New in Books

[Marti Talbott]

You may already know about this, but it is yet another branch of Written Word Media.
Prices are high and they only promote to Amazon as far as I can tell, but they do accept new books with as few as five reviews.

I submitted McShane's Bride at $299.00 and it got rejected. Paid upfront and they refunded.

https://secure.writtenwordmedia.com/features/new-in-books

[TimothyEllis]

Why did they reject it?

[Marti Talbott]

Grant S
Mon, Jul 20, 8:47 AM (1 day ago)
to me

Hi Marti,

Thank you for your recent NewInBooks Book Launch purchase for McShane's Bride to be promoted on 7/28.

Unfortunately, your book was not approved by our editorial team, and we are issuing you a full refund.

The primary determinant in these decisions is what we know about our readers and their habits, and the team felt that our current NewInBooks readers would not engage as actively with the book as we might hope for our authors. This is no way a judgment on the quality of your book.

We do think this would be a great fit for our Bargain Booksy readers! You can find more details on this service here. Please let me know if you would like any assistance in the booking process.
Have a lovely day,
Grant
********
At least they are branching out and trying to find what works for authors.I am not offended. Maybe they'll take my next book if I ever get back to writing again. Although - I'm not happy they only promote to Amazon? That's one expensive promo for just one site.

[TimothyEllis]

Ah. Bargain Booksy. Might have guessed.

In other words they're using it as a curating tool to funnel people into using the discount promo service for new books.

Not sure why anyone who doesn't normally release at 99c would want to do a discount or free promo on a new release.

[Marti Talbott]

Good point. I don't think I've ever used bargain booksy. I do use freebooksy quite often for my free books. For the money, it's cheaper ($95.00) than BookBub and lets you run a feature every three months on the same free book. Available dates are reasonable. I'd have to say Freebooksy keeps me in business.

[LilyBLily]

I've used both Bargainbooksy and Freebooksy. The Bargainbooksy was so underwhelming they gave me a free Freebooksy. A couple thousand people downloaded simply because it was free, with no intention of reading the book or the rest in the series. (It had a pretty cover.) There was no tail. Proof to me that a generalized ad for a book that is very niche is a waste of money. If you're writing in a big popular subgenre, your results will be better.

Written Word Media sent me an email, but my next book is super niche, so, no.

[alhawke]

Marti, I'm surprised that they didn't take your book as it's a romance. Did you just apply? They say they'll take a new book if it's within 3mos, but they may be looking for a just released/preorder.

You could consider making your "own" newinbooks promo. It would be cheaper. Doing your own Bargain Booksy, ENT, Robin Reads, and Red Feather Romance promotion could give similar results.

I used NewInBooks in the past and found that, though they do some extra interesting marketing like submitting to local newspapers, you can still stack some promos with a similar punch for sales/visiblity. I'm hesitant whether I'd use them again because of the cost.

I think LilyBLily's right about Freebooksy. I'm guessing Freebooksy is #2 after BookBub for free. Bargain Booksy, though always used by me for 99c, doesn't come anywhere near Freebooksy's might. ENT is #2 for 99c promos (but ENT likes rejecting me sometimes too, though ;)).

[Marti Talbott]

Marti, I'm surprised that they didn't take your book as it's a romance. Did you just apply? They say they'll take a new book if it's within 3mos, but they may be looking for a just released/preorder.

You could consider making your "own" newinbooks promo. It would be cheaper. Doing your own Bargain Booksy, ENT, Robin Reads, and Red Feather Romance promotion could give similar results.

I used NewInBooks in the past and found that, though they do some extra interesting marketing like submitting to local newspapers, you can still stack some promos with a similar punch for sales/visiblity. I'm hesitant whether I'd use them again because of the cost.

I think LilyBLily's right about Freebooksy. I'm guessing Freebooksy is #2 after BookBub for free. Bargain Booksy, though always used by me for 99c, doesn't come anywhere near Freebooksy's might. ENT is #2 for 99c promos (but ENT likes rejecting me sometimes too, though ;)).

New in books romance genre is the most expensive. I submitted it as literary fiction. Probably why they rejected it. But I'm not willing to pay that much for promotion only to Amazon.

Interesting about the newspaper angle. I wonder how they got into that. I've advertised in a local paper with no results. With newspapers, actual paper kind, going under every day, I have my doubts they could pull that off efectively.

Still, without freebooksy, promotion gets that much harder. I have tried stacking them. That's something to think about.

[Marti Talbott]

Here's an article on writing for newspapers. I knew about writing an article and submitting it, although I forgot about it.

https://blog.opyrus.com/author-blog/bid/52017/Using-Newspapers-to-Market-Your-Book

[Marti Talbott]

Here's another one that sounds interesting.

https://www.ingramspark.com/blog/book-publicity-opportunities-in-newspapers