So, I’ve been trying to set up a page for my book at Amazon. So far, color me very unimpressed.
The Advantage site has a form to fill out with book description, author bio, and three reviews. It very clearly states:
You don’t need to use HTML to fill out the edit boxes below – just type normally. However, if you’d like to use advanced formatting, you may use HTML to indicate breaks, boldface or italics.
<P> = a paragraph break <BR> = a line break
<b> </b> = boldface <i> </i> = italics.
Example: The <b>quick</b> brown fox <i>jumped over</i> the lazy dog.<BR>
Well, I kind of like paragraphs. Call me crazy, but that’s just how I roll. So I put in some <p>s, and bolded the names of the reviewers.
When I saved my work, it didn’t display the HTML properly, instead showing the code. Moreover, it had removed the second two reviews, and attributed the first one to the second reviewer.
I scratched my head, and went back int to edit, reinserting the other two reviews, and straightening out the reviewer names. I hit “View” and got exactly the same thing. HTML still in the code, no graf breaks, and the second two reviews disappeared, with the wrong reviewer name on the first.
I send a complaint to Amazon (via a web form, so I have no record of it, unless I had the foresight to copy it somewhere, which I didn’t). Here is the response:
Dear Vendor,
I apologize for the inconvenience caused.
Please be informed that when you update any information using update item content and then click submit button, everything will get disappear. However please be informed that the same will appear on the website in 5-7 days.
I request you to update the information without using HTML tags.
As you have the limit to add only 3 reviews, I request you to write back to us with the reviews that you wish to add and we will do the needful.
Thank you for selling with Amazon,
Sowjanya Reddy T.
Member Services
Amazon.com Advantage
So, they can’t show me what the page is actually going to look like until it goes live, and despite the fact that they clearly invite me to use HTML, they then request that I not do so. Which means that I can’t do so much as break paragraphs.
I’m kind of gobsmacked. I mean, this is fricking’ Amazon.