Have Authors been Compromised?
Written by Real Laplaine
This could be a touchy subject for some or many, so I apologize in advance if what I am about to say offends you.
As an author of 14 published works, so far, and an ardent writer, I found myself lured by Amazon and other book promotion services, into offering my books at discount prices. In fact, if you look for services that promote books to their readership, 99% of them focus on offering their readership either free books or books for $00.99. You will be hard-pressed to find a service that focuses on actual value priced-books.
I was drawn to this discount/giveaway platform for a time because of stories I read about authors who gave away their books for free or for next to nothing and how that developed into a readership and people started buying their books – leading them to great success. Sounds logical – right? I thought so too.
In truth, while that may be the case for an isolated few, it doesn’t work for most.
3 Responses
I agree! But as a reader and not a published author, I didn’t think I had the experience to voice that opinion. As a reader, yes, I would pay full price for books. The only reason i don’t is because of the aforementioned, ubiquitous promotions.
I have received a number of good reviews as a consequence of giving away Kindle titles. I’ve also received (as of today) one email praising my “Selected Poems”, which was generated as a result of me having given away a paperback copy of the same book, and I know of at least 1 sale which came from a lady seeing a book I’d donated to a local business (she bought her own copy). Having said all that, I’ve given away many books and only received a small (though valuable and much appreciated by me) number of reviews and sales. Kevin
As an author, I have given away far to many books and received under five reviews. However, I have had my books pirated…I do wonder if this is one of the ways they do this. Reviews are precious, however I doubt I will be giving any more books away. I’m also looking at doing paperbacks only. I’m hoping they are harder to steal. Price-wise, I’m starting to put realistic prices on my books starting with those I’m re-edited.
As a publisher, I advise a lot of my clients to buy in books (author copies) and on-sell them, do a short giveaway or ARCs. Just make sure you trust those you send ARCs to.