Give away your book.
Yes, you heard me. Give it away. Free. Charge nothing for it.
I know you have worked hard on it. It is your baby. Now I’m asking you to give it away. Why would you want to do that?
- To get it read.
- To increase your name recognition.
- To increase your mailing list.
- To make Number 1 on the Amazon Bestseller list.
I received an email today from a friend. She was passing on an email offer she had received from well-known self-help guru Tony Robbins. He was offering one of his many books as a free download. I followed the link and found that to receive the free book all you had to do was give Robbins your name and email address. Then you received a link to download his book.
It’s not a new idea. Marketing professionals have been using this technique for years. It is an excellent way to increase your contact list with names of people who are interested in your product. I particularly liked Robbins’ twist on this. He was using his current email list of customers to reach their friends.
And it works. Robbins had obviously sent out an email offering the free book to everyone on his list with the suggestion that they pass it on to their friends. Why would they not? It was a free gift. In fact, I received the email third-hand, not from the original person who was on Robbins’ list, but from a person she had sent it to. (If this is getting confusing just think of it as the old game of telephone. Robbins sent an email to Person A. She sent it to Person B, who sent it to me.)
Talk about increasing your network reach.
But that’s not the only way to get your book into the hands of more readers. My good friend and Open Door Publications author Sonja Hegman is currently doing a free e-book campaign with the goal of getting her book to Number 1 in her category on Amazon.
To do this she is trying to promote as many people as possible to download the book in one day. (As of this writing she was at number 4). She has used a different tactic than Robbins. First, since her book is titled Moving at the Speed of Twitter, and, obviously, is all about marketing on Twitter, she has used the day of the Twitter IPO to do her promotion. Second, she is using Twitter and Facebook to reach a lot of people quickly. Tune in tomorrow to see how her campaign works. And click here to download Moving at the Speed of Twitter free.
Let us know how you are doing with your November Writers’ Challenge. Send an email to info@opendoorpublications.com if you would like to be added to our email list for daily tips on writing your book. Tweet us @Publisher_KHM, check out the ODP Facebook page and take a look at Pinterest.