Publisher Rocket — The Amazon Research Tool Every Indie Author Should Know

If you publish on Amazon, you have probably heard the same advice over and over: research your keywords, choose the right categories, study your competition, and make sure readers can actually find your book.

The problem is that doing all of that research manually can take a lot of time.

This is where Publisher Rocket comes in.

Created by Dave Chesson, Publisher Rocket is a research tool built specifically for authors who sell books on Amazon. It helps you research keywords, categories, competing books, and Amazon advertising opportunities using data instead of guesswork.

And now there's another reason to take a look at it: Rocket Report, a new feature introduced in September 2026 that takes the research process a step further by doing the keyword and category research for you.

If you're serious about publishing on Amazon, Publisher Rocket is one of those tools worth understanding.

What Is Publisher Rocket?

Publisher Rocket is designed to help authors understand what is happening on Amazon before they publish or market a book.

Instead of guessing what readers are searching for, you can use Rocket to research the terms people are using, see how competitive those terms are, find relevant categories, analyze other books, and build keyword lists for Amazon Ads.

It is not a writing tool. It won't write your book for you.

What it does is help you answer a different question:

Once the book is written, how do I give it a better chance of being found?

That distinction matters. A great book still needs to be discoverable.

The Four Main Things Publisher Rocket Does

Publisher Rocket has several tools, but four of them form the core of the software.

Keyword Research

Keywords are one of the biggest pieces of Amazon discoverability.

Rocket lets you search for a keyword or phrase and see information that can help you decide whether it is worth targeting. You can use this to find terms related to your book, look for opportunities with less competition, and build a list of keywords to use in your KDP metadata.

This is especially useful when you have a general idea of what your book is about but aren't sure what Amazon readers are actually searching for.

Instead of saying, "I think readers will search for this," you can start with actual data.

Publisher Rocket also provides keyword suggestions, which can help you expand your initial search instead of starting from scratch every time.

Category Research

Categories are another area where authors often leave opportunities on the table.

Amazon has thousands of book categories, and finding the right ones isn't always as simple as looking through the categories you see when uploading a book.

Publisher Rocket's Category Search lets you research categories and look at the competition within them. This can help you find categories where your book is a better fit and where you have a realistic chance of becoming more visible.

For authors who have always just selected the first categories that seem relevant, this alone can be a useful change to the publishing process.

Competition Analyzer

Want to know what you're up against?

The Competition Analyzer lets you look at other books in your market and examine information such as sales estimates, rankings, reviews, and other competitive data.

This is useful before you publish because you can study the books already succeeding in your genre.

Look at their covers. Look at their titles. Look at their subtitles. Look at the keywords they appear to be targeting.

You're not trying to copy them.

You're trying to understand the market you're entering.

Amazon Ads Keywords

Publisher Rocket can also help with Amazon Ads research.

Instead of manually trying to come up with hundreds of possible keywords for an advertising campaign, Rocket can generate keyword ideas and related ASINs to help you build your campaigns faster.

Publisher Rocket's tutorial library specifically includes a walkthrough of its Amazon Ads keyword feature and explains how authors can use it to find more effective keywords for their campaigns.

For authors already running Amazon Ads, this can save a considerable amount of research time.

The New Rocket Report

This is the feature that caught our attention.

Publisher Rocket's latest update, version 2.0.101, introduced Rocket Report on September 28, 2026. According to the official release notes, the feature was introduced to do the keyword and category research for you.

That's a pretty significant change in the workflow.

Previously, you could use Rocket to research keywords and categories yourself. You would enter your ideas, compare the results, study the data, and decide which opportunities made sense for your book.

Rocket Report is designed to take more of that work off your plate.

For authors who aren't particularly interested in spending hours inside spreadsheets or jumping between keyword ideas, this is probably the most interesting addition to Rocket.

And it fits the bigger reason Publisher Rocket exists in the first place: give authors useful Amazon data without making them become data analysts.

Why Rocket Report Matters

There is a lot of advice online about Amazon keywords and categories.

Some of it is good.

Some of it is outdated.

And some of it is simply somebody guessing.

The advantage of using a tool like Publisher Rocket is that you're starting with data rather than somebody's opinion about what "should" work.

Rocket Report makes that process easier by doing more of the research for you.

That doesn't mean you should blindly accept every recommendation. You still need to look at your book, your genre, your audience, and whether the suggested keywords and categories actually fit.

But having a research process that gets you to the useful information faster is a big advantage.

Reverse ASIN Research

Publisher Rocket also has a Reverse ASIN feature.

This lets you research another book by its Amazon Standard Identification Number (ASIN) and see the keywords associated with that book.

Think of it as looking under the hood of a competing book.

If you have a book that is performing well in your genre, you can use Reverse ASIN to see what keywords may be helping it get discovered.

