On Saturday Amazon.com deleted the Amazon Connect blogs that authors use to post commentary on the product pages of their books, and the company posted a cryptic message that the program was undergoing “changes.”
UPDATE: I’ve been informed that Amazon notified some publishers via e-mail last week that Connect would be upgraded and restored by Wednesday.
On author profile pages like mine, the Amazon connect posts currently don’t appear at all. Before the weekend, the most recent blog posts had appeared at the top of the profile page. On the author profiles, there’s no explanation for the deleted blog posts. However, after navigating to the URL for a Connect blog, the the following message appears:
Amazon’s blogs are temporarily unavailable. We’re making big changes, so please try again later.
Amazon Connect has been highly popular with authors, many of whom use the program to appeal directly to their audience from Amazon’s product page.
It’s possible that Amazon is clarifying the rules for acceptable content for Connect posts. For example, many authors have been posting lengthy, unlicensed quotations from book reviews published elsewhere. Amazon requires such reviews to be abbreviated to 20 words or less to fit its interpretation of the “Fair Use” exemption under copyright law.
Also, within the past week, some authors have also reported that customer reviews have been deleted from their book pages, although it’s unclear whether the deletions are simply a technical glitch or part of Amazon’s revamping of the Connect program. In some cases, authors suspect that Amazon has begun deleting reviews for books which contain wording deemed “inappropriate.”
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10 Comments
Steve,
They yanked ALL of my reviews. One title, from 2001, lost every review its ever had. I'm seriously distressed and waiting to hear back on what happened.
Hmmm. I've know I didn't lose any book reviews for my three books.
Going to go check my Amazon Connect blog now.
Thanks for the update Steve. After I read your post I want to my own page and sure enough the blogs were gone. It was somewhat comforting to know that i was not alone in this. I raced over to the "You on a Diet" page, s those guys really know how to work a blog. If you haven't seen their book detail pages, they have one of the most entertaining blogs I have seen. They use full color, links, and progress reports from their readers. Someone taught them well. Well, I guess I can hold on until Wednesday to decide what to do next as far as blogs are concerned. Fortunately there is a never-ending list of ways to promote one's book(s) on Amazon, so I imagine we will all be a bit busy until the blogs come back in their new(?) form.
Wow, Steve, I'm so glad I stumbled on your blog post!!! I have been so ticked with Amazon the past couple of days–Amazon deleted ALL of my reviews.
I don't recall exactly how many but at least 90+ reviews, many of them for books that other publishers or authors asked me to review.
I have been struggling to get something other than a crappy form letter response from Amazon. In the first reply they said all of my reviews (dating back to 2003) were deleted because they were "inappropriate", but they failed to say how, even when I asked them.
The second reply said all my reviews "did not adhere to the guidelines". I asked them which rule(s) I'd broken. No reply, just the same "inappropriate" excuse.
I've read and re-read those guidelines at least a dozen times now, even printed them out, and still don't see where my reviews went against them. In fact my reviews were often very different from each other, even in how I signed them.
None of my reviews were nasty or negative. All were 3-5 stars, always respectful of the author (since I'm one too). If I don't like a book, I don't review it. And I only give honest reviews and stars accordingly. I won't write fake reviews for anyone!
Finally I got through by phone and a very nice customer service rep explained to me that the review dept. doesn't accept phone calls. I explained my situation, and how stressed I am that all my hard work has been deleted, and she put me on hold while she asked someone.
When she came back she told me that the review dept. said my reviews were all deleted because authors can't ask other authors to review their books.
What the–?
The practice of authors reviewing other authors has been going on for decades and there are hundreds of thousands of authors on Amazon who write reviews.
Needless to say neither the rep nor I understood this. And I just can't believe it. I am still waiting for someone to contact me, as they said they would, to explain more clearly why they deleted 90+ reviews that actually sold books for them.
Oh, and the other thing one of the reps said in an email was that my "customer reviews were removed because of the positive campaign." What the heck does that mean????
I only just realized that my Amazon blog was gone when I read your post. Can I possibly get more pissed??? (Excuse my language, please.)
Dealing with Amazon's email replies is beyond frustrating!
