Free KDP Select Promotion Case Study

Over the last couple of years, we have conducted dozens of free KDP select promotions with varying results. In October of 2012, we ran a free promotion for my book, “21 Prayers of Gratitude,” and received over 23,000 downloads. So when the ranking on that book recently started to drop, we decided to do another free KDP promo to see if we could boost the sales and rankings.

I decided to track my results of our second free KDP promotion for this book and share the results with you.

General Information:

[easyazon_image add_to_cart=”default” align=”right” asin=”B009KUE87W” cloaking=”default” height=”160″ localization=”default” locale=”US” nofollow=”default” new_window=”default” src=”http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41lXEtNA5iL._SL160_.jpg” tag=”training-authors-20″ width=”100″]Book Title:  21 Prayers of Gratitude

Formats Available:  Kindle eBook, Print book, AudioBook

Book Genre:  Religion & Spirituality

Promo Dates:  1/28/14 – 1/30/14

Reviews:  187 reviews prior to promotion

Bestseller Ranking  (prior to free promotion):  #13,827 Paid in Kindle Store

Marketing Strategy:

#1:  Boost Book Sales 

Our main reason for doing this free KDP Select promotion was to see if we could boost the sales and ranking of my book.  Sales stayed strong after the first free promotion for almost a year but had gradually started to decrease over the last few months.  We were hoping that this promo could not only boost our Kindle eBook sales but also the sales of the other formats of this book (Print, AudioBook).

We also decided to offer a couple of our other books free (including the Spanish version of this book) as well as put two of our books on a Kindle Countdown deal (including “A Life of Gratitude” which includes the three books in this series).  This would give us an opportunity to market several of our books at once to our reader list.

#2:  Sell Other Books in the Series

“21 Prayers of Gratitude” is part of two different series:

1. A Life of Gratitude series (3 books total)
2. 21 Prayers series (4 books currently)

In the back of the “21 Prayers of Gratitude” book, there is information on the books in both of these series.  Therefore, we hope that those who actually read the book may go on to buy our other books in these series.

#3:  Book Launch for 21 Prayers of Faith

The newest book in the 21 Prayers series was published the same week as this promotion.  Therefore, we also used this promotion as a way to launch the book, “21 Prayers of Faith.”

Promotion:

Here is an outline of the promotion we did for this free KDP Select promotion.  This was our first time to try paid advertising for a free promotion, but we were happy with our results.

1. Paid advertising for 10,000 downloads with Free Book Service
2. Kinstant Dashboard to submit to 15 free sites.
3. Manually submitted to the rest of the sites listed here:  https://www.trainingauthors.com/47-places-to-submit-your-free-kdp-promotion-for-your-kindle-ebook/
4. Created a blog post on our publishing site.
5. Sent 2 e-mails to our newsletter list (6,281 subscribers).  We use TrafficWave.
6. Posted on Facebook, Google+, Twitter and Pinterest.
7. Posted in our Goodreads group and sent a message to group members (812 members).

Results:

Day One:

I waited until there were over 10,000 download to start doing my own promotion.  I sent my first e-mail to my list once there were 10,081 downloads.  The book was at #42 in the free store at this time.  Our other two books only had 441 downloads (Fuel for the Soul) and 11 downloads (Spanish version); therefore, I know most of the 10,000+ downloads were from the paid advertising I used.  At that time, there were only 44 clicks on the Smart.URL link that we used to promote the book on social media and our blog.

• Downloads on first day – Over 18,000 at 10:30pm Mountain time
• Ranking – #7 overall in the Free Store on Amazon

Day Two:

Started out at #2 in the free store with over 19,000 downloads at 6:30am Mountain time.  We never did reach #1, but we aren’t complaining!  We were very excited to be at the #2 overall spot for most of day 2.

Fuel for the Soul was at #224 with 970 downloads.  This again shows that the majority of the downloads for 21 Prayers of Gratitude came from the paid advertising.

• Downloads on second day – 23,300 at 9pm Mountain time
• Ranking – As high as #2 but ended the day at #14

Day Three:

• Downloads on third day – We finished the 3 day promotion with over 26,000 downloads.  This surpassed the downloads of our first free promotion in 2012.
• Ranking – ended the day at #25 but was as high as #11

After the Promotion:

• Since the promotion ended, our Kindle eBook sales have increased by 61%.
• AudioBook sales of the same book “21 Prayers of Gratitude” have increased by 47%.
• Print book sales of the same book have increased by 46%.
• We have also had new sales every day for my newest book “21 Prayers of Faith”.
• We sold over 100 copies in our Kindle Countdown Deals.
• And already, I have gained 4 new reviews on the book that was promoted.

The highest ranking has been #4,665 in the Paid Kindle Store on 2/3/14 since the free promo ended (see screenshot below).

Note:  The above screenshot is from Author Central.  Find out how to get these statistics for your books in a video I recorded here.

Summary:

For the investment we made of both our money and our time, we think it was worth it.  We believe that between sales of the Kindle eBook, print book, AudioBook as well as sales of other books in the series, we will get a decent return on our investment (ROI).

Books that do the best in a KDP Select promotion are:

• Books that appeal to a wide audience.  For books in a smaller niche, you can still get exposure and possibly reviews for your book.  However, you may not get the amount of downloads that our book received.
• Books that are part of a series.  This way you can promote your other paid books within the book you give away for free.
• Books that have other versions available (Print, AudioBook) to encourage sales of the other versions.  This is especially true for AudioBooks enrolled in the Whispersync program as Amazon will immediately offer those who download your book for free a special deal on the AudioBook version.
• Books that have a good cover and title.  Most people (including myself) will choose whether or not to download your book based upon your cover.  If I see a cover that looks amateurish, I tend to not even go to the sales page.  Make sure your book cover is decent before doing a free promotion.
• Books that are well written.  If your book is not well written and/or has not been edited, you may get some bad reviews after a free KDP Select promotion.
• Books that have a lot of reviews.  I’ve noticed lately that many of the books in the top 10 free list have 20+ reviews (many books have over 100 reviews, like mine).  In my opinion…the more reveiws, the better.  Plus, some websites won’t promote your book unless you have at least 18 reviews.

For more information on how to conduct a successful KDP Select promotion, see my post with my 11 step checklist and 76+ places to submit your book.

If you enjoyed this case study, you might also enjoy my book, “7 Book Marketing Case Studies And Other Lessons Learned.”

Have you tried a free KDP Select promotion?  What were your results?  Share them in the comments below.

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