|
I should also mention that all ad sites/promo guidelines push us to do the lowest price possible (and sometimes turn down applications if they decide 2.99 is too high). I did a few ads when Under Witch Moon was in KU when it was on countdown. Some sites told me upfront they wanted free or 99 cents. I mainly did advertising at the 1.99 price point and was asked on two occasions by sites that would take 1.99 books if I could lower it to 99 cents.
My point (and I'm not even sure I'm really trying to make one) is that yes, the ad sites want to get subscribers and one way to do that is to push very cheap or free books. But I think that is a quick end-game that leads to zero for both the author and the site because if authors don't make money, they won't keep coming back to take out more ads. And if the ad sites attract those who only want free, their subscriber list becomes less valuable to authors. So some of these places have cycled themselves into a quick death spiral (mainly the new ones that have been around for a year or less). And I am not talking bookbub. They are quite savvy. The know what they are doing and are careful to balance things--but they (like Amazon) are going to go after the easiest denominator when it comes to talking authors into going free. Why wouldn't they? It's a business decision.
|