Goodreads charging for giveaways?

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Anna Iguana

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Has anyone used Amazon Giveaway? There's a link to the program near the bottom of every book page on Amazon, I think (in the desktop view only, not mobile view). I haven't read anyone talking about it, and it seems like it relates to Amazon's moves with Goodreads and BookBub.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/giveaway/
 

Aggy B.

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Has anyone used Amazon Giveaway? There's a link to the program near the bottom of every book page on Amazon, I think (in the desktop view only, not mobile view). I haven't read anyone talking about it, and it seems like it relates to Amazon's moves with Goodreads and BookBub.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/giveaway/

Nope. I don't willingly publish through Amazon. (My publisher does and that's their business. But I won't do the Kindle publishing. I just create Kindle files and sell them through Gumroad.)

I did have a friend who did one and it was weird. You just clicked on the link and then it would take you to a page and be like "Oh, sorry. You're not one of our winners." So it seemed like it was giving away a copy every so many clicks.
 

Fallen

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Those prices are utterly ridiculous. Most small publishers let alone authors won't be able to pay them. And damn, I've a release in late Jan too. I can't see my publisher paying that.
 

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I'm not in any position where I'd need to worry about this, but it is troubling to see Amazon finally "lower the hood" on its intentions within the publishing industry. I guess this is inevitable in any industry; a company remains competitive and friendly to consumers only to the point where they have a good chunk of control over that industry. Once they have that control, they no longer need to keep the "friendly face" up and the 80s corporate villain comes out.
 

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I absolutely cannot afford to pay $119 plus Createspace copies + postage to do a giveaway. And I'm not even sure it would result in any sales.

I was considering giving it a shot, but not now.
 

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Has anyone used Amazon Giveaway? There's a link to the program near the bottom of every book page on Amazon, I think (in the desktop view only, not mobile view). I haven't read anyone talking about it, and it seems like it relates to Amazon's moves with Goodreads and BookBub.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/giveaway/

It's not new, and it means you buy your book from Amazon.

That will work for some, but if you're trade published you either get free copies or, if you need more copies you can usually buy them at a vastly reduced rate.

A lot of publishers, if you tell them you're using the copies for giveaways, will comp them for you.
 

ElaineA

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F*** Amazon all. to. hell. Them and their multi-billion-dollar valuation sticking it to the tiniest link in their chain. God DAMN this makes me mad. The publishing industry has got to be able to come up with a viable space to sell books, they just...ARGH. I don't get it. At all.

I'm looking at that email Liz posted and the only difference I see between the standard and premium levels is "premium placement." So, in other words, you pay $600 to go to the top of the list? For basically billboard placement? Who is going to DO that? The power players don't need to give away books, and the small fry can't afford it. Publisher margins are so thin they're see-through, so it's likely they'll only spend on sure bets or surprise hits. I guess that leaves prominent self-publishers? Who are already receiving the biggest benefits of the Kindle program? So basically it will wind up a circling-of-the-wagons of Amazon's captive producers into a nice, protective ring, where Amazon makes money on every phase. How is this not a monopoly, please?
 

mpack

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I'm looking at that email Liz posted and the only difference I see between the standard and premium levels is "premium placement." So, in other words, you pay $600 to go to the top of the list? For basically billboard placement? Who is going to DO that?

As far as I can tell, that's correct. For $480 US, you get priority on a listing of giveaways.

I'm also concerned that the giveaway program requires both the author and the reader to link their Amazon.com accounts to Goodreads. I haven't done a giveaway before, was this standard prior to the announcement?

There's further language than any book participating in a giveaway must be available on Amazon.com in Kindle format -- even for print only giveaways, so UK-first publications will have to wait for US release.
 

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I'm also concerned that the giveaway program requires both the author and the reader to link their Amazon.com accounts to Goodreads. I haven't done a giveaway before, was this standard prior to the announcement?

Goodness, I missed this.

Sigh.

Well, after thinking about it for a day - I doubt the giveaways ever did much for me professionally, but I sure did enjoy doing them.

I'm going to look at Booklikes and LibraryThing, and get off my backside and start doing some of the side projects I've been thinking about for a while.

Time to stop railing at the things I cannot change.
 

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I've been participating in and working on book social sites for a very long time.

Remember that they are communities, just like AW. Spend a couple weeks looking around. Absolutely add yourself and create an author profile.

Do not be a badly behaved author.

Ignore what people say about your books. If you have books you love and feel comfortable saying you love them, and they aren't by you, do that.

I don't personally use stars or other ratings, generally. People get bent out of shape about them. I do think it's a good idea to let people know whose books/what books, you really love, whether it's fiction or cookbooks or research books. Pay it forward.

Lurk for a while and read a lot on the sites; some have social groups/sub communities, or forums; some don't.
 

ElaineA

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I've been participating in and working on book social sites for a very long time.

