, there are several features on the site (Groups, Lists, a private space to store favorite books and authors) that bring users back.


What are the key pages I should know about as an author?

Here are a few:

Using the BingeBooks site

Satyr's Son

A book cover uploaded at 520 x 780px.
What are the requirements for a book cover?

Please don't upload your big, beautiful book covers at their full size of 2 to 6MB. Use Photoshop or another image program to resize your book cover to about 520 pixels wide and 780 pixels deep and image quality at 50%. That should bring it in somewhere around 90 to 120kb in size. Important note: Don't include an apostrophe or any special characters in the file name or your upload won't work.


How do I create or update my profile?

Head to our author registration page and fill out the short form. When you're approved, log in using the same credentials. (Please don't create multiple accounts for the same author.)


I’d prefer not to show my real name on the site. How do I do that?

Many authors prefer to show your pen name. When you registered, we provided a field for your Displayed name (as a user) or Pen name (as an author). Only your pen name is shown to the public. Go to your account page if you'd like to change this and contact us to change your page's url.


I have multiple pen names. Can I get an author page for each one?

Yes. If you write under different pen names — say, you write for different readerships in different genres — you'll want to create and maintain a separate account for each. For each pen name, you'll get separate author pages containing separate grids of books. Just don't forget your log-in!


I forgot my username or password – how can I get back in?

Here's how to retrieve your password.


I have a special deal running on my book. Why isn’t my sale showing up?

For a sale to appear on your book’s page or places like Trending Deals, you need to complete all of the following steps. On the second tab (titled Sales Info) of your Edit Book page, please do the following:

  • Make sure the “On Sale” checkbox is checked
  • Enter the regular price (if it's not there already)
  • Enter the sale price 
  • Choose a start date for the sale
  • Choose an end date

Click the Save button and you're all set! The sale will show up on the genre landing page for the genre your book is in. 


Who decides which titles get included on your home page or genre landing pages?

Our team of fiction-loving curators refresh the carousels and landing pages each week. The best chance of being selected is to have a book sample and an attractive and professional cover. We're most likely to find your book for these features if you have completed the genres and tags fields for your book.


A book sample on an iPhone.

A book sample on an iPhone.
 
How do I add a sample?

We encourage you to add a sample — that is, the opening chapter or chapters of your novel to entice readers to buy and read the entire work. Samples increase engagement and sales - plus are required for your book to be featured in a carousel.

To add a sample, select your book on your My Books page. Go to the third tab at the top, Additional Details. Go the second field, Sample Content.

To format this correctly, you'll want to strip your sample of extraneous formatting. This can be tricky, depending on whether you're copying from a Word doc or another format. Copy and paste it into a text-only field, such as Plain text mode when composing an email. Most often, this results in a long block of text that retains paragraph breaks but eliminates indents. Copy and paste it into the Sample Content and hit Save. (Note: Instead of right-clicking to paste a sample, just click inside the text box then hold down the CTRL and V keys briefly (on a PC) or Command and V (on a Mac).)

Finally, go to the first tab (General Info), click the Preview button, choose the Sample tab and see how it looks as a pop-up on your desktop or mobile device. If you're having trouble, just contact support.


How do I create a series?

To create a series, go to My Reads > Author Access > My Books. Click the blue Add New Book button at the top right (we treat series and box sets as “books”). Then follow these steps:

  • Add the series Title.
  • Skip the photo, which is populated automatically.
  • Enter the Genres for the books in the series.
  • Skip the rest of the fields in the first column. At the top of the second column, check the checkbox that says Series landing page
  • Below that, type a number in the Series Order in Tabs field. This determines where it shows up on your author page. Putting “1” or “0” in that field will put the series in the first position.
  • Skip the remaining fields and click the Save button.

Your series page has been created. Now, you'll see a series of new tabs across the top of the page.

  • On the the second tab, Series Info: Enter the books' formats (ebook, paperback, audiobook) in the Availability field.
  • Enter the retailer link(s) (Amazon, etc.) at the right. Click the Save button.
  • Now go to the third tab, Additional Details. In the first field, Synopsis, enter the series description. Many authors simply enter "From book 1:" and then copy and paste the book description from the first book in the series.

Click Save. Next, go back to General Info (the first tab) and click the Preview button at the bottom to see your Series page. If something looks amiss, go back and update it.


Why do I see my book in ebook and audiobook versions on my author page?

If you have any audiobooks through Findaway Voices, our system attempts to match your audiobook and ebook versions so that there’s only one version on your author page, and the audiobook shows up as a tab on your ebook page. If our match technology didn’t marry them up, let us know and we’ll take care of it so that readers see only one version.


Do you publish books?

No. We're a book discovery and recommendation engine. For a book to be included on BingeBooks, it must be published by a publishing house or independently published and available on at least one major retailer.


How do you make money?

We generate revenue chiefly through a combination of affiliate fees from book retailers and authors who subscribe to Marlowe Pro, our AI-powered manuscript critique service for fiction authors. Coming soon: newsletter placements and advertising.


How do I get placement in your newsletter?

