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In the last few weeks, there have been scandals about so-called sock puppet reviews, when authors have paid for fake reviews or even created them under false identities. Whatever your thoughts on this type of thing, there's no doubt that having great reviews can help your book sell.
Personally I give away books and ask for reviews if people enjoy them, and I consider reviews to be critical in the sales process online, so I will continue to seek them out (ethically) for my own books. Today, guest blogger Laura Pepper Wu provides a handy guide to getting Amazon's top reviewers to review your book.
We all want more book reviews but until you have a huge readership waiting for organic reviews can be… well, a long wait!
One way to get more high quality, (usually) well-written and highly regarded reviews is to ask the ‘Amazon Top Customer Reviewers' to take a look at your book.
Why target the top Amazon reviewers?
While I've seen some reviewers with 7,000+ reviews, the Top Customer Reviewer award is not only about the number of reviews one person has churned out. At the time of writing, the #1 top customer reviewer on Amazon has only (!) 671 reviews under his belt.
As always, Amazon uses a complex algorithm to determine this ranking – this top spot is also determined by the number of “helpful” votes the reviews have received (our #1 guy has 39,414) and “percentage helpful” (97%).
Since that #1 spot is highly coveted, and quite the achievement, you can be sure that the Amazon top customer reviewers put a lot of thought and energy into their reviews. That’s good news – these are the best and most compelling kind of reviews!
As a result, aiming at the Top Customer Reviewers is a good strategy to curating well-written, meaningful and thorough reviews for your book. Here are some more pros for putting in the time and energy to solicit these:
1. These reviewers have proven themselves to be fast, consistent reviewers who read fast (often a few books a week) and will therefore most likely have a quick turn around
2. They understand what makes a good, helpful review
3. They may also have a book blog/ large social media following or other online presence that can bring you additional exposure
4. An endorsement by one of these guys looks GREAT on your Amazon page. Remember the whole third party validation/ social proof thing from your Economics class? Well this is it exactly! Validation from someone who takes reviewing seriously and is therefore 100% objective. Here's how the review listing will look on your Amazon page:
In fact, according to the results of the recent self publishing survey by Taleist.com, Authors who submitted to popular reviewers on Amazon received 25% more reviews than average and earned 32% more revenue for their latest release. Not necessarily a case of cause and effect but a good sign nonetheless.
With the positive there are some potential downsides, and it's only fair to mention those as well:
– Doing this research, and doing it well, DOES take time and energy. You’ll be led down some dead ends, and some reviewers explicitly state that they don’t like to be pitched.
(But if it was easy, everyone would be doing it right? This is the kind of stuff that gets you ahead of the game!)
and…
– They may well be more critical/ harsh. That's why it's super important to really do the research and only target those who would be interested in your book. Otherwise you're asking for trouble!
How to contact Amazon's Top Reviewers
Here are some step by step instructions on how to contact Amazon's Top Customer Reviewers to offer your book for review:
1. Head over to http://www.amazon.com/review/top-reviewers
2. Click on any name or reviewer profile that takes your fancy!
3. Look at the books she/ he has reviewed in the past (be aware that some of these reviewers will not be book reviewers at all, some may focus solely on electronics, clothes etc)
4. Look at his/her interests for relevant info (if this section is filled out):
5. Look under their profile picture to see if their contact information is public (I have blacked it out for privacy reasons here). Also look to see if there are any common interests or a location that you can mention when contacting them.
6. Send them a short, brief pitch stating:
– How you found them
– Why you think they'll enjoy your book (mention other books they loved or genre preference)
– Offer a free copy of your book
– Thank them for their time, whether they decide to take up your offer or not.
Don't forget these people are busy (as everyone is these days!), and most likely receive hundreds of requests. Keep your pitch short and sweet to make sure it’s read.
7. Aim to contact at least 3-4 times more reviewers than the actual number of reviews you are looking for since some will pass or you won’t hear back from them.
8. Wait for your replies 🙂
High quality and plentiful reviews can go a long way to driving book sales.
It does take time and effort though but the payoff is big.
Have you tried contacting Amazon’s Top Customer Reviewers? Why not share your experience by leaving a comment below.
*** UPDATE: Comments are now closed – Jan 2015 **
Laura Pepper Wu is a writer and the co-founder of 30 Day Books: a book studio and Ladies Who Critique, a critique-partner finding site. She has successfully marketed several books to become Kindle and print best-sellers.
