My New Kindle Adventure

[ash1ey]

Updated Stats:

Original book from 2011
Price: $1.99
713 downloads - Free Period Ended
0 Sales
0 Borrows
0 Reviews

New Make Money Book
Price: $0.99
190 Downloads - Fourth Day of Promotion Period
0 Sales
0 Borrows
1 Reviews (4 star)
2 Subscribers

Plan For Today:

The plan yesterday was to try and start the new book but instead i decided to do more research and more promotion of my book that is free. I sent out around 10 emails to reviews and got one new subscriber to my list and one new 4 star review! Tonight I am going to finish off my research and send out a few more emails to try and get another couple of reviews.

I found a few pieces of software that is helping me find reviews and do research. It's called KD Suite and as I don't want to link to a competitors forum, if you google "[GET] KD Suite - Premium Kindle Marketing Software" you will find it. I recommend taking a look at them if you need help researching and find reviews etc.

Edit: I'm also looking to change the category of my free book as the free downloads have been a little slow compared to my other book.

 

[ash1ey]

Quick update before I go to bed.

Started content for my next book (true crime gang related) and I just had my first sale on my original ebook from 2011! The book has a few links to a domain I didn't own so I just purchased the domain again and slapped up a quick homepage to avoid any bad reviews based on dead links.

I have some reviews and stuff on my newer book but ill update all stats sometime tomorrow.

 

[ash1ey]

Updated Stats:

Original book from 2011
Price: $1.99
713 downloads - Free Period Ended
1 Sales
0 Borrows
0 Reviews

New Make Money Book
Price: $0.99
250 Downloads - Final Day of Promotion Period
0 Sales
0 Borrows
3 Reviews (4.5 star)
2 Subscribers

Plan For Today:

Continue writing and researching for new ebook.

 

[ash1ey]

Updated Stats:Original book from 2011
Price: $1.99
713 downloads - Free Period Ended
1 Sales
0 Borrows
0 Reviews

New Make Money Book
Price: $0.99
281 Downloads - Free Period Ended
0 Sales
0 Borrows
4 Reviews (4 star)
2 Subscribers

Plan For Today:

Free promotion period ended for my second book with a lot less downloads to my previous book. The book was in a small niche and in different categories so no surprise really. Happy to have gotten some reviews so maybe it will help in producing sales further down the line.

Today I am going to continue writing and hopefully get the first draft finished for my next book.

Edit: Just had another reply to an email I sent and got another 4 star review on my second book.

 

[sirmattheww]

Great journey! How are you getting so many reviews in such a short time?

 

[ash1ey]

Great journey! How are you getting so many reviews in such a short time?

Thank you!

I get reviews by finding reviewers who have reviewed similar books to mine and email them. Here's a quote from my earlier post I emailed around 15 people to get those 4 reviews.

I found a few pieces of software that is helping me find reviews and do research. It's called KD Suite and as I don't want to link to a competitors forum, if you google "[GET] KD Suite - Premium Kindle Marketing Software" you will find it. I recommend taking a look at them if you need help researching and find reviews etc.

 

[Punisher]

Thank you!

I get reviews by finding reviewers who have reviewed similar books to mine and email them. Here's a quote from my earlier post I emailed around 15 people to get those 4 reviews.

How are you getting their email address to email them?

 

[ash1ey]

I am using some software called KD Suite Premium to find and extract them.

I found a few pieces of software that is helping me find reviewers and do research. It's called KD Suite and as I don't want to link to a competitors forum, if you google "[GET] KD Suite - Premium Kindle Marketing Software" you will find it. I recommend taking a look at them if you need help researching and find reviews etc.

 

[Punisher]

I am using some software called KD Suite Premium to find and extract them.

My only concern is some of those people might get pissed and question how you got their emails, then leave you a 1 star just for being pissed off. I dunno, if they report to Amazon couldn't you be in violation of soliciting reviews. That is a huge no-no on Amazon I am finding out.

 

[ash1ey]

Well my first test run of asking for reviews was successful. Sure I had people email back asking how I got their email address but I explained that it was publicly available on there amazon profile.

I am not asking for fake reviews. I am simply asking them to read my book (if they have time) while its free and leave an honest review. I am not asking them to fake a review so there is no problems there. Amazon is fully aware that people email reviewers asking for reviews, from what I've seen its common practice for indie authors. They just don't want you emailing them asking for "4 or 5 star" reviews.

 

[Punisher]

Well my first test run of asking for reviews was successful. Sure I had people email back asking how I got their email address but I explained that it was publicly available on there amazon profile.

I am not asking for fake reviews. I am simply asking them to read my book (if they have time) while its free and leave an honest review. I am not asking them to fake a review so there is no problems there. Amazon is fully aware that people email reviewers asking for reviews, from what I've seen its common practice for indie authors. They just don't want you emailing them asking for "4 or 5 star" reviews.

I understand what your saying, I understand your technically not breaking the rules. What I am saying is when you get that asshole who is pissed you found their email, then in turn slams you with a 2 star for spite, gonna sting like hell after all your hard work. They most likely won't even read the book either. I've dealt with these same assholes on eBay for 11 years, only takes a few of them to mess up your feedback, and believe me, they get off on it. Just be careful.

 

[ash1ey]

Why would they be pissed I found their email when they publicly display it on Amazon? Not everyone has there email displayed on there, you have to enable to have it displayed to the public. I'm sure most get many emails a day requesting reviews. Why are they gonna pick on you and leave you a bad one?

