Hi everyone,
I would like to talk about Indie publishing and promo opportunities. Last week I had a book, ALL OF ME up on FreeBookFridays, and it took ten months before I could get a time slot, but it was well worth the wait. For one thing, it cost nothing except 5 hard copys of your book as a giveaway, and you have an entire week of exposure and I believe they send it to around 12,000 emails. I was notified a couple of days ago that my book had 900 responses, the second largest number for Indie books this year! Yeah!!! It resulted in nice sales but the exposure was priceless.
They are having a sale on right now, and I intend to sign up for the Deluxe package which means no wait period, your book cover on display for 3 months, and a week to promote your book. How good is that?
I know some other authors have had great success with promo such as donating a portion of each sale to a charity, and I would like to hear how this works. If anyone has some great marketing tips for Indie publishing, please feel free to share!
I'm all ears. Thanks, and keep writing, keep promoting, and keep selling!
Hi Patrice I haven't heard of this site, but I have my book Neighbors and More at StoryFinds featured for a week. It cost me $50. And again I will have it featured for a month at Romance Books 4Us.
Great Mona. How did you go about it, is there just a sign-up link?
Awesome, Patrice. I'm just getting into the indie world and always looking for opportunities for promo. Sadly, I haven't done anything really except to blog here or at the Ruby Slippered Sisterhood and Facebook & Tweeter. I guess its time to roll up my sleeves. I'm anxious to hear of more promo ops. Thanks for sharing.
Hi Patrice - I'm on the wait-list right now for FreeBookFriday. I'm supposed to be up in Dec (which would be a 4-month wait) but I imagine I'll get pushed out as people pay for slots. I'm glad to hear you thought it was a good thing to do.
I also did a giveaway on GoodReads. I had just over 1000 people sign up for it, and I went from my book having 17 people mark it as "to read" to 217 people, so that was good exposure as well, only for the cost of giving away 2 paperbacks.
I did a Facebook ad, but only because I had a free $50 credit. It resulted in doubling the "likes" on my writer page, but as far as I could see did not lead to a bump in sales (at least nothing noticeable). I wouldn't have been happy if the $50 was out of my own pocket!
Am willing to spend some promo dollars, but just don't know the best place to spend it!
Would love to hear other's ideas.
Too bad you didn't include more info about the site. It sounds interesting.
I'm behind Autumn. I FB and do guest blogs. I'll know more when I see if letting Amazon make a book free in September for 5 days helps my other book sales.
Hey Patrice, we'll let you know how the donating thing goes as soon as Joan and I do it! You are amazing and a beautiful soul and seeing that huge grin on your face with your wonderful sales makes my day!!! I love how well things have gone for a hard working gal like you and it's a well deserved success.
Sounds great, Patrice, Congrats.
Patrice, congrats on the success on FreeBookFridays. All exposure is important, especially for Indie authors. I put up a non-fiction reading instruction book as an indie pubbed book this summer. I used Kindle Select. On Wednesday and on through today it has been featured free on Amazon. As of just a moment ago, it had been downloaded 365 times and was ranked #1 in study skills and #2 in reading on Kindle. I'm hoping the exposure will lead to sales! One thing I did was to go to linked in and post on the parenting boards. I think it is imperative to reach the right audience with our posts. If we focus on writing groups, we are preaching to the choir.
Scarlett - that sounds great. Good for you- sales, baby, sales!
Jackie, I'm sure you'll enjoy the exposure and success on FreeBookFriday's, but I'd love to hear more about Goodreads. I recently put some books up there, and need to start to promo more.
Thanks for commenting and good luck!
Thanks Beth, Mary and Mary M and Toni. I tried to attach the link and kept getting kicked out this morning. Had to redo the post 3 times! What a goof.
Please just go to Free Book Friday and the link will come up. I promise!!
Very interesting, Patrice. Particularly about GoodReads. I ran an ad on GoodReads, so some success but not what I'd hoped. You said you had to give away 5 hard copies? My indie pub is only ebook; otherwise, I might be interested in FreeBookFriday. Thanks for the info.
Yes - you do need to have hard copies as they are trying to promote the love of the book, so some of mine don't qualify either.
You deserve the best!!! I am so pleased with your success!
Continued too1
Patrice,
This is wonderful information. Best wishes for your continued success. You go, girl!