Laura has recently released Authorlicious, a premium WordPress theme for authors including tutorials, so if you want to maximize your blog success, check it out here! (affiliate)
Laura’s latest offering is ‘Fire up Amazon & Leave it on Autopilot!’, a video tutorial course on how to tweak Amazon to it’s full potential. When she's not glued to her laptop you can find her walking her dog, practicing yoga or “testing” out coffee shops in Seattle. Connect with her on http://twitter.com/LauraPepWu and say hi!
Images: Top Bigstock Customer Survey or Review, the rest provided by Laura Pepper Wu
Mark says
Hello,
Interesting article, I’m not a writer but one of the reviewers (currently 382). Just a quick idea, lots of reviewers have said they get loads of requests. So far that hasn’t happened to me, now this maybe because my focus is more on technology, I’m only just starting to try and write some book reviews, however I’m wondering if it could also be because I’m based in the UK. The top reviewers are different in different countries, so if you look up number 382 on the link above it isn’t me, but if you look at the UK list there I am (http://www.amazon.co.uk/reviews/top-reviewers/ref=cm_pdp_rev_rank?_encoding=UTF8&rank=382#A2Y6BQ8UGY8VFV).
Given Amazon and eBooks are global then perhaps it might be worth suggesting that you try and contact reviewers on other country lists, they may not be getting asked to review things as much as reviewers on the .com site.
Just a thought and good luck to everyone writing anything, it can be tricky writing a review so I’ve a great respect for anyone that manages an entire book!
Olga says
Hi Mark,
thanks for your comment and suggestion! It just makes so much sense to contact reviewers in different countries. To be honest I had no idea about the amazon top reviewers nor the fact the lists are area specific.
Sadly I was put off from contacting the reviewers because most of them do charge money. While I appreciate they need to cover their bills, the charges are a bit much (over £££).
It would be great to get more readers reviews to help the book to reach the right readers faster. I’ll keep trying 🙂
Thank you.
Mark says
I suppose if someone is in the top 10 reviewers they’re going to try and leverage it! After all, the main reason I cracked on with reviews was to try and get an Amazon Vine invitation, currently listed as reviewer 303 and still no contact (come on Amazon, send me some free stuff!).
Perhaps ignore the top 10 reviewers, maybe even the top 100, and instead go for someone with a top 500 badge? Far less likely to have been asked, and will likely find it very flattering. Worth a go, although maybe check out peoples reviews before contacting them to see if your book (or product) is something they might be interested in, I’d be happy to review things for free if it’s something I’m naturally interested, I’d be less likely to review something for free if it was going to feel like hard work.
Olga says
Thanks Mark for your additional comments. I just saw your ‘reviewer’ profile and (I hope it’s you :-)..) I particularly liked your video reviews!
I then went on to check your website to see whether you’d be interested to review my “How to be Selfish (And other uncomfortable advice).” book, however the link wouldn’t open up.
I’ll try again later, but just out of curiosity: how do I contact a reviewer if they do not display the email or other contact information? Is there a trick to finding their contact details? Because even if I like their comments on the other book or a product, I don’t feel I should approach them in that fashion (i.e. soliciting on their comment) since it’s disrespecting the other person/company’s product review space. Me thinks.
Mark says
Hmm, good question. On my profile page I’ve popped a link to my website, http://www.reviewify.co.uk (just a little side hobby but gets hits from my YouTube videos) so I suppose people could find me via that. Thanks for the heads up regarding the link, I assumed it was working OK so will check that out.
It sounds like you looked at the correct profile as I tend to do focus on video reviews, they seems to be far more helpful to people when buying a physical item. That’s why I’ve not reviewed too many books, I’ve no real desire to be in front of the camera and there’s not much other scope to video review a written product!
As a reviewer I always read and respond to comments, so if there was no other way of contacting me I think that might be your only option. Popping the correct comment on someones review would be fine I think, you could say something like ‘this review was really helpful, I’ve a similar book you might be interested in’, or something similar. Basically not just going for ‘Review my book as well please!’ but tipping the hat to the review and product that has been reviewed.
And if the review was useful please click the thumbs up button to let us reviewers know.
ada says
Hello, I am releasing a novelette title ‘The Ghost at London Victoria Station’ on 5th of August,2013. This is part of the novelette series called ‘London Station’. I have 3 positive feedback on the book so far. The book would be available on Ebook from Amazon and Barnes & Kindle on 5th of August. I am looking for Amazon reviewers to review the book. Though, I will be happy to have it review by any reviewers. please contact me to send you an Ebook for the book. Sorry, it is 15,000 words. This would be my first book.
