Baby Promo Sites

Baby book promo sites are hit and miss, but at least the price is right. When I was promoting Lies and Love (I think), I used a few of these. When you think about it, these sites are more for publicizing a book than for sales, because even at an ad price of $10.00, an author has to move multiple copies just to recoup their expenditure (the book has to be discounted). Would my money be better spent by purchasing one pricier ad? That's very debatable. Frankly, the majority of promo sites don't result in much of anything. (Yes, BookBub, too, at least for me.)

So, I figure, why not spread it around? And psychological or not, I feel more comfortable paying $10.00 at a time than $50.00 or $60.00.

I've decided to keep Running From Herself priced at $2.99 for a week. That will allow me enough time to test the promotional waters before deciding whether to keep going or give up.

Thus, I went with a few old stand-bys:

Awesome Gang ~ I could have ponied up $10.00 for a featured listing, but I went with the free one for March 2. They're going to send me a nudging email anyway, urging me to upgrade, and that's when I'll make up my mind. 

DiscountBookMan ~ Google supplied me with a $5.00 coupon, so I chose the $10.00 (net) featured listing for March 4. If memory serves, I never reaped any rewards from my previous ad with them, but it's hard to remember those things.

It's Write Now charges $10.00 for one newsletter plus ten posts on X, Facebook, and Pinterest (!). I believe I set up my promo for March 1-3.

Book Reader Magazine ~ again, I had a $5.00-off coupon, so I scheduled a $10.00 (net) promo for March 5.  They don't have a large subscriber base, but the price was right.

I still haven't gotten an acceptance from BookCave*, nor an email response from eReaderIQ regarding its review requirements. I took another hard look at CraveBooks, but despite some purported good author reviews (these can always be fake), it doesn't appear to fit my needs. First of all, none of its packages include my genre, and for an "all genres" promo with a decent subscriber base, the price is too high for what I suspect would be little return.

I found, through a Written Word Media email, a place called DartFrog, which caters to book clubs. Its "Reading Recommendation" program costs $150.00 just to be accepted, and an author has to submit a PDF of their manuscript for review. I don't know why I submitted; just an impulsive move, and I know I won't be accepted. Sometimes an author just says "screw it" and shoots for the impossible out of sheer defiance.

And there we have it; baby steps on baby promo sites. I still haven't targeted social media-only services, because I have a nagging suspicion that they're worthless; the same feeling I have about CraveBooks. You gotta trust those feelings sometimes.

Before long, I will have exhausted all my options, but that's okay. It's best to do a big push right out of the gate than to wonder a year later if I should have taken the time to do it.

 *Oops, rejected