For Indie Authors, Amazon Giveaways Are Finally Better Than Goodreads

I talked twice about how much Amazon's book giveaway system sucks compared to Goodreads.  Well now Goodreads has decided to milk publishers with exorbitant fees just to list a giveaway.  In true corporate style they wrote a press release that tries to make it sound like paying $119 to list your giveaway is a good thing compared to NOTHING, which is what you paid before.  It reminds me of this company I worked for about 18 years ago when they changed health insurers and the insurance rep came in and tried to pitch us on why paying more for insurance was a good thing.  And yeah people were not having it.  Not that it mattered since 99% of us at that company were out of a job there within 12 months.

The justification for this change is they're making minor tweaks like it automatically puts giveaways on someone's To Read shelf.  Which for me is actually motivation to not enter giveaways because I don't need 100 books on my To Read shelf that I'm not really planning to read unless I win a copy for free.  And it'll send emails to the winners 2 months later to nag them about reviewing the book.  That's nice but why do I have to pay $119 for that shit when right now I'm paying $0?  I mean really?  REALLY?  I'm sure on some writer's group somewhere there's a dipshit trying to paint this as a good thing or a necessary thing.

Really Goodreads giveaways have just priced themselves beyond the reach of small authors like me.  I mean for my last giveaway I sold plenty of books (for me) but enough to justify paying $119 just to list the fucking giveaway on their precious site?  No.  119 times no.

And so now Amazon's shitty giveaway service actually becomes the cheaper option because you can still (presumably) list the giveaway for free.  All you have to do is buy the copies.  Which it still pisses me off I can't use my Amazon Prime shipping on it.  But still, paying an extra $6 per copy is better than paying $119, wouldn't you say?  And I can handle sending announcements myself, Goodreads.  I don't need to pay you $119 to do it.

Or I suppose you could use Rafflecopter or something like that.  Or just do the whole thing on your blog or newsletter.

Since Amazon owns Goodreads I kinda wonder if Amazon was pissed not enough people were using their giveaways service and decided to make Goodreads commit corporate seppuku to drive people to Amazon.  Maybe I'm crediting them with being too smart--and too evil.  Or not.

I suppose the big publishers can go on using Goodreads, though I'd imagine even they would start reducing the number of books they put up for giveaways.  They're not made of money either.  It's just a fucking stupid thing all the way around.

Speaking of giveaways, enter to win a copy of the new Eric Filler book Papa's New Bag for six more days.