Thank you.
janette says
Hello Ada, please send me a copy of the book to;
janettebookreviews@gmail.com, and tell me a bit about yourself,
and send a copy to another reviewer Russell Williamson at;
russpat@ntlworld.com
We all have backlogs so please be patient
Janette
Robert A. Krueger says
I sent you an email at your gmail address requesting a book review. However, the email was blocked (which in my ignorance I do not understand). If you think you may be interested, I can send an email (or whatever) with a description of the novel for your consideration, no obligation, of course. I’ll review this site. The name of the novel is: The Children’s Story, A Novel Not for children (about good and evil). It is listed on Amazon (sveral independent reviews). Thank you. Robert Krueger rak27us@charter.net. I appreciate any independent reviews.
Rob Johnson says
Thanks for this very useful article and equally useful comments.
I do have a question (which may seem a bit daft), but do reviews appear on all Amazon sites if they’re only posted on one? That is, if I review a book on Amazon.co.uk, will it automatically appear on Amazon.com? I’ve been trying to find this information elsewhere but without success.
Thanks in advance for your help.
Rob Johnson
Katy Sozaeva says
Nope, unfortunately not. They will only show up on the one they are posted upon. And you have to have a mailing address within their area in order to have an account, so if you live in the US, you cannot have an account on the UK site.
Joanna Penn says
Actually, it’s a little more nuanced. The Amazon.com reviews show up at the very bottom of the UK screen BUT/ they don’t impact the star rating – so if you scroll down you can read them, but they don’t impact the ‘score’. The UK ones don’t show up at all on the US site – I usually log into both sites and post on both. You can have an account on both sites and can post reviews as long as you have purchased something, it doesn’t have to be that book. Hope that helps!
Rob Johnson says
Many thanks for the replies, Katy and Joanna.
I’ve just had a ‘trial run’, and it seems that I can post a review on the US site without having a US mailing address.
It does seem a bit odd that Amazon won’t let a review appear across all sites given that it’s the same book people are reviewing.
Mark says
I would imagine it’s to ensure more localised reviews are presented to reviewers. For example it wouldn’t be any good to your potential readers if all the reviews were in French! Approaching reviewers on both the .com and .co.uk would therefore appear to be a good course of action.
Olga says
Dear Joanna & Laura, thank you for the great blog.
Readers reviews are important in establishing the book credentials, especially for self-published authors.
When the author is known, many people are happy to place a review just to show off their ‘brain-power’ – it is similar to purchasing certain fashion brands. When the author is unknown or worse yet is writing about the uncomfortable topic, why would anyone review the book that could expose you to the social critique?
My latest book “How to be Selfish (And other uncomfortable advice)” had a great media exposure, yet the readers reviews are the ones that carry the weight. The readers reviews are the ones that direct the attention of those potential readers who may be interested in the topic discussed in the book and eventually in purchasing one.
My book sells well and I get beautiful letters from the readers, but barely any review on amazon 🙁
I will definitely try your suggestions. Thank you.
ps: I already took the liberty of sending an email to Janette.
janette says
Got the book, thank you, although I have a big backlog at the moment. I will get to it as soon as I can.
Janette
Olga says
Dear Janette,
thank you for noticing the comment and such a speedy reply!
Olga
ps: I’ve enjoyed reading your comments here
Ricky Shah says
Hi Janette,
I have written an ebook on SEO. Unfortunately, I did not manage to get many reviews. How do I proceed with the same? Do you also review ebook on Amazon? It’d be great if you do. I will send the PDF version of the book or kindle version to you right away if you do.
janette says
Hi Ricky, please send me a description of your book and a bit about yourself to; janettebookreviews@gmail.com
janette says
Hi, I just looked at a book on Amazon ‘Goat Mountain ‘ by David Vann. He has eight reviews, varying stars, all by vine voice reviewers. I would be interested to know how this comes about. There are no other reviews, but how on earth do you get eight vine voices, pre-publication to read your book. (publication date 10th sept 2013)
Katy Sozaeva says
Janette, Vine Voices are the only ones who can review ahead of publication date on Amazon, since we receive ARC copies of the books and have to review those books within 30 days of receipt. We have a special page to which we go to write the review that allows us to post our reviews immediately rather than having to wait for publication of the book. I am not sure how many of each book is offered in total, but I imagine there are probably between 50 and 100 of each book offered in the Vine Voice newsletter, targeted directly to those who would find those books of most interest among the Vine Voice members. Eight seems a reasonable number to me; I’ve seen up to 50.
