Today’s email is a bumper affair, and all about getting the most bang for your buck. Yassssss.

Not everyone has thousands of dollars to spend on Facebook Ads, but there are a range of promo options out there which don’t cost much but provide a decent return. 

Below, I have recommended my low cost favorites for you:

• grow your mailing list
• increase your BookBub Followers
• smash your daily word count
• push your freebies
• and boost your 99¢ deals.

But before we dive into all that good stuff, I have been pumping out far too many YouTube videos for this here email to keep up. I won’t keep linking to each one so you might want to subscribe over there as it becomes it’s own independent thing!

Anyway, we spoke a couple of weeks ago about how the book business might fare over the next few months of tumult, and why self-publishers might be insulated some from the worst economic effects. But that doesn’t mean we won’t be affected at all, of course, so I promised a follow-up email full of promo tips for authors working with reduced budgets or simply needing a better return.

And I’ve gone one better too. I’ve even arranged a bloody exclusive. As in just for you guys. Yup.

Exclusive List-Builder Promo

BookSweeps is my go-to list-building promo service. Not only is it the most professional list-building service and the very best value, it’s also the most effective: anyone who has used BookSweeps knows that these are the second-best quality email sign-ups you will get anywhere. Why second-best?

Because the very best is organic sign-ups at the back of your books, of course, and nothing will ever beat that. But sometimes you can be in a chicken-egg situation – needing to boost sign-ups to help you sell more books, but then needing to sell more books to boost sign-ups. It’s frustrating, I get it.

But BookSweeps can help you skip that tricky step, and deliver what are the closest thing you can get to the quality of an organic sign-up, in terms of open rates, click rates, engagement, and actual book purchases too.

In case you don’t know how BookSweeps works, the short version is they run a lot of reader-facing competitions which you can see on their site, and as part of the competition process readers will proactively choose to sign-up to the mailing lists of participating authors. This keeps everything on the level for GDPR, but also ensures that the sign-up quality is great, because readers actually want to be on your list.

The best bit: BookSweeps has its own audience. 

These promos are not like those BookFunnel or Prolific Works group promos which will live or die based on the number of people the participating authors can gin up. You don’t have to do anything to participate – except agree to give away a couple of copies of your book to competition winners – and BookSweeps handles the rest. (Although participating authors will get even greater benefits if everyone shares the promo too, naturally enough.)

I just did a list-builder for a pen-name a couple of months ago, and it delivered me around 800 brand new-sign ups – and unlike other list-building services, these really are readers who want to be on your list; it was no surprise that most of whom stuck around and are now happily working their way through my new onboarder.

The only downside with BookSweeps promos is that they sell out very fast, and that will probably be doubly true today — let’s see what happens — because I’ve arranged a special deal, exclusive to my mailing list peeps. (That’s you!)

BookSweeps list-builder promos normally cost $50 – which is a great deal for that price if you ask me. But you are getting 20% OFF if you use this link and then enter my coupon code GAUGHRAN at check out. Meaning you’ll pay just $40 instead, saving you a cool ten dollars.

BookSweeps also does BookBub Follow Promos too, which I haven’t tried yet, but they seem to be very popular and actually book out faster than anything else, so I can safely presume they are great too. And you also get 20% off those promos with my link and coupon code GAUGHRAN. Those promos have a regular price of $35, meaning you get them for just $28, saving you seven bucks.

That promo code will expire June 1, so don’t delay if you are interested. My only regret here is that I didn’t ask BookSweeps to make my coupon code BANANAHAMMOCK. Next time, people. Next time.

(BTW, there might be a next time if feedback is good on this, so hit Reply and let me know what you think!)

That’s the headline deal, and an affiliate link by the way, but I have lots more regular recommendations for you too!

Push Your Freebies

The cheapest and easiest way to promote a book is to make it free, and you will get some complimentary promo love from a bunch of sites that pick up every freebie going… especially if you can give it a little shove first. And as you have heard me say a few times, free is gold again for KU authors, and permafree is the most reliable and enduring tactic available to wide authors also.

