Q&A: How can I get prepublication reviews on Amazon?

QUESTION: My book has a publication date of October 2007 and it's available now for pre-order on Amazon. I'm interested in getting early book reviews on Amazon.

I've contacted a few Amazon Top Reviewers by following your instructions, and they've agreed to read advance copies. However, there isn't a "Write a Review" link on my book's Amazon page yet. Do you know if it's possible to to submit a prepublication review on Amazon?

ANSWER: Registered Amazon users can submit prepublication reviews, even though there isn't a "Write a Review" link on your book's detail page yet. Here's the link to give your early reviewers:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/
customer-reviews/write-a-review.html?asin=1594489505

Customize the link above for your book by replacing the series of digits on the end with your book's ISBN. Also, put the entire string of characters in one line -- I had to break the line here so it would fit in this column.

Using this link, your reviewers will be able to submit their reviews just as if the book were already selling. But the reviews won't show up on your book's product page until Amazon is actually selling copies of the book.

So you won't know what those early reviews say until the publication date. But there is a way to find out if you're getting positive or negative prepublication reviews on Amazon: Search for your title, and if there's at least one review already, you'll see something like this in the search results:


This book, with a publication date of March 2008, already has at least one review, which you can see from the star rating. But of course the text of the review(s) aren't displayed on the book's Amazon detail page yet.

Editor's Note: Since this article was written, Amazon has introduced a formal program for prepublication reviews from approved reviewers. Read more about Amazon Vine.

One word of caution: Some Amazon shoppers are skeptical when they see several glowing reviews were posted before a book's release. For example, check out the top two reviews for this book, which allege that early reviews of the book were phony. Here are some ugly highlights:

I am highly dubious of the reviews written in January and February in 2004 in particular - the book wasn't published until March 9 of that year.

... It is because of this abuse of Amazon feedback that I gloss over the positive feedback and read the one- and two-star reviews to get to the ugly truth.

Now, as far as I know, those prepublication reviews were completely legitimate. (I've read the book and recommend it highly.) My only point is that something didn't smell right to a vocal minority of reviewers, who blasted the book with two-star reviews chock full of nasty accusations. Then those two negative reviews were voted "most helpful" by Amazon shoppers, propelling them to the top of the list. Now those negative reviews are the first bit of independent information Amazon shoppers see about the book, and I'm convinced it has discouraged sales of the book.

In the case pictured above, Phantom of the Night appears to have at least one one-star prepublication review. In that case, I guess the author should be suspicious.