It’s been almost two months since the release of Before You Go and sales have remained steady. I’ve learned a ton about publishing and marketing a Kindle ebook. I’ll share some of those lessons in a future post. By the way, as of this week it is now available in the Nook format at Barnes and Noble.
One issue that has emerged in the feedback I’ve received is that I currently don’t have a great option for distributing a bundle of books to groups of people who want to read and discuss it together.
I was recently contacted by someone who is a part of the minister search process for his church. He read the book and wanted to share it with others, but wasn’t sure how to get it to those who don’t have a Kindle or who aren’t comfortable reading Kindle books on their phones. While it is possible to download a Kindle reader app for phones and computers, it is a bit more complicated than opening and reading a pdf file.
So I sent him a pdf copy of the Before You Go and told him to distribute it as he saw fit. Several days later, we were both getting feedback from people in his church who probably wouldn’t have read it in the Kindle format.
This gave me the idea to offer an “unlimited distribution” pdf version of Before You Go to churches. Rather than buying multiple copies from Amazon, churches can purchase and download one copy and then distribute it to everyone involved in the search process.
This option will give more people the opportunity to read and discuss Before You Go. I hope this will improve the minister search processes in churches across the country.
You can find more information about this special offer here.
Telling Stories, Asking Questions, Learning Lessons
This is the kind of adaptability and flexibility that the MPAA and RIAA will never understand. They assume people are inherently evil and will not pay for anything they can steal.
Other models have proven that if you provide what people want (a book without ten tons of digital copyright management packed on top) for a reasonable price, people will pay for value.
I think that pretty well proves that people, for the most part, are inherently good.
Kudos for a job well done on the book.