Has inflation eaten away at your book profits? Perhaps you want to start advertising and need some margin. Or maybe readers are not taking you seriously with your book’s current low price.
You need to raise the price of your book, but how should you do it?
Most authors raise prices quietly. One day the price just goes up, and they hope no one notices. But that approach is a massive mistake and a missed opportunity.
A future price increase is a rare opportunity to use a powerful marketing technique called a reverse coupon. So, what is a reverse coupon, and how can you use it to boost sales?
Every time you need to raise your price, you have an opportunity to use a reverse coupon strategy.
What is a reverse coupon?
With a reverse coupon, you announce the price increase and then give your readers a chance to buy your book before the price increases. I have personally made more money with this pricing strategy than with any of the other 14 pricing strategies authors use.
Why Reverse Coupons Boost Sales
Anchoring
All prices are relative. A reverse coupon has the same anchoring effect as a regular coupon, except that people are anchoring the current lower price to the new higher one. It is the easiest way to make your current price look like a bargain. They know that if they don’t buy now, they’re going to have to pay more later.
I made the mistake of not using anchoring when I announced the Novel Marketing Conference early-bird pricing. I did not mention the regular price on the landing page, nor did I mention that the price will increase by $100 on November 1.
Learn more about anchoring in my episode on How to Price Your Book Using Anchoring.
Loss Aversion
For interesting psychological reasons, people feel losses more than they feel equivalent gains. For example, you will have much stronger feelings about an unexpected $100 fee added to your bill than an unexpected $100 credit on a different bill on the same day.
By taking away the current low price, you trigger loss aversion in your readers. They feel the loss of the current low price. But if you give them a warning that the low price is going away, they are far more likely to decide to buy your book. Your announcement about the future increase won’t make them angry; it will push them to make a final decision.
However, a reverse coupon won’t make a stranger want to buy your book. It also won’t help them get to know who you are if they have never heard of you. But it will help your readers who are on the fence to make a decision.
To learn more about the effectiveness of this trigger, listen to my episode on loss aversion.
Urgency
Most people don’t act without a deadline. Authors need deadlines to write just as readers need deadlines to read. If you don’t give a deadline, readers will repeatedly put off buying your book until “tomorrow,” and they’ll never get around to buying your book.
A reverse coupon creates a deadline with a powerful promise: “Act now or forever miss out on the current low price.”
The greater the discount, the greater the urgency. A reader won’t be super motivated by the opportunity to save only a couple of dollars on a book. However, when those savings are combined with loss aversion and anchoring, the strategy works better than you’d expect.
For in-person events like the Novel Marketing Conference, a reverse coupon offers logistical help as well. An early bird price serves event planners in two ways. First, it helps create urgency for listeners to act now and buy a ticket, and second, it gives us an idea of how many people to expect.
You can learn more about the marketing psychological trigger of urgency in my episode on How to Create Urgency.
Golden Rule Technique
Marketing is not about tricking people into buying something they don’t want. Marketing, when done well, is about helping people make decisions that are in their own best interest.
A reverse coupon is a Golden Rule technique.
Wouldn’t you want every company to warn you before they increase their prices? If the gas station had today’s price and tomorrow’s price posted, wouldn’t you be glad? It would be so easy to make a decision knowing which day the prices would be lower.
If my episodes on marketing psychology make you feel uncomfortable, take comfort that this is a very white-hat technique. People will be glad to know of the future increase and thankful for the opportunity to save while they can.
So, now that you know why a reverse coupon works, let’s talk about how to make it work for you.
How To Use a Reverse Coupon for Your Book
Step 1: Build an Email List
A reverse coupon is a conversion technique. It only works on folks who already know and like you. Knowing that a random book by an unknown author is going up in price probably won’t motivate you to buy it. However, if you hear that the book you’ve been considering from an author you like is about to increase in price, that might just be the push you need to make the purchase.
If you need help growing your email list, check out my course, Author Email Academy. You will learn how to rapidly grow an email list of thousands of subscribers. If you register for the Novel Marketing Conference, you will have the chance to buy the Author Email Academy for 80% off the regular price so you can build your list ahead of the conference.
Step 2: Get Control Over Your Pricing
Reverse coupons are yet another technique that traditionally published authors can’t easily use. Technically speaking, it is possible. You can talk with your agent about your book’s pricing and ask if there’s a chance you can convince the publisher to do some price promotions.
