Hi there,
It’s time for another BookRoar Newsletter, where we catch you up on all the things we’ve been working on and drop the occasional nugget of wisdom. It’s all designed so you can get the best out of your BookRoar experience.
This month we’ve been mostly working on our internal systems so that our customer service advisors can do more of the things that the development team can. This means that we can authorize review extensions and investigate matters raised to us with greater speed and efficiency. You may have also noticed that the website is much more stable due to some ‘behind-the-scenes’ improvements, which have helped us cope with the ever-increasing web traffic.
As usual, a great big thank you to our monthly supporters and those who have donated to us through Ko-Fi. Your kindness and generosity is what keeps the site running. If you are unable to donate, then please consider posting about us in blogs or social media, or better yet jot some words into a TrustPilot review. It all helps us spread the word!
**Polite Reminder**
Amazon processing times are lagging again, with the Canadian marketplace being the hardest hit. We’ve had members there waiting for nearly two weeks for their reviews to be made Live! Stay tuned as we have written up a plan to make this easier on our members, but it will take some time to implement.
In the meantime, please refrain from submitting your reviews to us if you have not received the confirmation e-mail to say the review is Live on Amazon. All that happens is we pause the authorization timer while we wait for the review to be processed. We will of course extend review deadlines to cover the period, so if you are running out of time then please send us an email and we’ll sort the rest.
Author Interviews
Interviews are a great way for authors to gain publicity for themselves and for their books, mostly because you get to promote yourself in a different way and it gives your audience the chance to get to know the real you. People are more likely to buy a book if they know more about the person who wrote it!
BookRoar are happy to announce that any member of our club can ask to be interviewed, with the interview being posted onto our Medium page and then promoted on our social media accounts. You are then free to post the links wherever you like, such as in your books, on your website, and on your own socials. These interviews will be conducted over email (big up the introverts!), where we can ask you some questions and you can ask us to ask you the questions you want to be asked.
If this is of interest to you, then please send us an email and we will book your slot. We do ask for a small donation of $25 (via Ko-fi) to conduct the interview but please wait until we have confirmed this with you before sending any payment.
What Are You Waiting For?
We have been going through our member list and have found that just under half of you who have signed up are yet to select a book from the Review Pool. It seems that many people are waiting to see if BookRoar works with their free Credit before diving in.
But don’t sit on the sidelines — get stuck right in! The more active readers we have then the better and more rewarding BookRoar will be. Not only does having more Credits assigned to a book improve its place in the Review Pool, but you can expect that those Credits will be used at some point so you can in theory get a review for every book you read. Plus, there are a lot of genuinely AMAZING books on BookRoar that get nowhere near the attention they deserve. BookRoar is not only rewarding but it is brilliant for introducing you to new authors and the wider writing community!
Be Nice (and Generous)
Constructive criticism is at the core of what BookRoar is all about, and we always encourage true and honest feedback that can help the author improve their craft (and more importantly so that we don’t breach Amazon’s Community Guidelines). That being said, we have noticed one or two very spiteful reviews coming through with some very low scores.
We know that four or five star reviews are not practical for every book you read, but a new author with very few reviews and ratings can be hit hard with a very low score. Please bear this in mind, and if a book is just not gelling with you consider returning it to the Review Pool and requesting a refund from Amazon rather than review-bombing it.. Remember, BookRoar is all about helping one another, and when one of us succeeds it paves the way for the rest of us.
Revenge Reviews
The notion of ‘revenge reviews’ is not something that is unique to BookRoar as it is a problem which has plagued many in the writing community at some point. It is unkind, unprofessional, and something we take very seriously at BookRoar. In short, please don’t do it. We will be posting some guidance on this matter to our Medium page soon, including any penalties we can issue to those found or suspected to be involved. We’ll post some tips on how to protect yourself too.
Merchandise
Okay, okay! Are you excited, because we’re excited. Our custom-made BookRoar mugs have arrived and they are ready to top you up on that lovely, lovely coffee, the stuff that helps authors power through with their reading and writing.
The mugs themselves are fairly inexpensive to make, however we are searching to try and find the cheapest way to ship them internationally from the UK. Once we have things sorted, we will open an online store on Ko-Fi where you can purchase one. But for now, you’ll have to make do with this wonderful photo. Good, eh?
I think that’s it. Happy reading and reviewing everybody and we’ll see you next month.
The BookRoar Team
