Getting ebook reviews

[M.P. Jones]

Does anyone have any ideas how to get good reviews (well, any reviews!) on ebook selling sites such as Amazon?

You cannot force people who buy, or download for free, your book to leave a review - asking people you know is a no-no. Is it just sheer volume of downloads that does the trick with one in a thousand leaving a comment?

M.P. Jones

[ATDrake]

Basically, patience, and offering your book to interested people in the hopes that they will both read and enjoy it, and comment in public upon it.

You could offer free promo copies to a select audience which you think might be your best-targeted reading demographic in exchange for an honest review, as long as you're willing to live up to that no matter what comes out and the reviewer discloses that they got it free in the review in exchange for said review. I've seen a couple of reviews like that where people got stuff via LibraryThing or other giveaway and say as much, and they tend to be fairly thoughtful, coming from people who are dedicated about their reading.

But basically, it's really a waiting game because there's no guarantee that people who accept review copies will even get around to reading your book*, much less that they'll like it when they do.

And to be honest, the disproportionate responses of a number of authors behaving badly has tended to put people off doing reviews for unknown writers in a lot of venues, just in case there's the chance that the writer you give a overall positive and mostly praise-filled 3 star for "good effort, minor issues and could use a little more polish, but overall really liked the story and would like to see a sequel" will turn out to be a lurking psychopath bent on flaming you to death for giving an insufficiently stellar† review.

And with that I link this helpful Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal cartoon: How to Communicate With Writers

Good luck with it!

* I often don't get around to reading my actual paid purchases within the same year I bought them, much less non-urgent freebies by people I've never otherwise heard of.

† Which I personally seen happen a couple of times, with at least one author asking her friends to downvote the review on Amazon, then making threads to mock the reviewer's statements in several public fora, and changing her book's description to include said mockery, and then pretending not to know about a flamewar that one of her fangirls was holding in the comments of the review while at the same time being gleeful on Facebook that the "controversy in the comments" was driving up her sales.

And that was for a positive 3-star review. For a mere 2 stars, apparently you can get called "a rat and a big snake" on your very own blog.

[Shack70]

I've seen writers give promo copies away and ask people to review those promo copies.

[avantman42]

These pages are lists of review sites:
http://www.ilovesmashwords.com/book-reviews/
http://www.stepbystepselfpublishing....ewer-list.html
http://www.theindieview.com/indie-reviewers/

Most of them are review blogs, so they post reviews on their blogs. Some of them will also post their review to Goodreads, Amazon, etc.

[M.P. Jones]

Thanks Avantman42 - I will check those out. It seems like patience is required - I imagine even the review sites are swamped with people like me desperate for some exposure.

AT Drake's comment about targetting is interesting. My book is a childrens book (actually aimed at 11 and above'ish) which I don't think is necessarily the best genre to be in from an ebook perspective simply because the readership is lower than, say, romance or thriller.

And of course children may be less likely to review than adults (although I have zero evidence for that assertion!)

My friend is also a childrens author and has had more selling success simply because his book is unashamedly in the Enid Blyton tradition and so he is able to successfully focus on a reasonably narrow range. On the other hand, my book has much more general appeal (in theory!), although that same friend said he had never read anything like my book (was that meant to be a compliment?)!

It seems to makes it harder to target - where do you start?

M.P. Jones

[ATDrake]

Perhaps aim it first at parents who vet their children's reading, or at least those who seem likely to write a "my kid normally doesn't read all that much, but s/he really liked this one and I'm glad this fun adventure tale has got them on something besides just Harry Potter/Twilight" kind of review?

Or perhaps young-at-heart grown-ups who read YA who'll say "even though this book was written for kids, I really liked it and didn't think it dumbed down for a younger audience: truly an all-ages work!" You can do the latter more easily if you have a fantasy or science fiction or zombie-themed tale, though.

[GeckoFriend]

Originally Posted by ATDrake

......
And to be honest, the disproportionate responses of a number of authors behaving badly has tended to put people off doing reviews for unknown writers....

I'll start off by saying I am not a writer but I am an avid reader. I probably average reading 4-5 books per week, across almost all genres. I never write reviews and frequently feel guilty that I do not, especially for some of the very good free books I have downloaded.

The quote above is one reason I don't write reviews, but not the primary reason. Basically, I don't know how to write a review. I have started paying more attention to how other people's reviews are structured and am trying to determine what makes a good review, neither so short it tells you nothing nor written like a book report with plot spoilers included.