Remember that they are communities, just like AW. Spend a couple weeks looking around. Absolutely add yourself and create an author profile.

Do not be a badly behaved author.

Ignore what people say about your books. If you have books you love and feel comfortable saying you love them, and they aren't by you, do that.

I don't personally use stars or other ratings, generally. People get bent out of shape about them. I do think it's a good idea to let people know whose books/what books, you really love, whether it's fiction or cookbooks or research books. Pay it forward.

Lurk for a while and read a lot on the sites; some have social groups/sub communities, or forums; some don't.

The thing is, if I want to write books, I don't have time for all this. I'm in the throes of pre-release. I'm trying to figure out who wants to read my story and where to reach them. I'm being pulled in 20 directions. Twitter, GR, Amazon, my own website, and the thousand* FB party groups and subsets my publisher is pointing me to, and I've never even USED FB before! Now I have to think about LibraryThing and BookBub and, and, and. I don't even have time to get to the contract on the next book that's sitting in my inbox.

I long for the good ol' days where a writer could just...write. *sigh*
 
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lizmonster

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I long for the good ol' days where a writer could just...write. *sigh*

Yeah, I spent some time on that thought yesterday. If I'd started this when I was under 30, like a normal person, I'd have established...something?...by now. Or moved on to do something else with my life.

The thing is, I'm not sure how much social media really helps, in terms of sales. I've met a few readers that way, which has been nice, but sales? I think it's impossible to tell, really. If your work doesn't get picked up and talked about by the right circles, you're going to have trouble.

Spouse tells a story of an old math class that I think is a good analogy. Kids in the class were carping about "We don't use this in the real world," and the teacher said, "Actually, you're right. Only about 10% of this is going to be important for any of you. The trouble is, I don't know which 10% is going to be important for which of you, so we all have to learn it all."

I don't know if Twitter and Facebook help me. That's probably not something that can be properly analyzed. I've no idea if Goodreads giveaways gave me anything more than the warm fuzzies of mailing books to actual people. I doubt it'll do me damage to give it up, though.

Realistically, I need to start updating my blog more consistently before I start expanding my social media circle. I always say I'm going to do that, but I haven't. And no, not all authors have a regularly-updated blog, and mine doesn't get enough readers for me to believe on any level that it expands my readership. (Chuck Wendig has famously posited that his doesn't sell him books, and indeed I read his blog all the time and have never read one of his novels *hanging head in shame*.) But it's a thing I can do that feels natural to me, and I don't think the social media thing works if people sense you're forcing it to try to get them to buy stuff.

Twitter is fun, but I impulse-tweet sometimes which probably doesn't help me! Facebook is easy to use, but you reach such a small percentage of your followers with each post unless you pay them.

I don't know. I've got a couple of tasks on my plate that I've been ignoring, and I expect I'm better off trying to do the work than weeping over a lost promo tool I don't even know was effective.
 

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That's disheartening. If I'm ever published, I ain't doing any giveaways on Goodreads. I would rather give everyone a chance.
 

Undercover

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This is just completely disappointing. Like others have said, I can't afford something like this either. And I just scheduled a giveaway too and this all changes in January. Just a shame. As if it weren't hard enough to sell books.
 

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This is so disappointing. As a reader, I don't particularly like books being forced onto my to-read list.

On the author's end, I'd imagine there's no real way to assume giveaways result in reviews/ratings. If it was a lower price point, say $25-30, for something where you didn't have to pay for postage like Kindle copies (but will Amazon still charge you for the Kindle copies?) it might be worth it even if you only netted 2-3 reviews for 100 books. But $119 is a big chunk of money if you're just getting started or not yet selling many books.
 

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But $119 is a big chunk of money if you're just getting started or not yet selling many books.
It's a big chunk of money even if you are selling a lot of books, because there are very few tangible benefits from a Goodreads giveaway.

Most authors would be better served, in my opinion, by taking that money and spending it on a Bookbub promotion.
 

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This is such a turn around from a few years ago when Amazon seemed like it was actually poised to help indie writers/publishers to be competitive with traditional publishing. I still remember a lot of people back then being really upbeat about Amazon and how it was "looking after them." Now it turns out they're not as altruistic towards indie writing as everyone had hoped.
 

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Amazon was NEVER in this to "help independent publishers". IMHO Amazon was in it to hurt commercial publishers, drive self-publishers and small presses to rely on Amazon and maximize Amazon's profits whatever it took to do so and eventually set itself up as the only game in town.

And it's damn near done that.

That people ever thought that Amazon was their partner amazes me still.
 

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That people ever thought that Amazon was their partner amazes me still.

My sister-in-law really believed in Amazon in the beginning. She got frustrated with trying to get traditionally published and began to hate literary agents as arbitrary gatekeepers. Once she went into self-publishing, she was basically singing the praises of Amazon as a partner that was helping people like her to "take the publishing industry down and give it back to the people."