P.S. I believe one of the deleted reviews was for your book 'Plug your Book!', which I recommend to all my writer clients.
Cheryl Kaye Tardif,
Bestselling author and Book Marketing Coach
http://www.cherylktardif.com
I hate to ruin your day but…
good news: your connect blog is back up on your Amazon page.
bad news: like me, every review you've written has been deleted.
Sorry to be the bearer of bad news. If you get yours resolved before me please let me know.
I'm going to check my author friends' Amazon pages…
Cheryl
Ok…here I am one more time.
I was checking some of my author friends and found they were missing the number of reviews at top right…it reads as:
6,057 (?)
The total number of reviews should be where the ? is.
I re-checked your page and your reviews are still below, as are some of my friends…but the total reviews written is still (?)
This should be my last email for the day.
Cheryl
Hello again, Steve:
Here is the update and final decision, according to Amazon. This applies to all authors who write reviews on Amazon, so heads-up!!
I really want you to have this information before Amazon deletes all your reviews.
A week ago I found that all 85 of the reviews I've written for other books had been deleted. It has been a very difficult and stressful week dealing with Amazon. They are not very accessible and I was given at least 3 different reasons for why my revews had been deleted. After numerous emails, this is what it's come down to:
Their final ruling: "Please know that our participation guidelines don't allow customers to promote their own titles in their reviews." If you sign your review with anything other than your name, your reviews could be deleted.
If any of you are in the habit of signing your reviews with something like ".., author of Whale Song", which has been common practice for years, Amazon has deemed this as "inappropriate" and will be deleting them. It seems they are on a campaign to go through reviews posted. They recently made changes to the Amazon Connect program and all our blogs were temporarily gone too. Most are back up.
They also will delete your reviews if you have added the book link (that they supply) and directed it to your own book title's Amazon page. Many authors have used that in their signature line. It can lead to deleteion and suspension, according to Amazon's latest email.
I argued the fact that thousands of authors sign their reviews like this, and that it's common practice in our industry. I was told by my last publisher to sign my reviews like this; he even wanted us to include the ISBN, which I only did a couple of times then stopped. It made no difference
to Amazon that this is what my publisher wanted me to do; they aren't accepting signatures with titles.
Amazon is starting to take note of such practices and you'll get no notice; they'll just pull all the reviews you have written. That's what they did with me, even though many of my older reviews were signed with just my name.
So to clarify, according to Amazon, when posting a review, you are not allowed to have a signature of anything more than your name, and NO links to or mention of your books whatsoever in the review or sig line.
I am giving you the heads-up now so you can go in and edit your reviews if you choose. That's what I'd do, to be honest, because fighting with Amazon is not easy. There is no one who will talk to you by phone, and waiting for
their response is not easy.
This rule also applies to any comments you leave on a book review. Amazon does not want authors to mention their own books anywhere on the review pages.
I haven't heard from Amazon.ca yet, but I expect this will be funneled over to all the Amazons, so I'll be working on editing my reviews there next week.
Please forward this on to all authors you know and any writing organizations or associations you belong to.
I wish you all the very best in success.
Cheryl Kaye Tardif
Author & Book Marketing Coach
http://www.cherylktardif.com
http://www.shamelessbookpromoter.com
Oh, darn, I forgot to add: this is very important information to all authors so feel free to blog about this and quote my comment here. I'm asking if anyone does report my comment/letter, to please credit me as Cheryl Kaye Tardif, author and Book Marketing Coach, http://www.cherylktardif.com
Thank you.
CKT
Hi, Cheryl. I think it's you, but why don't you pass on your email address and phone number, so I can verify this—given the incredible nature of the accusation? Could you also forward to me the full text of the source material where Amazon says you can't mention your own titles in reviews? I want to bounce this off Amazon PR. If Amazon is doing what the comment attributed to you says, this is incredible indeed! I've been battling with Amazon over e-book standards and, out of fairness, simply want to guard against an April Fools' joke. Thanks! David Rothman, for teleread.org (email: dr NOSPAM teleread.org =- 703-370-6540)
No wonder, we were looking all over for the Hanes Segler connection…thought I'ld lost my touch!