If you've been around Kindlepreneur for a while you've likely seen me write and rave about book sales tracking platforms.
I started using ScribeCount a few years back and loved it, but over the past few years they’ve gone through some serious company concerns and haven’t been as reliable. Whether it's through their teams or system, it left my looking for alternatives.
I came across Publisher Champ a few months ago based on other authors raving about their abilities.
I’ve tested it out, synced all my data, and have had a few months to test out its reliability.
And so far, I haven’t been disappointed.
So, What Is It & How Does It Work?
Before we dive into the hows and whys, I want to provide a bit of context to the background of Publisher Champ.
Publisher Champ wasn’t always the fully robust program you’ll see today. When it originally launched, it was called “KDP Champ” and had very limited functionalities. Although it was still a royalty tracking system, Eirinaios Theodorou (aka Eiri, the company's founder) partnered with another programmer to put together something even more expansive. And, in 2024, they rebranded into today’s Publisher Champ.
Expanding beyond just KDP, Publisher Champ supports all of the major book retailers as well as many other platforms authors might sell on. Today it’s a considered a well centralized dashboard for authors who are looking for a clear view of their entire publishing business in one place.
Going beyond just sales, you can also quickly find your ad metrics, historical data, pre-orders, and so much more.
How to Set It Up
Creating an account is easy. They offer two tiers that are available for monthly or yearly subscriptions: Standard and Plus. And there's a 14-day free trial to test run it yourself.
Standard:
- Access to the core dashboard and reporting metrics
- Ability to track royalties, ad spend, and overall book performance
- Review tracking
- All integrations available
Plus:
Everything included within standard, as well as:
- More third-party integrations like Shopify, BookBub, WooCommerce, etc
- Advanced analytics and deeper data insights
- Smart Links to easily track sales and desired redirects
- Amazon attribution stats to help you get a deeper understanding of your Amazon sales
Personally, for the additional $5 a month, the Plus plan offers so much helpful data and metrics to make it worth the cost.
Once I chose the plan I wanted, I was quickly prompted with options to sync my account with. By simply clicking the “sync now” button, I could sign into accounts, be redirected back to Publisher Champ, and see that they were syncing with my books.
On the dashboard, you can filter through what metrics you want to see and drag them around to your liking.
What I Liked
There’s a lot to like with a program like this. To go through everything here would take a lot of time, so I’ll just stick to what I found most helpful.
Customer Support
It’s no secret that a customer support team can make or break a company (or program for that matter). No matter how good you are at the programming and tech side of things, having a solid and helpful support team is key.
For Publisher Champ, my questions were answered the same day and even simple fixes were addressed! Having that on the back end makes me want to use the program more just to show appreciation.
Platform Integration
Publisher Champ offers a very robust dashboard that offers tons of integrations to keep all in one place. Even if you run an e-commerce site that offers merch or something other than books, you can get those linked up too. Having this ability is great as many authors tend to move into more than just their book sales to turn a profit.
Easy to Use
The platform is intuitive and easy to use once you know what data and information you’ll need. It took me minimal time to get my account setup the way I’d like and that included the integrations at the start.
They do a great job at making everything streamlined and straightforward.
Marketing Tools
Although I personally haven’t gotten to test these out much, I think having the ability to also track your Amazon Ads is a great addition. And not just Amazon, but Facebook ads too.
I look forward to testing these features out more and getting a better understanding at what else I can move over to Publisher Champ entirely.
What I Didn’t Like
Although there’s a lot to love with Publisher Champ, no program is perfect. Here’s a few things that I found stood out to me and will hopefully see fixed down the road.
Syncing
Oftentimes after not logging in for a few days, I do find a program or two out of sync. To get it resynced only takes seconds, which is nice. But having to never about re-syncing would be a great bonus here.
Data Overload
While this might not be an issue for everyone, as a first time author you might find yourself go into a data dump overload. After messing around with the program I was able to see what I needed and what I would use, but even then it may be a bit overkill for an author with only one or two published books.
Who is Publisher Champ Best For?
After using the program myself and getting a feel for what it offers, I believe it makes the most sense for authors treating self-publishing like a business and not a side gig. Especially if you find yourself publishing across many different platforms.
Once you find yourself moving beyond just Amazon, things get messy. It’s just the nature of the beast. Overnight you’ll find yourself spending hours checking separate platforms, ad platforms, direct sales, and more. All while still trying to piece together what your actual performance looks like.
I’d also say it’s a good fit for authors who find themselves tired of maintaining spreadsheets just to track royalties. Yes, every individual platform will have their own tracking methods, but it’s having it all in one place that helps find trends so you can know when your next promotion might need to take place. For years, I found myself manually exporting numbers, comparing dashboards, and manually building my own reports just to get a clear pictures of what was happening. Simplifying this alone was a game changer.
With all that being said, if you’re a new author publishing on just one platform, Publisher Champ might not be worth the price or feel essential right away. Where it starts to shine is when your publishing business expands and you need a centralized way to track everything without losing hours every day bouncing between spreadsheet or switching platforms constantly.
