Do Free Promotions Work? Part Two

When I published the first post about this I promised a follow up post once I had a better idea of how the boost provided by my free promotion was going to translate into sales in the long run.

Well, we are only a week or so further along, but I think it's still worth looking at how things are panning out. And hopefully I can give my answer to the question in the post title.

Let's start with a reminder of where I was at before all of this.

I (or rather The Last Knight) was ranked somewhere around #500,000 in the paid kindle store. I made perhaps one or two sales or borrows (remember, I count these because I still get paid for them!) each week. And that was if I was lucky. There would often be stretches of 10 days or two weeks without a single sale.

The free promo, with paid advertising I should stress, resulted in around 3,000 downloads and a huge jump in rankings, that translated back into a higher ranking in the paid store once the book was no longer free.

But that was in the immediate aftermath. How about weeks later?

I like to think that the image is pretty self-explanatory. I had a huge surge in the first few days, but it's continued solidly since then. I haven't had a single day without a download, whether it's a full sale or a borrow. And most days have been more than one. The average I would say has been around 4 a day.

Now, I know, that's not exactly going to make me rich. But I think it's important to understand that it's all relative. Compared to the last few months, the last few weeks have been a huge game changer.

It isn't just the sales. Reviews and ratings on goodreads have gone up, people are adding all my books to their 'to-read' shelves, and my facebook page has had a little bump in terms of likes. My ranking on Amazon fluctuated a lot over this time frame, but as of right now it sits at around the #80,000 mark. More that 400,000 places higher than The Last Knight was on the 28th of January. I even became a 'bestseller' briefly.

 

So now, the question, do free promotions work?

I think I have to say yes. But with a couple of conditions. I think you have to be willing to pay out a little for advertising. I think simply putting your book free and expecting people to find it won't work. In order for it to make a difference you have to have downloads in the thousands, and for that I think you need the advertising.

The second condition is that you have other books for sale. Not all the sales you see are for The Last Knight (though there are more of those particularly when the book was ranked higher), my other books have been selling more too. Those who did pick up The Last Knight for free are potentially the buyers of my other books.

And I think the final thing is not to expect free promotions to make you money. I've made back what I spent on advertising, plus a nice little chunk, but that's it.

When I say free promotions work I am thinking more in terms of exposure. I think they are an effective marketing tool. It all comes down to how you use them.

I hope people found this interesting. It's strange putting my sales figures out there because I know they aren't that high, but for me this was a breakthrough. I feel like progress in my career has been made. Perhaps it's a method that could work for others too if their books have stalled.

Would love to hear people's thoughts. Have free promotions worked for you? If they didn't, what did?

Do Free Promotions Work?

Let me start out with a little bit of honesty.

As much as we might not like to admit it, the indie author has low odds of being successful. It is an unavoidable fact that most indie authors only ever sell a handful of books, and most often only to family and friends. Breaking past that point and reaching a wider audience is the dream we all share, but we all know how hard it can be.

We have a limited number of tools in our toolboxes for achieving that aim. And there comes a time when shouting into the void of Twitter or Facebook becomes a little pointless. There is a hashtag floating around on Twitter that I'm growing to love #IndieBooksBeSeen, because after all, the best written book is irrelevant if no one knows it exists. Spreading the word and sharing the love amongst the indie crowd is essential. A big part of why this blog was created in the first place. But even all that shared love isn't enough. We have to find ways to get our books into people's hands.

Free promotions, putting the book for free for a limited time, is one of the tools we have, and it's one that sparks a bit of debate amongst the indie crowd.

A lot of people will tell you that giving your book away for free will only devalue it. A bit like when your Mum told you no one would buy the cow if you gave the milk away for free. Most people who are against free promotions will tell you that the people who download free books will never buy your book, in fact they probably won't even read it.

I'm not going to argue with them. They may well be completely right. But I think that there is more to free promotions than the people who actually download your book for free. It's what those downloads can do for your rankings. It's what it can mean in the long run once your book goes back on sale.

