Readers love a good bargain, so one way to drive discoverability and book sales is to run a price promotion. This typically means dropping the price of your eBook to free, $0.99, or $2.99 for a limited time—say 2 to 3 days. The lower price attracts more buyers, while the temporary nature of the promotion creates a sense of urgency to make the purchase. At Bublish, our price promotion partner is Bargain Booksy. They specialize in building large email lists of readers across many categories, and for an affordable price can blast your price promotion out to those readers.
How Do Price Promotions Help Authors?
Price promotions have a number of short- and long-term benefits, which is why they are a popular strategy among indie authors and traditional publishers alike.
Increase Visibility: If you're a new author with no name recognition, price promotions encourage readers to give your work a try. If a lot of new readers give your book a try and like it, your price promotion could kickstart sales, word-of-mouth recommendations, and lead to more reviews. Scheduling price promotions on a regular basis—say every 6 weeks or 12 weeks, depending on your goals—is called price pulsing. This strategy can positively influence Amazon's powerful algorithms, which can lead to a higher sales rank and more organic visibility.
Boost Sales Volume: Even though you will make less money per sale during a price promotion, the volume of sales should increase significantly. More sales can help your book rank higher on platforms like Amazon—and may even lead to best seller status in your category. This can trigger increased algorithmic recommendations as well as more organic visibility.
Expand Reader Base: Gaining new readers is crucial, and price promotions are proven to help in this area. Once readers have enjoyed your book, they're more likely to buy other books you've written at a higher price or even full price. Running a price promotion is a strategic investment to build a larger fan base.
Preparing for a Successful Price Promotion
To prepare for a successful price promotion, you'll want to take the following steps:
Understand Your Goals: It's important to be clear about what you hope to achieve with your price promotion. For example, do you want to hit a best seller list? Are you promoting the first book in a series with the intention of driving discoverability of all the books in the series? Are you more interested in visibility than profitability—or, is running a profitable price promotion the goal? Answers to questions like these should drive decisions around your price promotion.
Optimize Your Product Page: Make sure your product page (sales page) is ready to convert book browsers into book buyers on all major retail sites. Does the description of the book engage? Is your book in the correct categories? Do you have at least 12 reader reviews (more is better) with an average rating of 3.3 or higher? Reader reviews are those little yellow stars you see on Amazon—and they are very important! If your book has won awards or received strong editorial reviews, those should also be reflected on your book's product page. Your author bio (on Amazon, your Author Central profile) should also be optimized. If you need reviews, check out Bublish's offerings on our Marketing Services page. If you want help effectively positioning your book and optimizing your product page, try out Bublish's AI Positioning Report.
Ensure Consistent Pricing: Ensure that your eBook has been discounted on all book retailers where your title is available. Forgetting to lower the price on one platform can mess up a price promotion. If you're eBook is in distribution with Bublish, we'll take care of this step for you.
Prepare for Promotion: While a company like Bargain Booksy promotes your eBook discount to their very large lists of readers, you're still in charge of getting the word out to a wider population. That's how you can get the most out of every price promotion. You can do this by announcing the upcoming promotion to your email list, preparing social posts, and submitting your promotion to multiple sites. Book Marketing Tools has a cool tool to help you do this quickly.
Running a Successful Price Promotion
The day of your price promotion is a flurry of activity. You might want to block time out in your schedule throughout the day to keep an eye on everything. Here's a checklist to help you navigate the details:
Run Final Checks: Do a final check of your product pages the night before and early the morning of to make sure everything is ready for your price promotion.
Promote Widely: This is when you put your planning into action and send the emails, post to social media, and get the widest exposure possible for your price promotion. Be prepared to engage with readers and answer their questions throughout your price promotion.
Monitor Sales Rank: If you hit #1 best seller status in any of your categories, take screenshots and be prepared to let the world know—while your price promotion is still running, if possible.
Price promotions are an effective, affordable way to reach a broad readership and build momentum around your book. With the right planning and execution, these short-term campaigns can generate long-term gains in sales, visibility, and reader loyalty. So, why not give your book a boost? Start planning your next price promotion today and open the door to new readers who could become lifelong fans!