# Latest Free Data



## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

I ran a free promo via select, putting my first novel into Select to do it. Book ran Wed and Thurs. Hit #1 overall free within 5 hours. Sat there for 36 hours, finished the free run at #10 after 40K free downloads.

In the three paid sales days following, on that title, which typically sells 10-15 per day, I've seen 100 sales. Day #3 following a free run is usually the biggest paid sales day.

I did a bookbub ad to juice it. It worked. 

Basically, I saw 60 paid sales at $4.49 so far. So about $180 net. Cost of the ad was $240. I'll break even because there will still be sales tomorrow through day 6.

Anyone contemplating the value of free would be cautioned to take a very hard look at those numbers. Especially being number one for most of the run. Meaning, this is the absolute best you can expect - a handful of dollars that, after the ad, won't buy lunch. I'm guessing #2-5 didn't do nearly as well.

Bluntly, free now has literally no positive effect on sales. My hunch is that Amazon just did their final algo change, making free a non-starter, even if #1. Perhaps you believe your experience might be different. I have a friend running a promo tomorrow, and I'm watching that one closely too. My money's on it does squat.

You heard it here first. Sorry to be the bearer of ugly tidings, but it is what it is.


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## BlankPage (Sep 23, 2012)

_Comment removed due to VS TOS 24/9/2018_


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## ChrisWard (Mar 10, 2012)

Wow, that sucks. Looks like free really is a waste of time now unless it's a perma-free on the first in a series.


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## RinG (Mar 12, 2013)

I'm wondering what you'd call a success from your free run? Maybe I'm missing something, but it did seem you had quite a boost, and to have broken even by day 6 seems pretty good? My post sales boost usually lasts for around a month?


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## Robert A Michael (Apr 30, 2012)

Thanks for the data. I am running a 5 day free promo this week (Cry Me a River) to get some more reviews.  I am using the free promos now as a longer-term strategy.  I need to develop my "platform" and open up more exposure and "social currency."  The risk I take is that people who download my book for free will not be my ideal audience and so the reviews may reflect that.

I think your point is that the old algorithms allowed for a 40,000 unit give-away to segue into comparable sales ranking the next day out of free.  The good news is, though, that out of those 40,000 units, you can potentially grow your readership for your back list by up to 10,000 new readers or more. I think that is the only advantage of pushing the button on free.  Gaining market share of readership previously untouched by your marketing efforts.


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## Patty Jansen (Apr 5, 2011)

That's a pretty pathetic return, especially if you subtract the number of sales the book would normally have had during those days (without promo and advertising).

These days, the only benefit you'll see from paid ads+freebies like this is if people go on to buy your other books.

But I'm doing that with perma-free, which costs nothing since I don't advertise, and the only people who download it are the people who read the genre, and I get fewer "I don't normally read this genre, and I'll tell you what, it sucks" type of reviews.

I don't understand why Amazon doesn't kill Select. All the benefits of the program are dead.


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

No serious increase to your other titles post-promo?


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## ChrisWard (Mar 10, 2012)

Patty Jansen said:


> I don't understand why Amazon doesn't kill Select. All the benefits of the program are dead.


Agreed. It's run it's course, it seems. A lot of people coming in now are unaware of what it used to do for post free sales. Even as a relative newcomer, in Dec I gave away four thousand and had 100 sales and thought that was rubbish compared to what I'd been hearing it was like a year earlier, where I'd heard I could have expected more like 500. But FORTY thousand for just 100 sales? No thanks.


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## BrianKittrell (Jan 8, 2011)

Patty Jansen said:


> I don't understand why Amazon doesn't kill Select. All the benefits of the program are dead.


Because they get exclusive content that way. And most people don't know the benefits are lackluster at best.

Beyond that, I had a very successful Bookbub sponsorship on the 1st. Over 1000 paid sales across all channels so far =~ $3500-$4000 on a $90 ad. Now, just to clarify: 1) I have no way of tracking and associating the fact that the Bookbub ad has an effect after a handful of days; 2) I have no idea if the Bookbub folks are even buying the rest of the series; and 3) these sales figures are not just over the moon above what I normally do in a month. In other words, don't trust my result as the de facto proof that Bookbub will propel you to new heights of grandiosity. It may, or it may not. I like them and will keep using them. Others may waste the money.

It has caused an uptrend in what previously was a downtrend, though. As with all things, your mileage may vary. A lot.


