Freebies! Everyone loves these. Did you know that everyday there are hundreds, sometimes thousands of free downloads on Kindle, both fiction and none fiction?
Do you like to read fiction? If not, do you like cookbooks, manuals, how-to's? They are on the free lists too. You can go to Amazon Kindle free or sign up for one of the many notification services that are popping up everywhere these days, like eReader News Today, Book Bub, Addicted to e Books, Mama Says Read, Bargain eBook Hunters and forty more. You tell these sites what you like to read and they send recommendations to your email address on a daily basis. They'll also send the cheap reads too, if you ask them. And every day there are loads of freebies and cheapies. Not just junk either. Some of the classics have been sneaking on to the free lists lately to build momentum for movie releases like The Great Gatsby and Les Miserable.
The key here is that authors use the Kindle Select platform to raise their ranking on Amazon. Ranking happens to be everything to an author and can make or break your book. Once you get in the top 100 free store, you are more likely to slip into the top 100 paid store if you can keep the momentum going after your five free days (out of 90 days in Kindle Select). If you slide undetected in to the Top 100 paid and stay there, you are off to the races and raking in the bucks. Pardon the cliches. Maintaining your spot on that list is hard but rewarding. But I digress...
You don't read on a Kindle? No problem. Kindle has apps that download to your phone, PC, Mac, ipad, ipod etc. You get the picture. If you have a mobile device, you can read with a Kindle app.
You like to read printed books? (Me too) Sorry, nothing can be done to get you free books unless you borrow from a friend. You might want to try reading from a device every so often, just to try out the free books. Recently I downloaded a Cookbook for slow cooker recipes, a how to book on marketing, a social media guide -- all free and maybe not something I'd normally pay $5.00 for in a bookstore. The books I will buy in print at the bookstore are usually favorite authors or those recommended to me by friends, something I know I'll want to keep and possibly read again or lend to friends. But this is where the freebies are golden. I can download a novel from an unknown author, check it out for a few pages and if I'm not compelled to continue, no money lost. I have hundreds like this on my Kindle right now. Sometimes I finish, sometimes I don't. If I finish the book, it means I probably liked it and then I always write a review to let the author know it was appreciated. After all, a novel takes a year or more out of someone's life to write and authors love to hear that all their hard work has entertained someone.
Think about downloading some new authors if you like to read. Or just check out the lists. Recently The Great Gatsby was free and it's now at the top of the Paid list. Last time my novel The Dream Jumper's Promise went free, I was competing with Les Miserables for ranking.
Enjoy your freebies and don't forget to leave a nice review. If you hated the book (which means you did not finish it, right?) and you still feel compelled to review, remember the rule of criticism- sandwich the bad stuff between two compliments.
Over and Out.
Kim Hornsby's Suspense Novel, THE DREAM JUMPER'S PROMISE, is free Sunday May 26th to Tuesday May 28th at Amazon. It has 95 Reviews, most are 5 stars and is an Amazon Best Seller. http://amzn.com/B00AA4FAJC