Publisher Rocket introduced Reverse ASIN in September 2024, and the feature has continued to be part of the software's development.

There are usage limits on Reverse ASIN searches because the feature requires significant data processing. Publisher Rocket currently explains that standard users receive a monthly allocation of searches, with additional access available for certain publishers or advertising agencies through support.

Publisher Rocket Isn't Just for Fiction Authors

One misconception about keyword research tools is that they're mainly useful for fiction.

They're not.

Publisher Rocket can be useful for fiction, nonfiction, children's books, cookbooks, self-help, business books, and other categories sold through Amazon.

The important thing is that your research should always start with your specific market.

A romance author is going to approach keyword research differently from a nonfiction author writing about personal finance. The tool gives you the data; you still have to understand the reader you're trying to reach.

What About Amazon's Rules?

This is another area where authors need to be careful.

Finding a keyword that gets a lot of searches doesn't automatically mean you should use it.

Amazon has rules around keywords, including restrictions against using misleading terms or other brands in ways that could confuse readers.

Publisher Rocket has a flagged-keyword system that highlights keywords Amazon might object to so you can review them before using them.

That's useful because the goal isn't simply to find the most popular keyword.

The goal is to find a keyword that is relevant to your book and useful for reaching the right readers.

Is Publisher Rocket Worth It?

For an author who publishes on Amazon and intends to take their marketing seriously, I think it is.

The biggest benefit isn't that Rocket magically makes a book sell.

No software can do that.

The benefit is the time it can save and the information it gives you before you make decisions.

Instead of spending hours searching Amazon manually, you can get a much clearer picture of your market in one place.

And the software isn't standing still. The update history shows regular improvements to data quality, keyword research, competition analysis, Amazon Ads features, international markets, and other parts of the software. The new Rocket Report is simply the latest example.

That continued development matters.

Amazon changes. Author strategies change. The software needs to change with them.

A Personal Note

I've used a lot of author tools over the years, and the ones I keep coming back to are the ones that save me time without trying to replace my judgment.

That's where Publisher Rocket fits.

I don't want a tool telling me what book to write.

I want a tool that helps me understand the market I'm entering and gives me better information before I spend time and money.

That's what Rocket does well.

And with Rocket Report now handling more of the keyword and category research, I think it becomes even more useful for authors who don't want to spend their entire afternoon doing market research.

Dave Chesson and his team have also done something I appreciate: they keep working on the product.

Rocket has received regular updates over the years, including improvements to data reliability, keyword results, competition analysis, international markets, and Reverse ASIN.

That's important because a tool built around Amazon data can't afford to sit still.

How Publisher Rocket Fits Into Your Publishing Workflow

Publisher Rocket isn't something you necessarily use every day.

You might use it when you're researching a new book idea.

Then again when you're preparing your title, subtitle, keywords, and categories.

Then again when you're looking at competitors.

And again when you're setting up Amazon Ads.

That's actually one of the things I like about it.

It fits into different parts of the publishing process rather than trying to be the entire publishing process.

You write the book.

You create the cover.

You publish it.

Publisher Rocket helps you make more informed decisions about how readers will find it.

Then, once the book is live, ScribeCount can help you track what happens next.

Publisher Rocket + ScribeCount

This is where the two tools complement each other nicely.

Publisher Rocket helps you research the market and make decisions before and during your Amazon marketing.

ScribeCount helps you see what happens after your books are live.

Did sales increase?

Which platforms are producing the most revenue?

Which books are selling?

Which formats are performing?

Those are different questions, and you need both sides of the equation if you're treating your books like a business.

Publisher Rocket helps you research the opportunity. ScribeCount helps you measure the results.

Don't Skip the Tutorials

If you already own Publisher Rocket, don't just open it and start clicking around.

Publisher Rocket has a tutorial library covering keyword research, competition analysis, category research, Amazon Ads keywords, and Reverse ASIN.

That's worth going through because the value of a research tool depends heavily on knowing how to interpret what you're looking at.

The software gives you the information.

The tutorial helps you understand what to do with it.

The Bottom Line

Publisher Rocket isn't going to write your book, create your cover, or guarantee that you'll hit the bestseller lists.

What it can do is remove a lot of the guesswork from one of the hardest parts of publishing: getting your book in front of the right readers on Amazon.

The original keyword, category, competition, and advertising tools are already useful. The new Rocket Report makes the process even easier by handling more of the keyword and category research for you.

For a serious Amazon author, that's a pretty compelling combination.

If Amazon is an important part of your publishing business, Publisher Rocket is one of the tools I'd want in my toolbox.

And if you haven't looked at it in a while, now is a good time to take another look. Rocket has changed quite a bit over the years, and Rocket Report is the newest example of the team continuing to improve the product.

 -Randall Wood