Alumni Magazine, Free Promotions and Other Marketing Results

[Zero Angel]

Hey guys,

Thought I'd share some results. I was recently featured in an "Alumni Authors" section of the Alumni Magazine for my university. It's been about a week since they went out so I feel confident saying that this has resulted in zero sales.

If I ever get an actual "article feature" then I'll be sure to pass those results on too


So far the best marketing I have found is to be "popular" with OK SEO descriptions. If you can get everyone you know to purchase your book(s) on the SAME day (or as close together as possible) then the velocity (which in my opinion is the most important variable to the bestseller list) will skyrocket your bestselling status and popularity status (although staying power over 30 days is more important in popularity status than velocity).

Free promotions are spectacular as well, although they've nerfed their popularity impact. With about 160 free giveaways I was able to top out a subcategory free bestseller list (each subcategory is different though) and ended up with over 200 giveaways followed by somewhere around 10-20 sales (the numbers elude me presently). I've heard for series, free promotions are the best way to go, but I have evidence they are somewhat effective even for a standalone, although there may be some confounding with people that heard about the free promotion and then decided to buy it when they saw it was over, I still count that as a sale resulting from the free promotion. I believe if I had been able to get an additional 50-100 free giveaways, that I would have topped out a category (as opposed to a subcategory) and believe the results would have been exponentially increased. This belief stems from the fact that I was in the top 20 of the category and believe increasing by 150% would have been enough to at least break into the top 10. The exposure of the category versus the subcategory is much greater.

These are teensy giveaway numbers by the way. I've read blogs of authors that say they regularly give away 1000s when they do their free promotions, but as my first free promotion, I was very pleased with the results.

 

[Zero Angel]

Oh, did I mention categories???

I think anyone that's been writing or thinking about this stuff knows I at least alluded to them with my reference to the popularity lists and bestseller lists. I really have a snowball's chance in the inferno making it onto the popularity and bestseller lists, but I'm #68 in Mathematics > Study & Teaching.

Let me put that in perspective, I'm #399,195 on Kindle's overall bestseller and #68 on Study & Teaching Math. ARE YOU KIDDING? What a great category!

I can easily break into the top 10 of this category (in fact, if I had been in this category after coming off my free promotion, I already would have--#10 is only ~100,000 in Kindle, I've been as high as 50K).

Your category is very important when playing the free promotion/popularity game. You only get to pick two. Make sure at least one of those you can compete in. Good luck!

I am releasing the follow-up to my nonfiction entry this week (if the formatting goes OK, bloody math equations...), with a couple fiction shorts by the end of the year, so I should have some data on related works in the near future.

 

[BWFoster78]

Zero,

Good point.

I've read a lot about the subject and did a blog post on it. You can view that here.

 

[Zero Angel]

Zero,

Good point.

I've read a lot about the subject and did a blog post on it. You can view that here.

Thanks Brian. I actually subscribe to your blog so I am aware if it wasn't for the restrictive commenting, I'd probably comment on it more too.

Although I disagree with you about a lot, you regularly have a lot of good information to say and I recommend it for anyone that comes to Mythic Scribes (hence why I subscribe).

I just couldn't believe how high my category ranking was at close to 400,000 overall. I've since gone up to ~175K and in that category am at #21! It is definitely worth it to get the categories off the beaten path.

And remember Author Rank is benefited by additional works.

(My dream is to someday be the top of the Amazon bestseller list in Fiction and Nonfiction and in Fantasy, Science Fiction, Horror and Mystery alllll at the same time. I'm a lot better at math than writing apparently, as I am doing significantly better with my nonfiction entries. Still, I have to keep believing in the fiction works that provide me succor to keep going every day.)

 

[Xaysai]

Is it just me, or does it seem like more work goes into jockeying for a good author rank than actually writing the book?

Haha, I'm screwed.

I'm struggling just to write the book!

 

[BWFoster78]

Is it just me, or does it seem like more work goes into jockeying for a good author rank than actually writing the book?

Haha, I'm screwed.

I'm struggling just to write the book!

I think we all want to have the narrator's voice from Field of Dreams speak to us and say, "If you write it, they will read it." Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to work that way. Even if you produce a fantastic work, you've still got to work hard to get it noticed.

I've noticed that marketing topics tend to draw less interest than writing topics. I wonder - is that because:

Writers know all they need to know about marketing already.

OR

Writers don't think there is a good solution to marketing and thus bury their heads on the topic.

OR

Writers don't necessarily like marketing and therefore avoid the topic.

 

[Zero Angel]

I think we all want to have the narrator's voice from Field of Dreams speak to us and say, "If you write it, they will read it." Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to work that way. Even if you produce a fantastic work, you've still got to work hard to get it noticed.

I've noticed that marketing topics tend to draw less interest than writing topics. I wonder - is that because:

Writers know all they need to know about marketing already.

OR

Writers don't think there is a good solution to marketing and thus bury their heads on the topic.

OR

Writers don't necessarily like marketing and therefore avoid the topic.

I choose option 4: writers believe they are experts on writing and thus can discuss that, but are not self-proclaimed experts on marketing and so avoid it.

That's my theory anyway.

 

[Zero Angel]

Is it just me, or does it seem like more work goes into jockeying for a good author rank than actually writing the book?

Haha, I'm screwed.

I'm struggling just to write the book!

As far as Author Rank and Bestseller Rank and Popularity Rank, there are some things that you can put a lot of time into doing for it, but they are equivalent to selling your books anyway which is what you should be doing once it is out there (without detracting from your production rate of new works too!).

Otherwise, there are some easy things you should pay attention to:

• Choose two categories that your book fits in that you are able to compete in and are relevant to your book
• For Author Rank, 2 titles with 50 sales each > 1 title with 100 sales (and so on)
• For Bestseller Rank, velocity (i.e. having your sales close together) can skyrocket you
• For Bestseller Rank, velocity is measured over hours, so possible to skyrocket in one hour and tumble by the end of a day
• For Popularity Rank, free giveaways account for ~1/10 of a sale after going back on the paid lists
• For Popularity Rank, your velocity is measured over 30 days so staying power is more important