Traditional publishers approach pricing very differently than indie authors. They see pricing as a retailer thing and rarely fiddle with price. In fact, they often print the price on the back cover because they don’t intend to change it. They’re committed to that price for the duration of that print run. Price promotion isn’t a tool they use.
Indie authors, on the other hand, do a lot of experimentation and innovation with pricing. They are willing to offer lower and higher prices than traditionally published books. A traditional publisher rarely offers signed and numbered, limited-edition print runs, but it’s becoming increasingly common for indie publishers. On the flip side, you don’t see many traditionally published authors experimenting with techniques like permafree, which many indie authors are also willing to try.
Indie authors are also more likely to use skimming, penetration pricing, permafree, and the other 14 pricing strategies I talk about in my Book Marketing 101 episode on price.
Once you get the rights back on your book, you can control the price. You must be able to control your pricing to use this technique.
Step 3: Commit in Your Heart to the New Price
Don’t use a reverse coupon to experiment with price points. Sometimes, finding the optimal price for your book isn’t straightforward. Generally, as prices increase, demand decreases. However, if your book is priced too low, readers might not take it seriously. In fact, raising the price can sometimes increase demand.
I experienced this when I started my website business right after college. My prices were so low that people didn’t take me seriously. As I raised my rates, I found that more authors were interested in working with me at the higher prices than at the lower ones. It was surprising, but it taught me that pricing is a fascinating and complex aspect of business.
Most authors eventually find a “sweet spot” for their book’s price, where both sales volume and revenue are maximized. But your price-point experiment is not the time to use a reverse coupon. You only have one reputation, so don’t waste it lying to your list about the price.
Your new price is the list price for the next few years. Commit to it.
I would also commit to not offering discounts or price promotions for at least three months after you increase the price. You can offer a limited sale after a reverse coupon, but the promotions need to be spaced out so you don’t lose credibility.
Step 4: Pick a Date
Pick a date far enough in the future so you have time to announce and warn about the price increase. But don’t schedule it so far out that there’s no urgency. I recommend choosing a date anywhere from two weeks to two months down the road.
The bigger the increase, the more notice you should give. For example, to announce the $100 price increase of the Novel Marketing Conference, we began offering the early-bird price over a month in advance.
Step 5: Promote The Future Price Increase
Promote the future price increase just as you would a limited-time coupon.
For example, if you downloaded this episode in October, you would have heard a pre-roll ad about the early-bird pricing for the Novel Marketing Conference.
However, you mainly want to promote the new price via email. Podcasts are a great way to create demand but not a great way to get people to take action. It is hard to tap to buy something when you’re listening to a podcast while driving or doing dishes.
Send at least two emails to promote the reverse coupon. If you only send one email newsletter per month, giving a two-month warning makes sense. This way, you can mention the reverse coupon in two newsletters. In the first one, give the initial notice about the price increase, and in the second, give the final reminder. Make the price increase the subject of the second email since not everyone reads every message. An email with “Last Chance” in the subject is much more likely to be opened.
Step 6: Purge
Once the price has gone up, purge as many mentions of the old price as you can. No one wants to be reminded that they missed out on the old, low price. People get enough reminders about inflation at the grocery store. This is one reason I don’t recommend printing the price of a book on the back cover.
For example, once the Novel Marketing Conference’s early-bird price goes away on November 1, I will change the pre-roll of the podcast so that it doesn’t mention early-bird pricing. I will scrub any mention of it from the conference webpage, and the price will just be the price.
When can I use reverse coupons?
- Audiobook Price Going Up
- Ebook Price Going Up
- Early-Bird Pricing for Events
- Some Kickstarter Rewards Can Be Reverse Coupons
- Course Price Going Up
Let me know how you’ve used reverse coupons in the comments or in this episode’s thread at Author Media.social.
Featured Patron
Michelle L. Levigne, author of Inquest: The AFV Defender Book 4
Join the fearless crew of the AFV Defender, a legendary ship known for their daring adventures and unbreakable bond. But when strange signals from the edges of charted space lead them on a mission with the notorious Inquest, their luck may finally run out. As they race across the galaxy to uncover the source of the mysterious signals, they must also navigate the dangerous reputation of their new partners. With every step closer to the truth, they realize they may be facing an enemy unlike anything they’ve encountered before.
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