I decided last month that I was going to give the free promotion thing another try. I'd done it before and received some extra reviews from it, so it hadn't been a complete waste, but this time I was going to do it properly. Which included a little paid advertising. Not much, just a $15 outlay for being included in an e-reader newsletter. Not enough to break the bank, but enough to test the waters.

I'm now going to give you actual numbers and figures. My sales prior to this were low. Not embarrassingly low (after all, see above about the success rates of indie authors) but low enough that the results are pretty obvious. 

Prior to the free promotion days my sales ranking was somewhere around the #500,000 mark. Yup. That low. I would say I made at most 2 sales a week. (note that as I get paid almost as much for borrows as sales on the KU scheme I do count them as a sale). Not terrible considering The Last Knight has been out for over a year and a half, but not brilliant by any means.

The free promotion days ran from the 30th Jan to the 1st Feb, with the paid advertising falling on the 31st. Right in the middle.

The first day of free downloads was OK - but nothing more than that. 159 copies.

The second day the advertising kicked in, and things changed.

By the time the day ended I had over 2,300 copies downloaded.

The next day the downloads continued, but not at the same rate, another 800+ copies however.

But the big thing for me was not how many were downloaded, but what it did for my ranking.

At it's highest point I reached #72 in the free rankings. I'd started at around #18,000 the previous day.

I know what you're thinking though. All of this is irrelevant in a way, because I'm not getting paid for those copies and the people who downloaded them probably won't read them.

But you see, those free copies do matter. Because if I take away the free copies on the sales graph, I get this:

Now, it may not seem like much - but when you look at the whole of January, you can see what a difference has been made. Even taking the borrows (which I do tend to count as I mentioned above) I had six books sold in January. (Which was up on last years sales of...zero) But on the day the free promo starts the sales jump up. And they've gone up since this graph was taken. But even just with what is visible here, in 4 days I had 13 sales. Double what I'd had for the whole month. To me that is a huge increase.

And it in turn has had a massive impact on my rankings now I'm back in the paid charts.

 Remember up top where I told you my ranking before this was somewhere around #500,000?

Here's my little indie book ranked up there with a traditionally published book. (Yes I am just a little pleased with that!).

The fact is though, rankings matter. Success breeds success. It's a well known fact. Those free downloads, and the subsequent sales have boosted me up the rankings, which will in turn bring more sales.

I hope.

And this is where the waiting game comes in. I plan on doing a second post in about a week - to see if any of this has sustained itself. Then I might be able to actually answer the question this post poses.

But until then I'd love to hear what others make of these numbers. Do free promotions work? Do you think success (even if somewhat artificially created) can only breed further success (or sales?).

To be continued...

David Estes talks about Indie success: Beating the Odds

Today's blog post comes to us from David Estes, an author who has proven that Indies can overcome the challenges of the market and create successful writing careers for themselves.  If you have not yet read any of David's books, check them out.  I just finished my first one (David's new release, Brew) and I am now officially a *fangirl*.  Enter to win a free copy in the giveaway below.  - Kate

Beating the Odds

by David Estes

Due to the explosion of ebooks and the destruction of publishing barriers, there are now literally thousands of Indie authors all screaming at the top of their lungs that their books are worth reading. That’s pretty daunting if you’re trying to make your book(s) stand out amongst the crowd. When I started seriously writing four years ago, I was CLUELESS as to what I was really getting into. And yet, somehow, some way, I’ve managed to “make it” after a zillion mistakes, a lot of hard work, and plenty of good old-fashioned luck. Although I don’t pretend to have all the answers or the magic bullet for success, here’s my story along with a few tips that have helped me get from bored full-time accountant who liked to write stories to full-time Indie author.

Roll back the tape of my life. I hated being an accountant. Desperately hated it. Long hours, high stress, corporate politics. So I quit my job and switched to another desk job that I’d heard would be less hours and less stress. I had two weeks off in between, and my Aussie wife asked what I was going to do with my break. “Uh, sit on the beach?” I said. She gave me that raised-eyebrow look and said, “Why don’t you start writing that book you always talk about?”

