This is a short instructional YouTube video by Julie Broad explaining what NetGalley is and how authors can use it to obtain professional-minded reviews. It defines NetGalley’s role as a platform for distributing digital ARCs to reviewers (librarians, journalists, booksellers, bloggers, educators), summarizes pricing/options (per-title fees, six-month listing, subscription, and lower-cost access via IBPA/resellers), recommends listing 6–8 weeks before launch, and warns authors that NetGalley reviewers can be critical—so only invest if the book is professionally produced. The video closes with practical promotion tips and a call-to-action to comment.
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Book reviews are lifeblood for an author's success. Next to coffee, it's probably the most important thing for your survival as an author. Well, or maybe chocolate. Anyway, you need book reviews as an author. And while you can't pay someone to give you a positive review, there are some great legitimate review services out there where they will read your book and post reviews on Amazon, Goodreads and often some of their own websites. And one of those services is is NetGalley. If you're wondering about this service and whether it will help you get more reviews for your book, this video is for you. Hey there. I'm Julie the book Broad. I'm an Amazon Overall Number 1 Best Selling Author and the founder of a fabulous company called Book Launchers. Our superpower is caring. There's my heart. Our superpower is caring. Caring more about you and your book than anybody else as we help you write, publish and sell a nonfiction book that will boost your brand and make you money. As part of our Platinum Plus Level service, we pay for our clients to get NetGalley reviews. Never heard of NetGalley? Well, NetGalley is an online service that basically connects book publishers with reviewers. They are often people from media librarians, booksellers and other people in the book space, or just really avid book lovers. Basically as an author and a publisher, you know you can pay to list your book with NetGalley and then they will put it out there to their database of readers. Those readers can then request your book for review. The best time to do this is six to eight weeks before your book launches. Reviewers are most interested in reading and reviewing a book before it's launched. But if your book is already out in the wild, don't let that stop you. Netgalley will still accept your title, but it is a fee based service so it's really up to you to decide if it makes sense for you post launch or not. Their service revolves around delivering digital ARCs to readers. ARCs is is the fancy term for advanced reading copies. So the fact that netgalley calls it arcs advanced reading copies tells you that this service is set up for pre launch. Now, the readers that sign on with NetGalley aren't usually an average reader and this is an important point to know. They are typically as noted reviewers, media journalists, bloggers, booksellers and people in the education space. All of these reviewers work with authors and publishers in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Japan, the UK and of course the usa. Why I'm putting an emphasis on who these folks are that are reading your books is because they are not easy to please. More on that in a second. NetGalley works to get reviews Like I said, we pay to use their service so that our clients will get more reviews. But their reviews aren't fluffy. They aren't like you need this awesome book on your Kindle type review or this was a great read for lack of a better word. These folks are generally what I would call critics. NetGalley's website is@netgalley.com to set up your book on NetGalley, you have some options. You can pay a per title listing fee of $849 and that allows them to market your book to their list or $450 for their standard six month listing. Now this one makes sense if you are launching one or two books in a year. They also have a subscription package that will be great if you have 10 or more titles per year. Now as noted, that $849 fee also includes their marketing. So they will have a listing in their direct newsletter that goes to readers interested in your genre. That can absolutely be useful, but that's a big chunk of change for most authors. So I have a couple lower cost options for you. Now the co about this is that a reviewer posts reviews to their NetGalley profile, Amazon, Goodreads, and sometimes blogs or media. So it gives you more exposure than a typical Amazon review. The reviewers join for free and they're getting your book for free. But they are motivated book reviewers. It's part of their jobs or careers in most situations and you don't have to worry that a bunch of people are getting your book for free. When you work directly through NetGalley, you access a book reviewer's profile and approve their access to your book or not. So if you feel that they always write unfair reviews because you can see the reviews they've written before, or you just think they aren't a good fit for your book, you can reject it and not have them get a copy of your book. Now the reviewers aren't vetted as reviewers. They're just expected as part of their participation to review books as a reviewer. That's why it's useful that you can withhold books from reviewers that are unfair or not qualified to be reviewing your book. All that said, there are more affordable ways to access NetGalley Review Service, but they take that ability to reject or accept reviewers away. But it saves you money. So there's always trade offs, right? One of the great ways to get A lower cost NetGalley review is through the IBPA member services or through a reseller of NetGalley reviews like Expresso Services. We're IBPA members and really like their membership. So if you want to get the NetGalley review, the $139 fee for IBPA probably makes sense just to access the lower cost NetGalley reviews which is a three month listing for $199 overall. NetGalley reviews are a great way to connect your book to reviewers and even audiences that would know about your self published book any other way. But you do need to know that NetGalley reviewers can be rather harsh. It is rare to see a five star review from most netgalley reviewers, even if what they say is incredibly positive about the book. Again, these are reviewers who are saving their five stars for the unicorn books because they look at books all day long. Speaking of unicorns, a fun fact for you. When I was in grade three I wrote an entire book about a unicorn in the forest. You could say it was the first book I ever wrote unpublished and will always stay that way, but I've literally been writing since I was a little kid and it all started with a unicorn. Anyway, back to the NetGalley reviewers. They don't give five star reviews easily, so I just want you to know that going in you are likely to get a handful of reviews and sometimes those reviewers are in a position of power and influence where they can get your book into other places. One of the reviews for one of our clients that was a five star review Hooray. Was from a librarian who said that she was then going to put it forward to be listed in their libraries. So that's the power of NetGalley reviews. Now when you get a great review, use it to promote your book. Post it on your author page, your website and social media because this is a great thing to have. Now I do have one final warning. If you don't pay for marketing with NetGalley or some other service to generate interest in your book listing with NetGalley, then you do need to do some sharing. They have a widget and some other share links. You'll need to use them to get it out there so people will find out about your book. You can't automatically assume that people will see your listing there. If you're doing nothing to promote that you're on NetGalley. You should also encourage people to give your cover a thumbs up on NetGalley because that helps it get featured as also completing a form for In House Love. They need to be registered NetGalley to do that. But if people do that, then your book will get more exposure. So is NetGalley worth it? Well, if you haven't invested heavily in professional production, I would not spend money on NetGalley. Remember, these are not gentle, cheerleader kind of reviewers. If your book is riddled with problems, they're going to be very pointed about that and you can't control where they post their review. But if you have a great book and it's been professionally edited and you're looking to gain as much exposure and as many reviewers as you can, then yes. And if you have a budget for book marketing, I think NetGalley could be a great way to go, especially through IBPA or other resellers out there that offer access to that service in a more bite sized, affordable way. Now I'm curious, have you used NetGalley or do you plan to use them in the future for your books? Share that in the comments below. And when you comment the day a video is released, you'll be entered to win some sweet noboringbook swag like this fabulous mug coffee tastes better in it. True story. Now, since we're enjoying coffee together and having such a lovely conversation, let's stick together for a little bit longer, shall we? Do you know how to ask for book reviews? This video right here will help you plan that list. And this video right here is the latest and greatest from the channel. Both are really special if you ask me. So go ahead and choose and I'll be waiting for you over there. Cheers.