We are still a little ways off from that. Once we've launched our Binge-worthy Reads newsletter and tested it, we'll create a process for submitting your book before it goes on sale.


BingeBooks subscriptions

How do I subscribe to your genre newsletter?

Log in, click on your author icon at the top right and choose My subscriptions. Check as many subgenres as you'd like and they'll be compiled for you in a single newsletter (launching soon).


What is this “bingeing” business all about?

See BingeBooks CEO Alessandra Torre talk about bingeing on the user FAQ page.


How do I use BingeBooks' social features?

Glad you asked! Check out Alessandra's short video explaining just that.

 

More answers to more questions ...


I live outside the U.S. Are you only for U.S. authors?

We’re for every author who writes English-language books, no matter your location! For now, we are focused on books available in English, and all of our retailer links are U.S.-based. That said, we already have authors from Canada, the U.K., Ireland, Australia and New Zealand, and we have international sites and sales on our roadmap.


Do you carry foreign-language titles?

Not yet.


Do you carry nonfiction titles?

We plan to, but not yet.


My favorite subgenre isn’t showing as an option in the Genres field. Why not?

We group fiction titles into more than 230 categories, most of which come in as feeds from the publishers based on the book industry's BISAC categorization schema. As our catalog grows, we’ll expand into additional subgenre niches.


Can I pay for placement in one of your carousels?

Sorry, no. 


Do you pay authors?

Alas, no.


Can I add links or images to my comments?

Yes. The fields in the comments section of book, author and group pages are not rich text but they do support html.

  • To add a link, include the html code for a link: <a href="https://anylink">linked phrase</a>
  • To add an image, like the one above, just include the html code as part of your comment: <img src="https://bit.ly/box-o-chocolates">

Where can I see some of the new authors who've come on board?

We spun up some carousels of authors who are new to BingeBooks.


What else can I do on BingeBooks?

Lots.

  • Bookmark any book or author page to revisit later in your own private My Reads space
  • Follow fellow authors or users
  • “Like” books and authors you come across
  • Create and share book lists
  • Join or start a group — including a book club.

How can I get my list featured?

You'll notice that the default List Bliss page shows featured lists, which are curated by our editors. You'll also notice what they have in common: They're interesting and add value to the reader. So we encourage you to create lists about books you're knowledgeable about. A list that simply lists all of your books in a certain subgenre likely won't get featured. A list that contains your book alongside great reads by other authors just might be. Make sure you publish your list so it's public, and try to add at least nine titles. (Note: You can add audiobooks but they will display the ebook cover.)


How is BingeBooks different from Goodreads, Book Riot and other book sites and online bookstores?

We think readers deserve more choices and more voices. Here are some of the ways we're different:

  • We’re a platform. Authors get to decide what's on their author pages and book pages.
  • Readers can dive into the opening chapters of more than 100,000 books in our catalog — and we make it easy to read on any mobile device.
  • We’re out to encourage conversations and interactions between authors and readers. Sites like Amazon actually prohibit authors from responding to readers.
  • We’re an independent enterprise. (Goodreads, for example, is owned by Amazon.) BingeBooks is run by authors based on input from readers.
  • We’re not a retailer and we’re not here to upsell you or promote products you don’t want. We’re an online community, knowledge base and resource.
  • We give every user a personalized private dashboard called My Reads.
  • If you want to buy a book, we give you a choice of several retailers, and we’re not limited to just eBooks.
  • We offer an all-in-one experience. You don't have to hop from site to site to see the book description, read a sample, see readers’ recommendations or listen to an audiobook excerpt.
  • We provide the easiest, most modern way to organize your digital book life and show off your expertise by sharing lists featuring beautiful book covers.

Can I include my audiobooks on my book pages if I’m in Audible?

Absolutely! Just add your audiobook cover and sample on the Audiobook tab of any book’s edit page and fill out a few fields:

  • Runtime — e.g., 8 hrs., 5 mins.
  • Language
  • Release date
  • At the top right, check the Audiobook checkbox
  • Upload the .mp3 of your audiobook retail sample
  • Upload your audiobook cover
  • Add the narrator(s) and hit Save.

Where are you based?

We’re all over the world! BingeBooks is a U.S.-based company with team members in eight countries, including the U.K., Canada and Australia. No matter the hour, somewhere in the world, a BingeBooks team member is researching, cataloging or reading a great book.


What's your company structure?

Our self-funded tech startup, Authors A.I., Inc., is a Delaware C Corp.


Does your site have an app?

Yes, we have an app for listening to audiobooks you've purchased on the site. It's called BingeBooks Audio, and here's how to download it. We also plan to release an app for reading.


Are all the authors on your main Authors page part of your team?

Only those with the founding author designation are part of our startup team. But we're including many more authors whose works we admire and want to showcase, from emerging new talents to best-selling household names.


I’m a traditional author and my publisher has added my books to your site. How do I access my author page?

Just email support and we’ll provide your credentials.


Am I allowed to do anything and everything on your site?

Not quite. Please abide by the House Rules for Authors.