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## JB Rowley (Jan 29, 2012)

My results in Select have been quite different; no ugly tidings at all.

I did a free promo at the end of April: almost 44,000 downloads, made it to #2 overall.

Sales for May = 1218 (compared to 160 the previous month) plus KOLL = 613 (Total = 1831)

(Sales in my other books also increased.)


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## MonkeyScribe (Jan 27, 2011)

JB Rowley said:


> My results in Select have been quite different; no ugly tidings at all.
> 
> I did a free promo at the end of April: almost 44,000 downloads, made it to #2 overall.
> 
> ...


I don't doubt your results at all. However, that was two months ago. Does anyone have good free results from within the past few weeks?


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## PhoenixS (Apr 5, 2011)

MichaelWallace said:


> I don't doubt your results at all. However, that was two months ago. Does anyone have good free results from within the past few weeks?


Different genres, different price points, different promos, different goals - but I'm happy to share my results over a late-May free run with multiple books with zero dollars spent on promo vs this month's free run with 2 books getting a BookBub boost. All data is for the US store only. (Bear with the length, please, this post is a good place for me to capture and work through my data.)

*MAY 27-31*

MW had 13,600 downloads - best rank = #27
154 more sales than were made in May - $2.99
Note this title had a higher rate of borrows vs sales post-free - 92 borrows vs 62 sales over May's totals; the other books had 20 borrows between them

RP had 10,000 downloads - best rank = #41
110 more sales over May's total - 99c
This is #2 in a 2-book series (the only series book in the group); no real benefit seen to Book 1 sales, though there's also a box set that we put on sale, so that could be impacting collateral sales on Book 1

SR had 8000 downloads - best rank = #63
80 more sales over May's total - 99c

RESULTS 3 weeks out over 3 books
$0 ad dollars spent
112 borrows over May's totals at an estimated $2/borrow = $224
62 sales on the $2.99 title = $124
190 sales on the two 99c titles = $66
______________

Total = $414 extra direct profit over May

*JUNE 22-27*

We have 5 books in the Top 100 right now for comparison purposes (we have a 6th one sitting at #104 so I may also include that one in a later update if it climbs some more).

PB had a $220 BB ad on June 22 and hit #1 - 2-day total downloads = 39,000
Book 2 in the series (a new backlist release) had 104 sales @ 99c with no other promo on June 22. We sent a newsletter out on June 23 and it had another 104 sales, so maybe half of the sales on the 23rd came as a result of the freebie. I'm going to estimate collateral sales dollars coming from the free run exposure at $54.

CTN had a $220 BB ad on June 23 and hit #3 - 1-day total downloads = 31,000
Book 2 in the series is also a new backlist release and the newsletter send impacted its sales on June 23, so the data is muddied on this one. Book 2 has sold 550 copies @ 99c. I'm going to estimate the collateral sales dollars attached to the free run at $100.

The 3 baseline books in the Top 100 with no paid promo are all standalones - we're cross-promoting 25 free and 99c books through them, so collateral sales will be too muddy to track directly:

S-TD - 2-day total downloads = 7100
AE - 2-day total downloads = 6500
CK - 2-day total downloads = 3400

I'll update with post-promo figures, um, post-promo...


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## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

Results from one month ago, two months ago, four months ago, are meaningless to what you'll experience now. I suspected another algo change based on others' experience since June 1. So I threw one of mine onto the pile to test the water.

It's been a waste of time. Now, perhaps your experience will be different. Perhaps you'll spend most of your time at #1, and see a bunch of post-free sales. I'm not here to argue philosophy. Or counsel one approach versus the other. I'm simply reporting results of a title that's done consistently well on free promos, after its last one four days ago. 

As to lift on the other titles, not really. 

For me, the only free that's worth doing is perma-free on the first book in a series. Select free promos seems to be dead. I'll watch my friend's promo in case mine was a fluke, but I don't think so. BTW, I watched the other one that was #2 with me, The Blade Itself, by Marcus Sakey, which also benefited from being the guest blog on Konrath's a few days ago. His ranking is worse than mine. So anyone that thinks this is a singularity might want to ask themselves what their plan is besides Bookbub, a #1 spot for the duration of the promo, and being on one of the more popular blogs, to get more than 100 sales post-free, because if you don't have something even bigger planned, looks like you're lucky to make your ad dollars back - forget about making any money. Sure, you can tell yourself that you got a huge number of new readers, but my experience has been that the vast majority who get a free book don't read it, and those that do (maybe 5%), at least half, if not more, only read free books nowadays. So if your hope is that you'll see a big jump in sales from all those who discovered you due to your Select free run, think again. That's A) High hopes and sheer speculation, and B) unlikely.

