I just read a post that cites an imaginary statistic, and that is so absolutely flawed in it’s premise that I felt the need to put pixel to screen in the hopes of correcting this gross error. From the post:
“…Now this is a very important mistake and 75% of the authors do that. They just make their book free to get high rankings on self publishing platforms. I have read about lot of authors who say that making their book free has done wonders for them and boosted their book sale. This high ranking and sale will be short term if you don’t know how to do it properly. You must always get other benefits and those benefits should be of long term if you are going for free…” – Jay D, Book Promotion & Marketing Guru
Wow. And I mean WOW. That’s like … totally wrong.
Not sure where that statistic comes from, but it’s wildly incorrect, as is the assumption that authors are trying to get high rankings, and that free promotions are only available on “self publishing” platforms. With that enormous amount of misinformation, it’s kinda hard to take any part of the blog post seriously.
To set the record straight: The vast majority of authors are using free promotion correctly:
- They are advertising before release, making sure their free days are going out to their tribe, to possible new fans through subscription services like BookBub, and to everyone on their cultivated mailing lists.
- They are using the free days to get a short-term bump in rankings and trailing sales after the free day sales are over.
- They are using the free days as a tool to promote their brand, and entice readers to buy their other works.
- They are using the free days on Amazon – which, most assuredly, is NOT a “self publishing” platform. It’s the largest eBook retailer in the world, and the most serious place to sell ebooks.
To correct some other bad advice from the follow-up conversation:
- NEVER ask for reviews, and don’t give away your book in the hopes of getting a review from a “verified purchase.” A fake review can be spotted over an organic review in an instant. And a free review is worth exactly that: nothing. Maybe even less than nothing. This is different than a “if you liked my book, let me know by putting up a review” enticement at the end of a work. That’s not a bad idea, but you don’t want to be all Billy Mays on your ‘gimme a review” sales pitch; it can turn your newfound fan off. You want your readers to become part of your clan.
- If you’ve only got one book, don’t hesitate to consider mounting a campaign that includes offering it for free. Free days bring more readers. They bring more sales. They’ll probably even encourage you to write another book!
As far as the “never give a book away for free” constituency goes, I have to disagree with that whole argument. And I’m not the only one, since we’ve got these things called “libraries” where books are free. We’ve had them for hundreds of years. They seem like a pretty good idea.
If you’re going to go with free days (which I recommend), then make sure you’re using them right and not making bad choices based on misinformation. It’s not hard to create a book campaign, or to have you free book make you a good income.