My new nonfiction title, New Yorkers: A Feisty People Who Will Unsettle, Madden, Amuse and Astonish You, is still featured on Reedsy Discovery. The first chapter is available there free, but the book has only four upvotes, needs more. You will earn the author's undying gratitude if you go there and give the book an upvote. You don't have to buy it or read the sample, just click on Upvote. You can buy it there, if you wish, or get the ebook or the print version from Amazon and Barnes & Noble. A good read for people homebound in lockdown. A tip: If you hurry, you may even get the ebook free -- yes, I said free -- from Amazon. Don't ask me why. There's some kind of credit available, though I don't know for how long.
My new website will be up and running soon. The virus slowed it down, but now it's almost finished.
FREE? KILL IT!
Common advice to authors without a large following: to get your new book known online, offer it free. So I did. I offered 100 ebook copies of New Yorkers: A Feisty People Who Will Unsettle, Madden, Amuse and Astonish You in a Goodreads giveaway absolutely, totally, and joyously free. And what did I get? A batch of lousy reader reviews. Said one reader: “Don’t waste your time.” Said another: “Not my cup of tea, I am not the target audience.” Others were slightly kinder, and one actually praised it in a four-star review. But the initial overall tone was negative. Yet this very same book has received a string of positive editorial reviews, “editorial” meaning reviews from professional reviewers, as opposed to casual readers. So why the divergence? What gives?
I don’t mind negative reviews, if I can learn from them, and I learned a useful lesson from these. With a couple of exceptions, these reviews came from readers who had no special interest in New York and New Yorkers. So why did they even glance at my book? Because it was free. And why were the editorial reviews so positive? Because those reviewers had an interest in the subject matter that attracted them to the book. Lesson learned: Don’t offer free books, except to a targeted audience with an interest in the contents. Free is okay if offered to that audience, but risks rejection if offered to readers generally. My motto henceforth: Free? Kill it.
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| Helena Rubinstein She practiced what she preached. Even at age 40 or 50, her skin was without a wrinkle. |
Offering something free actually depreciates its value. Savvy retailers, especially those selling fashion and luxury items, know this and exploit it to the hilt. Helena Rubinstein (1872-1965) built an international chain of beauty salons whose targeted audience was affluent women concerned with their appearance. Those women had money and were prepared to spend it, if it gave them what they wanted. And Helena Rubinstein, whose motto was “beauty is power,” offered them salons where the staff “diagnosed” the patrons’ skin problems and “prescribed” the appropriate treatment. This gave glamour a scientific look. Rubinstein was selling the illusion of youth and beauty, and the higher the price of her products and services, the more her customers valued them. The last thing they wanted was cheap, not to mention free.
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| A patron getting treated at Rubinstein's Fifth Avenue spa. |
“There are no ugly women,” Rubinstein insisted, “only lazy ones.” So beauty was available to all — well, not quite all — at a price. And in her seven-story flagship New York City spa, the center of her empire, she added a gym, a restaurant, sumptuous displays of modern art, and classrooms offering instruction in facial care. Eager for this very special experience that her spa promoted, and for the attention that would be given them by “experts,” women flocked to it and spent half the day there. So what if it cost a small fortune? It was worth it; they paid gladly and would soon come back for more.
(For more on Rubinstein, see chapter 15 of my nonfiction work, Fascinating New Yorkers: Power Freaks, Mobsters, Liberated Women, Creators, Queers and Crazies, available from Amazon and Barnes & Noble. Rubinstein was a bit of a power freak, certainly a liberated woman and a creator, but in no way crazy. Savvy to the crux of her being, she died a billionaire.)
Coming soon: ???
© 2020 Clifford Browder
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