Sending emails to users, Amazon announced that Kindle Matchbook and Amazon Giveaway are shutting down.

Amazon GiveawayFirst, Amazon Giveaway is shutting down, which allowed authors to run giveaways similar to Goodreads Giveaways.

Amazon alerted users:

After careful consideration, Amazon Giveaway is retiring. Thank you for participating in the program. Our records show that you have credits from previous eBook giveaways. These credits can be used to create new giveaways until October 10, 2019 and customers can enter giveaways until October 17, 2019. You can also download any remaining eBook credits as Kindle claim codes from the Amazon Giveaway dashboard. Claim codes do not expire, and can be gifted through social media channels, or directly to fans, followers, friends, or family members.

Any unused credits that are not downloaded as claim codes will be refunded by November 30, 2019.

On The Digital Reader, author Crystal King wrote what a blow this is for authors:

This is a huge bummer. It was the best way to get followers to your Amazon author page, so that whenever you release a new book those followers would get an email notification, boosting day one sales. I got the tip from the former head at my publisher, who had worked at Amazon. I ran a contest every month and easily added anywhere from 600-1000 new followers to my page every time I ran one. And it only cost me usually about one book to do so–way cheaper than Goodreads’ contests. I probably have about 7-8k followers on my Amazon page just from these contests, so yeah, this sucks, IMHO.

Kindle MatchbookThe shutdown of Kindle Matchbook – a program that bundled together ebook and print editions – is less surprising, as it was not widely used by readers. Amazon wrote:

Starting October 31, we’re retiring the Kindle MatchBook program. If you have books enrolled in Kindle MatchBook, they’ll be unenrolled at that time.

Here are a couple things to know:

  • Readers will still be able to buy books in their preferred format (eBook or paperback).
  • We’ll issue payments from any remaining Kindle MatchBook sales on your regular payment schedule.

Best regards,
The Kindle Direct Publishing Team

When it comes to book marketing, even Amazon can sometimes get it wrong.

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