Sorry, all. That's the lay of the land. But by all means, if you feel like throwing money and books away, go for it. I'll stick to things that seem to have a measurable effect. I'm calling OVER on free. If you think spending a few hundred bucks on an ad, and giving away tens of thousands, to sell $100 net worth of additional books after the ad costs, in exchange for exclusivity for three months (and losing the sales from those other sites - mine tend to be 10% of my amazon sales) is a good deal, go for it. Not for me, thank you.


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## 13893 (Apr 29, 2010)

I did two free days in Select with _Love Scars_, my new title under my new adult romance pen name. I had about 6800 downloads and got up to #35 in the free store, though it mostly hovered between #41 and #45. In the four days since it's come off free, it's had 78 sales.

Not all that fun.


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## Sapphire (Apr 24, 2012)

blakebooks said:


> Sorry, all. That's the lay of the land. But by all means, if you feel like throwing money and books away, go for it. I'll stick to things that seem to have a measurable effect.


So, what things are you 'sticking to' that seem to have a measurable effect? That's the approach I want to take.

Having been self-employed in more than one business in my life and having a bit of corporate exposure to boot, I never understood the concept of: "You paid for my book yesterday; Surprise it's free for 5 days now (too bad for you who already spent your money); Then I want everyone to pay money again; Now you plan to wait it out expecting me to make the next book free sometime."

It also appears to me that some writers forget to subtract the normal number of sales that would have occurred, without any intervention, from their post-whatever results.


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## Steve Vernon (Feb 18, 2011)

I've got one book left in the Select program. I've got one freebie coming up next week and I'll schedule the remaining free days shortly after - depending on results.

It's due to fall off in the first week of August and then I'm getting out of Select completely.


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## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

Well, Sapphire, I like the .99 and $1.99 BB specials. At least I see not only a bump in ranking, but also make back the ad cost and around a grand or so. Beats selling 100 books after giving away 40K, barely recovering the ad expenditure.


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## Mike McIntyre (Jan 19, 2011)

I don't dispute anything here, but one continuing benefit of Select is KOLL $$.


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## Marti talbott (Apr 19, 2011)

I have been keeping an eye on Bookpub too, and I think it's usefulness might be on the decline. All good things seem to get overused in this business. I didn't go with Select either, but I can tell you about Permafree.

I went permafree with the first book in my series in February of 2012 and it has remained in the top 100 free in Historical Romance since that time. Book 1 sells the rest of my books and keeps me from having to spend a lot of time promoting.

However, permafree isn't the magic bullet either. The first time I went free with it, I gave away over 60,000 copies. To date, something close to 100,000, or around 5000 a month. The thing is, it seems to be accumulative sales that keeps it in the top 100, and not monthly, weekly or hourly as some might suspect. Therefore, unless you can somehow rack up the numbers, permafree is not a guarantee of sales either.

That's just my take on it, I could be wrong. It wouldn't be the first time.
Book 1 - http://amzn.com/B003XF1E36


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## nikkarina (Jan 15, 2013)

Wow! That's some great results you got there! So you are the author of Jet! I've been watching your book go in front of mine in the top free category, and I keep saying "Darn it Jet! You are still beating me!"   But seeing as I only have 1,300 downloads, you've earned that spot! Congrats!


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## Desmond X. Torres (Mar 16, 2013)

blakebooks said:


> I'm calling OVER on free.


Well Blake, I agree with you. Just from what I've seen in terms of data since January has tended to make me think this way. When we run a promo, it will be a discount and not a freebie. I probably have fifty free downloads right now, and I don't know when or if ever, I'll read them.

The funny thing is, that each book I've paid just a buck for; I didn't just hit the buy button, I stopped and decided to buy it after reading the blurb and sample. And guess what... I read the book!

And twice, I enjoyed the .99 book enough to go grab another book by that author.

And isn't that what it's all about? Sure, a limited data set of a single case... even so, my own behavior is enough for me to decide that we're not going to do free give aways.


