More About Gifting E-books...

A short while ago, I posted about gifting e-books and how simple it was.  For those who missed that entry, I'll briefly recap the basic idea here.  When one goes to Barnes and Noble or Amazon, you have the option of 'gifting' an e-book to someone and having a notice sent to their e-mail that they have a new book waiting for them.  The e-mail will also provide a link so that person can claim their gift.  Pretty straightforward and simple right?  Of course it is.  But there's also an added feature that allows you to determine when that e-mail goes out to the recipient.  You can schedule the day that e-mail goes out so they can be notified of the present on a specific day such as a birthday...

Christmas... 

Hannukah... 

or whatever the special occasion is.

*To see the full entry click here: http://allankrummenacker.blogspot.com/2016/11/the-holiday-season-is-coming-and-you.html

However, there was one little feature I did not mention at the time I posted that entry and that is, any sales made as gifts will NOT be reflected in your sales report.  

Why?  Because until the gift is actually claimed by the recipient the sale is not considered FINALIZED.  I only found out about this recently myself when a person who had won a copy of "The Vampyre Blogs - Coming Home" in a poetry contest run by my fellow author/blogger Aurora Jean Alexander (blog link: https://aurorajalexander.wordpress.com/).  I knew the sale had taken place from my end and that an e-mail had been sent to the recipient informing them the book was waiting.  But after several days I saw no sign of the sale on my KDP Report.  This confused me and as the weeks progressed I still did not see the sale show up, even though when I had 'gifted' someone an e-book previously the sale showed up rather quickly.

Puzzled, I got into contact with Amazon and was informed that until the gift was claimed the sale was not done and would not show up in the report.  I am following up with Aurora Jean to have her get in contact with the recipient to check their e-mail, specifically their 'Spam' filter, so they can claim their prize.

But this experience was an eye-opener for me and based on the number of thanks and kudos I got from fellow authors about my article on gifting e-books, I felt it important to share this new piece of information here.  I recently ran a 50% off sale on all the e-books in my Para-Earth Series and did not see much sales happening at all.  Then I remembered, I had mentioned in my advertising the benefits of 'scheduling' when the books should arrive and will be waiting until Christmas and Hannukah to see if sales were actually much better than I'd thought.

So the lesson here is patience my friends.  I still highly recommend gifting e-books and that all writers should mention the scheduling feature of when the book is to arrive.  Just don't be discouraged if sales don't seem to be picking up right away.  They may be waiting in the wings to surprise you especially around this holiday season.

So until next time.  Take care, be safe as you shop, and keep writing.