As soon as the 90-day KDP Select period ended for The Shepherd, I threw it on Smashwords for free and sent Amazon a couple of notifications using the “tell us about a lower price” link on the book’s product page. I had heard that price-matching is often more effective when you contact Amazon directly through their help system in the KDP dashboard. As it turns out, this strategy was a little too effective.
I sent Amazon a polite email to let them know that I had made the novella available elsewhere for free. The text of that email was as follows:
Hi, I’ve submitted a lower price notification through the book’s product page and was wondering if you’d be willing to price-match The Shepherd to free based on its availability at Barnes and Noble, Smashwords, etc. Thanks for your consideration.
I then included links to the product pages on both Barnes and Noble and Smashwords. Amazon replied promptly with a fairly standard response, echoes of which I have seen elsewhere:
Hello,
Thank you for your information on pricing.
I’ve confirmed your book “The Shepherd” is being sold for the lower price on other sales channels.
From time to time, we may match prices elsewhere online, including free promotions. However, we retain discretion over our retail prices.
I’ve matched your Kindle book’s price with the price on other sales channels, so you can expect to see a change reflected within the next couple of business days.
I hope this helps. Thanks for using Amazon KDP
Amazon price-matched The Shepherd to free the following day. This is great, since I’ve already released the next book in that series. I’m pleased with Amazon’s fast service and quick response time.
What I hadn’t also accounted for was that they went ahead and price-matched the first book in the Driftmetal series at the same time. Now, within the first day of going free, Driftmetal has shot up into the Best Seller lists in both its categories. As I write this on the morning of the second day, Driftmetal is sitting at #3 in Steampunk and #4 in Cyberpunk. I took a screenshot to commemorate the moment, since I am well aware that this may never happen again. Behold:
While I’m pleased with the book’s performance, having Driftmetal price-matched now is not as good a thing. I’ve had the book on Smashwords for close to two months now, and it has been doing very well over there – if you consider getting downloaded many times for free “doing well” (which I do). However, while I’ve written Part 2 in the series, it’s still in draft. I had planned to set the draft aside for a couple of months as I normally do while starting work on my next book (Children of the Wastes, Book Two in the Aionach Saga, for those interested). The problem is that now that Driftmetal is getting gobs of downloads, there is no second book for readers to move on to.
Thus, I’ve pulled up the draft of Segment Two to begin the editorial process. I’ve placed it on pre-order and I’m pushing for a release date of April 5, unless I can finish it sooner. Worse things have happened, I suppose. I just wish I’d been prepared with a completed second book by the time the first one went free.