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## Pnjw (Apr 24, 2011)

Desmond X. Torres said:


> Well Blake, I agree with you. Just from what I've seen in terms of data since January has tended to make me think this way. When we run a promo, it will be a discount and not a freebie. I probably have fifty free downloads right now, and I don't know when or if ever, I'll read them.
> 
> The funny thing is, that each book I've paid just a buck for; I didn't just hit the buy button, I stopped and decided to buy it after reading the blurb and sample. And guess what... I read the book!
> 
> ...


Anecdotal evidence. What you or I do isn't what is important here. It's what gets your books visible. The question I ask myself is: Will making the book free make it more or less visible than if I price it at 99 cents? Just pricing your book at 99 cents isn't going to do anything unless you can find a way to get eyes on it. The same can be said for free, but it's a little easier to stay on top 100 free bestseller lists than the paid ones. I've had a permafree book for over a year now. I've also had plenty of people write to thank me for making that first book free as that is how they found the series. So, there is _my_ anecdotal evidence that people do read free books.

On a personal note, I have so many books on my ereader, I can no longer remember what I paid for and what I didn't. If the writing is decent and the topic interests me, I'll read it. If I love it, I'll go on to buy the rest of the author's work. I don't think I'm alone in this. And the free ones I don't read? I was never the target audience anyway and would likely have never bought the book anyway.


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## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

Mike: My titles average 7-10% of total Amazon sales on B&N and Apple, and it's growing. So KOLL $$$ are actually lower for me than those sales, because those are at full price. For me, there's no reason to be in Select, even if I ignored that KOLL $ cannibalize my sales, which they do.

I'm afraid that those who believe it's worth giving Amazon an exclusive so they can give free copies of their book away and see virtually no sales as a result, and accept $2.20 for a borrow instead of $3.50 for a sale, are going to be doing so without me. I'm out. I only have one title in the program, and that was the one I decided to try this experiment with. 

I also don't buy that giving away 50K books gets one very much visibility. I've heard no stories about sales jumping due to awareness having been built from all those downloads. For a time, sales did jump due to the algos, but that's pretty much useless for me now. The visibility theory is wishful thinking, because if doing big free promos resulted in more awareness and hence sales, we'd see everyone, or most, who do big promos, seeing a bunch of sales. And they don't. So that's one of those, "more angels will be on your side" arguments. Predicts nothing, and is therefore useless to me. 

Free is still useful for perma-free. That's about it. If I have to go exclusive on a title and forego a bunch of revenue at other stores for 90 days, and the argument for doing that is to make less from KOLL and see no meaningful result from big promos, it's dead to me. It's just a bad deal. Whether others figure that out isn't my issue. They will, eventually.


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## PhoenixS (Apr 5, 2011)

Sapphire said:


> It also appears to me that some writers forget to subtract the normal number of sales that would have occurred, without any intervention, from their post-whatever results.


And some build that qualification into the stats they share and disclose fully right in their posts how many sales are above the average .


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## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

Phoenix: I disclose that. On this title, I sell 10-15 per day. Over four days, I call that 50, mas o menos. So if my total sales over that four days is 100, which is about what it looks like so far, I've really only sold 50 additional books after sitting in the #1 spot for 36 hours. Or about $150 extra, with the ad costing $240. Now, I'm guessing I see another $50-$100 from residual ad effect, as well as increased sales in the UK, where the algos seem to work more like they used to, so between the two I figure I'll make the ad money back, plus beer money. However, I have not gotten the sales from B&N and Apple and Sony for 90 on that title, so when I factor that in, from a financial perspective, it's a loser. Perhaps you'll fare better, but my hunch is not much. I believe we saw another algo adjustment around June 1-10, that has made free a non-starter now financially. I have a friend who's free this week, but I have also been tracking the other books that were in the top 1-4 when I was, and their rankings are as bad or worse than mine, so it's difficult to draw many positive conclusions. I'll eagerly await your results. But my gut says, this was it.


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## MonkeyScribe (Jan 27, 2011)

blakebooks said:


> Sorry, all. That's the lay of the land. But by all means, if you feel like throwing money and books away, go for it. I'll stick to things that seem to have a measurable effect. I'm calling OVER on free. If you think spending a few hundred bucks on an ad, and giving away tens of thousands, to sell $100 net worth of additional books after the ad costs, in exchange for exclusivity for three months (and losing the sales from those other sites - mine tend to be 10% of my amazon sales) is a good deal, go for it. Not for me, thank you.


