Picking Amazon categories is confusing to say the least. Sort of feels like guesswork, that is, until you have actual sales data in front of you. That’s what the category search tool assists you with in Christian Author Demand Lab. Basically, it takes Amazon’s full book category tree and shows you exactly how much competition sits at every level, even down to the subcategory.
Here’s how it works, without wasting hours.
Consider upgrading your subscription to unlock:
A full ARC-led launch campaign — a team reading and reviewing your book pre-launch, plus a personalized 30-day roadmap to run it
Full access to the Christian Author Demand Lab:
our research tool that shows you what Christian readers are actually searching for, finds gaps competing authors haven’t filled, and pulls live Amazon sales data so you know where your book fits before you publish
Start Broad, Then Drill Down
Pick a top level category. Christian Books & Bibles is the obvious starting point for many authors here. You then click the orange “explore” button to the right. It then breaks down a full subcategory tree. Things like, Bible Study, New Testament, Old Testament, Study Guides….etc.
Some categories will repeat themselves and look like duplicates. You might see “Net Testament” show up twice. That’s just a weird quirk in Amazon’s own data. Ignore it and move one.
Read the Columns Before You Pick Anything
Don’t skip this part. You’ll see that each category comes with four numbersL
Sales to #1 — how many daily sales it takes to rank first in that category
Sales to #10 — how many daily sales it takes to land in the top 10
Publisher % — what share of top titles came from a traditional publisher
KU % — what share of top titles are enrolled in Kindle Unlimited
A category like Christian Books & Bibles at the top level might need 668 daily sales to hit #1. That's out of reach for almost every self-published author. Drill down a few layers — say, into Bible Study, New Testament, Jesus, the Gospels, and Acts — and that number can drop to around 100.
