Naked Truths About Getting Book Reviews

Gisela Hausmann

naked truths new cover

 

ALL BOOKS NEED MORE REVIEWS

 

• “My book needs more reviews!”
• “Even after I had my book on Bookbub, less than 1% of people who downloaded the book reviewed it.”
• “I want better/longer/more exciting reviews.”
Comments like these can be found in authors’ discussion groups on many social media platforms. Less frustrated-sounding social media postings ask to “Save an Author”, “Support an Author”, and “Hug an Author” by reading and reviewing independent authors’ books. And, it is true, it is not easy to get book reviews and even more difficult to get good book reviews.

On the other hand, there are at least two books in Amazon’s web store that have amassed more than 30,000 reviews. While books can be uninteresting, boring, so-so, great, brilliant, and phenomenal, surely these two books aren’t 30,000 times more brilliant than a book with only one review.

Surprisingly, people add even more reviews to these 30,000+ existing reviews. One of these two books received four new reviews and the other one five new reviews since yesterday. Reader-reviewers cannot really have too much hope that their review will be found among the 30,000+, yet they keep posting.

Reviews follow the law of attraction. Once reader-reviewers see that a book has received many reviews, they probably read a few of them and then decide to add their own opinion, even though their thoughts may have already been expressed somewhere among these thousands of opinions.

Though I have read neither one of these two books, I know about
them. I have seen both books/covers pop up in my Goodreads newsfeed.

That is one way how news about books spreads. We see book covers pop up in our social media newsfeeds. While we can overlook one, two, or three reviews of the books easily, once we have seen them often enough, most often we decide we need to find out more about these books since apparently ‘everybody else’ is reading them. Depending on how interlinked readers’ social media feeds are, book reviews pop up at Facebook, Goodreads, Twitter, and other websites. Talk about a domino effect!

Domino effect
Noun
The situation in which one event causes a series of related events, one following another

Word Origin:
Alluding to a row of dominoes, each standing on end, all of which fall when one is pushed

Naked Truths About Getting Book Reviews Description:

Fully revised and updated June 2016
Completely new chapters:

• How seeking reviews has changed since 2015
• The most persistent rumor
• The most important tip of this book: Do not use templates! (See what really works! Includes screen print of an actual email exchange)
• Contacting foreign reviewers (w/links)
• One last advice regarding reviews
plus
• 8 new illustrations

2015 Kindle Book Awards Finalist

Amazon top reviewer Gisela Hausmann reveals best strategies for seeking book reviews.

CONTENT

All books need more reviews
A proven fact
Authors have all advantages on their side
That’s me
How to build up reviews strategically
Getting reviews from friends, colleagues, and friends of friends
What if you don’t have too many friends who enjoy reading?
5-star reviews that don’t help
1-star reviews that help selling books
What you need to know about fake reviews
Getting reviews from people who attend book signings
Getting reviews from (local) newspaper editors
Getting reviews from known book bloggers
Why you need to save blogs – forever
Buying reviews from paid review services
Getting reviews from Amazon top reviewers
Always remember – asking for reviews is about your book
The best strategy is to stick to your genre and show off
How to react to negative book reviews
Do not give away information nobody needs to know
Authors’ worst mistake
Authors’ second worst mistake
Author’s third worst mistake
What if your book already has a few ‘not helpful’ reviews?
Finding a mentor
7 Thoughts to keep you going

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