My gut is also saying that Select is fading fast, and that's why I'm pulling my books out as their 90 day periods expire. However, things have changed, thing will continue to change, and all you're doing is showing a snapshot of one book on one promo. More data is needed.


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## PhoenixS (Apr 5, 2011)

blakebooks said:


> Phoenix: I disclose that. On this title, I sell 10-15 per day. ... have a friend who's free this week, but I have also been tracking the other books that were in the top 1-4 when I was, and their rankings are as bad or worse than mine, so it's difficult to draw many positive conclusions. I'll eagerly await your results. But my gut says, this was it.


Russell: You absolutely did disclose right up front. I didn't mean in any way in my response to Sapphire that you didn't, but to point out that many of us sharing stats here know how to calculate return and present our data from a business perspective.

I'm also not disputing that certain aspects of Select have been gutted. I, too, am pulling books out where I was once all in with nearly 60 titles. The landscape HAS changed.

BUT ...

Every author/publisher/whatever's situation is going to be different. For instance, you're in a position to be able to get a BB deal often, which a lot of folk here aren't able to do. Some can't get a BB ad at all - just as there are books in our inventory that don't qualify.

My preference for the books I manage is to always get a paid ad at BB. Sometimes in the more competitive genres, it just isn't possible. I had a choice this month on the two that got freebies - run free or don't run an ad for them this month. If these authors weren't releasing books monthly (backlist) and didn't have sequels for these books to cross-promote to, I would have opted to wait for the paid spot. But both authors have paid spots for more new releases next month, so I went with free this time.

What I think you may be overlooking in your equation is that a BB ad for a free run is optional. Of course, you'll hit higher if you use BB, but Select free and BB ads can be separate tools. For instance, Jennifer got a BB ad for a 99c book this month. That doesn't preclude me from ALSO running more of her inventory free. With enough books out there, you can rotate some of them in and out of Select, planning around BB's policies regarding freebies. It's not an either/or decision. At least for me it isn't. I can utilize both and choose the optimum books for each.

Of course, if the free runs on the 13 books I've got free now don't pan out...



MichaelWallace said:


> More data is needed.


That's pretty much my answer for everything!


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## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

Michael: Try The Blade Itself. That was #1 when I was #2. Look at its ranking. Or Redemption Song. Also hit in the top 5 or 10 last week. Sucking exhaust.

I wish it were different. But that's 3 books that were alongside mine in the top 5, and none are doing particularly well. Again, anything's possible in terms of someone seeing 40K downloads and doing better, but my hunch is, not so much. Fatal's had six free runs, all of which generated thousands of dollars of post-free sales. This is the first time it's ever tanked like that. The Blade Itself is one that I was interested in due to Konrath's blog, which is why I remember it. It's also doing poorly. And it had to have at least as many downloads, if not more. 

But as I said, everyone's free to make their own decisions. I'm just putting data out there. Fatal peaked at #3000 late in the evening on day 1 paid, and then proceeded to move steadily lower. The last few times it went free and hit #1, it peaked in the top 100. I don't know what to tell you beyond that. It's certainly sufficient for me to make my decisions accordingly. Suffice it to say I won't be doing any more Select experiments. Frankly, I can't afford that kind of performance out of my one shot at Bookbub each month. It's a waste of the opportunity.

Phoenix: I completely appreciate that not everyone can get a BB ad. I use that example because it represents the absolute best performance you could hope for - a BB ad, hitting and sitting at #1, etc. My point is that if you can't get more than 50-100 paid sales out of sitting at #1 for most of your run, what hope do you have if you don't have that going for you? I'd wager it will be pretty much zero chance of any incremental sales. All in exchange for giving exclusivity for 90 days and foregoing income from the other sites, and building a presence there. That's a crap deal, as far as I'm concerned. Don't get me wrong. It was brilliant for a long time. Until it wasn't. I have no agenda here, and don't particularly care whether people do or don't make their books free. I'm simply trying to provide data so people can make enlightened decisions. I'd be very interested in hearing your thoughts after your runs. That will be a much larger sampling, so more representative.


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## Anne Frasier (Oct 22, 2009)

i have to agree that select is over. done. dead. i've felt that way for a few months even though Amazon contacted me and asked that i consider keeping my books in select in exchange for a week or two of more visibility. even that did nothing, and I wish i hadn't re-enrolled for another 3 months because it cost me money in the end. just waiting to get everything out of there. i could still see it maybe having some benefit with a new book, just to get some reviews up there, but i'm not even sure if it would be worth it for that.


