When the book is finished, it needs reviews. How to get reviews? One of the ways is to give your readers ARC (authors and readers copy) of your book.
You can send WORD , PDF or MOBI format of your book in a return for honest review. While some authors prefer to give many ARC as giveaway, I don't support that idea.
ARC copy should be a benefit, not a donation. I want to know who read my book. I don't need trash collectors, people who will get something because it is free. That is why I avoid free book promotions, especially I don't want to pay promotions of free books.
If you give 100 books away, statistic show one to ten will appear with reviews. Maybe you will get nasty ratings without reviews, or troll reviews where author is a subject of mocking.
What I suggest, is to give ARC copy to readers:
Readers who are regularly buying your books.
Readers who are talking to you about your writing.
Readers who already gave reviews and who are genuine interested for your work.
Readers who are asking about your sequels and talking about their favorite characters.
What kind of readers you should avoid?
Those who talk you should edit your book and offer their services.
Those who ask you to post your free book in social media.
Those who got free copy of your previous book and never read it.
Those who promise to read your book but it never happens.
Your task is to prepare your book the best you can, to be understandable to readers. But, since you give your book for free, you will count on readers who will tell you what is wrong. The point of ARC reading is to expose author's mistakes. It is like I am listening DEMO song and it sounds good, but it needs some additional sounds.
Readers can't abuse trust and recommend some sources to get money from authors. They can warn about grammatical errors, bad formatting and give their opinions what is missing in the book. The book is not a platform for earnings, like many services online think. Every time when I release a new book, my spam inbox is full of invitation for online promotion. These I delete without reading.
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