Here’s my recent research on finding ways to give away a book for reviews. My research is focused on fiction, but to the best of my knowledge, none of this is exclusive to fiction and can also be used for non-fiction.
Voracious Readers Only | Connecting Readers with Authors
The site collects readers who are happy to pick up free books and then, often times, review them. The good thing is that they DO NOT guarantee reviews. This is still the same as if you personally offered an ARC copy to someone and then crossed your fingers that they would review. VoraciousReaders do email their subscribers and remind them to read and then review, once they’ve picked up a book, but they don’t make reviewing conditional for getting books and they do not pay for reviews.
But, and here’s an important thing, each reader who requests a copy of your book, even if they don’t review, gives you their email, so you’re building your email list, too.
The first 20 books you give away are free to you to give away. After that, they have a $10/month plan and a $20/month plan. I’ve read at least three happy authors who have used this service. So far, I haven’t heard them mentioned on any of the half a dozen podcasts I follow.
Prolific Works (also known as InstaFreebie)
Little pricier and if you don’t pay at least $20/month, you don’t collect email addresses for your giveaway. It is another ready made set of potential ARC readers. I haven’t dug as deeply into them, but for $20, I think I can try one month at least, give away a book one and see about collecting some email addresses. It’s helpful if you promote the InstaFreebie giveaway yourself, but…. You can promote it places where you don’t know everyone, and then capture that newsletter op-in for the future, something you didn’t have before. For example, I think I’ll use this in connection with Instagram posts and/or Facebook posts to promote giving away book 1 while gaining that connection. This is different from Voracious REader because you do help with the promotion, and if you’re getting traction, then Prolific Works seems to step in and also promote the InstaFreebie page themselves.
This seems to be really focused on managing ARC teams with automation. For example, you can see who has reviewed your book or not, and remove people from your ARC team for the future, who don’t review, etc. Book Sprout uses an automated email sequence to prompt reviewers to post their review and reminds them when an ARC is coming, as well as other important reminders, like when to review. They also have introduced a feature for blocking book pirates. I don’t entirely understand that, but it seems like a useful feature if that’s a concern. The cost is $0 for the Free plan, $10/month for up to 50 reviewers, and $20 for the full professional plan with unlimited reviewers.
The Art and Science of Words 