We could really use your help, pretty please?

[Crystal Dawn]

Hi guys,

We could really, really use your help. My fiancé's blood, sweat and tears are all devoted to his magnum opus (title to be announced), and in a new marketing design to create an interest in the brand, he has developed www.miragestories.com where he releases short stories and novellas, 100% free, based in the same world as his fantasy series, with some of the same characters, and some themes that will be important later. I can link you to his blog explaining this, if you would like to know more. Here's the issue however. All of these stories will be released for free, no exception, but Amazon's ebook policy doesn't allow for free book listings. He's missing out on countless marketing avenues because he can not utilise this service. This is where I need your help.

If you could please price match his book, now listed on Amazon, then hopefully they will change its price to free and we can begin our new marketing scheme. We would be eternally grateful and will pay it forward in any way we can.
Go to this link:
https://www.amazon.com/d/B06XKY5KR3/r...

And scroll to the "tell us about a lower price" link. It looks like this.



Take one of these links: (Any will do, as I'm sure a variety will make them sway their decision quicker).

https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/stri...
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view...
https://www.kobo.com/au/en/ebook/stri...

And fill in the information requested.
Thank you so much in advanced, and I will keep you posted as to how it goes! Fingers crossed!!

Much love,
Crystal

[Nicole]

I have been using Pronoun for distributing my "wide" books, and I LOVE them. You can list your Amazon price (and other distributors) for free with no hassle. They distribute to Amazon, B&N, iBooks, Kobo, and GOOGLE PLAY! (Yep, it's the only way I've found so far to get my books onto Google Play at all.)

They send me emails every day telling me how many of each of my books were sold the day before and from where. They also email me when I have a new review on any of my books listed by them on any platform, and also when my book could be ranked higher in different but applicable sub-genres.

I can't tell you how helpful this has been, and I haven't had to deal with any of the headache of Amazon price matching since I switched. I will definitely be using them for all my books moving forward. So basically I list my books on Pronoun and Smashwords, and together those reach all the ebook distributors I've ever been made aware of (and then some).

[Crystal Dawn]

Alex wrote: "Hi Crystal, I have reported the price match thing using all 3 links, the only problem was the option wasn't available on the book link you provided - I don't know if that's because it was the AU li..."

Thank you Alex! I couldn't see it when I posted the thread, but I thought that was because it was our book. It's odd that you can't price match in other countries ... Thank you regardless, we really appreciate it! I'll change the link now so it's an easier process for others :)

[Erin]

Nicole wrote: "I have been using Pronoun for distributing my "wide" books, and I LOVE them. You can list your Amazon price (and other distributors) for free with no hassle. They distribute to Amazon, B&N, iBooks,..."

This is fascinating - but what are "wide" books?

[Dante]

I'm curious about the 'wide' books as well. And does Pronoun allow you to release eBooks for free? I'm currently looking for a service that will allow me to release them for free.

[Nicole]

Dante wrote: "I'm curious about the 'wide' books as well. And does Pronoun allow you to release eBooks for free? I'm currently looking for a service that will allow me to release them for free."

When you "go wide," that means you publish on more than just one platform. If you have a book enrolled in Kindle Select, and then you open it up and publish on other platforms like iBooks, Kobo, Smashwords, etc, that is "going wide."

Pronoun does allow you to list books for free. I have one listed PermaFree (a holiday romance short story). I can control the pricing any time I want through my dashboard, and the pricing takes much less time to update across the other distributors than any other changes, like book cover changes or content changes. Those usually go live within a day, but Barnes and Noble tends to take a lot longer, for whatever reason.

[Crystal Dawn]

Nicole wrote: "I have been using Pronoun for distributing my "wide" books, and I LOVE them. You can list your Amazon price (and other distributors) for free with no hassle. They distribute to Amazon, B&N, iBooks,..."

I discussed the 'Pronoun' option with Kevin, and he had heard of it before whereas I hadn't. He doesn't want to use that option, simply because he can't control the formatting of the final product and they use a simple program to automate it, rather than giving it the hour + dedication it deserves. I run an author assistance service, catering in formatting as well, and we have a unique and beautiful style that we'd want to maintain. It's unfortunate, as it does sound like a brilliant idea, allowing for more writing and less marketing maintenance but for now, we'll keep with what we're doing. :)

We would really, really appreciate if you, Dante and Erin could help us out with this issue though, I promise it won't take more than 30 seconds! :)

[Crystal Dawn]

Please help? :/

[Nicole]

I did the "tell us about a lower price" link for you. Have you tried calling KDP directly? They aren't there on Saturdays (save yourself the frustration I've had to endure over that) but if you call and are persistent enough ("I've seen hundreds of other books price matched at perma-free, so I KNOW you CAN do it, Amazon!") they will begrudgingly change it. Emphasis on begrudgingly.

[C.L.]

I'm sure that, like everything else, it takes 24-48 hours to process. Be patient, grasshopper. People have done it, but it will take time for the changes to appear.

[Crystal Dawn]

I have called them in the past regarding a few other issues on Amazon, and I can tell you for sure, that you need more emphasis on begrudgingly, haha. I will call them again though, and see where we can go from there.

I've heard it can take anywhere up to 72 hours (business hours) just to be reviewed in these cases, so I know it takes time. We're just eager to start our new campaign as soon as possible, and unfortunately, we do need an Amazon link for it. If it doesn't go through though, we will have to remove the book as it completely clashes with our model, and the last thing we want is for someone to purchase it, realise they could have gotten it for free, and be angry.

Thank you for your help everyone, I will continue to return the favour!

[David]

Crystal Dawn wrote: "Hi guys,

We could really, really use your help. My fiancé's blood, sweat and tears are all devoted to his magnum opus (title to be announced), and in a new marketing design to create an interest ..."

Crystal,
this is sort of like how I did it. I emailed short stories for free and posted them on my website. SSs had same setting, some of the same characters like your fiancé's. The SSs are free; now I'm dropping the novel and it will be interesting to see if the give-away stories turn into sales.