Cutting through the noise is the only real challenge.

Freebooksy is the top dog, and I always recommend them for freebies if you have the budget because it's by far the most powerful site for pushing freebies, with the exception of a BookBub Featured Deal, of course. While the prices are far from BookBub’s range, they will still set you back $90-$100 for the bigger genres, which is stretching the definition of a budget option – particularly if you go for one of the fancy new series promotions at $150. 

But Freebooksy is the first deal site to embrace the challenge of running promos to series pages, so I felt it was worth a mention as it is completely unique in that regard, and brand new too.

But if Freebooksy is out of your price range, then take a look at Fussy Librarian – whose free list in particular has been growing nicely. Promos cost $17-$43, depending on your genre, and here’s the best part: First-time users get a promo FREE. Use the code TRYFUSSY on checkout.

Smash Your Daily Word Count

I’ve been writing like a demon over the last month and it’s all down to one site: 4TheWords.

You will either love 4TheWords or hate it, I reckon, but if you do give it a shot, you will see it has very cleverly gamified the process of writing. Using the same gameplay loops and dopamine hits as addictive games and social networks, it basically rewires your brain and turns you into a word count junkie.

Normally, it costs $4 a month, but the first month is free so you can try it and see if it clicks with you.

And you can win extra free time in the game – i.e. just by writing more words – and, honestly, I wrote so much in that first month that I was happy to shell out for a whole year in advance. This is my referral code – NVVCW83915. It's not an affiliate link but if you drop it when signing up to your free plan I think we both get some additional free time or some such.

There are social aspects to the site too – like a forum and whatnot and the ability to friend people. I got a bit of a Wattpad vibe off the community, so that’s there if you want it. But participating is completely optional and I don’t personally bother with it; I’m there to work. 

And boy is it good for that…

Boost Your 99¢ Deals

Getting good value on deal sites pushing 99¢ promos can be tricky these days, as prices (and value) is all over the map and once-reliable sites seem to have slipped considerably. Right now, I’m seeing best results at Robin Reads, where 99¢ promos cost $40-$70 depending on your genre.

Only problem is, the secret is out at Robin Reads where promos are usually booked out more than a month in advance, and sometimes as much as two months. Book ahead!

SF/F authors should also check out Book Barbarian which does 99¢ promos for just $35 - perhaps the very best value in this space right now. Book Barbarian also does free promos, which are worth doing even if they are a little more expensive, and has some unique options also, like overflow promos and double listings, which I have used and liked a lot.

Authors of Romance/Erotica and Mystery/Thrillers should check out the sister sites at Red Roses Romance and Book Adrenaline, which offer similar promos which, I'm told, are almost as powerful for even less money.

Heads up though: all of these can book out quite a bit in advance as they are such good value. Remember to check those overflow listings if your dates are gone! I often get lucky with those.

LitRing Promos

You may have heard of some of the above sites already, I don’t know, but you might not have heard of LitRing – at least, I only became aware of it recently. They have a variety of promo options, most of which are very cheap. There are Amazon Follow promos, BookBub Follow boosters, and group promos to push a permafree or boost your mailing list – all of which I’ve tried and was pleased with, especially as they all cost $25-$50.

The type of promos available at any one time switches up every few weeks, so like with BookSweeps, I recommend signing up to their list so you get notified when the next set drops.

I haven’t tried the more expensive services, so can’t give you a read on those, but LitRing does have a useful Facebook group that has lots of great (free) marketing advice.

These are my go-to promos when I need to push a book on a smaller budget, and I leaned on these heavily when getting a new pen name off the ground earlier this year. Make sure to check them out, and particularly the exclusive BookSweeps promo above, as that was the star of the bunch.

Next week, maybe we’ll talk about what to do with the emails you collect from a promo like that – how to greet them, warm them up, and ensure that they stick around and buy some books (while weeding out any freeloaders early on).

Back to the word-mines!

Dave

P.S. List-growing music this week is, rather appropriately, the Housemartins with Build – an 80s classic from the UK which didn’t really cross the Atlantic. UNTIL NOW.