So this is my first post! A little nervous not going to lie, so please be kind! I've had my book sitting on Kindle for about a month but nothing really happened. I did a lot of shameless self-publishing on Tumblr, facebook and Instagram. Decided to have a break from that, I was scared I was annoying my friends and family! I have seen you can have your book sold for free, for five days and apparently it really helps sales. It's not like I wrote to become super rich (tho who am I kidding it would be nice lol) I just want people to read my book and enjoy it....not asking much am I? What do people think of having your book going for free? Would you do it? Has anyone had a bad experience with this? I suppose this is the problem with self-publishing but finding an agent was becoming a murderous struggle! x
You need to be on Kindle Select, not just regular Kindle, in order to use the five free days, but other than that I don't think there's a significant down side. That said, there may not be much of an upside, either. If you have more than one book available, making one of them free (especially if it's the first book in a series) can be a good way to drive sales of your other books. But if you only have one book, you're not really driving sales of anything. So possibly not that useful?
Is that the same as Kindle Unlimited, @BayView? My friend has a handful of books on Kindle and they allow her to have a free for a month special on one at a time, or at least they did. I haven't paid much attention since they started the the unlimited version.
As for the OP question, in my opinion most any marketing effort is worth a try until you get your name and/or book out there.
Firstly, there's no need to be nervous. I'm new here, too, but on the job, the people here are friendly and encouraging. So.... Welcome aboard. Regarding your question. I know that you're desperate for your book to be seen, but i'm not entirely sure that this is the best route. I don't know much about this sort of thing, so maybe i'm not qualified to answer. I do understand why you're contemplating it, you're probably thinking than an agent/the equivalent of an agent will read your book and think "Wow! This woman has some talent! I must sign her to a multi-million pound deal!" Give it some thought.
I think Kindle Unlimited is the subscription service (where authors get paid by the page for KU members reading their books) and Kindle Select is what authors have to sign up for in order to have access to KU or various other Kindle promo programs. I think.
As a reader, I'm much more likely to give a self-published book a go if it's free (or on Kindle Unlimited). I've been let down so many times that I'm leery of paying for them unless I've had a personal recommendation. If your goal is to be read then I don't see any downside to making it free.
Apparently it's the done thing to put in a polite notice at the end of the book requesting reviews. If you get some good ones that can drive interest after the free period is over.
Are you using the look inside feature? As a reader, I always use that to find out if I want to buy a book, as writing style can be a make or break feature for me. Our local library doesn't have a lot of the books I like to read, and I don't buy books unless I can read at least the first few pages.