Although the thought of even looking at my laptop during my vacation gave me a stomachache, I listened to her pointed advice. I did it. I started writing. She hasn’t been able to get me to stop since. In four years I’ve written twenty books and published sixteen of them. Two years in I was able to quit my boring day job to pursue my dreams: I became a full-time fiction writer. 

My first trilogy was a huge success, right? Um, no. Not even close. When I published The Evolution Trilogy (a unique non-religious spin on angels and demons) a year after I started working on it, I was ready. Ready for success. Ready for a big payoff from all my hard work. I’d been reading about Amanda Hocking’s success as an Indie author and I said, “Hey, why not me?” Well, because my writing wasn’t good enough. My book idea was awesome and unique and had huge potential, but my writing was amateurish, sloppy, and in desperate need of a good editor. While I wouldn’t say The Evolution Trilogy bombed (it has sold 3,000 books in 4 years), it didn’t come anywhere near my expectations, and it most definitely wasn’t paying any real bills. The reviews were mediocre at best, which was a major reality check. Writing wasn’t as easy as I thought it would be. At first I was heartbroken. Thousands of hours of hard work down the drain. All that hope dashed on the rocky coastline of failure. I didn’t have what it takes—never would.

SCREW. THAT.

I’m the type of person that hates failure. I don’t like losing, especially at something that I love. And I LOVE writing. That’s a major key to success as an Indie author. If your goals (like mine were) are to make millions and be rich and famous, then you’re in the wrong business. Most of us will make a few bucks here and there, and a lucky few will be able to scrape out a living. Even fewer still (the Amanda Hocking’s, Elle Casey’s and Hugh Howey’s of the world) will hit it big. Right now I’m in the middle category—scraping out a living. I’m not complaining, I’d rather scrape out a living as a writer than be earning six digits a year in some job I hate. I’m happy.

My second series was the one that allowed me to quit my day job. Originally I planned another trilogy, but eventually the project turned into a 7-book epic series that combined two separate trilogies, The Dwellers Saga and The Country Saga, in a 7^th book that brought characters and plotlines together. So far it’s sold in excess of 30,000 copies in just over two years.

That brings me to another key for success: Building your backlist. Unless you’re extremely lucky and far more talented than me, writing one book a year like most traditionally published authors simply won’t cut it as an Indie. I wrote and published the 7 books in the Dwellers/Country Saga in 20 months. By that point I’d written 1 million words in three years. There are a few good reasons for writing and publishing like a fiend. One, practice is the only way to get better. By having a crazy-aggressive writing schedule you’ll force yourself to improve. Two, every new reader multiplies your potential sales. Suddenly a new reader doesn’t mean just one sale. It means a potential sale for every single one of your books, particularly if your books are in a series. It also means you can magnify the impact of giving away free copies of your books. I’ll pretty much give away an ebook of The Moon Dwellers to anyone who wants one. Why? Because if they like it, they might buy the other SIX books in the series! Quick side note: the BEST way to give away free ebooks is buy making your book free on Kindle through Amazon’s KDP Select program. The BEST way to advertise that is via BookBub, which seems extremely expensive but which is WELL worth the money. As an example, I advertised The Moon Dwellers for FREE on BookBub and had 30,000+ downloads in three days. Then I did Fire Country a month later and had 27,000+ downloads. Obviously, I made zero royalties from these downloads, but sales of the sequels took off, and I had four straight months of 2,000+ full price sales. These months changed my life. You might have tried BookBub. You might have been rejected multiple times. I was too. They are extremely selective, which is also what makes them so valuable. Keep trying. Continue to build your reviews on Amazon. If you can get over 100 with a decent average rating, that’ll give you a chance at being accepted by BookBub. Don’t give up!

