Jessica Russell's Blog - Posts Tagged "rating"
Don’t Get Ahead of Yourself
To keep it short and sweet today, there's nothing wrong with doing a book giveaway on this site or any other. There’s also nothing wrong with handing a free book to someone if you really want to. However, nothing gives off the vibe of desperation more than chasing after readers, or even worse, other writers, offering them free books in exchange for reviews. Great things are worth the price, and you are instantly devaluing your work when you do the aforementioned dance. It instantly inserts into the person’s mind “how great could this novel be if the author has to hand it out for free?”
A much better approach is to focus on driving traffic to where your book is sold. Once you get sales, reviews magically take care of themselves. But if you get ahead of yourself and give your book away, you are simply working against what you are hoping to accomplish.
Let’s say that people who get free books consistently do the reviews like they’re supposed to– and a lot of times this doesn’t happen – so what? Even if you get 15 or 20 reviews on Amazon or somewhere else, it’s not going to get you sales because no one is landing on that page to see all these great reviews? (And I’ll give you a hint: a lot of times people who review for free rate very very hard and you end up with a mediocre rating, where if you just would’ve let it happen organically, your rating would be much higher.)
You put a lot of work and effort into the creation of your novel. Don’t tattoo “I’m desperate” on your forehead after all that time and energy. Advertise, do podcasts, schedule book signings, get a good book trailer made and posted on social media, but don’t hand away your hard work for free and fool yourself into thinking you’re going to get ahead. You’re not. Write on!
A much better approach is to focus on driving traffic to where your book is sold. Once you get sales, reviews magically take care of themselves. But if you get ahead of yourself and give your book away, you are simply working against what you are hoping to accomplish.
Let’s say that people who get free books consistently do the reviews like they’re supposed to– and a lot of times this doesn’t happen – so what? Even if you get 15 or 20 reviews on Amazon or somewhere else, it’s not going to get you sales because no one is landing on that page to see all these great reviews? (And I’ll give you a hint: a lot of times people who review for free rate very very hard and you end up with a mediocre rating, where if you just would’ve let it happen organically, your rating would be much higher.)
You put a lot of work and effort into the creation of your novel. Don’t tattoo “I’m desperate” on your forehead after all that time and energy. Advertise, do podcasts, schedule book signings, get a good book trailer made and posted on social media, but don’t hand away your hard work for free and fool yourself into thinking you’re going to get ahead. You’re not. Write on!
