Last
weekend, I put Warrior’s Heart on sale. I had contemplated the move for a
while, just to see how it goes. The book turned one month at the end of last
week, which seemed like a good time to try it. I didn’t want to make the book
free, because I have some issues with free books. Mostly, I believe that people
who download them don’t really read them – I know I haven’t read all the free
books I have, and I don’t actually download them very often. In turn, when they
don’t read the books they won’t review them either. So I set the price at
$0.99, the lowest Amazon allows, with the hopes that people who spend even that
small amount will actually read the book, and hopefully review it as well.
The
experiment wasn’t a resounding success. The book moved a bit more than it
otherwise would have, but not by much. One reason for it was that I started my
sale slightly too late. New books are listed separately for the first month of
their publication on Amazon, but it’s probably four full weeks instead of
thirty days. Warrior’s Heart had left that list already when the sale began so
it didn’t get the extra visibility. Also, I didn’t advertise all that much; I
mentioned the sale a couple of times a day on Twitter and once on Google+. I
think that I should have listed the sale on one or all of the websites that
specialise in advertising books. Link to one was shared in Writer’s Discussion Group on
Google+ today – too late for me.
Despite the
lack of excitement that my sale was met with, I’ve decided to continue with the
experiment. This time, I've priced At Her Boss’s Command at $0.99/£0.77. I
may try the site above to advertise the sale; otherwise I’ll just mention
it here. In addition, I’ve lowered the prices of the rest of my books too; they’re
now all $1.99, for the time being.
This
experiment is about low prices. I’ve read arguments for the opposite too; that
readers would appreciate books with a higher price tag better. After I’m done
with this experiment, I may give that one a go too.
Have you
tried different prices for your books? How did it work?
You are so right about the exposure advertising provides. I'm thinking of attending several book fairs. I would also like to try this experiment.
ReplyDeleteEmil A. Jefferson
Bookfairs would be fun, but there are none close enough.
ReplyDeleteSusanna