Book reviews are one of the most powerful marketing activities. There is no such thing as having too many reviews. The great thing about a good review is that it tells potential buyers that someone else read and liked the book. A good book review is a powerful marketing tool. You can use it by placing it on your blog. You can also share it through the social media links. Another tactic is to add it to your book page at Amazon Central.

There are several strategies you can use to acquire more reviews.

Goodreads Groups are a fertile area to request reviews. Use these groups as your first resource. Some of these groups are listed later in this chapter.

Another approach is to contact a review site. These come in two flavors. One will review your book, usually for a fee. Desktop Publishing Reviews it is such a place. Be Booklife. Some sites will review your book for free. Reader favorite It is one of those free sites, although it will ask you to upgrade to a paid review.

The second type of review site will not review your book, but will make it available to multiple potential reviewers. I list some of these later in the chapter. There are many more besides the ones I mention, but I only included a few that I am familiar with. A simple search will give you a list of more sites that offer to get book reviews for a price.

Let me be clear: if you use one of these services, you are not buying a review. You are paying for a proofreading service that will put your book in front of many potential reviewers who may or may not choose to proofread your book. The review service does not pay reviewers who choose to read your book. What you pay for when you sign up for a review service is access to all the potential reviewers on your list.

Some of the review services will not deliver the products. They tell a good story about the many reviewers they have on their email list, but you won’t get the number of reviews you signed up for. These sites just don’t have enough readers on their list to deliver the reviews. Others, a small number, are just scammers looking to scam the authors.

Another strategy is to give away copies of your book, hopefully in exchange for a promise to review it. You can use your social media contacts here. Ask if anyone wants a free copy of the e-book review. I found this tactic to be marginally effective. The main reason is that some people ask for a review copy just because it is free and they do not intend to write a review. Also, some readers will not like the book and will not write a negative review. My experience is that around 25% of these readers will write a review. However, sending e-books to potential reviewers costs you nothing, so you will not incur any costs.

My observation is that many people do not write reviews of books that they enjoy because they are not sure how. To alleviate this problem, I wrote a series of questions to help readers write a short and simple book review. There are two versions of this: one for fiction and one for non-fiction. When you ask someone to review your book or when you submit a copy of the e-book for review, please paste the questions in the email or you can create a document and attach it to the email.

Fiction book review questionnaire:

1) On a scale of 1 to 5 (5 being the highest), how would you rate this book?

2) Did you like or dislike the book?

3) Explain why you answered 2) as you did.

If you liked the book, answer the following questions:

4) Why did you like the book?

4) What didn’t you like about the book?

6) Did the main characters seem real and credible to you?

7) Did you want the book to continue beyond the end?

Use your answers to these questions to write a few sentences about the book. Hint: don’t write a short synopsis.

As an example, here is a review I received of one of my novels:

I enjoyed reading “Falstaff’s Big Wager: A Fantasy Adventure to Spin Shakespeare in His Grave (Gundarland Story Book 2)”. The author has written a fun satire and it is a very entertaining read. I felt that the author was very creative and knowledgeable about the writings of the famous Bard of Avon in writing this light, imaginative, and delightful account.

Nonfiction Book Review Questionnaire:

1) How many stars, from 1 to 5, would you give this book? (Five is the highest rating)

2) What did you like about the book (if you liked anything)?

3) What did you not like about the book (if you liked anything)?

4) Did you get the information that the author promised in the book blurb and other promotional material?

5) Does the book contain information that was not expected or that you did not know?

6) Would you recommend this book to other people?

Use your answers to these questions to write a few sentences about the book.

Here’s an example review of one of my nonfiction books:

FFilled with diagrams and written almost as a step-by-step guide for authors, “Creating Stories” is a must-read book if you are a new author or have had trouble writing your next novel. This is a guide for novel and short story writers. Covers character development, plot development, and more. In fact, it even comes down to the nitty-gritty. I like that it’s even based on things like comedy writing and satire.