Should the Book Be in the Erotica Category?
This is something you should ask yourself when you list your book in Amazon. If it should be, then definitely put it into Erotica. However, sometimes you write a romance book and it gets listed in erotica ‘accidentally.’
How Do I Know If My Book Should Be Listed as Erotica?
Please read my other blog post where I break down the different categories. You can find it HERE!
I was confused when I first started writing. I do write explicit sex scenes and thought the responsible thing to do would be to put it into erotica. However, after further research, I found that my stories are really “vanilla” compared to others that are listed in contemporary romance.
Now, if you are writing hardcore with the intent to stimulate, please put your book in erotica. Especially if you write about incest, forbidden explicit taboos, bestiality or something else along these lines.
If you are writing a love story that has sex in it, you should put it into romance.
How do I avoid the Adult Filter?
You can avoid putting your book “accidentally” in erotica by paying close attention to your cover, keywords and your description. These are all things that they look at when placing a book in a category.
For the cover, avoid using nudity and people in sexual positions.
For Titles, Subtitles, Keywords and Descriptions, use keywords that describe your book, but avoid using keywords that could be considered erotica. The best list of keywords I have seen that break it down for you is HERE! It’s a great resource!
The reasons really vary for why a book is put into the erotica category. I have been told that if you put virgin anywhere on the book, it goes into erotica. However, I have a book called The Billionaire Biker’s Virgin and it is listed in contemporary short stories. So, sometimes I think there is no rhyme or reason of why or how these things happen.
The good thing to know is that if your book does get put into erotica, it is not the end of the world. You can make changes to get it fixed.
How I got my book out of the Erotica Category.
Another author sent me an email asking me to help her get her book out of erotica. This had me start thinking.
My book, My Everything, is one of my favorite books I have ever written. It’s about an injured veteran who gives up on love because of his injury. Well, I’m sure you know how it ends.
But anyway, it was listed in the erotica category and it is my lowest performing book. Which really disappointed me.
So I started working on trying to figure out how to get it out of the adult filter.
In my blurb, I had talked about her innocence and giving him one night. I had thought this might be the problem, so I went into KDP and changed my blurb. Once the updates were live, I then sent an email message to Author Central requesting for them to take another look at my book. I explained that I had made some changes and would like for my book to be removed from the erotica category.
Well, come to find out that was THE sentence that put my book into erotica.
I received an email from Amazon and they let me know, after further review they had decided to remove the search restriction and my book would now be found in their general product search results.
My book was removed from erotica and is now in contemporary short stories and one hour short romance reads.
Do you have any questions?
I hope this helped you understand how to get your book of of erotica if it was “accidentally” placed there. Did I answer all the questions you have on this topic? If not, send me an email, I would love to chat and help!
