Sooooo it’s been a long time since I’ve done a #selfpub corner, and since I’ve been updating my business plans and doing more research and all that, I thought it was high time to start again. Plus, I love reading others’ experiences . Time to give back 🙂
MY EXPERIENCE WITH FREEBOOKSY
- What is Freebooksy?
Freebooksy promotes free books (being perma-free or those free for a limited period of time). At the time of this post, they do not restrict their ads to full-length novels. I checked with them to make sure I could buy an ad for a novelette and it was fine.
Freebooksy currently advertises to more than 130k newsletter subscribers and 200k+ Facebook fans.
- What did I want to achieve with a Freebooksy ad?
– At least 800 downloads of ONE DREAM ONLY
– At least 5 reviews of ONE DREAM ONLY
– At least 5 new subscribers
– At least 5 new FB group members
– At least 20 new sales of ONE TWO THREE
- How did it go?
I bought a Freebooksy ad ($70) for my novelette ONE DREAM ONLY (which is currently free). I scheduled it for June 5th. And this is what happened…
More than 700 copies on the day of the ad and overall more than 1000 copies….During the ad, One Dream Only ranked #3 in the free Best Sellers in Two-Hour Teen & Young Adult Short Reads.
- What happened after the ad?
– I sold more than 10 copies of One, Two, Three (sales had been stagnant previously)
– I gained one newsletter subscriber
– I gained two new members in my Facebook group.
- Was it worth it?
Yes. In my view, it was. Gaining new readers is so important. Plus, I love connecting with them, so I am very excited whenever they either subscribe to my newsletter or join my FB group.
In addition, when people download something free, they may not read it right away and I think I’m still seeing some One Two Three sales thanks to the ad.
- Will I do it again?
Yes. But not right now. Right now, I’m going to look into ENT and BargainBooksy and others to plan some ads on ONE TWO THREE, around the release date of A SUMMER LIKE NO OTHER.
Hope this was helpful/interesting.
If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to let me know 🙂 I’d love to hear your own experience with Freebooksy if you’ve used it…and if you want me to tackle a certain topic, just ask and I’ll try my best 🙂
Elodie Nowodazkij 
Thank you so much for sharing your results with Freebooksy! We always love to hear it when authors are pleased, and it means a lot to us that you’re spreading the word.
One clarifying point – we’ve grown our lists a lot this year, and are well above 75k readers. Our email list is now over 130k subscribers and still growing rapidly 🙂
Thanks so much for letting me know, Taylor. I got the 75k number from your website (http://www.freebooksy.com/freebooksy-feature-pricing/ which states “inclusion in our daily email to over 75k) but I’ll amend it in my post to reflect the actual number. I’ll definitely try to book a slot again in September or so 🙂
On Tue, Jul 7, 2015 at 11:39 AM, Elodie Nowodazkij wrote:
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Good for you with the push! Very impressive. Please don’t hate my newbie-ness, but this just applies for indie pubs, right? Meaning, the book’s status must be ‘free’. Could this apply if a publisher sets the book to free for a bit?
My Freebooksy promotion (today and tomorrow) is a disaster, but that’s nothing to do with Freebooksy – unfortunately, KPD shows that the book is free… but the Amazon pages still show the original price. Still, when (if…) they reply within 48 hours, I’ll know why it’s a disaster!