Tag: advertising free eBooks

How to Buy Book Advertising & Promotion Services

nailbiting lady by MS clipartI was once there: afraid to buy book advertising. I almost forgot what that was like. Recently, in the comment thread of my article discussing What My House Taught Me About Selling Books, I was reminded how scary this industry can be. It’s extra-intimidating if you don’t have someone like Martin Crosbie to show you the ropes. I’m extremely fortunate.

So, I thought it might be nice to offer a little hand-holding and some baby steps for those of you who have yet to take the plunge into advertising their books. Here are a few easy steps to take you from Petrified Author to Seasoned Pro. Continue reading “How to Buy Book Advertising & Promotion Services”

Orchestrating a “Craig’s List” Free eBook Event

craigslistLast month, I wrote about the success I had offering five of my eBooks free simultaneously for four days over the New Year’s Day holiday period. I ran the same promotion on Washington’s Birthday and had success again. However, that was only a single free day.

I define success as having sales bump following the free period. There is much discussion about whether authors should make their books free, so I want to share my methods with you here, and maybe it will work for you as well. Continue reading “Orchestrating a “Craig’s List” Free eBook Event”

KDP Select Freebies Revisited, Yes, Again

Free BeeI kinda missed the freebie boat. I hadn’t got to marketing Trucking in English when the KDP Select model changed and the overnight successes weren’t happening any more. I’d not have been one of those anyway, you need a pukka novel for that, but reading what experts such as Martin Crosbie had to say, it seemed as though the era of nice sales spikes might have gone as well. Martin’s article How I run my KDP Select Promotions, concluded that freebies can still help but it’s more of a lottery than it once was.

I decided to try it anyway, not so much for sales but because I was struggling to get the review numbers I needed for some of the bigger marketing sites. I thought maybe people who downloaded a freebie would be more likely to write a review in return. I also had a more existential question to answer. My stuff isn’t obviously interesting to most people until they get stuck in. When you do mad things in case they’re amusing, and then write about them when they are, your titles can feel so niche as to appeal to almost nobody. I knew that once I persuade someone to try one, they love it and buy the other, so maybe if all it took was a click rather than the untrousering of a dollar or few, more people would dip toe in water.

So, I planned my freebie. I opted to run all my five days together, to give the book the best chance of gaining some traction. I used the excellent list of free book promo sites that Martin compiled for IU, giving each site a month’s notice of the full five days, to maximise the chances they’d list my book. I only used free listings, assuming I’d not recoup any outlay. I did not tweet or Facebook it (I’ve spammed my friends enough) but I did list it here on IU.

I took careful notes and learned some things. Here they are. Continue reading “KDP Select Freebies Revisited, Yes, Again”

I Have Never Paid for It

Bookbub is a new company which, as you probably know, sends out email shots to hundreds of thousands of registered readers, publicizing a handful of free and discounted books each day. It’s not just for indies either; recently I’ve seen ads for books by James Patterson and Ian Rankin.

Ad prices vary, depending on the book’s genre and offer price ( http://www.bookbub.com/advertise/pricing.php ). Their ad prices are apparently rising steadily. Also, they’re selective in which ads they take. The good folk at Bookbub clearly have impeccable taste, because last week they chose to publicize my novel HOPE ROAD. I didn’t ask them to feature it, and I didn’t pay anything. In fact, until they mailed me to let me know I’d been featured I had no idea that Bookbub existed. It seems that, as they develop their business, they select the odd Amazon freebie and include it alongside their paid ads, no charge to the author. Continue reading “I Have Never Paid for It”