1,000 People Downloaded My Amazon Book in a Day

Here’s the marketing hack on how to do it

This week is mental health awareness week, so I decided to put my mental health self-help book for free for five days.

I did not expect it to become a number one bestseller in the meantime!

There are tricks I found on the way while using my Instagram handle as the main marketing platform.

What happened?

On the fourth day, I had 1,000 people download my Amazon book in a day. (Now I sound like something from the Bible… haha.)

Here is the hack on how to do it, so you too can become a bestseller.

Be Prepared To Market Like Mad

When I thought of the idea to put my book for free for mental health awareness week, I knew that just pressing the button on Amazon wouldn’t be everything I had to do.

I prepared a strategy.

First, I would put the book for free on a Saturday because most people will have free time to download and read.

Second, I would post about it on my Instagram to get my followers' attention and hope other people would share (which they did in their stories).

With both these tricks under my hat (is that what you say?) I had a good start to my marketing tactics.

I posted on Instagram on Saturday announcing the freebie as seen below:

In the text, I wrote about the reasoning behind my freebie and why this book specifically would help people with their mental hygiene.

Considering readers have described it as a “happiness go-to guide” and a “mental hygiene book”, I had all the reasons to put it free in line with mental health awareness week.

After describing why I put it up for free for a few days for mental health awareness week, I shared it in my story. Not only this, but I showed my face.

Showing your face in your stories is crucial for more interaction (so I have learned) and in the video, I stated how to download it and that you don’t need a kindle to download it — only need to download the app for free on any device.

If you noticed, I also didn’t provide a link to the book in the actual post as people cannot click on this link. Instead, I provided the link in my bio as the top link in my link tree and also posted on my story of how to get there.

You see, on social media, you have to really lay out every step the people need to take to get your product — otherwise, they won’t.

People are lazy, especially on social media.

Post Instantly

In an age of instant gratification, we want things now, and the same applies to buying products via social media which we are used to scrolling through day and night with the odd click here and there.

That means you must post instantly with your post. Don’t just put a post up and leave it, but nurture it.

It is like a plant — you must water and feed and touch it so it grows. The same applies to your following and to this marketing business!

In summary, these are the steps I took to put my free book out there:

• Posted on Instagram and tagged many people to share it
• Put the link in my bio
• Posted on my story
• Went live on my story to tell people how to download it

With those four steps, I thought my job was done.

It wasn’t.

Don’t forget there are other social media platforms not to forget about, such as Facebook.

Use All Social Media Platforms

OK, so if you are most active on Instagram, as I am, then I would put the main focus there.

Basically, put your focus where your followers are.

Remember, they're not just followers, but people who respect and buy from you.

So for me, that is on Instagram. As a coach and yoga teacher as well as writer, I gain most traction through my Instagram and have left my Facebook page to dwindle in the recent months.

Ah well, I will get over it.

Instead, I made a Facebook group recently (as people have been telling me to do it for ages). In my Facebook group, only I can post. I usually post gratitude posts as the group is called Gratitude Attitude — made to make people more grateful and happier! So I decided to post in there because it is a mental health book that will make you more grateful and giving.

To my surprise, I had some people that I didn’t know (all my friends bought my book in the first week) respond.

I then pasted the link to my book on the post for everyone else to see it but also responded individually to the comments.

Aside from my Facebook group, I also posted in other Facebook groups, but be careful not to spam. I am a part of many Facebook groups because I am an author and writer and there are many groups that support you. It’s wonderful really as you get to meet many other authors and make friends with them too.

I have been using these groups in the lead-up to releasing my book and posting links to my books there. I have also used these groups to make friends and support fellow authors by reading other authors' books and reviewing them.

Be careful: Exchange reviews are against Amazon's policy, so don’t do what I did, not thinking that they would catch me. OK, so they didn’t catch me but still.

I heard of someone else in the group get their book removed from Amazon due to forfeiting the rules and regulations… so just be careful.

Anyway, where was I?

Oh yes, the groups.

So I posted in one group named Serious Non-fiction books saying:

I did this every day, as Amazon only lets you put your book on for free for five days.

When doing this post in another group, I got a private message from the admin saying that it breaches their rules. Fair enough — you can’t please everyone — so my mum would say!

Just be wary where you post, but do it anyway!

Steps To Make Your Book Available for Free on Amazon

Firstly, be wary that you only have five days free — great marketing technique already.

OK, here we go:

• Go to your Amazon KDP.
• Click on the dots next to the book you want to promote.
• Select promote and advertise.
• On this page, select free book promotion and hit create.
• Select dates for your free promo.
• Press save changes— your book will be for free!

Once you decide the dates you want to promote your book, remember to promote your book on your social media too and get people involved! It always helps when you ask readers who have already read your book to put it in their stories on Instagram too.

The Takeaway

On my third day of promoting, I checked my KDP where you can check how many books have been sold and to my pleasant surprise, 1,077 people had purchased my book!

I didn’t think it was real and thought Amazon was lying to me in all honesty!

But it worked — my mental health awareness week marketing trick worked and people got my book for free to help them with their mental health, which is most important here.

In summary, the things to do for 1,000 people to download your book are:

• Be prepared to market like mad.
• Use all social media platforms.
• Be wary of spamming.

I hope this helps you in your journey, and I would love to know your results too — please share below!