So you’re probably thinking the Dwellers Saga was an instant success, right? Try again. My third year as an Indie was decent, far better than I ever could have expected. Although I wasn’t making enough to live on, my wife and I had savings and we decided to quit our jobs to make a go of my dream, with her as my editor. A big risk, but that’s what life is anyway: one massive risk. My writing was improving, and I wasn’t going it alone anymore. I’d learned the hard lesson that good writing takes work. It also takes serious criticism from serious critics. I started using a beta reading team, and I stopped brushing negative feedback aside as “Just one person’s opinion.” I realized my writing sort of sucked and that I needed to learn how to improve it. I focused on every single sentence, every single chapter. Making them tighter. Making them better. I read books on writing, like Stephen King’s On Writing and Donald Maas’s Writing the Breakout Novel. I improved with each book, and my readers noticed. They appreciated my efforts. They were fully along for the ride. 

Partway through the third year I started a Goodreads fan group. Right off the bat I had 300 members. Woohoo!! I was ecstatic. Over the moon. Six months later I was churning out the sequels to The Moon Dwellers and I still had around 300 members. What? I couldn’t understand why my membership wasn’t growing. The Dwellers Saga was getting great reviews, but my fan group was dead. No activity. No interest. I decided to change things up. My biggest problem was that I made the group all about me. And who was I? Nobody. Just another person who writes books, another tree in the forest. So I changed things up. I made the group all about books. My books, someone else’s books, reading in general. Anything was fair game. It became a place where anyone could hang out and talk about their interests, passions, and experiences. The group started growing and now has more than 2,600 members, many of whom have never, and may never, read my books, which is perfectly fine by me, so long as they read other books. You see, it’s NOT all about you as a writer. It’s about READERS. The more readers we have, the more readers enjoy reading, the better it is for everyone. Become part of a book community, not for the purpose of selling your books, but because you love books like all the other people. I recommend Goodreads, but there are many others out there. Take it seriously. Participate in discussions. Make friends. Don’t spam about your book. Readers will realize you’re a valuable member of the community and they’ll click on your profile and discover you’re an author and get EXCITED about that fact and potentially try your books. I’ve had numerous people message me on Goodreads to say they’ve been my friend for over a year and never knew I was an author, but loved all the book recommendations I gave them (books that weren’t mine!). In most cases they said they’d give my books a shot. 

Year four. The best year. Part luck. Part hard work. Part good timing. The Dwellers Saga was listed as one of 15 Series to Read if you Enjoyed The Hunger Games on Buzzfeed. Sales shot up. A couple movie inquiries came in, as well as a TV inquiry (nothing has panned out so far, but it’s still cool!). An agent contacted me and eventually signed me. I wrote another trilogy, Brew, and although it had interest from publishers including a purchase offer, my agent and I decided to sign on with Amazon White Glove. Brew, and its sequel, Boil, hit the top ten on genre bestseller lists almost immediately. I stopped eating away at our savings and started paying bills with my royalties—ALL our bills. It could happen to you, but don’t expect it to. Expect to have to fight for every reader. Treat every reader like your ONLY reader. Be generous with your free books, especially the first book in a series. Never stop writing. Never. Do it because you love it and good things will follow.

Never give up. 

For more specific Indie Author Advice from David Estes, check out his dedicated author advice page on his blog here: http://davidestesbooks.blogspot.com/search/label/advice

Also, David Estes loves connecting with fellow Indie authors as well as readers, feel free to contact him on one of his favorite social networking sites:

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/3167424.David_Estes

Blog: http://davidestesbooks.blogspot.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Davidestesbooks

Twitter: https://twitter.com/davidestesbooks

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Reviews

Reviews

The Holy Grail of the writer.

We seek them out, desperately hoping that if enough good ones pile up they will finally help us reach more readers.

But how do you get them?

The sad fact is, most people who read your book won’t leave a review. I know I don’t review every book I read. Most people unfortunately only review if something blows them away, either by how good it is or by how bad it is. And as much as we want reviews, we certainly don’t want the latter!

For most indie books building that review pile can seem impossible. We see the sales, but if feels like they’re disappearing into the ether, because there’s no feedback. Whilst part of me subscribes to the no news is good news idea, I also hunger, like any other author, for more reviews.

Now you can sit back and let them come in naturally, or you can try and generate some more yourself.

How?

