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Reviews are very important on Kindle. Of course a good or bad rating can have a big impact when it comes to influencing the buying decisions of your readers – most of us are considerably more likely to buy a book if we think it sounds good according to the previous buyers. Likewise, if a book is often described negatively then we will often be put off (by the way, if you want to learn how to write a 5 star Kindle book, check out this post here.
Actually though, this isn’t the biggest way that a review impacts sales. Ultimately, most of us will at least read the free sample of a book on Kindle if we are sufficiently interested in the topic.
The bigger problem then, is that reviews can impact rankings. If your book has bad reviews, then it won’t rank as highly on the Kindle Store and this will mean that far fewer people are able to discover it and thus spend money on it.
So the question becomes: how do you ensure you get the best reviews? Let’s take a look…
Write A Great Book
This should go without saying but it’s incredibly important to write a good book if you want to get the best reviews.
This means that the writing style should be on-point with good use of language, correct spelling and good grammar.
Likewise though, it also means that the book should be interesting, unique and engaging. It needs to provide some kind of value and that means that you need to provide some kind of takeaway for the reader.
And if you are writing a non-fiction book, you need to ensure that your book is well researched and factually correct.
Write An Accurate Description
In a bid to make the most sales possible on their books, a lot of marketers and writers will write a highly persuasive and sales-y description for their books. The aim here is to make people want to read the book and to thereby over-sell it.
While this can help to give you an initial surge in sales though, it can also end up hurting you if what’s in the book doesn’t live up to the hype.
Make sure your description is accurate and that you don’t give away all the surprises inside. You want your readers to come away pleasantly surprised and not disappointed when they’ve finished the book.
And ideally you’ll have them wanting more; this is why creating a series of books can be highly lucrative if done correctly.
Charge Correctly
Ultimately, a review should tell people if a book is good value or not.
And the best way to make a book good value is to decrease the price – thereby meaning that the readers get more for less.
Actually, one of the very best things you can do for your book in terms of ranking is to lower the price for a while to drive sales and to increase the number of positive reviews.
Respond
Another tip is to respond to your negative reviews. Don’t be defensive or aggressive and respect your readers’ right to their opinion. At the same time though, you should be sure that you respond in order to apologise and to explain your point of view – you can even offer a refund.
This not only shows that you offer good customer service (thereby taking some of the sting out of a bad review) but if you’re lucky they may even change their rating once they feel heard!
Another way to increase the positive reviews for your Kindle book is to ensure you have great pictures in your book and there are a number of things to keep in mind concerning your pictures. So let’s look at that next…
How To Take Stunning Pictures For Your Kindle Book
Pictures can add a great deal to a Kindle title and really help it to sell. Not only is the cover one of the most important features when it comes to grabbing attention and drawing people in but the images inside the book will also help to illustrate your points and also make the pages pop more.
This is only even more true now that the Kindle Fire and other full color tablets are becoming more popular as many users’ preferred reading devices.
But the question is: how do you take great quality pictures for your book? It’s not enough just to add images: they need to look fantastic if they’re going to help you sell.
Of course you can use free stock images or you can buy images – but this will pale in comparison to the benefits that come from creating custom images that perfectly illustrate what the text is saying and that your readers aren’t going to accidentally find anywhere else!
So here’s how you do it…
Invest In A Good Camera
A good starting point is to invest in a high quality camera. This should have a decent number of mega pixels and should also have a good lens and lots of features.
A DSLR can help you to pull off more impressive and stylistic effects but it’s not necessary if you want to save money or you’re not sure about learning all the different settings.
A bridge camera is a camera that is much cheaper and that offers a good ‘half-way’ point between a DSLR and a decent superzoom.
Think About Lighting
When you take your photo, it’s not just enough to think about the object itself. At the same time, you also need to think about the lighting which will have a big impact on how it appears.
Avoid having glare (unless it’s intentional) and make sure the subject of the photo is well lit.
Ideally, try to have light hitting the object from the side.
Think About Composition
Also important is to compose your shot. This means thinking about the foreground, middle ground and background.
It also means deciding where you want your subject to be among these elements and how you’re going to lead the eye from one to the other.
Having an object out of focus in the foreground, or putting your subject to the left of center can make for a more interesting shot than just taking photos of everything head on.
Tell A Story
Perhaps most important of all is that your photos tell a story. That is to say that it’s not good enough for your photos to simply be of something: you need to make sure that they express emotion or suggest what has just happened or what is just about to happen.
Instead of taking a photo of a party for instance, you could take a photo of a glass that’s empty with lipstick marks around the top. This creates much more intrigue because it gets the user to think – which in turn increases engagement for your book.
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