EBook Marketing Tips, The Superuser, and Twinkies

With the massive success of indie authors like John Locke, many people are opting to self-publish instead of going a more traditional route. We chose to go this direction with The Superuser for a couple of key reasons: it enabled us to have a much higher percentage of sales, and the time between completing the novel and actually selling it was reduced from many months to a couple days spent formatting it for Kindle. We’ve decided to give away our book for free until the 26th.

Why do authors give away their books for free?

The idea is that it leads to more sales once the book goes back to the original price. In my book’s case, that’s $2.99. Almost two days into the four day promotion, I’ve given away 10,870 copies of my book. Hopefully, I’ll give away about 20k copies before the price returns to normal. The Superuser’s Amazon sales ranking seems to have peaked in the free store to the number of cards in a deck (#52), but I’m hopeful that the sites I chose to promote the deal will help the book reach a lower number.

Perhaps the biggest negative for ebook self-publishing is the lack of a mainstream publisher’s marketing contacts. Some bigger names, notably James Altucher (one of my self-publishing heros), suggest looking into hiring someone to market your ebook. Once again, I opted to take on this task myself. (I guess this explains certain deep things about me— like why I prefer spending $35 on materials to knit my own scarf, rather than buying one for $10!)

There are many outlets to promote ebooks, and here are the ones that I’m using during this promotion (some charge a fee and have minimum requirements to promote):

www.pixelofink.com

www.kindleboards.com

www.digitalbooktoday.com

http://ereadernewstoday.com/ent-free-book-submissions/

http://bargainebookhunter.com/

http://www.freebooksy.com/editorial-submissions

http://www.thatbookplace.com/free-promo-submissions/

http://indiebookoftheday.com/authors/free-on-kindle-listingdirects

http://www.facebook.com/ebooksfreefreefree

http://www.freebookdude.com/p/list-your-free-book.html

https://www.facebook.com/indieexchange

Someone emailed to ask me if it hurt to give away something I spent so long on for free to so many people. The short answer to that is “No.”

The long answer is that many authors have a sense of entitlement once they finish a book, as though after they put forth the effort of writing it the world should flock to buy their book faster than Twinkies the week they went under.

The way I see it, even if a person gets my book for free, they are still giving me the gift of their time spent reading it. While I deeply appreciate it if the person enjoys it and decides to pen a glowing review, I understand that the book market is changing. Frankly, I’d rather have 25,000 people read it, even if the majority got it for free, as I fulfilled a dream by co-authoring it. Also, I like the idea of spreading a novel about poker to a more mainstream audience. And if 25,000 free “sales” turn in to 25,000 real sales, then I’d be able to justify writing a sequel— and maybe even bake a homemade Twinkie to celebrate!