Other Places to Find Good Books: BookFunnel/StoryOrigin

This is Part Seven of a series:

Part 1: Kobo
Part 2: Barnes & Noble, Google, Apple Books
Part 3: Ask an AI
Part 4: Smashwords
Part 5: Subscription Services
Part 6: Fiction Apps
Part 7: BookFunnel & StoryOrigin
Part 8: Book Bundlers
Part 9: Direct Sales

I suspect that many readers are familiar with acquiring books via BookFunnel promos. StoryOrigin is similar. Authors collectively provide a book each, sometimes more than one, for a group promotion. A landing page is built with all the books in the promotion on it. Then each author in the promotion tells their readers about the promotion and sends readers to the landing page, where readers can pick which books appeal to them from all the authors’ books arrayed on the landing page.

Group promotions like this come in two flavors.

There are giveaways, where all the books are free. Often, you have to agree to be subscribed to the author’s email list to get the free book.

The other type of group promo is the sales promo; the books offered on the landing page will lead you to your preferred retail store or, sometimes, the author’s direct sales store, where you buy the book.

Sales promos don’t collect email addresses. In addition, the books in the group promo may or may not be discounted in some way.

Discounts can be dictated by the coordinator. In this case, the authors can only participate if they discount their title by the amount the coordinator demands. This is often reflected in the title of the promotion, for example: “99c Historical Romance Sale”.

If the coordinator hasn’t set a discount criterion, the individual authors can set their own. I nearly always provided a 15% or 20% discount coupon code for every book I put into a sales promo, for example.

Sometimes, the only way to learn about a book’s discount is to click on the book’s cover and check the landing page that opens up, where the author will announce any discounts.

What Group Promos are Good For

Group promos such as BookFunnel and StoryOrigin are great for discovering new-to-you authors and new titles from favourite authors, because each promo only has a few to a few dozen books in it, so you’re not overwhelmed by hundreds of titles the way you can be on retail sites.

Plus, the discounts that authors and promos provide via these group promos are often only available via the promos.

And the books that are given away in the group promos are sometimes only available for purchse, elsewhere.

So there are some exclusive opportunities available for readers!

How to find these promos

If you are subscribed to the email list of an author who participates in BookFunnel or StoryOrigin promos, then the author will provide news about new promos in an email. If none of the authors you follow do these group promos, you can instead watch on social media for authors who publicly announce their promotions.

You might find some current promotions mentioned on social media, too.

Another way to learn about group promotions is to ask other readers if they know of any, and to share their link.

Once you have signed up for an author’s email list via a group promotion, you will hear about future promotions that author participates in, that you can browse, buy, and download.

Scandalous Scions Box Four out soon!