I have always heard positive things about BookBub, so last September I decided to run a BookBub promotion. I had a coupon book that was a runaway smash when I first published it. I ran a free KDP select promo and received about 30,000 downloads, plus my free book went viral, and tons of coupon websites posted about it being free. Unfortunately, the coupon book topic is very popular with authors and without continued promotion my rankings began to fade.
During the beginning of September I had only sold 5 copies, and I knew something needed to be done. Coupon policies change frequently, so the first thing I did was go through my entire book and edit and upgrade anything that had changed. Then I submitted my book to BookBub. My book was normally priced at $4.99, and I decided to run a bargain promo priced at .99.
The current pricing in BookBub runs from $30 for a free book in the Supernatural Suspense category to $1,350.00 for a book priced over $2.00 in the mystery category. At the time of my promo I paid $160.00 to run a .99 promo in the Advice and How-To category. You can also use BookBub to promote free ebooks.
During my .99 promo I sold around 900 books and the best I ranked was #60 in Paid Kindle Store, and I was #1 for the categories of Finance, How-to & Home Improvements, and Reference. I made back more than my investment the first day of the promo. This was before Amazon Countdown deals, or else I would have doubled the earnings because I could have kept my higher 70% royalty.
Eventually, my book began to fade back to obscurity, but the promo was great for improving my rankings and giving me a little financial boost, as well. BookBub continues to be a popular site with authors and readers. They continue to increase their subscriber count, which reflects in the prices that have gone up a bit since my promotion last September. I paid $160, and now the price is $240.
In my opinion, BookBub is a great tool for promoting books and improving rankings. Below are a couple of screenshots of my rankings after the promotion.
