Another reason reviews matter: All-Star Bonuses

Update: whew, that was close Big Story Problems

Another reason reviews matter: All-Star Bonuses

All right, so of course RIHASI dropped at Amazon today. As always, I would appreciate it if anyone who has already read it would drop by Amazon and post a quick review.

And why?

Well, all the normal reasons, of course! Plus a brand-new reason.

Reason the first: I’m running a promotion on the series through the 6th and it would be nice if RIHASI had some reviews to reassure anyone hesitant that now would be a great time to buy the whole series.

Reason the second: reviews will matter forever for persuading readers that yes, they should buy this book.

Reason the third: It’s just a nice thing to do.

and now

Reason the fourth: So, do you know what All-Star Bonuses are? I thought I did, but it seems that Amazon has changed how these work.

What used to be true: If a book got A LOT of KU pages read in one month, the author would earn an All-Star Bonus for that book that month. By A LOT, I mean that the trigger seemed to be something around 1,750,000 pages read for that one book in that one month. This was not something any of my books was going to achieve — I mean, not in one month — so I wasn’t paying a lot of attention to this. On the other hand, Amazon tweaks things now and then, so when I found out about this, I started planning to release new books at the beginning of the month whenever possible so that the newly released title would pick up as many pages read as possible in that one month.

And it turns out that was a good decision, because Amazon did tweak how All-Star Bonuses work. Right now, what happens is that if a book gets some number of pages read AND some number of positive early reviews AND possibly there are enough orders right out of the gate AND perhaps the stars align in just the right configuration — then the author may get a bonus with a whole lot fewer pages read in one month.

In April, MARAG picked up just over 151,000 pages read, and that was enough. I got an email that said, “Congratulations! You have earned an All-Star Bonus because your book delights readers.” And while Amazon does not spell out what they mean by “Your book delights readers,” there’s no question in my mind that what they mean has to include “Your book quickly picked up a solid number of really positive reviews.” It’s hard to see how any other metric could be as important when assessing “delight.”

Now, it wasn’t a huge bonus. But it was nice to get, especially unexpectedly like that.

RIHASI is dead sure to get substantially more pages read in July than MARAG did in April because, I mean, it’s 40% longer. Therefore, I would particularly appreciate a good number of early reviews clicking into place in time to trigger that bonus, provided Amazon is still doing the “delight your readers” thing, which I think just started this year, so they probably are.

ALSO

I sincerely hope RIHASI delights you all. I think it will. I can’t wait for you all to read it!