Sell ebooks online direct to readers, without a store taking its share.
Selling an ebook through a retailer gives you distribution and takes a share of every copy for it. Selling direct gives you the reader's email, the full price, and the freedom to bundle, discount and price however you like. Most authors who do well end up doing both: retailers for discovery, their own site for the readers who already know them.
Overview
EmbPay is the checkout for the direct half. Upload the book once, put the buy button on your author site or link it from your newsletter, and every sale is a card payment into your own Stripe account. Readers get a private download link by email straight away, in whichever formats you chose to include.
How ebooks are priced in practice.
Fiction and general non-fiction sold direct typically sits a little above the retailer price, since readers who buy direct are supporting the author; specialist non-fiction and technical books are priced far higher and sell in smaller numbers.
Direct buyers are your warmest readers, so bundles do well: the book plus the previous one, the book plus a workbook, the ebook plus the audiobook. Set the single book as the main product and offer the rest as order bumps or a one-click upsell after payment. A pre-order can be run as a normal product with the file swapped in on release day.
Pricing options that fit
- One-time — a single title or a bundle.
- Pay-what-you-want with a minimum — a first novella or a reader-supported edition.
- Subscription — a serialised book or a monthly chapter drop, delivered as a hosted URL that you update.
One product can carry up to six pricing options; the buyer chooses at checkout. Full detail in subscriptions, split-pay and pay-what-you-want.
Selling ebooks with EmbPay takes three steps.
- 1
Create the product
In the dashboard, add a product with a name, description and price. Choose how it is delivered: upload a file, point to a hosted URL, issue a licence key, or show instructions after purchase.
- 2
Package your ebooks
Readers expect to choose their format, so the standard delivery is a zip containing the EPUB and a PDF, plus a MOBI or AZW3 if your readers are on older Kindles. EmbPay hosts one file per product, up to 500 MB, so a zip of all three formats, or an ebook with a companion audiobook, fits with room to spare. Put a short read-me inside naming which file is for which device.
- 3
Share the link or embed the checkout
Every product has a hosted page you can link from anywhere, and an embed snippet for your own site. Connect your Stripe account and buyers can pay; until then the page says the product is not on sale yet.
The parts of EmbPay ebooks sellers actually use.
Every item here is enforced in code, on the free plan unless it says otherwise.
Your reader list, not a retailer's
Every order records the buyer's email in your dashboard. Send it to your newsletter tool automatically with the built-in integrations for Mailchimp, Kit, MailerLite and others.
Bundles as bumps
Offer the audiobook, the previous book or a signed-print pre-order as a tick-box on the checkout. Up to five bumps, each at its own price, and any bump can hide itself from readers who already own it.
Expiring links for a file that travels
Ebooks are the most-shared digital product there is. Set the download window to a day, or shorter, and a forwarded link stops working before it can circulate. You can always send a fresh one.
Launch coupons
Percentage or fixed-amount codes with a usage cap and expiry for a launch week or a newsletter exclusive. The code applies at checkout and is released back if the payment fails.
What a sale costs you: Stripe's fee, and nothing else.
EmbPay platform fee
On every plan, including free. There is no per-sale percentage and no per-order charge anywhere in the payment path.
0%
Stripe processing
Billed by Stripe on your own account, as on any card payment. Usually 2.9% + 30¢ for a US domestic card; other countries differ.
Stripe's rate
Monthly
Free covers two products. Pro adds unlimited products, licence keys and API keys. Neither takes a cut.
$0 or $29
Work out the exact Stripe fee for your country and price with the Stripe fee calculator.
Selling ebooks: the questions we get.
Can readers pay with Apple Pay or Google Pay?
The checkout offers whatever payment methods you have enabled on your own Stripe account, since the charge is made directly on that account. Cards are always available; wallets and local methods follow your Stripe settings.
Does EmbPay add DRM to the ebook?
No. The file you upload is the file the reader receives. Most direct-selling authors prefer it that way, because DRM frustrates the paying reader more than the copier. The protection EmbPay offers is a time-limited download link.
How do I run a pre-order?
Create the product with a placeholder file or a hosted URL to a “thank you, it's coming” page, take orders, and replace the file with the finished book on release day. Existing download links point at the current file, so early buyers who open their link after release get the book. There is no automatic notification, so email them.
Can I sell the ebook and the paperback together?
EmbPay handles the payment and the ebook delivery. It does not ship physical goods, so a paperback would have to be fulfilled by you from the order details, or sold as a bump whose delivery text explains how it ships.
What does it cost per copy?
Nothing from EmbPay: the platform fee is 0% on every plan, including free. Stripe charges its own processing fee on your account, as it would for any card payment.
Start selling ebooks on the free plan.
No card required. Build the product and rehearse the checkout in test mode, then connect your Stripe account to be paid.
Also selling pdfs, study notes, ai prompts or notion templates? Or see everything you can sell with EmbPay.