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## Alex Owens (Mar 24, 2011)

I'm starting be be a believer (free is dead!). My 2-day freebie has had pitiful downloads with no outside ads, and only managed to break the top 1000 free. I expect no post free bump. And to make matters worse, someone posted the book to a pirate site today :-( talk about salt on the wound!


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## A.A (Mar 30, 2012)

I joined Kboards in mid-2012, which was my introduction to the world of indie publishing. I said back then I didn't think Select's 'free' was sustainable, and didn't change my mind. I've always thought Amazon needs some better and more creative tools to allow authors promotion, centred around the genres that appeal to particular groups of readers.


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## Anne Frasier (Oct 22, 2009)

Kpfowler said:


> I'm starting be be a believer (free is dead!). My 2-day freebie has had pitiful downloads with no outside ads, and only managed to break the top 1000 free. I expect no post free bump. And to make matters worse, someone posted the book to a pirate site today :-( talk about salt on the wound!


ack. i've experienced the post-free piracy too. they don't even want to pay for a single copy and wait to grab the free books.


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## JB Rowley (Jan 29, 2012)

MichaelWallace said:


> I don't doubt your results at all. However, that was two months ago.


Well, it makes sense to look at a range of results over a period of time rather than assume the latest result will be the lasting result.


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## Alex Owens (Mar 24, 2011)

Anne Frasier said:


> ack. i've experienced the post-free piracy too. they don't even want to pay for a single copy and wait to grab the free books.


Normally I'd just ignore it, but on the lackluster tail-end of a Select run it just chaps my rawhide 



JB Rowley said:


> Well, it makes sense to look at a range of results over a period of time rather than assume the latest result will be the lasting result.


Sound logic, but in this case it really doesn't help. If something significant has changed in the algo's, then data from prior to the adjustment is irrelevant IMO.


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## timskorn (Nov 7, 2012)

Well, I'm insane and just do free promos without paying anyone to promote.  So, it costs me nothing and I can generate about $40-$50 in post-free sales on a single book (and only 500-600 total free downloads).  So, hey, I'll take that return.  Without free, and until I get more books out, this is my best way to keep SOME income rolling in.


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## MacMill (Jun 6, 2012)

Patty Jansen said:


> I don't understand why Amazon doesn't kill Select. All the benefits of the program are dead.


For authors maybe, but not for Amazon.


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## morriss003 (Feb 20, 2009)

I published a novel in 2009.  It was $1 at Amazon, because they ignored my observation that it was free at Smashwords.  After making almost $2,000 Amazon finally realized it was free at other sites and priced matched.  It's been downloaded about 150,000 times since then.  I published the second book in the series in mid May 2013, and so far that one has sold 100 books.  I think a lot of that is coming from people who read the first book.


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## Lady Vine (Nov 11, 2012)

morriss003 said:


> I published a novel in 2009. It was $1 at Amazon, because they ignored my observation that it was free at Smashwords. After making almost $2,000 Amazon finally realized it was free at other sites and priced matched. It's been downloaded about 150,000 times since then. I published the second book in the series in mid May 2013, and so far that one has sold 100 books. I think a lot of that is coming from people who read the first book.


This tells me that people are getting too used to free books.


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## jnfr (Mar 26, 2011)

Amazon has definitely taken steps to make the free books get less exposure. They were playing with putting freebies in separate tab, and that was going back and forth for a while, but it's what I see consistently now. It's just one more step to find them, but you have to be actively looking.


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## beccaprice (Oct 1, 2011)

well, I put my book "Dragons and Dreams" free for the July 4  weekend, and so far 2 days into it and with no advertising really other than my blog, I've had 75 free downloads - which is way more than how many sold over the last month. I'll be interested to see whether I get a paid bump when the sale is over.


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## Rykymus (Dec 3, 2011)

There is more to Select than free promo days. How much more is debatable, as is whether or not it is worth it. (A case that must be decided by each individual.) I don't think the free promo days were ever meant to be a way to get a sales bump, but rather it was the result of unintended side-effects of the algorithms at the time. Amazon doesn't want to give away books, there's no money in it for them.

Free promos are still useful if you want to get eyes on your material, but that's about it. As a way to increase sales of the same book, nah.

