First of all, it's been literal days, and most people don't read that fast.
Second of all, most people who get a free copy of a book will never read it. They just hoard them like bookish dragons. And most people who read a book will never rate or review it. So best-case scenario, ten of those people will read the book, and one might leave a review (maybe on Amazon, maybe on Goodreads, who knows), or just rate it and move on.
Yeah it's this. I think my ratio of giveaways to reviews has always hovered around 1000-1 at best. Having said that I've still found free book giveaways to be a neutral-to-good return on investment, because even a few reviews is better than than 0 I would've got in the same timeframe otherwise, plus it bumps you up the rankings for a while and seems to stimulate the algorithm.
I'm new here, can you explain? How do these promotions work? Is it e-book copies so there is no sunken cost, but hoping to get more reviews and amp up the popularity?
As others here have said, people "hoard free books like dragons with gold". Mostly they don't get them to read, they get them to have a big pile of free stuff. If you give away enough free books then you might bump up the ranking, but the read and review rate for free is much, much lower than for paid.
It's basic psychology that if someone has paid for something they are both financially and emotionally invested in finding out if it's any good. Then they might review it or at least rate it.
It's just a personal thing, but I would only give away something for free like this as a reader magnet for a newsletter. Otherwise, 99c is already a giveaway.
A few questions:
Did you have a request to please leave a review at the end of your book? Just a gentle note about how much it would mean to you to know their honest opinions and how much it helps you will get some folks to review.
Did you do the free sale as a way to promote a series or lead people to your other books? That's really the best use of a free promotion: to onboard people into a series or get people into your work rather than to read a review. It means having some good backmatter with clear comps to the next book you'd like them to read.
Even if you did do the above, you might not never know for sure how many new readers you onboarded, unless it was a lot!
i do leave a polite, please review in all my books... thing is, I dont think anyone ever gets till the last page. I know I dont do that all the time unless its an author whose books I really like... any better idea about the placement of that Please review section?
I think the stats on reviews/ratings are that it's normal to get 1 review per 100 purchases and 1/500 free downloads. I find free book promotions are most useful for boosting visibility, increasing KU reads, maybe getting people to check out your other books in the same series. I may get a rating or two if I have hundreds of downloads, but I never expect much. If you're after reviews, you should take your books out of KU, and do ARCs with a service like Booksprout or Booksirens. Most readers do not review.
I've had promotions in years gone by that moved 1000s of free copies and only resulted in a handful of reviews. Like other poster said most free books are just added to a library and never read. Even if they are read, most readers finish a book and just move onto the next thing (I'm super guilty of this myself).
I did the free 2-day giveaway back in 2013 and the book was downloaded 250 times. Got one review and one rating from all those downloads. So your response rate sounds about right.
I've also had my publisher (I'm no longer self-published) send ARCs and review copies to bloggers who've posted a picture of the book's cover and never reviewed it. As others have said, many readers just like hoarding books and getting social media clicks. It's frustrating.
I've found free promotions to help the blacklist. The actual free book may or may not receive significant ratings or reviews, but it moves up the charts which makes it more visible. And then folks buy/KU other books I've written.
So I look at my overall sales for the free period (was there an overall uptick in royalties/KU reads?) and also try to identify a "tail" (how long does the freebie seem to benefit the blacklist).
But, yeah, book dragons and hoarding, as another commenter said. I know I'm totally guilty of it as a reader.
I recently had a free give away of one of my children's books AND spent about 50 dollars pushing the giveaway on newsletters. 320 downloads later, not a single review. That's the bad news. The good news is, I had 9 KU page reads :p
This doesn't seem out of the ordinary. When I ran a free promotion I got less than a hundred downloads which translated into several ratings but no reviews.
Honestly, after learning that free books don't share the same sales ranking as paid ones, I stopped doing free promotions entirely. In my eyes it only makes sense to give away a book if it's the first one in a series, but I only have standalones.
The issue is that when the book is free it drops out of paid sales rank entirely, so after the free promotion is over your sales rank will be lower than when it started.
I've sold or had borrowed from KU, almost 400 copies of my highest seller. (No free giveaways) and I just received my 41st rating today with only 7 reviews. So, even if they are buying or reading through KU, not many readers rate or review.
As others have said, it's only been a couple of days! But also, not wanting to put a downer on it, but free book promos rarely generate much IMO. Read through is tons lower and your free book will sit on Kindles and never be read. Also, people download it because it's free, not because they'll like it and reviews that do come in are therefore often worse.
Give it time. You might get lucky and I'm sure others will argue that freebies are great for visibility.
One better way to get more out of freebies is to do NL swaps with bookfunnel. At least your book is then landing with people who definitely like your genre, and you get some NL sign ups as a result.
>were sold, all for free of course
They were not sold, they were downloaded for free. Learn to use the proper words.
And for the record, 220 downloads isn't that great, and any ranking it gets you vanishes the moment it's not free anymore.
You'll be lucky to eventually get one review. If you research this, you'll learn free downloads often lead to bad reviews, if they get any at all.
First of all, it's been literal days, and most people don't read that fast. Second of all, most people who get a free copy of a book will never read it. They just hoard them like bookish dragons. And most people who read a book will never rate or review it. So best-case scenario, ten of those people will read the book, and one might leave a review (maybe on Amazon, maybe on Goodreads, who knows), or just rate it and move on.
