Many authors dream of being able to throw their book out into the universe and have it become a success. I once went to a panel where one of the authors talked about how they hate marketing and would live in a cave and simply throw out books as they wrote them if they could. A decade into my publishing journey and somehow also feeling like Day One, I get that sentiment fullstop.
Why do I bring this up? Because there’s a misconception about KU being the ultimate tool to get you tons of sales. Does it help? Sure. Is it possible to put your books on KU and do no other marketing and still become a success? No. Point me to an author who did literally nothing to market their books in any way who became a success just be tossing their books on KU.
But… is it worth a try? Absolutely. Because it does put your book in a catalog that potential readers might see. My books aren’t on the first few pages of my category in KU, but I still have someone out there 100 pages in. Or a few people more than 20 pages in. Getting one more reader is definitely a win in my book, especially for something as low effort as submitting my books to Kindle Unlimited.
The downside is that you do have to be exclusive to Amazon with your ebooks. You will have to weigh the pros and cons of that decision yourself, but keep in mind that KU isn’t permanent. You can have your books removed after the KU period is up.
As for my experience, I can say it's decent for as little advertising as I've done. Since I put my books on KU in May, I've had over 2500 page reads and only done social media marketing. Very little of it, if I'm being completely honest. (I've posted in a few groups on Facebook, commented on like two Tik Tok things with my book info, and posted a few Instagrams. When I say very little, I really mean it.) But I'm still seeing movement on my KU pages read. That's a couple more bucks I've made and a couple more people who've read my books. For low effort, no cost, and not much follow up, that's a what I call a win.
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