If You Are A KDP Publisher, You Could Be Making This Costly Mistake

How to avoid getting your Kindle Direct Publishing account terminated for trademark infringement

Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) authors are running into issues with their accounts being terminated for trademark infringement.

You may have already heard that Amazon terminated the account of Jade Summer Coloring Books in November. Jade Summer is a brand owned by Fritzen Publishing LLC that created popular coloring books sold on Amazon.

On November 15, the company made a statement on its website:

“We had a trademark-related issue with the title/subtitle of two of our books. The problem was with Amazon’s terms of service and was not a complaint from a third party.”

In other words, Amazon terminated Jade Summer’s account because they did not follow the terms set by Amazon to ensure that no-content and low-content books do not infringe on trademarks or copyright laws.

Jade Summer was one of the most successful publishers on Amazon. They are a well-known publisher with fans that create Youtube videos of themselves coloring in Jade Summer books. Although the company reached out to Amazon, explaining that the infringement was not intentional or malicious, Amazon refused to reinstate their account.

Why does this matter to you?

If a seller who generated thousands of dollars for Amazon through the sale of products can be terminated without exception, it is clear that Amazon takes trademark infringement exceptionally seriously.

As creators and authors, we must understand and respect what we are getting into when publishing on a platform like KDP.

Three harsh realities of publishing on the KDP platform:

Authors/creators/producers are in a binding legal agreement that Amazon can break at any time.

Solution: read the fine print

When you sign up for an Amazon account, whether for KDP or any other division, you agree to their terms of service, these are the rules that you must follow to maintain your account and avoid any legal issues.

Like any organization, Amazon is serious about its terms and agreements. If you are publishing low content, you have agreed to comply. Breaking any of the stipulations puts you in violation of the contract you entered. Therefore, Amazon has the right to terminate your account.

You must read through the terms and conditions carefully before publishing anything on Amazon. This way, you can avoid any legal issues and account termination.

If you do not have a copy of them, click Kindle Direct Publishing Terms and Conditions.

Suggestion: do not try to spam Amazon

Amazon has been cracking down on books that violate trademarks, copyrights, and other intellectual property rights. When publishing low content, don’t try to spam Amazon. It ruins things for both the customer and other producers.

It is critical to check your existing listings and any new ones against Amazon’s low-content product policy. You can find the complete list of prohibited products and services in Amazon’s Content Guidelines.

You will not be paid royalties owed in the month your account is terminated.

Solution: do your homework before publishing any more books.

When your KDP account is terminated, any money owed from previously earned royalties is forfeited. Since we are paid sixty days after the sales month, you will lose all royalties for sales made in the previous two months. In addition to losing all outstanding royalties due, it’s important to remember that Amazon can also take legal action against you.

Ensure that none of your content infringes on any trademarks or copyright laws. You should also check your book descriptions to ensure that they do not contain trademarked names or phrases.

If you are unsure whether an item might be infringing on a copyright, it is best to avoid using that metadata in your low-content products.

Suggestion: go back and check all your current published books.

If you have low content books already published through Amazon KDP, now would also be an excellent time to go back and check them for any potential infringements.

If you find that your product does contain trademarked or copyrighted material, take action right away — immediately unpublish the book. I explain how this is done in the next section of this article.

Make checking your product listings against trademark or copyright laws as part of the regular maintenance of your KDP business. Even if the listing does not currently violate this policy, it may later be updated to include prohibited words or phrases.

Being terminated means losing a revenue source that you cannot get back.

Solution: don’t put all your eggs in one basket.

Even if low-content products are something that you do well on, it is still good to make sure that all your income sources are diversified and not reliant solely on Amazon KDP or any one source of revenue. This way, you do not lose out entirely in the case of account termination for any reason. You will be able to continue publishing low-content products through other channels.

Always create a backup of your products so you can republish elsewhere if one source dries up.

Suggestion: dust yourself off and get to work publishing with someone else but with the corrections made.

There are many different ways to make money online, and Amazon is just one. Jade Summer Coloring Books now uses LuLu to publish their products, which they sell on their website. There is also Ingram Spark, or you can sell digital versions of interiors through Etsy.

Checking Your Title and Descriptions for Trademarked Terms

Let’s look at how to avoid having your KDP account closed down by checking your titles, subtitles, backend keywords, and descriptions for any trademarked terms, as well as how to repair any issues you find.

I first heard about Jade Summer’s account termination from my favorite KDP Youtuber, Paul Marles. It was a sickening wake-up call in the early hours of the morning. I followed his instructions and unpublished six titles that I was unsure of trademark infringements.

I recommend that you watch his video for detailed instructions.

Here are the initial steps that I took to keep my account safe.

First, I went to my KDP dashboard, Bookshelf, clicked the three dots on the right-hand corner, clicked on edit details.

Next, I went to the USPTO website, found search TESS, clicked on Basic Word Mark Search, then entered the search term into the bar.

USA https://www.uspto.gov/trademarks

UK https://www.gov.uk/search-for-trademark

I checked every title, subtitle, backend keyword against TESS even if I thought it was a common enough phrase that there would be no way it could be trademarked.

I was wrong or at least very unsure six times.

I immediately unpublished each book as I found an infringement or possible infringement until I had time to do more research.

Finally, I reached out to customer service to ask them how to proceed.

Here was the email I sent and their response:

Dear customer service,

Yesterday I became aware that six of my published books contain wording in the titles and subtitles that may run into trademark infringement. This was completely unintentional on my part and I immediately unpublished all six books when I realized the error I had made. Since titles and subtitles cannot be edited once published, can you please advise me on the steps that I need to take in regards to the six books?

Thank you for your help,

Crystal Garrett

Hello Crystal,

I hope that you are having a really nice week so far! Thank you for contacting Amazon KDP for more information on how to proceed with your books.

You are correct: titles cannot be updated after publishing. I understand that you have unpublished the titles you felt might run into issues.

In this case, the only thing you would need to do is choose new titles and then resubmit as new publications with new ASINs.

You’ll want to make sure your manuscript and cover image files are updated to reflect the corrected before publishing.

Please let me know if you have any additional questions and I will be delighted to address them.

Have a wonderful day!

Here is where I add a little side-note: based on the friendly response from customer service, I think it safe to say Amazon is not out to get low-content publishers and wipe us off the platform. Just sayin’.

Final Thoughts:

When the news first came out about a top account being terminated, fear infiltrated the KDP producer ranks. A few said that they were giving up on the platform. Others that were still in the research stages noted that they were too afraid even to try KDP.

That said, I still believe that Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) is a viable way to generate income. You can produce print-on-demand books for little output, few skills, and zero start-up costs.

However, like any online business, whether a blog, website, or ebooks, there are protocols to follow to avoid trouble — such as Don’t steal other people’s intellectual property. Even if you think something has been unfairly trademarked, it is what it is; do your research, don’t try to spam the system, and double-check your content.