Everyone wants something for nothing, so giving away free ebooks seems logical. But is it worthwhile?
Many sites that offer lists of free Kindle ebooks are doing it to attract traffic for pay-per-click advertising on their website. Or they are trying to make Amazon Associate income from paid book sales and luring traffic by listing a lot of free ebooks.
Amazon makes this easy by offering a whole host of tools for affiliate marketers to list Amazon products, including free Kindle ebooks made available by KDP Select self-published authors every day.
But can a free ebook giveaway have any benefits?
What do authors get out of free Kindle ebooks?
Well, not very much at all.
When KDP Select first started, there was one significant benefit for authors.
Free downloads counted towards a book’s sales rank and helped gain some traction.
However, this is not the case any longer.
Giving away thousands of copies of an ebook gains little for an author.
Some authors believe giving away free ebooks via KDP Select is still a useful promotional tool for launching a new title.
But I think that is about as far as the benefits go.
To help promote a book, having a new ebook listed on free ebook sites will at least give a new book some exposure.
But once a book is launched, is there any value in continuing to offer the ebook for free for five days in every ninety days of KDP Select?
I doubt it.
Some benefits of free ebooks
There are other ways to leverage free books to get something of value in return, particularly if an author has published several titles.
One method is to use Amazon’s Price Matching to force an ebook to be permanently available as a free Kindle ebook.
I used Price Matching on one title for a few years, and the book attracted new reviews and, more importantly, Shared Notes & Highlights.
These quotes and extracts from the book are highlighted and shared by Kindle readers. I believe these now appear on the Goodreads page of the book.
You can make an ebook free permanently on Smashwords or Draft2Digital to distribute to their retailers. Then you can use Price Matching on Kindle.
If an ebook is the first in a series, giving away free copies is an excellent tactic to hook new readers.
Hopefully, they will enjoy the book and buy more books in the series.
The marketing aim of a permanently free ebook is to promote your other titles.
Make sure you include them at the beginning and end of the book, with hyperlinks to the other titles.
If you offer a book for free, make every download a valuable promotional tool for your other books and your social media and blog links.
How to make a permanently free ebook
Amazon will not let you list an ebook for less than $0.99.
But you can offer your ebooks for free on other book retailers and then hope that Amazon price matches to free.
The easiest way to do this is to set the price of your title to free on Smashwords or Draft2Digital.
After a few days, it will be free on Apple, B&N, Kobo, and any other retailers you select.
But there is no guarantee that Amazon will always match the price.
Giving away free ebooks from your blog
Another way to profit from free ebooks is to offer them to help you build a mailing list.
With a WordPress blog, plugins are available to manage downloads, so you can offer different titles anytime.
A landing page is another good idea for your free ebook downloads.
But in return for offering a free ebook, you get the reader’s email address.
Once you have collected, say, 1,000 addresses in your email list, you have a ready-made audience.
You can keep informed about new titles, book signings, interviews, or news.
It is a great way to build a valuable marketing resource and get closer to your readership.
These are just two ideas for getting better value from free ebooks. But I’m sure there are many more creative ways to use them.
Perhaps after reading this, think about how you can better utilize your free ebooks as a marketing tool.
Don’t be lazy and give away your ebooks on Kindle KDP Select because you can. But then get nothing in return.
That really is a dead giveaway.
Related Reading: Free Ebooks Don’t Work Like Free Stuff Finder And Giveaways
Sorry..this seems like a really silly question..maybe. I am a self-published author with two books out…released through self-publishing houses. I personally do not have a “ebook” or Kindle file in my hands. The publishers do.
SO….if I want to offer my 1st ebook….in exchange for email addresses….where do I get acces to my ebook….to give away to those who want them?
I cannot giveaway what I do not have…right?
BOB