Amazon Ads Part Two

[Demesnedenoir]

Relevance seems to be working. With a small "tinkering around" budget there are swings, but the two micro-targeted campaigns I'm running are averaging about $0.30-0.40 less per click than they were, some days 50 cents. I could probably back off the bids as they're still maxing budget pretty early in the day.

 

[Demesnedenoir]

KENP Page reads accountable to Amazon ads is curious. For the month of February, ads only officially account for less than 10% of the month's total. The caveat is that ads only track for 14 days, and after EoS went wide and off KU the last time, I got page reads over two years later, heh heh.

Anyone else see something similar?

 

[Demesnedenoir]

Started an Amazon Australia bargain-click ad, only six clicks so far, and have sold $24.80 on $3.80 advertising budget (including read through) OR $9.94 in royalties off of $3.80 spend if only including Eve of Snows.

 

[ThinkerX]

Given the dismal sales thus far, I might have to take another stab at an Amazon Ad.

 

[Demesnedenoir]

I think that IF you get Amazon ads working for you, it's the platform that will keep producing. I worked harder on FB, and then they screwed me (although not on purpose, privacy laws did that) but Amazon should stay consistent. So, I'm going to nail them down then worry about anything else.

Given the dismal sales thus far, I might have to take another stab at an Amazon Ad.

 

[Jason]

Just back from the pub and have no idea what you are talking about. Can you recommend a tutorial or something before I get strung up like a kipper?

 

[Demesnedenoir]

Tutorial on Amazon ads? Sheeeeit. First, I'd look at Amazon's tutorials. Then? You can ask me specific questions here, and I can attempt to help; I'll give you some conflicting opinions/options for strategies, heh heh.

Two good books which don't always agree are:

Amazon Ads Unleashed, written by Robert J. Ryan, a fantasy author.
Amazon Ads for Indie Authors by Janet Margot, if I recall correctly, she worked for Amazon in the ads area for books, but even then she doesn't know everything.

 

[Jason]

A dark art indeed. Thanks, I'll get back when I'm more clued up.

 

[Demesnedenoir]

A dark art indeed, indeed, heh heh. Amazon ads are tricky stuff despite a simple appearance; you can really get lost in the weeds.

A dark art indeed. Thanks, I'll get back when I'm more clued up.

 

[Prince of Spires]

Started an Amazon Australia bargain-click ad, only six clicks so far, and have sold $24.80 on $3.80 advertising budget (including read through) OR $9.94 in royalties off of $3.80 spend if only including Eve of Snows.

The bid-prices of non-US Amazon ad clicks always have me wondering if everyone's focus on the US is the smartest way forward.

I understand that the US is the largest and most mature market. If your ad takes off there then you're good to go. However, I'm at the start of the journey. I'm not looking for thousands of sales. I'm looking for 1 a day. 2 would be amazing. And if Australian bids are half or even less of what they are in the US, then that 1 sale might be easier to find. outside the US. It gives you room to experiment with who to target and it's a lot less pricey to be wrong a few times.

 

[Demesnedenoir]

From what I've seen, Australia is a nice side gig if you get it rolling. I've moved maybe 2 thousand copies of Eve of Snows down under. Maybe. Could be more, could be less. It makes you feel good because your rankings skyrocket, but the way rankings jump and stay high means Australia AU's book market is not as active on Amazon. Kobo has a pretty good market share there and in Canada. The UK is the other tease. I'd had the UK rolling before and thought damn, this is sweet, just to have it rollover and croak on me, heh heh. Outside of those two markets, and the US, I'm not sure what Amazon ads might achieve.

In fairness, that has been mostly FB ads in the past, but FB ads kicked ass for a long time.

The bid-prices of non-US Amazon ad clicks always have me wondering if everyone's focus on the US is the smartest way forward.

I understand that the US is the largest and most mature market. If your ad takes off there then you're good to go. However, I'm at the start of the journey. I'm not looking for thousands of sales. I'm looking for 1 a day. 2 would be amazing. And if Australian bids are half or even less of what they are in the US, then that 1 sale might be easier to find. outside the US. It gives you room to experiment with who to target and it's a lot less pricey to be wrong a few times.

 

[Demesnedenoir]

I may be changing my opinion on what makes for an effective blurb... but I'll give it a few more days before I say more, in particular since it isn't something you can 100% control. I don't want to say anything until I am certain (or close to it) that the results aren't a matter of coincidence.

How's that for a tease?

The basis is something that Bookbub put out in studying the effectiveness of ads. I saw this weeks ago, but since I wasn't running a BB ad I said ppbbbt. But then yesterday, I got to thinking that IF their data is true—and why lie?—would it also hold for sticking something a little untraditional at the beginning of a blurb? Untraditional yes, but you look at a lot of successful Indie blurbs, they are all over the place in what they include in blurbs.

Okay so, first some results, and then some caveats.
March 23-28 = The Big Zero in cash sales, with several KU downloads.
Late March 28, the blurb change goes into effect.
March 29, 3 cash sales today on the exact same budget and exact same ads.

Caveat #1: 6 days without a cash sale is damned near unheard of. It is an aberration. March has been rough, and March has also been rough in the past, but still, 6 days without a cash sale is a shocker.

Caveat #2: The super obvious, March 29 is only 1 day. Duh.

BUT, 3 cash sales on this minuscule budget with only 12 clicks is impressive, when during the rest of the month, the most cash sales I had on any given day for Eve of Snows was 2 sales.

A side note: I will be testing BB ads again the next time I do a $0.99 sale using a couple of different ad tactics. And this time, I won't be running any other special promos at the same time, to make for a more or less pure BB ad test. Time to see how the psychology works.

 

[ThinkerX]

For me, two or three weeks with zero sales is the norm. None of the promo sites I have tried netted more than two or three sales lately. I'll be releasing book 6 in a few days, but experience tells me I'll likely get only twelve or fifteen sales out of that - the 'new book bump.'

The culprit, I believe, is market saturation - simply way too many books competing for attention.

 

[Prince of Spires]

March has been a bit like beating a dead horse for me to try to get sales with (Facebook) ads. No one seems to be buying...

BUT, 3 cash sales on this minuscule budget with only 12 clicks is impressive, when during the rest of the month, the most cash sales I had on any given day for Eve of Snows was 2 sales.

The wonderful world of not-enough data... Amazon could probably tell us how significant that number is. They just aren't going to. It may very well be that those 3 people had already clicked on your book a few times before today, and this one just pushed them over the edge (7 points of contact marketing and all that). Or any of another dozen explanations. Still, it's an interesting experiment. Let us know once more data rolls in.

The culprit, I believe, is market saturation - simply way too many books competing for attention.

I don't buy it. At all. It's not that different from last year or even 5 years ago. 15 years? yes, there was less competition then. 10 years? I'm not sure. Once you get above 1 million or so books it doesn't matter all that much anymore. There are just a lot of books. And getting people to them is the tricky part.

 

[ThinkerX]

Last few Facebook Ads I tried flopped completely. So, I gave those up for ordinary posts to Facebook Book groups. Those also tend to flop - save for the ones pushing new books - but they're free. About half of them get likes.

 

[Demesnedenoir]

FB ads tanked last year after tanking about a year before that. 10 years ago would a major difference in breaking through the crowd, not just because of saturation, but because other authors didn't have a giant knowledge and book count lead.

There are plenty of reasons for a sales spike on any given day, for sure. It's wait and see at this point.