One option is book bloggers, blogs like this one that offer a free and honest review of your book in exchange for a free copy. There are plenty of sites, like World Literary Café, just as example, that have forums to connect authors with bloggers looking for books to review. The downside is, a lot of those bloggers have huge to read lists, and it can take a while for them to get to you. But if you can be patient you might be rewarded with a nice full blog post about your book.

Another option is Goodreads. There seems to be a growing trend for R4R discussion groups where you can find readers who are willing to write reviews in exchange for a copy of the book. Find groups that fit your genre and market and join up. Try and be a part of the community, and you may soon find you have a steady stream of people willing to review your book.

The one path I don’t recommend: paid reviews. It might seem like a tempting idea. Pay for a few reviews to boost your rankings and ratings, and hopefully generate some real sales. But what this means is that you’re lying to your reader, and that’s hardly the best way to start out a new ‘relationship’.

So what about you? Do you love reviews or hate them? What are your tips for bumping those reviews on Amazon and Goodreads?

But You're Giving It Away!

Some friends are horrified at me giving away free copies of my book. ‘You’re not making money!’ they cry. Of course, they haven’t realized how valuable ‘free’ is.

‘Free’ is a wonderful word everybody loves to hear. Nobody loses with ‘free’ – you’re getting something without spending money, so you’re likely to take a risk. If it’s not for you, you’ve lost nothing. If you love it, you’ve been exposed to something new you may not have tried if not for that magical word. ‘Free’ is the indie author’s friend. 

I’m not saying give every person a free copy of your novel, but running a giveaway offering a number of copies can really generate interest. Lowering the price of your eBook to £0 for 24 hours can see your readership increase because people are more likely to pick it up. Many readers specifically look for free eBooks. With money tight and book prices rising, unless it is a known author they adore, they stick to free eBooks because it is a way to get their literary fix without breaking the bank. And if one person likes it and recommends it to a friend, that friend could be a paid purchase.

I also distribute free copies to people who are specifically reading to review. There are numerous people willing to do this, such as the wonderful team at Rock the Book. Reviews are gold. Not only can they be an ego boost (or a sobering reality) but they are one of the main things customers look for when purchasing novels (along with cover and blurb). Utilizing services offered by people who are happy to read and review in exchange for a free copy is an invaluable investment. 

There is a line between profitable ‘free’ and giving it away to everyone. You need to be using ‘free’ to generate interest, gain readership and hold attention. If it is always free, the hype will burn out and people may question why it is priced at nothing. 

Top tips:

Use ‘free’ sporadically – drop the price to nothing for 2 to 5 days every 6 months.

Time ‘free’ right – coincide it with a specifically high reading time: winter, back to school, summer vacations, a holiday your book is associated with (Halloween Horror, Valentine’s Romance).

Promotion – Generate hype! Create Facebook events, update your website/social media, produce a countdown, post daily during the ‘free’ event. Get people interested.

By Chloe Testa
 Chloe is of British-Maltese descent and grew up in the small, seaside town of Brugibba with her mother, grandmother and two arrogant cats. She now lives in Surrey, UK, dividing her time between writing novels and teaching English, with almost no time to sleep in between the two. She is a lover of great books, good company and bad puns.

Find out more about Chloe on her site, or find her book on Amazon.

The Indie Book Routine by Guest Author Mark Shaw

Since releasing my first novel The Keeper of the Wind, the one thing I noticed right away on social media was the frenzied way everyone seemed to be promoting their books. I thought it was crazy how Indie authors were basically begging for someone to either buy or take a look at their book for free. Social media is saturated with this, and I found this very discouraging and wondered how i could compete in such chaos, and I’m sure many new Indie authors think the same way in the beginning, too. Being a very creative person, right away I started thinking of ways to get around the frantic hustle that promoting Indie books seemed to be based around, and started thinking of other alternatives to promote my book. 

A few days after putting my book out, another Indie author sent me a note asking me how my book was selling and how I was promoting it. He then proceeded to tell me how his current book wasn’t selling well at all, and he was in the process of releasing his 4^th novel. I thought this was crazy. Then right after, I read an article online titled “Keep Your Day Job”. It broke down how very few Indie authors are making money at their craft. And how the chances of them being able to make a decent living from their writing are slim to none. This pissed me off, and I saw it as a challenge for change. With this notion I came up with the #IndieBooksBeSeen movement. 

