As I type, there are over 1,359,590 ebooks available to download from Amazon. It really is a jungle out there, and if you’re brave enough to publish independently, you need an extra helping hand. Smart indies enrol in Amazon’s select programme, which allows five free promotional days over a ninety day period. It really is vital to exploit this advertising opportunity to the max.
To make any impact at all, you need to hit at least the top ten in genre, but the real biggie is top ten overall chart position, with the holy grail being number one in free downloads.
There are no guarantees, but you can give yourself the best chance of success by following these five easy steps:
1. General exposure: Email buddies, post on writer forums and call in favours. You need guest posts, interviews etc.
2. Ensure your title has at least five solid reviews, preferably with an average of four stars. This helps enormously.
3. Make certain your product and author pages are up to date on Amazon, and all your titles are linked to each other.
4. Update your own web page/facebook, making certain there are sufficient links to sample/buy within easy clicking distance.
5. You should by now have composed a list of sites and facebook pages which announce free kindle downloads. Some require advance notification, some same day notification. Social site Twitter is a major player of course, try to keep tweets up to the minute – that way you can announce the milestones as they happen – 3,000 downloads was my tipping point – once you reach the top twenty – you’re charting front page on Amazon.
I’m speaking from experience, my last promo was for A Ripple in Time, which achieved 17,000 free downloads. In addition to the above, I leaned heavily on the Campbell brothers’ “Can’t Sell, Won’t Sell” a self help guide based on their own experience which is free on the first day of every month.
An Explosive Time goes free this August bank holiday (5 – 7th August) and of course I’d love to emulate or even surpass 17,000 downloads. It does boil down to luck – but it’s wise to load the odds in your favour. Follow the steps above, and your chances of success have just improved significantly.
Image Credit : Suite101