I suspect many readers are like me, somewhat intimidated by the idea of writing a review for others to dissect. Any suggestions on how to learn to write a good review?

[ATDrake]

Originally Posted by GeckoFriend

Any suggestions on how to learn to write a good review?

I'd say keep on doing as you have been; keep looking at other reviews and see which are the ones you found that told you something useful and informative about the book that you wanted to know, or that made it sound like it was just your kind of thing/okay for others, but not to your personal taste/a book that would be best suited to prop up wobbly table legs should you receive a hardcopy as a gift.

See what elements those reviewers included which drew you in, and conversely, how much/what kind of content you felt was spoilery or oversharing or better saved for one's dedicated blog instead of a consumer site.

Also, look at the "most helpful" reviews on various sites (especially the "most helpful critical" ones) and see what other people seemed to find useful to them, and read reviews filtered by star category to see how the "good" 2/3/4-star reviews seem to be consensus-determined (at 1 and 5 stars, I think there's a lot of generic gushing/slamming and vote-skewing going on).

Generally, a lot of the good reviews will have a certain pattern of medium-length and not too vague, as well address elements in the book in a manner which describes any issues with them, but does not spoiler the outcome or particular plot twists. Praise or criticism given will tend to sound more specific to aspects of the story, rather than generic: "I liked the development of X's character; it was a nice take on the standard hero's journey tale, with enough of a twist to make it stand out, even if the cutesy pet monkey was really annoying and too-conveniently kept saving the day." vs "The characters were great! I loved how they all changed over the course of the story. Except for the monkey. The monkey was bad."

I should note that length isn't necessarily actually a factor in review quality. Some long reviews can be very good, as can some very short reviews. It's more a matter of signal-to-noise ratio.

[GeckoFriend]

@ATDrake

Thanks for the advice; I'll continue reading reviews and someday I'll actually write one.

[avantman42]

Originally Posted by GeckoFriend

Any suggestions on how to learn to write a good review?

ATDrake's advice is good, but I'd also add: don't worry too much about writing a good/useful review. Any review, as long as it is honest, is useful. Some are more useful than others, obviously, but to coin a phrase, don't let perfect be the enemy of good.

[VydorScope]

You could also try posting over in he self promotions section here. I know that some authors do that, and offer the book free to anyone willing to write up reviews.

But mainly its a function of time... my first book which has sold probably 17 to 20k copies now has 28 reviews. The percent hit there is not very high. I think most readers just dont think about writing a review, at all ever.

[rhadin]

I buy and read a lot if indie books, especially at Smashwords and B&N. However, I rarely write a review. The only books I will write a review for are those that I think are exceptional -- whether exceptionally good or exceptionally bad. The mere fact that a book was a pleasant read is insufficient motivation for me to write a review.

Much too often, even a book that was enjoyable overall is riddled with grammar and spelling errors. That I was able to enjoy the book even though the author incorrectly used, for example, were for where or you're for your is insufficient inducement for me to spend my time and the effort to write a review. My feeling is that if the author didn't think enough of his/her work to make sure basic grammar and spelling errors were for the most part avoided, then there is no reason to reward the author for his/her lack of care by spending my time and effort to write a review. Sure, I could write a 1 or 2 star review and criticize the language use, but why downgrade a read I otherwise enjoyed and discourage someone else who doesn't care as much about grammar and spelling basics as I do (or who doesn't recognize the problems to begin with) from discovering the book. I think not writing a review is doing the author a favor.

But give me a book that is well-crafted and well-written and nearly error-free, and I'll gladly write a review and award 4 or 5 stars.

[Nancy Fulda]

Originally Posted by GeckoFriend

Any suggestions on how to learn to write a good review?

The best way to learn is by doing.

Seriously, your posts here on MB show that you are an analytic thinker with a clear sense of grammar and compositional structure. I suspect that you'd do just fine with reviews, if you're inclined to write them.

[GeckoFriend]

Thanks for the advice everyone, especially Nancy . I do get the idea that any decently written review is better than none and that waiting for perfect is well beyond my abilities.

I'll start writing reviews just for myself and eventually post one somewhere and see how that goes.

[morriss003]

Originally Posted by GeckoFriend

Thanks for the advice everyone, especially Nancy . I do get the idea that any decently written review is better than none and that waiting for perfect is well beyond my abilities.

I'll start writing reviews just for myself and eventually post one somewhere and see how that goes.

I'll just say that I would rather have a bad review than be ignored.