📖 The Book Promo Swap System

The Book Swap system is a unique cross-promotion tool for authors on Indieguana. The concept is simple: you browse other authors’ books and swipe right on any you’d genuinely recommend to your own readers. When that author also swipes right on your book, you’re matched — and you each get a unique tracking link to promote the other’s book in your newsletter, social media…or wherever you can!

Swaps are author-only. You need at least one published book on Indieguana to participate.

Step 1 — Set Your Active Book

Before you can swipe, you need to tell the system which of your books you’re currently promoting. This is called your active book.

1. Go to Find Swaps.
2. At the top of the page, click Set Active Book and choose the book you want to promote from the dropdown.
3. Your active book is shown to other authors when they are browsing the swap queue — it’s what they will be swiping on.

You can change your active book at any time. Changing it does not affect existing matches.

Step 2 — Browse and Swipe

Once your active book is set, the swap queue loads a series of book cards from other authors. Each card shows the book cover, title, author, genre, word count, and synopsis.

• Click ✓ Swap (or swipe right) if you’d recommend this book to your readers and want to swap.
• Click ✗ Pass (or swipe left) to pass.

You can filter the queue by genre using the pill buttons at the top of the page to find books that match your audience.

Your own books will never appear in the queue, and you will not see authors you have already matched with.

Step 3 — Getting a Match

A match happens when both authors swipe yes on each other’s active book at the same time. When this occurs, you’ll see a match screen showing both book covers and the name of your new swap partner.

You and your match will both receive an email notification with a link to your Swaps dashboard.

Step 4 — Your Swap Dashboard

Go to My Swaps to manage your active matches. Each match card shows:

• Your partner’s book cover and title
• A downloadable promo card that’s ready to go for social media and email newsletters.
• Your unique swap link — a tracked URL that points to your partner’s book page. Share this link in your newsletter instead of a plain URL so both of you can see click counts.
• Your partner’s swap link pointing to your book (so you know it’s live)
• Click counts for both directions

Marking a Swap as Shared

Once you’ve featured your partner’s book in your promotions, click Mark as Shared on the match card. This lets your partner know you’ve held up your end of the swap. When both authors mark it shared, the match is recorded as complete.

Swapping Again

After a swap is complete, either author can request a repeat swap by clicking Swap Again. When both authors request it, the match resets and the swap cycle starts fresh with the same partner — useful if you’re both promoting new books or simply had a great experience the first time.

Tips for a Good Swap

• Only swipe yes on books you’d genuinely recommend. Your readers trust your judgment — a swap that misfires hurts both authors.
• Match genres when possible. A fantasy author recommending a fantasy book to a fantasy audience converts far better than a cross-genre mismatch. Use the genre filter.
• Share promptly. A swap partner who waits weeks to feature your book gets less value out of the exchange. Mark as shared once your newsletter goes out.
• Keep your book listing current. A complete listing — cover, synopsis, genre, and format — gets more swipes from quality partners.