An Amazing Gift! The Results From Caught’s Birthday.

Greetings all,

There are simply no words to express how overjoyed I am. To say the giveaway was successful would be an understatement. I’d like to walk you through how things went.

The event kicked off with a start that already had me thrilled.  Ninety-seven people downloaded Caught. I’m always happy when I get a lot of downloads during free events, and that was just amazing.

Day two brought similar results as eighty-two people downloaded the book. I was on cloud nine.

When I set up the giveaway, I also set up a BookGorilla campaign. I’d used them a few times before, and I wondered how things would change if the book was free. I went to church and then we got to my in-laws’ place. I brought up my phone, expecting to see another hundred or so downloads.

What I saw first was the bar graph KDP uses to show sales. The bar for that date was much higher than the others. Much. Higher. I zoomed in and touched the bar: More than 300 people downloaded the book. I jumped off my seat, telling my family what was going on. I rushed to Caught’s Amazon page and learned I was ranked seventh in my category (Paranormal Suspense).

I would have been out of my mind with joy if it had stopped there, but that bar just kept going. I saw that I had 500 downloads and moved up to fifth. 748 downloads later, I had landed in the top three. Number 3 in my category.

Monday came, and 183 more people downloaded my book. The campaign finished Jan. 30, and fifty-seven more people had downloaded the book.

In total, 1,166 people downloaded the book. There just aren’t words. I could say thank you 1,166 times, I could say it 1,166 times 1,166, and it wouldn’t be enough. To all of you who picked up the book, THANK YOU! I hope you enjoy it.

If I shut off the overjoyed artist for a moment or two, I can talk about the overall goal. The first goal was to get about 300 downloads. Well, that goal got obliterated. The next goal is one that I’ll have to track.

You see, it’s common for people to simply grab up a copy of a free book. Who wouldn’t? The hope is that any percentage actually read the book. My hope is about 100 people read the book. I can’t really track that, but the last metric gets to the main hope of the campaign. Every author hopes for the most cherished thing they can have. Purchases are nice. Compliments are wonderful, but the thing that really helps an author is a review. My goal for this? 10 reviews.

I’d love for all of those to be glowing praise for my creative mind, but if I get ten scathing reviews, it would still be a successful campaign in my eyes. I’ve already seen a bit of reaction. My Goodreads page for Caught shows two new ratings: One two star and one five star. I can live with that sort of breakdown.

Th campaign hasn’t even been over for two days, so the fact that two people have already rated the book  is just amazing. Now all that’s left is the wait.

Even if I don’t get any reviews, it’s just amazing to see that so many people have at least shown the interest in Caught to download it. I can only hope everyone who tired it enjoy it. Whatever you think of the book, I just want you to know how grateful I am. You’ve made a silly old dreamer so happy, and I don’t even know how to show my appreciation.

Bless you all.

Thanks for reading,

Matt