What Daily Deals Can Mean for Authors, Books

There is still some confusion among readers and writers about what free can mean for books in terms of ebook pricing. A New York Times article yesterday explained how the algorithms that go into book ranking can be affected in ways that can result in a greater readership and therefore higher sales, even at the risk of losing initial sales. According to the article, offers like the Kindle Daily Deal and the Nook Daily Find offer a means to promote a book, even in large enough outcomes to send it to the bestseller lists. This has proven especially helpful for books who were published years ago, and more importantly, to introduce readers to an author who has a new title coming out soon. But what too many self-published authors fail to capitalize on is the potential for building a devoted fan base. Opportunities to be promoted via mass email from Amazon or Barnes and Noble aren’t usually offered to lesser known authors, but the potential to increase one’s following by sharing content–such as through the popular story sharing site Wattpad or by posting sample chapters on writers’ blogs–can lead to increased sales and readership. Instead, many authors take issue with the basic principle: “You want me to GIVE my book away?!” The New York Times article demonstrated key sales figures on authors like Stephen King and recounted how one of King’s older titles sold 30,000 copies during one day of reduced-price promotion, but that’s not typical of self-published books. What is more common, though, is an exponential increase over typical sales. Other authors have taken issue with the concept of reducing the price of a book as they feel it lessens the recognition that books have value. Rachel Thompson, bestselling author of three titles, including the award-winning Broken Pieces, shared a criticism from an author who argued that one writer discounting his own book means other authors’ works will be ignored. While the fallacy of that statement is ludicrous, that by saying readers will only base their book reading decisions on price rather than content, her post about the critical exchange received a fair amount of support for the angry writer’s view point. It is interesting that the wild fluctuations in price and the short-term promotional discounting have become very popular with ebooks. Without having a price actually printed on a cover, and with the realization that a discounted copy of a digital edition did not involve taking a financial loss on printing and shipping a physical book, authors and publishers are become very creative with their experimentation on ebook pricing. What Daily Deals Can Mean for Authors, Books is a post from: E-Reader News

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