THE Group for Authors! discussion

I currently have a novel giveaway in progress. I started out with one five-star review of my book posted. Then a person rated my novel one star without a review to explain her thinking, which brought my star presence down to three. I have since gotten another five-star rating (again, no review), which brings my numbers up to 3.67, but the stars are still at three.

Does anybody know why GR doesn't round up stars?

A three star rating doesn't do much for my giveawy. I only have 37 people so far.

Thanks,

It is a difficult situation, isn't it. Maybe you could give a few away to friends whom you are fairly sure will like it, and ask them to review it for you (- if they enjoyed it (bearing in mind that if it was free then that has to be mentioned in their reviews) and hope that they actually do like it. You will know what style of books your friends enjoy, so you will know which of your friends is most likely to enjoy it. Short of that you could post excerpts from your book onto your blog or Facebook page and see if anyone wants to win a copy, once you know what people think of the excerpts. Unfortunately getting good reviews is often a matter of luck, as it depends so much on the taste of each particular reader. Not only that, but not everyone who enjoyed it will either join Goodreads or write a review.

By the way, my Giveaway started very slowly and I got really frustrated. Eventually it grew to a respectable number. I gave away 4 books, and received only one review, which was only 2 stars. I know other people have enjoyed my book but the winner didn't really enjoy poetry, but was trying the genre to see if she might. She did give me a couple of positive comments which balanced it out though. It really is a matter of luck, as the winners may not enjoy the book. You cannot guarantee a positive outcome from a Giveaway, and may get no reviews from it at all, unfortunately. But don't be discouraged. Hang on in there. Best wishes.

Hi Loretta,
What a nice reply. Your encouragement and experience are helpful. What a journey we have embarked on.

I love the idea of posting excerpts of my novel. I may give that a try. I do have a couple of friends who like my book, and who actually bought it, who can help out. Good suggestions

Reviews are the hardest thing to get. And I hate somebody ranking the book without comments. Argh.

Thanks again.

Jo

As for the star update, I'm back up to four stars.

I didn't post a giveaway until after I had a few reviews. I got the reviews I got by listing the free PDF or e copy (on a read for review premise). I did the giveaways in the groups of my genre and it has worked out pretty well so far. Just keep plugging away. Or like Dori says "Just keep swimming" :)

Jo wrote: "Hi Loretta,
What a nice reply. Your encouragement and experience are helpful. What a journey we have embarked on.

I love the idea of posting excerpts of my novel. I may give that a try. I do have ..."

So glad I was able to encourage you, and that you are back up to four stars. I hope the suggestions work well for you. You're right, it is a strange, incredible, crazy journey we have embarked on.

Best wishes,
Loretta :)

Hi Kelly,
Where did you post your work on a "free for review" basis? Sounds like a great idea.

The ratings details are cached (on goodreads, caches can take 10 minutes through 72 hours to refresh). If you think ratings and ratings details are badly out of whack, authors can post a request to refresh in the librarians group. Or, authors can refresh themselves (edit book details and midway down righthand column/side where you set the default/primary edition that shows in searches and on author page there is a setting to refresh).

Jo wrote: "Hi Kelly,
Where did you post your work on a "free for review" basis? Sounds like a great idea."

Click "Groups" at top menu bar and explore if you want to find goodreads groups that do (or lurk around groups geared to your genre to see if they have threads for, every group has their own rules on author participation and promotion--likely a fellow author in the group can tell you how effective or you can follow the free-for-review areas to see if did generate reviews). I stopped participating in a lot of groups as was overloaded (also stopped reviewing) so I'm not current with free-for-review stuff; but, at one time there was a "Making Connections" and a "Shut up and Read" (Shut Up's whole group was not for reviewing but had a "Read It and Reap" section that was) groups.

Personally, I disliked the free for review groups that fail to specify the genre (or at least give enough book description or link to that a reader can judge). Too easy to get a perfectly good book that you would absolutely hate because you hate anything in that genre.

Although goodreads giveaways don't currently allow for ebooks, can always post on your own goodreads status that you have a free-for-honest-review ebook to goodreads members who like reading xyz genre.