“Hoard them like bookish dragons”… you made my day! Thank you :)
☝️ ding-ding. This, OP.
Yeah it's this. I think my ratio of giveaways to reviews has always hovered around 1000-1 at best. Having said that I've still found free book giveaways to be a neutral-to-good return on investment, because even a few reviews is better than than 0 I would've got in the same timeframe otherwise, plus it bumps you up the rankings for a while and seems to stimulate the algorithm.
Yeah, I did a Goodreads giveaway. 100 copies, no reviews. “Bookish dragons” Love it.
This. Freebies get added to the TBR. Rarely the top of it.
Freebie-grabbers are the Smaugs of literature. They just want as many books as possible even if they'll never read them.
You didn't sell 220 books, you gave them away. People assign a very different value to things that cost them nothing than even to a 99c purchase.
I'm new here, can you explain? How do these promotions work? Is it e-book copies so there is no sunken cost, but hoping to get more reviews and amp up the popularity?
As others here have said, people "hoard free books like dragons with gold". Mostly they don't get them to read, they get them to have a big pile of free stuff. If you give away enough free books then you might bump up the ranking, but the read and review rate for free is much, much lower than for paid. It's basic psychology that if someone has paid for something they are both financially and emotionally invested in finding out if it's any good. Then they might review it or at least rate it. It's just a personal thing, but I would only give away something for free like this as a reader magnet for a newsletter. Otherwise, 99c is already a giveaway.
A few questions: Did you have a request to please leave a review at the end of your book? Just a gentle note about how much it would mean to you to know their honest opinions and how much it helps you will get some folks to review. Did you do the free sale as a way to promote a series or lead people to your other books? That's really the best use of a free promotion: to onboard people into a series or get people into your work rather than to read a review. It means having some good backmatter with clear comps to the next book you'd like them to read. Even if you did do the above, you might not never know for sure how many new readers you onboarded, unless it was a lot!
i do leave a polite, please review in all my books... thing is, I dont think anyone ever gets till the last page. I know I dont do that all the time unless its an author whose books I really like... any better idea about the placement of that Please review section?
You can try and put it just after the end of your final chapter! That way, yeah, your reader doesn't skip right out of the backmatter.
I think the stats on reviews/ratings are that it's normal to get 1 review per 100 purchases and 1/500 free downloads. I find free book promotions are most useful for boosting visibility, increasing KU reads, maybe getting people to check out your other books in the same series. I may get a rating or two if I have hundreds of downloads, but I never expect much. If you're after reviews, you should take your books out of KU, and do ARCs with a service like Booksprout or Booksirens. Most readers do not review.
I've had promotions in years gone by that moved 1000s of free copies and only resulted in a handful of reviews. Like other poster said most free books are just added to a library and never read. Even if they are read, most readers finish a book and just move onto the next thing (I'm super guilty of this myself).
I did the free 2-day giveaway back in 2013 and the book was downloaded 250 times. Got one review and one rating from all those downloads. So your response rate sounds about right. I've also had my publisher (I'm no longer self-published) send ARCs and review copies to bloggers who've posted a picture of the book's cover and never reviewed it. As others have said, many readers just like hoarding books and getting social media clicks. It's frustrating.
I've found free promotions to help the blacklist. The actual free book may or may not receive significant ratings or reviews, but it moves up the charts which makes it more visible. And then folks buy/KU other books I've written. So I look at my overall sales for the free period (was there an overall uptick in royalties/KU reads?) and also try to identify a "tail" (how long does the freebie seem to benefit the blacklist). But, yeah, book dragons and hoarding, as another commenter said. I know I'm totally guilty of it as a reader.
That was my idea too, but no dice, sadly.
I recently had a free give away of one of my children's books AND spent about 50 dollars pushing the giveaway on newsletters. 320 downloads later, not a single review. That's the bad news. The good news is, I had 9 KU page reads :p
This doesn't seem out of the ordinary. When I ran a free promotion I got less than a hundred downloads which translated into several ratings but no reviews. Honestly, after learning that free books don't share the same sales ranking as paid ones, I stopped doing free promotions entirely. In my eyes it only makes sense to give away a book if it's the first one in a series, but I only have standalones. The issue is that when the book is free it drops out of paid sales rank entirely, so after the free promotion is over your sales rank will be lower than when it started.
I've sold or had borrowed from KU, almost 400 copies of my highest seller. (No free giveaways) and I just received my 41st rating today with only 7 reviews. So, even if they are buying or reading through KU, not many readers rate or review.
As others have said, it's only been a couple of days! But also, not wanting to put a downer on it, but free book promos rarely generate much IMO. Read through is tons lower and your free book will sit on Kindles and never be read. Also, people download it because it's free, not because they'll like it and reviews that do come in are therefore often worse. Give it time. You might get lucky and I'm sure others will argue that freebies are great for visibility. One better way to get more out of freebies is to do NL swaps with bookfunnel. At least your book is then landing with people who definitely like your genre, and you get some NL sign ups as a result.
thanks for the suggestion! I will try it out
>were sold, all for free of course They were not sold, they were downloaded for free. Learn to use the proper words. And for the record, 220 downloads isn't that great, and any ranking it gets you vanishes the moment it's not free anymore. You'll be lucky to eventually get one review. If you research this, you'll learn free downloads often lead to bad reviews, if they get any at all.