September 1st, 12:30 am update – Legacy is now at #2. It shows an increase of 50,150% from 1,005 to 2nd.
Amazon is turning on its free marketing valve for its first Amazon Encore production, Legacy by Cayla Kluver. Its free till September 4th, 2009.
Here’s a look at the impact -
14,609% Jump. A One of a kind Publicity Vehicle
That’s a jump from a kindle sales rank of 1,618 to a kindle sales rank of 11. It means that Legacy now gets first page placement on the BestSellers list and gets even more sales.
Amazon’s Magic Marketing Lever
Its interesting to see that Amazon now has possibly the most powerful, and almost certainly the cheapest, publicity and marketing tool in the book business i.e.
the combination of its BestSellers List and the ability to put certain books at $0 (while restricting everyone else at $1 or higher).
My suggestion had been to make it half price (updated to a free recommendation when I realized it’s a series). Free is obviously better to get attention and exposure for the author. A lot of those people (10% to 20%) might end up buying the physical book.
An even larger number (25%, possibly more) will end up buying the following books in the series (It’s a 3 book series, as far as my understanding goes).
Amazon waited until around the time of the physical book release to come out with this offer. Trying to figure out all the reasons for that. Or was it that sales of the Kindle Edition weren’t as good as Amazon was hoping for?
Does this make Amazon Encore the best Publisher for a new Author?
Let’s think about it -
- You probably get 35%, at the minimum 20-25%.
- You’re guaranteed to get a lot of publicity due to being an Encore Edition (at least for the first dozen or so books).
- You’ll have lots of bloggers with nothing better to do writing about you
. - You have the benefit of getting a $0 promotion in the Kindle Store.
- You’ll get a lot of readers, and get featured in the Kindle Store.
The biggest advantage is that Amazon’s whole Encore imprint will depend on you for at least the first 10-20 books. Amazon’s success being tied to your success means you get all of its strength behind you.
Filed under: free books Tagged: | amazon encore, free books for kindle
