Results of the Free Download Promotion

In terms of boosting units the free kindle give away on April 24th was a great success without doubt. 66 copies were downloaded boosting the total up to 242! For the first time Amazon.com shifted some units with 50 downloads from non UK people, so it all made for a very interesting day.

One of the main objectives for doing it was to help raise bowel cancer awareness and there is no doubt that with 66 people downloading the book who otherwise might not have means it succeeded on that score. Obviously my main aim with the book is to raise funds for the charity and giving it away doesn't help with that, although I am hoping that the increased downloads and exposure may result in some extra sales? I priced the kindle and paperback versions of the book as cheaply as I could so as to get the charity approx. £1 per sale, so I think £1.65 for a kindle download is a pretty reasonable price. I think I just have to accept that some people will always be on the look out for a freebie, but at least it might make people think about bowel cancer at the very least.

I have also been very mindful that for the people who have bought the book already this promotion might not sit easily with them. It was a difficult decision to take. I am hoping that some of those who downloaded the book yesterday might donate on the justgiving page if the book touches them. I have worked out that allowing for the tax on the overseas sales, the charity would have got about £50 if people had paid for their copies yesterday. Therefore I am donating £50 to the charity today to keep the figures straight, making sure the charity doesn't lose out and of course so that those who have donated already can be rest assured that everything keeps moving forwards on the fundraising front.

And so today the book resumes its normal fundraising life, and it appears to be back to normal with no sales from Amazon.com. However a paperback copy has been sold in the UK so we are now at 243 copies so the book is approaching 250 sales and hitting the quarter mark of its final target of 1000 copies. How nice it would be if I could somehow generate paid sales like I did with free sales yesterday as I would reach that target in no time! :)