The first thing I set out to do was to make July 1^st of every year IndieBooksBeSeen Day. A day where Indie authors show we’re unified and proud to be Indie. We would post a picture of us holding up our Indie titles and then constantly retweet everyone else’s book, for the world and all social media to see. One grand gesture to show the world that we’re here and strong together. It was a better success than I thought it would be, and I was very moved by others' warm sentiments and sense of pride. This gave me hope and I felt encouraged to forge ahead with a new plan while the momentum was still present. 

I then decided to attempt giving struggling authors a boost, by challenging all others to seek these authors out and give them reviews to bolster them. I for one know what it’s like to just start out and hardly anyone will give you reviews, unless you pay for them. So i felt this would be an easy challenge, and boy was I wrong! I began to tweet several participants of our indie pride day to start. Thinking they were still feeling the love from our #indiebooksbeseen day a couple weeks before. Only to get one person say that she felt like she was being spammed by me. And i thought wow! But it wasn’t spam when I and tons of others spent hours retweeting your title. To make things worse, the review challenge never took flight. Out of all the people I reached out to, only a few took part. What this said to me was that most Indie authors will only get involved in projects that are self-serving to their own cause, unless they’re part of a group. 

What is so clear to me and a few others is most Indie authors can’t seem to shake this routine of hustling the books at all cost. This mindset will keep us right where we are, with some doing great and most of us not! I am doing everything I can to break this routine with new innovative ideas on how to take us to that next level where being Indie is trendy. I want Indie books to be the cool alternative to mainstream books and the only way I can see this happening is if we become one voice for the industry itself. I’m not saying don’t promote your book, I’m just asking you to give some of your energy to boosting our industry. Because when the light shines on our industry, it’ll shine on all of us.       

Connect with Mark Shaw:

Twitter

Facebook

Youtube

Think Tank: Authors, Bloggers, Readers wanted

Hey everyone!  While trying to decide what to write about this week, I realized that we had an idea a while back that has not really taken off yet, and I would like to try to get it going (with your help).  This won't work without you, so check it out and see what you think!

The idea:

An online think tank composed of authors, bloggers, and readers.  We'll tackle some of the tough questions of Indie publishing, hot topics, and what-worked-for-you sort of things.  All you great thinkers will put your minds together, and we will publish your answers to the questions.

How it works:

Sign up with your email here.  We won't spam you, sell your info, or anything like that.  Every once in a while, you will be emailed a question from Rock the Book.  We'll try to give you plenty of time to answer it.  If you don't have time, or you don't like the question, then simply don't reply.  If you would like to contribute to the post, reply with your answer.  Include a link to your site if you like.  You receive credit for your work.  We reserve the right to edit spelling and punctuation errors, and to cut excerpts (if everyone sends us twenty-page answers, it might be a little much).  All the answers received will be compiled into the post.  It's kind of like a mini guest post.  Hopefully all our participants will remember to share, which translates to exposure.  Exposure is good.

Pretty cool, huh?  I hope we can get some interesting discussion going soon.  So, if you have a couple of minutes now and then to be part of the RTB Think Tank, go ahead and sign up!

Breaking News:  

Jane Dougherty is launching her third book in the Green Woman series today.  Congrats, Jane!  *Waves and jumps up and down like a rabid fan*  If any of you read my 5-star review of Jane's first book, The Dark Citadel, you know I absolutely loved it.  Well, guess what?  To celebrate the launch, The Dark Citadel is free on Kindle August 20th and 21st.  It doesn't get any better than free.  And this book is truly amazing.  If you don't believe me, check out Jane's other reviews from her other rabid fans.  So go here and get it now:  The Dark Citadel on Kindle.  Tell your friends, and your friend's friends.  All you fellow Indies out there, let's support Jane's launch!  And... come to the launch party Facebook event at : Beyond the Realm of Night Launch Party  Last thing: check out my special interview with Jane tomorrow to learn more about the inner workings of her amazing stories!