I stay in Select not because I think it is more lucrative for me, but rather because I have no interest in using the other Vendors at this time. Life is complicated enough just trying to get a new episode out every other month.


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## Shane Murray (Aug 1, 2012)

blakebooks said:


> Phoenix: I completely appreciate that not everyone can get a BB ad. I use that example because it represents the absolute best performance you could hope for - a BB ad, hitting and sitting at #1, etc. My point is that if you can't get more than 50-100 paid sales out of sitting at #1 for most of your run, what hope do you have if you don't have that going for you? I'd wager it will be pretty much zero chance of any incremental sales. All in exchange for giving exclusivity for 90 days and foregoing income from the other sites, and building a presence there. That's a crap deal, as far as I'm concerned. Don't get me wrong. It was brilliant for a long time. Until it wasn't. I have no agenda here, and don't particularly care whether people do or don't make their books free. I'm simply trying to provide data so people can make enlightened decisions. I'd be very interested in hearing your thoughts after your runs. That will be a much larger sampling, so more representative.


I agree its a crap deal, especially in your case as you already have a strong presence in ebooks. Still, I am hoping that my select promo on the 10th and 11th with a book blast (can't get bookbub) will at least pull my out of my BBoS for this month 

I'll post my results up on this thread. I might be useful to see the select results for a nobody's book vs. a somebody's book.


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## Michael J. Scott (Sep 2, 2010)

Anya said:


> I joined Kboards in mid-2012, which was my introduction to the world of indie publishing. I said back then I didn't think Select's 'free' was sustainable, and didn't change my mind. I've always thought Amazon needs some better and more creative tools to allow authors promotion, centred around the genres that appeal to particular groups of readers.


Gonna be real curious to see what, if anything, Amazon comes up with next. I pulled my books out of Select a while back, and now I'm trying to rebuild the lost revenue from B&N and Apple. Mark Coker's warning about this is still ringing in my ears. I have two new books I haven't uploaded to the other sites yet, because I intended to run a select promo once I got some reviews in, then go live on the other sites once select is over. Now I'm not so sure...


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## PhoenixS (Apr 5, 2011)

Circling back around with post-free results after setting 14 books free June 22-27. Only I posted all the stats in the Mega Select Free thread, so you have to hop over there for the nitty-gritty:
http://www.kboards.com/index.php/topic,98775.msg2265070.html#msg2265070

TLNR version:

Two of our books (Historical Romances - backlist titles) hit #1 and #3 Free with 52,000 and 50,000 downloads. 
2940 sales + 625 borrows on one, 2270 sales + 300 borrows on the other in the 3 weeks post-free. 
5675 collateral sales + 255 collateral borrows over 2 collateral books. 
Total of 10,885 sales + 1180 borrows.
$12,800 earned less $640 in ad costs = $12,160 in profits over these 4 books + about $300 extra across the others that went free. 
Other free books did meh (off 4800-12,000 downloads) to zilch-ish (off 1000-4000 downloads) in post-free sales. 
Caveats out the wazoo. These sales did not happen in a vacuum but were part of a precisely planned marketing campaign, none of which involved GoodReads, Facebook or Twitter.

_Select Free Is Dead; Long Live Select Free_ - it's all in how you choose to use it...


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

Those numbers are impressive, Phoenix.


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## David Wisehart (Mar 2, 2010)

blakebooks said:


> Bluntly, free now has literally no positive effect on sales. My hunch is that Amazon just did their final algo change, making free a non-starter, even if #1. Perhaps you believe your experience might be different. I have a friend running a promo tomorrow, and I'm watching that one closely too. My money's on it does squat.
> 
> You heard it here first. Sorry to be the bearer of ugly tidings, but it is what it is.


My results seem to confirm your findings.

I had a three-day free run July 17-19, supported by BookBub and other sites, reached #3 free in the Kindle store, and gave away 35,000+ free copies of _Blood Alley_.

Post-free sales for _Blood Alley_, in all Kindle stores combined:

July 20: 16 sales, 2 borrows
July 21: 8 sales, 3 borrows
July 22: 5 sales, 2 borrows
July 23: 1 sale, 1 borrow

This is a new title, released in June, and had previously been selling an average of about 3 per day.

As a result of this free run I got a bunch of new reviews, greater exposure in the also-boughts, and more signups for my email list, but...

The post-free sales bump was only a blip.

David


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