Ricky Shah says
Hi Katy,
Vince Voices program seems fascinating. Where do I find more information about it? Do you guys review only particular book (say fiction)?
Janette,
I have send you an email from my personal email address 🙂
Katy Sozaeva says
If you go onto Amazon and look up information on “badges” there is some about Vine, but it’s a by-invitation-only program, and as far as I’m aware, there haven’t been any new Vine Voices added recently. I was among the first in 2008. We receive two offers each month. One is targeted based upon our purchases, and the second is everything left over from the previous week, and sometimes for a few months prior. We did not used to have a deadline on our reviews, and as long as 80 percent of what we’d received was reviewed, we could request more, but now we have to review everything within 30 days, so I generally read the books as soon after I receive them as possible. At any rate, we can request up to four books a month, two from each offer, and there is also a “Last Harvest” program where they offer overstock, but it’s the same thing, and since I have so much to review already, I haven’t taken a look in that section for a long time. I hope that helps!
Ricky Shah says
Hi Katy
Thanks a lot for the prompt response. I got the concept of Vine program. If I am not wrong, then you have to ASK the book you wish to receive/review the book.
Is it possible to ask Vine members to review our book? I have an ebook in the Computer Technology section (SEO).
Katy Sozaeva says
Well, Vine members are also regular Amazon reviewers. If you look at my reviews, you’ll note the Vine books are a very small minority of what I review, so yes, you can always contact Vine Voices for reviews if they are open for it. But I would strongly recommend you research them first, find out if they have any review-submission guidelines, and follow those submissions. If you can’t find any information, such as a link to their blog in their profile and if the types of books they review seem to match the type of book you want reviewed, you can always leave a comment on one of their reviews asking if they are open to review-request submissions, and if so how one would go about it, but first check their profile, see if they have a blog, and look at the blog to see if there are reviewing or review-submission guidelines. We’re all very busy, and each spring at least 200 of us are asked to do reviewing for round 3 of the ABNA as well, so they may not have the time, but it never hurts to ask.
Robert Krueger says
I’ll bet Amazon’s editor submitted Goat Mountain to the Vine reviewers because Amazon knows historically he sells a lot of books. Amazon is getting ahead by marketing a book they think will be a winner. Same does not apply to most of us!
janette says
Katy, thank you very much for that, I find the the whole system very interesting.
Darren Stock says
Hi to everyone on here
I have just came across this blog post and have very enjoyed reading all the comments. Janette, if you are not too snowed under with books to review – would you be able to help with a review of my non-fiction book ‘how to write an ebook in less than 7-14 days’?
janette says
Hi Darren, thank you for the message. I do have a bit of a backlog as usual, but send me a copy of your book anyway to janettebookreviews@gmail.com, and I will look at it as soon as I can
Janette
Sax says
Thank you for this article. I started combing through Amazon’s top reviewers with high hopes. After looking at 300 profiles and comments, I came away with a short list of eight reviewers, only one of whom provided contact information. If contact information is not provided, does that mean they are not accepting inquiries or does it mean you’ve got to do more detective work?? Thanks.
Katy Sozaeva says
Sax, I know a couple of us have answered this. Check the profiles for a blog link, and go check the blog. If they are accepting reviews, they will usually have a “review submission guidelines” area in their blog that will provide you the information on how to contact them to request they take a look at your book.
Sax says
Katy,
Thanks for your reply. I can appreciate that the best reviewers must be overwhelmed.
My short list of one reviewer with contact info came from a thorough read-through where I scoured each profile, and if they indicated my genre, read their guidelines, followed any links, etc. in search of contact info. For the most promising, I googled them only to land on more dead-end pages.
I do not want to waste my time or theirs with unwelcome review requests.
FWIW, my editor is working from the other end of the list. She has combed through over a 1000 reviewers, but has only been able to get four email addresses.
These are the reviewers I’d like to connect with: K Corn, Cupcake, ck_361,Happy Reader, Holly K, J Arena, Book Fanatic, Frieda.
Cheers,
Sax
Celeste says
HI, Does anyone know how to email K Corn? I’d like to see if she would like to review a book of mine.
