Amazon is full of AI books — and everyone earns less
AI-generated books make up 20 percent of Amazon's self-published catalog and account for 12 percent of sales. Revenue per book is falling in seven of eight genres, including titles written by people. It made me think of the question freelancers type in late at night: what does outsourcing my marketing actually cost me? This news is about the same question — what is your work worth once the market fills up?
What is happening on Amazon
A new study, described by The Decoder, looked at self-published books on Amazon. AI-made titles are 20 percent of the catalog and bring in 12 percent of sales. In seven of eight genres, revenue per book is dropping.
That drop hits the writers who spent months on their book as well. Their title still exists. It just sits further back, among things that were made in an afternoon. The shelf is full.
Volume is not a plan
AI has made exactly one thing cheap: making more. Play that game and you compete with everyone else who can play it too. There are many of them, and more every week. The price that belongs to a market like that goes down on its own.
I see the same thing outside publishing. Photographers losing jobs to images from a generator. DJ's and coaches disappearing on LinkedIn between ten posts a day from someone who no longer writes anything themselves. It is rarely about quality. It is about space on the shelf.
What this means when you run your own business
Two questions come up again and again. What does outsourcing marketing cost me, because the agency gets more expensive every year. And should I hire a virtual assistant, because the admin eats the evenings.
Do the math for real. Take the last twelve months of bank statements and add up what leaves for tools, subscriptions and outsourced work. Use your own numbers, not mine. With me it is one amount, €35 per month, cancel monthly. If your math does not come out in my favour, I would rather say so before you pay.
And watch what you hand over. Work nobody sees — preparing a quote, sorting mail, chasing an invoice — can go to a machine without any fuss. Work with your name on it stays yours.
What you can do with this tomorrow
Three things you can do today:
- Pick one piece of work you never hand over. Your photos, your music, your advice to a client. Your name goes under that, and speed will not make it better.
- Put the technology on the invisible work. Quotes, reminders, planning, admin. That is where it saves hours without watering down your trade.
- Do the math on outsourced work before you cancel or sign anything. Calculate first, decide second. Skip that and you keep paying for years for something that once made sense.
Amazon shows what happens when a market runs on volume alone: everyone makes more and everyone earns less. I do not believe in more. I believe in work you can put your name under and sleep well. Want to do the math together, mail me at info@mia-automation.com.
Frequently asked questions
So should I never use AI for my texts?
Of course you can. The difference is what for. Let a machine sort your mail, prepare your quote or make a first draft that you rewrite yourself. Do not publish anything with your name on it that you would not want to read out loud.
Will my trade fill up like the book market?
In every trade where the end product is a file — text, images, music, video — supply keeps growing. Where you have to be there in person, on a stage, on location, at a client's table, that happens far less. Look at where your work sits in that picture and spend your time there.
How do I know whether outsourcing still pays off?
Add up what you pay per year for tools and outsourced work, and put the hours it really saves you next to it. A lot of money for very few hours means you are paying for habit. That is a twenty-minute calculation, not a strategy project.