Sure someone might still get pissed but in general the Amazon community of publishers and reviewers seems very nice. The rewards greatly outweigh the minimal risk IMO.

Also remember you should only email people who have left reviews for similar books to yours. That way you know they are interested in the subject of your book and will most likely be happy to have a free book to read.

I will continue to email people as and when I release a new book, but only if I don't get any reviews during the free promotion. It's honestly the only viable way to get reviews. If you have no reviews after the free period, from what I've read and seen, your very unlikely to make many, if any sales at all.

To try and get more reviews during the free period, on my next book im going to be adding a short sentence or two asking the reader to say thanks for the freebie by leaving me a review. Not sure whether to do this at the start of the book, at the end or both.

 

[Punisher]

Why would they be pissed I found their email when they publicly display it on Amazon? Not everyone has there email displayed on there, you have to enable to have it displayed to the public. I'm sure most get many emails a day requesting reviews. Why are they gonna pick on you and leave you a bad one?

Sure someone might still get pissed but in general the Amazon community of publishers and reviewers seems very nice. The rewards greatly outweigh the minimal risk IMO.

Also remember you should only email people who have left reviews for similar books to yours. That way you know they are interested in the subject of your book and will most likely be happy to have a free book to read.

I will continue to email people as and when I release a new book, but only if I don't get any reviews during the free promotion. It's honestly the only viable way to get reviews. If you have no reviews after the free period, from what I've read and seen, your very unlikely to make many, if any sales at all.

To try and get more reviews during the free period, on my next book im going to be adding a short sentence or two asking the reader to say thanks for the freebie by leaving me a review. Not sure whether to do this at the start of the book, at the end or both.

Keep us posted! I know me and you both understand you are not doing anything wrong. It's the guy that just hates getting unsolicited emails who has a bad day and strikes out because someone pissed in his coffee. Has nothing to do with you, or what your doing. Just a bunch of people who get offended the minute you email them for whatever reason. Hope it works out for you! Free period reviews are definitely the best way to kick start your sales. Good luck.

 

[ash1ey]

Thanks and good luck to you as well

 

[erickishere]

Good luck with your journey

 

[ash1ey]

Updated Stats:

Original book from 2011
Price: $1.99
713 downloads - Free Period Ended
2 Sales
0 Borrows
0 Reviews

New Make Money Book
Price: $0.99
281 Downloads - Free Period Ended
0 Sales
0 Borrows
4 Reviews (4 star)
2 Subscribers

True Crime Short Story
Price: $0.99
0 Downloads - Free Period Starts Tomorrow
0 Sales
0 Borrows
0 Reviews

Poker Book - Old Stats
Price: $1.99
25 Downloads - Re-Writing Today
1 Sales
0 Borrows
0 Reviews

Plan For Today:

Yesterday I managed to finish my 3rd book (true crime) and it is published and submitted to start its free promotion period tomorrow. Really interested to see how many free books will go in this category.

While going through my stats yesterday I noticed that my poker book (which contained mostly copied material) randomly made a sale on amazon.fr even tho it was only for sale for about 1 day before I pulled it off that marketplace. Because of the sale I'm going to spend the day re-writing this book. It's around 8k words but I seem to be getting through it pretty quick. All being well I will get it finished and published tonight so I will have 4 books live.

 

[eveneven]

It's good that you are using opt-in to capture leads in the long-run. Selling Kindle books is fine, but there is more money in capturing emails and sending them offers IMO.

If I were you, I would at least put a page in the front, and one in the back, saying something like:
'We all know how internet marketing keeps changing. Though this method will continue to work for a long time, things change. As an extra bonus for those that bought this book, I will offer you free lifetime updates. Simply opt in here, and you will be one of the first to receive the latest new methods: [link] '

Frame it like you're offering them something, and you have their email -- easily. By putting it in the front, you will also capture those that are looking inside the book, and by putting it again in the back, you'll remind people to opt-in.

John Chow also has a vid where he puts an opt-in link in the description at Amazon. :shrug:

 

[ash1ey]

Thanks for the reply mate.

John Chow also has a vid where he puts an opt-in link in the description at Amazon.

Sounds interesting ill have to check it out.

 

[ash1ey]

A quick update. I didn't manage to finish re-writing the poker book as I had hoped. It was taking a while and becoming very tedious. I decided to take a break from it and threw together a kinda puzzle book that was easy to do and took me about 3 hours from start to finish to get published. It goes on the free promo tomorrow.

I also decided to publish some public domain work (an old English literature short ghost story) and to stay within the amazon rules i threw in a few unique illustrations. I had an email back from them asking a few questions regarding original publish date and author so I've replied to that. I decided to do publish this as a test more than anything.

To keep thing simple, I'll only update my stats now if there is any changes.

Updated Stats:

True Crime Short Story
Price: $0.99
5 Downloads - First Day of Free Promo
0 Sales
0 Borrows
0 Reviews

Very few downloads tells me this is likely to be a flop.

Plan For Today:

Try and re-write more of the poker book. If I get bored again I may make some youtube vids to promote the books I currently have published.

 

[ash1ey]

Quick update. I now have a total of 8 books live. Some are currently in the free promo period.

In total I now have 6 sales - 0 Borrows - 0 Returns.