With appreciation,
Celeste
Gerard Thomas says
That is really helpful me, you have mentioned everything I need to contact them. I’ve tried to contact them but no luck till now I’ve also try to contact them via How To Get Amazon Reviews lets see
Sax says
Gerard, did the app work? And if so, does it have contact info for nonfiction reviewers? Let us know your results and good luck.
sharon stanley says
Thanks so much for a most helpful article. My picture book (first!) just went up on Amazon this week. The Little Dog in the Middle of the Road has been a long time coming and I want to do my part in marketing it. For a non-techie, it’s a big order but I’m up for it and this information is super. I will be researching amazon reviewers and welcome anyone who might be interested in peeking at my book and giving an honest opinion. Thanks so much!
Scott Spotson says
Very interesting and helpful article, thanks. Is there a way to find reviewers who primarily review books? Most of the top ones review consumer products. It is time-consuming to open up one at a time. Too bad the short bio isn’t displayed in a column that could be added to the table.
Any suggestions?
James says
Hi Scott, I added my site further back up this chain of comments. I thought you might be interested in taking a look? I’ve basically done all the hard work and mined out all those top Reviewers who are contactable and broken them down into genre.
Take a look at the site here: http://www.bookreviewbroker.com
Thanks,
J
sharon stanley says
When my little children’s book The Little Dog in the Middle of the Road debuted on Amazon in November, I did exactly what your post advised and looked at top reviewers. It did take time…I spent several hours looking at the things the reviewers reviews..many do not review books, and I looked for those who specifically said they like kid books. I wrote PERSONAL emails to those I thought might read my book…not a blanket email to all concerned. I believe that made a difference, as I sent 10 emails and heard back from 4 willing to review my book. They did so as soon as I sent the book and I was so pleased. I had one tope 10 reviewer, 1 top 500 reviewer and 1 top 1000 reviewer. I was thrilled!
K Raveendran says
I came across your site through Googling for Amazon top reviewers. It is heartening to note that there are so many nice people around helping budding authors.
I have just listed an eBook , namely, Start a New Business from Scratch and Skyrocket Your Income in 9 Easy Steps, on Amazon KDP select and tried my luck with top reviewers. On a list of 20 reviewers, I got 3 response and one person gave a 5 star rating. Remaining two are yet to get back after reading the book.
I got one sale immediately on listing and 184 down loads on the first free listing after a week. However, I wish to get some more reviews and wondering how to get that. Looking for help.
Ethan Holmes says
Curious…, what was the point of posting a link to Amazon’s Top Reviewers when most of them are reviewers of products, not books?
Sarah Olver says
If you read their profiles you find that many are willing to review books. I studied the top 70 and found 4 that were explicitly interested in books on my subject and over 20 that have a decent chance of interest. Within a day I had two agreements to review my book so I consider the advice above to have been valuable – many thanks!
The book is on gardening, 4.8 stars with 36 reviews: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00CQSPNLK/
You can get the PDF at http://leopig.com/GardenGuide.pdf
Mark says
Hi all,
When I first came across this post my reviewer ranking was between 300 and 400. I’m now ranked as 11 in the UK (and rising!) and I’ve written a short article on getting reviews, I though it might be of interest to read thoughts from a reviewers perspective: http://reviewify.co.uk/get-book-reviewed/
Feel free to leave any comments or additional tips and tricks at the bottom of the article so others may benefit from your experience.
James Jean-Pierre says
Thank you, this was definitely helpful.
Durval Olivieri says
Dear Friends
We have just published a book in the http://www.amazon.com system both in Kindle and paperback
The name is Kutz’s Screams
I did the English version on the original written in Portuguese by Italo Brazilian author Eduardo Giudive
Please inform me how to get it reviewed in the best mode.
Thanks
Durval
janette says
I would be interested in reviewing this book. Please check out my other reviews on Amazon and on my website
best-book-review.co.uk
Rich says
My first ebook has 9 reviews (4 star average) and is ranked in the high 800,000’s. My second has one review and has been ranked as high as the 18,000. One successful author told me that he wrote five books. The first four did not sell well but his fifth book was a hit, and then his first four started to sell well too. Everyone is out there trying to get attention. It’s crowded.
Me? I just write. If one of my books does well, maybe the others will take off too.
Sine says
Hi Joanna/Laura,
I was excited to find this article and am now immersed in looking at profiles on Amazon, but it seems like none of the book reviewers I’ve found thus far share an personal contact details – are you just out of luck then?