Tag: free e-books

How to Set Your Book Free on Amazon

free ebooks earth-237955_960_720This may be old hat to some of you. But we get new indie authors every day, and also Amazon changes stuff every little while. So since IU is here to help everybody, no matter where they are on their indie-author journey, I thought I’d take a few minutes to explain what it takes to get Amazon to set the price of your eBook to free.

First, let’s get the names straight. To sell an eBook as an indie on Amazon, you need to publish it via Kindle Direct Publishing, which is often abbreviated as KDP. Continue reading “How to Set Your Book Free on Amazon”

Is “Free” Over?

Before the rise of Amazon’s KDP Select, I had serious reservations about the merits of giving books away for free as a means to build readership.

Then the Select program came and shook things up in a big way. For what was likely the first time, indie authors were shooting up the charts on a par with authors who are household names. Numerous early adopters of the program reported post-free sales surges and sales in their back lists. Amazon had figured out a way to make “free” work.

Then they began changing it. The first thing to go was the impact of free downloads on the ranking algorithm. The freebies no longer shot up the charts, gaining and sustaining the visibility they once had.

The next bubble to burst was that downloads did not appear to equate to readership. People seem content to fill their Kindles with free books they never get around to reading, let alone reviewing. Continue reading “Is “Free” Over?”

Dream With Me

There is a store in Toronto Ontario. This store has been in business since 1972. What does it sell, you ask? Why, books of course. And not just any books. This very real, successful store sells only Science Fiction and Fantasy books. Don’t believe me? Check it out. It’s real. Its name is Bakka Phoenix. Google it. It’s moved locations a few times and now has a home near the University of Toronto. Continue reading “Dream With Me”

Preparing for Your KDP Select Free Days by Rex Jameson

[Editor Note: This step-by-step list is a great guide for promoting your free book through KDP Select. We used Rex’s methods to promote BAD BOOK at the end of June and had good success.]

Back when I first started using KDP Select, I used the Squidoo list by theinformationlady to promote my KDP Select promotion periods. I have had some pretty lousy results from Select recently, and I decided to revisit this and try to ferret out the proper way to do this. Here is my current process for promoting KDP Select titles:

Step 1: Make sure you have reviews BEFORE you settle on your promotion dates

Shortly after I published The Goblin Rebellion, I scheduled a KDP Select 2-day promotion over a month later and informed all the major sites without having any reviews for the book in place. I didn’t receive any emails back from ENT or POI, but I was in conversations with 2 book bloggers and had given away 50 copies at LibraryThing to try to garner some reviews. There were at least five people, counting the book bloggers, who told me they should be able to hit the promotion deadline.

None of them came through. Continue reading “Preparing for Your KDP Select Free Days by Rex Jameson”