She bailed out of self-publishing and doesn't do it anymore. She got disillusioned when Amazon's practices started hurting her. She really believed for a while they were "partners" in "sticking it to the man," and I don't think she ever really recovered from finding out it wasn't true.
 

Ari Meermans

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Amazon was NEVER in this to "help independent publishers". IMHO Amazon was in it to hurt commercial publishers, drive self-publishers and small presses to rely on Amazon and maximize Amazon's profits whatever it took to do so and eventually set itself up as the only game in town.

And it's damn near done that.

That people ever thought that Amazon was their partner amazes me still.

This is it, entirely. Amazon never intended to be anyone's partner. And any appearance of "sticking it to the man" was and is simply a means to becoming "the man". Consumers are a commodity to be exploited (nothing new there), and vendors are to be harnessed (much like Walmart and nothing new there, either). Amazon has famously dueled with both eBay and Walmart—and Amazon always comes out on top. Why? Because Amazon has something other online retailers don't: the means and the willingness to risk on innovation. This puts the shine in consumers' eyes and lures vendors with the promise of volume sales.
 
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Amazon has had an agenda right from the start; that hasn't changed.
 

Aggy B.

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I have, in my day, gotten in a few intense discussions with some self-pub folks who were convinced that Amazon was going to save the author world from the greedy publishers and their gatekeepers.

And yes, as it became more and more obvious that Amazon was only interested in making money and didn't care from whom, the disillusionment (and denial) has been pretty intense.
 

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I have, in my day, gotten in a few intense discussions with some self-pub folks who were convinced that Amazon was going to save the author world from the greedy publishers and their gatekeepers.

And yes, as it became more and more obvious that Amazon was only interested in making money and didn't care from whom, the disillusionment (and denial) has been pretty intense.

Funny what happens when one realizes one's basically been indentured.

I honestly don't understand how anyone could think a company manipulating people to sell years of their life's work for 99 cents (or giving it away for FREE), and then willfully look away while crooks game the system, is your partner, your buddy, your advocate, or anything else positive. They are your (our) exploiter, that's it.

I've cut back almost to nothing purchased from Amazon, except in the cases where I *have* to, for now. As in kindle books. When my current Kindle dies, I'll give long, hard thought to a Nook, even though the reputation of the device isn't stellar. I don't belong to Prime, don't participate in streaming from them, don't shop from them unless I absolutely can't find something I'm looking for anywhere else. The only thing I can do is talk with my wallet, even if it means paying more or losing convenience. I realize it's not the case for everyone, that the savings are important, and the convenience can be life-altering, especially for people with physical limits, but I lived a lot of my life before Amazon ever existed. I can do (mostly) without them.
 

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Amazon is a publicly traded corporation, so it exists to make a profit for its shareholders. In a way, the problem is, like Walmart, that it's too good at what it does. Publishing houses, too, (largely) exist to make a profit. If they don't think your book is likely to do that for them, why would they want it.

I make a steady couple hundred dollars per month with my various SP books that I probably wouldn't be getting otherwise, because of Amazon. But of course you have to have something that anyone wants or the huge selling platform won't help you, whether you're an individual or a micro/small press who relies on Amazon for most of its sales. My books thus far don't have huge commercial appeal (either because of the type of book or because of the type of author lol) but I'm happy to get to do what I want and get a small (but growing!) income trickle from it. I see Amazon as another opportunity, that's all. To me, it's nice for books that wouldn't turn enough of a profit for a decent-sized publisher to take. I'm happy with far less profit than they are.

So, now Amazon owns Goodreads and is taking advantage of another revenue opportunity by charging to use their giveaway program. I'm not crazy about it but it is their site so they can do what they want with it.

You can still get free reviews by offering a free copy "in hopes of" a review without paying for any program (on Amazon USA, I believe you aren't allowed to say "in exchange for" any more). For example, there are some Goodreads groups for that, and you can list your offer on here and lots of other places, too.

Also, we did always have to pay something on Goodreads anyway. It wasn't $119 but it was paperback copies only, which you'd have to pay for along with shipping, so maybe at least $6 a book or so. You could afford to offer a whole lot more copies now that they're including e-books so that figures in, too.
 
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Aggy B.

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Amazon has consistently offered less author control over content and taken higher percentages than other self-publishing platforms. For trade pubbed folks paperbacks are part of the contract - I received a certain number expressly to give away. Even my self-pubbed paperbacks could be given away fairly low cost. (And eBooks are easy enough to give away via Twitter and FB, I never felt the exclusion on GRs was prohibitive in that sense.)

My irritation has always been that Amazon demonstrated predatory/price-fixing behavior but the gurus of self-pub refused to believe they would ever bring that business ethic to bear on individuals. And in the meantime they have helped Amazon do the one thing that other platforms have trouble competing with and that is build a title aggregator.

But yanno, if one has made the system work for them, great. Just don't be surprised if you are increasingly squeezed for more work and less profit.
 
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