Taming Amazon discussion

Hi all! I am just starting out. I started very small with a two chapter serial novel. The next two chapter come out March 3rd. I feel like I am drowning in all the information I am reading. I haven't even figured out how to get my book loaded on here yet. The Amazon sales are more than what I expected but no one is leaving reviews. How do I change that?

Hi Anne, welcome to the group.
It can be overwhelming! As far as getting reviews, the average reader doesn't leave reviews for everything they read. I've had the most luck by joining in facebook review exchange groups, emailing Top Amazon reviewers, and asking for reviews here on Goodreads, in exchange for a complimentary review copy.

If you have an eBook on Amazon, I'd suggest that you change your Goodreads profile to an "Author" profile so you can have a link to your book. Your fellow members here will look at your profile to find out about you and look at your work. Here is a link to get you started:
https://www.goodreads.com/help/show/1...

Good luck! Let me know if you need any help.
Jim

Thanks for the leg up! Hopefully, I can learn to navigate quickly. This feels very fast paced for me. I did get my first 5 star rating!! :-)

Hi Anne, I see you have set up your author account, congratulations! Can I suggest that you add a profile picture? It's a great way to help people get to know you.

Also, I've looked at your book on Amazon, For His Love: Sparks: Part One, and noticed you don't have an Author page set up. You might think about doing that also. I know, not enough time in the day, right?

Let me know if I can help you with anything, okay?
My email is jim@jimsgotweb.com
Jim

Good morning, Jim. Great minds and all that. I had planned on delving more into getting profiles on each set up properly today. As well as writing for the love of it, I am also a full-time nurse at our local hospital. I generally am running full steam ahead.

Thank you for your help and suggestions!

Anne

Hi Anne, welcome to Goodreads! I completely understand feeling overwhelmed. We all feel that way in the beginning..and the middle...and, well now. Just remember that this is a journey. We all make mistakes in the beginning, so don't be afraid. Soak up information, experiment, learn, learn, learn, and you'll start discovering what works for you. Jim provides really good advice regarding garnering reviews. A few more things I would add are to make sure you politely ask for reviews at the end of the book. On my books, I write something really simple after the last page, like "If you like this book, please consider leaving a short review so other readers can discover this story." Also, I've had luck with purchasing a book review blog tour. You can always reach out to individual book review bloggers (just make sure they review your genre, are open for new reviews and review indie books), but this is very time intensive. In my circumstance, it was easier to purchase a blog tour for a reasonable amount to garner honest reviews from bloggers.

Hi all. Sorry to interrupt. How does one purchase a blog tour and from whom?

Cris, you're not interrupting at all! This is what the message boards are for. There are many different companies that offer blog tours. Their prices and services vary a lot. If you Google book blog tours, you'll get a lot of results. Just make sure to do your homework and have realistic expectations. My main goal in using a company for blog tours is to generate honest reviews from book bloggers. Some blog tours will only feature your book with a blurb, publish a guest blog post that you write or do an author interview. Not all tours offer or guarantee reviews. In these cases, the tour will only be as successful as the blogs they include in the tour and how well your book matches up the audience of the participating blogs. I'm not sure how these types of tours do as far as generating interest and sales. Some tours are very low price, but this may mean you are featured on blogs without a large audience.

Also, one thing I just want to clarify, when I use a book review blog tour, I am paying the tour operator to reach out to bloggers and request reviews on my behalf. I'm not actually paying the bloggers for a review, and I have no control over the review the blogger generates. Paying for dishonest reviews is a big no-no.

The blog tour company I use is Innovative Online Book Tours. http://www.iobooktours.com/

I admit, the website isn't the most professional, but Vickie is very responsive and her pricing is incredibly reasonable. I can post an update on how my review tour goes at the end of the month if anyone is interested.

Great post, J. Thanks for the information!
Jim