- A book promotion might just be the perfect solution
to spark some energy back into your book sales.
If you're part of Amazon's Kindle Select Program,
you're eligible to run a free ebook giveaway
or a Kindle Countdown Deal.
But even if you're not in those programs
'cause I know my books are not in those programs,
you can still make it happen with a couple extra steps.
If you're wondering how to do that,
well, stick around because this video is certainly for you.
(upbeat music)
Hello there, I'm Julie The Book Broad of Book Launchers,
the awesome self publishing services team.
Authors enrolled in KDP select can promote their book
with a free book promotion or a Kindle countdown deal
once every three months.
It's great timing because it's common for sales
to need a pick me up every quarter also
depending on what else you've been doing
to market your book.
Now a free book promotion is well, obviously, free
for up to five days,
you can give away free copies of your ebook.
Of course, when you're giving away your book,
you are not making any profit from it
but there's a trade-off that can be worth it sometimes
because sometimes once a reader grabs a copy
from your giveaway, they can leave a review.
If you have other books,
a free book can often be a great strategy
to introduce them to your book ecosphere,
ecosystem, you know, (laughs) all your books.
It's a typical strategy for fiction authors.
They introduce the first in a series for free
and then sell the others.
But for non-fiction reviews are really what we do it for
and if you're experiencing a recent dip in sales,
reviews can add to that by providing social proof,
a free giveaway may not put money in your pocket
while it's happening.
But if those free readers post a review,
you are boosting your potential
for money-making opportunities in more ways than one.
All that said, I'm not a big fan
of giving non-fiction books away for free.
I have a few reasons for this one is that,
I do believe it devalues the massive amount of value
that is in a non-fiction book.
In some books like my book, Self-Publish and Succeed",
you're gaining steps and resources that are equivalent
to thousands of dollars of advice and mistake avoidance.
That's really high value and to give it away for free,
well, I don't think it puts value in the mind of the reader
which leads me to the second reason,
I'm not a huge fan of free non-fiction books,
they don't get read through very often.
Maybe you give away 100 books and possibly five read it.
Well, I'd rather sell 20 and have 10 people read it.
And finally, the reason I don't think it's a great idea
for non-fiction to go free
is that you're rarely trying to get those readers
into your ecosystem.
You might have more books for them to read
in which case it can be a consideration,
but generally free doesn't attract highly committed people.
And if you've written a non-fiction book,
chances are you're hoping they're gonna come in
and check out your business or your product or your service
or hire you to speak or do something else
beyond just read your book
and free doesn't equal commitment.
So that usually won't lead to all those wonderful things
you hoped would happen when you write a book.
But those free ebook deals are there for you
if it makes sense for you and your strategy.
Now, a Kindle Countdown Deal on the other hand
starts your sale price low and increases it slowly
over a set number of days
until it returns to its normal price.
Your sale can last from five to seven days
and you can set your pricing in whatever increments
that your little heart desires.
So it's really more of a count up deal (laughs).
On average, we see the best results with five day sales
that start at $0.99 and increase a dollar each day.
Now you don't have to start at $0.99.
You can drop your price down to 0.57 or 0.24 or $0.13
but $0.99 price tag tends to grab attention
and grab the most sales
and it's just what people most commonly see.
So it won't surprise them in a weird way.
Five-day sales also tend to have great traction,
they're shorter so you won't get that one day sales hit
that Amazon actually doesn't like
and it also could get missed if it's only one day.
So by having it five days more people will see it.
But if you run a sale that's too long,
it can also not work in your favor either.
So five days is kind of a sweet spot.
We run $0.99 promos for clients
that aren't in Kindle Select as well.
Like I said, my books are not in Kindle Select.
We just manually set the price down to $0.99
and run the paid promos.
But Kindle Countdown deals include two little features
that help get readers to buy.
One is the placement of a promotional price,
right next to the regular price,
showing readers how much they're saving.
The other is the slightly anxiety inducing countdown clock,
letting them know how much time is left
until the price raises to put the pressure on.
You don't get that if you're not in Kindle Select.
Now Amazon also features countdown deals
on a dedicated page.
So readers can browse the books on sale that week
and find new books to try without
a huge financial commitment.
So you're not simply potentially upping your sales,
you're upping your discoverability too.
Okay, so that's the logistics of setting the price
and getting ready for this.
Now you have to promote it.
Now, the first way you're going to want to promote it
is of course to your audience,
social media email list website.
Now time and time again,
I've said email list
is one of your most valuable tools as an author.
Well, here's another reason.
You can tease the upcoming sale
at the end of one of your newsletters or social media posts
and then a week or so before, promote it
sharing the reason behind the sale, why you're celebrating,
why you're having the special offer.
And then the specifics like the date it starts
and the price.
On the day of the sale
of course you need to announce it
and make sure to send out another reminder
the day before it ends.
It never hurts to share a few posts to your Facebook
or Instagram story either.
Now, aside from your own promotion,
you should be doing things to gain traffic.
What we do is purchase ad space
from ebook promotional sites.
For our clients, we test a lot of different sites
but we consistently use Bargain Booksy and Fussy Librarian
which have reasonable rates and sizable audiences.
We are also commonly using sites like Buck Books,
Riffle Books, Good Kindles.
But like I said, Bargain Booksy and Fussy Librarian
consistently returned the best sales results.
I'll link to a page on Kindlepreneur
that has a gigantic list of ebook sites that you can test.
A lot of them are for fiction.
So us non-fiction authors do have some limitations.
Now these sites work by sending daily newsletters to readers
that advertise that days, ebook sales.
Ad space ranges from 20 to $110
but there are variances based on what packages you choose.
Usually we purchase three to five ads for a five day sale,
spreading them out over the course of that promotion.
Sure, this costs you money but you're potentially reaching
a whole new audience specifically signed up for emails
to find new things to read, or is it,
we definitely think so.
Word of warning though,
these promo sites can fill up quickly.
So that's why it's beneficial
to plan your sale dates well in advance.
At Book Launchers, we purchase space three to four weeks
in advance for our authors and longer
when it's the holiday season.
Sites have limited space available
and some have an approval process
before they will even run the ad.
Now, you've picked your dates,
you've purchased your ads
and you've got your own promotions lined up
and you're ready to run your sale.
Well, here's what you do.
First go to the marketing tab in your Amazon author account.
Then in the run-up price promotion,
select Kindle Countdown Deals
and click Create a Kindle Countdown Deal.
Select the book you're gonna promote
if you have multiple books and then click continue,
enter your selections for marketplace, date and time,
number of price increments and starting price.
After you hit continue, you'll see a table pop-up.
Edit the price increments and start times you'd like
and then finish up by clicking Add Promotion.
If you're not in Kindle Select, you'll have to do what I do
and that is set a reminder to drop your price
the day before your promotion starts, go in and do it
and then set another reminder to go in and raise your price
when your promotional period is over.
We don't get that cool countdown
nor do we get that promo price notice
but we get to sell our books wherever we want
and we haven't given Amazon all the power.
So there's trade offs, right?
All right, something to keep in mind
before you rush over to Amazon to run your promotion.
Once you schedule your Kindle Countdown,
you won't be able to edit or stop it within 24 hours
of its starting time throughout the entire deal, period.
Amazon also requires that your books regular price
can't be changed for 30 days before and 14 days
after the promotion, surprising?
Well, there's more surprising facts about Amazon
that you need to know as an author in this video right here.
And if you still haven't heard
about A Plus content on Amazon,
well, you definitely need to watch this video right here.
Either way, I can't wait to hang out with you
and I think it's a win-win both ways.
(upbeat music)