Amazon gives you seven keyword slots for each book. These keywords directly impact whether readers can find your book when they search. Choosing the right ones is one of the highest-leverage things you can do for your book's discoverability.
How Amazon Keywords Work
When a reader types something into Amazon's search bar — like "cozy mystery small town" or "epic fantasy with dragons" — Amazon scans titles, subtitles, descriptions, and keywords to find relevant results. Your seven keyword slots are invisible to readers but critical for search rankings.
Keyword Research Strategies
Start with Amazon's search bar. Type the beginning of a phrase related to your book and watch the autocomplete suggestions. These suggestions are based on what real readers actually search for.
Study your competition. Look at the top-selling books in your category. What words appear in their titles and subtitles? Those are likely high-value keywords.
Think like a reader, not a writer. Writers think in terms of themes and literary devices. Readers search for tropes, settings, and emotions. "Enemies to lovers romance" will outperform "romantic tension with narrative complexity."
Use phrases, not single words. Amazon lets you enter phrases in each keyword slot. "Small town cozy mystery with cats" is far more useful than just "mystery."
What to Include in Your Keywords
- Genre and subgenre terms — "urban fantasy," "dark romance," "hard science fiction"
- Tropes and themes — "enemies to lovers," "chosen one," "found family"
- Comparable authors — readers often search by author name
- Setting descriptors — "Victorian London," "small town Texas," "space opera"
- Audience identifiers — "books for teens," "clean romance," "beach read"
- Format terms — "series starter," "standalone," "box set"
Common Keyword Mistakes
Don't repeat words from your title or subtitle. Amazon already indexes those.
Don't use quotation marks or subjective claims. "Best mystery ever" won't help you rank.
Don't waste slots on overly broad terms. "Book" or "fiction" won't help you compete.
Don't set and forget. Keywords should be updated periodically. Trends change, and what readers search for evolves.
Organizing Your Keywords
Managing keywords across a large catalog can get unwieldy fast. Keep a running list of researched keywords for each genre you write in, and track which keywords you've used for each book. Keyword pools — saved sets of keywords organized by genre or pen name — can save hours when publishing new titles.
The key is to treat your keywords as a living part of your book's metadata, not a one-time setup task. Revisit them quarterly, test new phrases, and track whether changes improve your visibility.