Is anyone else’s stomach twisting like a porcupine’s trying to tear its way out? Oh then, it must just be me. My book, “To Kill a Wizard,” has been out since June 30th, and so far, I’ve only sold a handful of copies. Depressing, right? Well, as a new author, I didn’t expect to be carried on the shoulders of my waves of readers, but I’d hoped for more than this. But then, my initial plans for promoting my book kind of didn’t work out the way I planned. So today, I’m giving away my book for free on Amazon. Which brings me to the topic of today’s blog… I’ll let you know what I did wrong, and then, what I’m trying now when it comes to promoting my book.
Initial plan:
- Give away a free copy of a short story, in my novel’s world, to generate some readers for the novel.
- Release “To Kill a Wizard” a few weeks later.
- Promote on Twitter, Amazon, and blogs.
- Wait for the orders to roll in.
Okay, so at this point, I’ve had about 300 downloads of my short story from Smashwords and a handful from Amazon. I have no idea how many of those copies have actually been read, but the overall feedback has been excellent. However, not many copies of my book (as I’ve said) were actually purchased after that point. And the big issue, I’d hoped Amazon would “price match” (although they technically say they don’t do that) my short story and make it free on Amazon. Weeks later, they still haven’t, so there is no free story to entice Amazon readers to give my novel a shot.
New Plan:
- I’m giving away a copy of my novel on Smashwords.
- I enrolled my novel in KDP Select, at least for the first 90 days.
- I’m doing a “free day,” where my novel will be free.
So that brings me to my “free day” on Amazon. It’s today! I have no idea how it will go over. Maybe I won’t get a single download. Maybe I’ll get a bunch of them. Either way, I’ll update all of you, so you know whether it was worth it. Wish me luck!
And if you’d like to download my book, check it out at: http://www.amazon.com/Kill-Wizard-Roses-Story-Protectors-ebook/dp/B00X4XR32I/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&sr=8-1&qid=1436653857
The World of the 7 Evil Dwarves 