How Self-Published Book Author and Marketing Maven Phillip Strang Gets Amazon Reviews

Phillip and I were talking a few days after the interview and I asked him how he managed to get so many reviews (over 300) on Amazon. He graciously shared his methodology with me and gave me permission to share it with you.

A 15 Step Program
Important: The first step is not recognizing you have a problem, it’s deciding you want to succeed.

Bonus: You don’t have to stand up and say “Hello, My name is … and I’m an author wanting to get reviews for my books.” Okay, maybe you should say that to yourself, depending on your confidence levels.

Seriously, here are the 15 steps:

• I take my mailing list, primarily generated through Lead Gen Ads on FB initially, although, now I only use InstaFreebie. It’s a lot cheaper and I’ve seen no difference in the quality of the emails I receive.
• I then upload them onto Mailchimp using a programme called Zapier. The emails gained from FB lead gen ads and Instafreebie are auto loaded onto Mailchimp through Zapier. It’s a bit fiddly to set up, but MailChimp deals with the duplicates. There’s no manual uploading by me.
• Mailchimp rates the emails on a 1 to 5 scale. I use 4 and 5 for my reviews.
• Noting that of 5K on my list, only 2K are of any validity.
• I then sent the 2K an email (left image at bottom. Click for larger image).
• Of those, 100 will respond.
• I’ll send them a file with the download link. I use Bookfunnel to ensure that they receive with full instructions for whatever device they use (right image at botom. Click for larger image)
• Those that respond with a review will receive the next book, and so on.
• A list of 5K will give me about 30, maybe 40 reviews.
• As new subscribers are added to my mail list, I repeat the process.
• It’s a labourious process to start up, but I’ve found no other way to get reviews.
• Website’s offering for you to join the club in exchange for reviews are of little use
• Of course, the best ones are when someone buys your book and gives a review, but most people don’t.
• Let me know if you want any more information.
• Be prepared for the wasters who will take the free book and never do any
  more. I’ve got a detailed spreadsheet, so I know who these are.

Many thanks to DCI Isaac Cook and DI Keith Tremayne thriller author Phillip Strang for sharing his review-getting methodology with us.

And remember, Phillip’s full interview will be available Wednesday, 10 Jan 2018, 12:01pmET at Phillip Strang – Murder is a Tricky Business (British Sleuths and Publishing Analytics) (link won’t be active until after that date/time).