I have tried a few things over the last year and thought I’d share my views/experience...

Lol thought that would be the answer ;) Think I will have to save up all my bday and Xmas pressies off my parents for the next few years to pay for an editor. My aunt SPs without a professional editor (she thinks as she edits/proof-reads for her tiny publisher then she can get away with it, plus she can't afford editing) but it does show and is jarring.
 
I should have an interview for my blog this week with Richard Fox who just ran a bookbub for his first book at FREE about a week ago. He was sharing with me some of the details so I asked if he would be up for an interview about it. I told him a lot of people would love to hear about the numbers behind it. At the point we were talking, there was a day left I think in the promo and he had 36,000 downloads already. So stay tuned because I know we have talked a lot about the value of listing the first book as free for promos, so hopefully we can see some tangible figures from Richard on it.
 
I'd be very interested in the outcome...
naturally a sample of '1 book' is not likely to be considered significant... unless I already agree with the results :)

My principles are that I won't do 'free'... I am very happy to do $0.99 though

... unless it shows that a free period can quickly turn into $$$$$$$$
(in which case I get new principles)

looking forward to the blog
 
Well, he tried to get to bookbub at .99 but they are a tough nut to crack, so I think they took it at free finally. The idea being he has a 3 book series and it will get book one into more hands. I did see that the other two books climbed the ranks again at his regular 4.00 (or thereabouts) mark. I am curious to see how it all ended up panning out. I just looked at Amazon.com and book one is at 1,148 ranking so still quite strong and at 3.59. The other two are 12-1300 ranking so that is quite a few books a day in total.
 
I should have the interview with Richard up tonight or tomorrow. I will share the link when it's available! It is a good one with some good data
 
Fibbonaci, have you done any further advertising? I see your book is killing it right now on Amazon.com. Congrats man!

Just in case you missed my post about the Bookbub promo, here it is
 
ratsy said:
Fibbonaci, have you done any further advertising? I see your book is killing it right now on Amazon.com. Congrats man!
Just in case you missed my post about the Bookbub promo, here it is
Click to expand...

thanks ratsy

I am very happy with progress on Amazon.com, but I wonder if I could be a little more savy about pricing etc.
I set my price for 99c in June/July and haven't moved it since
I notice that there are plenty of other books in the lists (Hard SciFi / First Contact) are around $3.99/$4.99

But I worry that if I raise the price that I will fall out of the Top 20s (of those sub-genres) and I take the view that the sub-genre lists are gold dust; and I also take the view that I just want to keep visible until my next book comes out (... it may be some time)

So... yep, I did do "discount" advertising this year... as follows
I have had success with Robin Reads (Jan 24th), ManyBooks.net (Feb 4th), and BookSends (Feb 19th)
but at 99c... it's not adding up to a heap of royalties...

I have no idea what to do... my plan is to raise the price to $2.99/$3.49 in a week or so and see what happens.

and many thanks... > I did read your blog, thanks for resending; it was very interesting and I guess that the right way to make a little cash is to have 3 books, of which one is discounted and the others are closer to 4.99

but I only have one book currently... so I will avoid the BookBub route (too expensive) until I can cross-sell

:)
 
I guess that's the worry. I think the trend seems to be that people are more accepting of 2.99 - 3.99 books. And at 70% of 2.99, you have to sell 6 at .99 to make the same royalty (I think that's the math with .99 being 30% vs 2.99 at 70%)

If you do decide to raise it, I'd love to hear how it works out for you
 
ratsy said:
...I'd love to hear how it works out for you
Click to expand...

I agree with your maths, it's 6 or 7 times the profit at the higher price (which in itself is generally not considered at a barrier level)
I will definitely report back on my pricing experiments.
nick
 
Jo Zebedee said:
Two thoughts .... I'll report back.
Click to expand...

sounds good Jo, thanks

Five times!
I may give BookBub a try (although they are notoriously hard to get accepted by... and I think I have to revert to "normal price" for 3 months before they will look at me)

good luck

and, yes please, please do share your data (when you get it) so we can all benefit!
:)
 
FibonacciEddie said:
sounds good Jo, thanks

Five times!
I may give BookBub a try (although they are notoriously hard to get accepted by... and I think I have to revert to "normal price" for 3 months before they will look at me)

good luck

and, yes please, please do share your data (when you get it) so we can all benefit!
:)
Click to expand...

If you go UK only, they're not hideously expensive and it seems easier to get accepted. :)[/QUOTE]
 
Fivrr are not worth a fiver, Ratsy. Nice job, bugger all sales or hits to the blog that I could see.

however, next week I have a wider promo on so I'll see how that goes.

On another note. The first person who groans, slaps their forehead, or giggles never gets spoken to again.

Remember that book of mine that had a YA agent? the one that straddled both markets? Well, I thought listing teenage as a keyword would mean it showed up in YA. No. It needed to be a category tag. So, for six months it hasn't been in the YA categories.

I shifted it last week and things have been pretty steady since. I know, I know... (On a plus side I'm in and around the top ten for YA aliens.:D)
 
Hmmm. You used the bknights? But not in conjunction with a promo? I think it probably works best for that.

I'll buy you a coffee one day when we meet :)
 
ratsy said:
Hmmm. You used the bknights? But not in conjunction with a promo? I think it probably works best for that.

I'll buy you a coffee one day when we meet :)
Click to expand...

Ah, I didn't know which of the options to use (it's a very confusing site). I chose not to go on a promo with the one I did as the site he did for me looks really good and I can use it for promotion on an ongoing basis - nice link page. But if I did that at 99p only, then I'd only be able to use it on promo weeks. So, I'm happy enough I got my value for money - just not many sales. :)
 
ratsy said:
Hmmm. You used the bknights? But not in conjunction with a promo? I think it probably works best for that.

I'll buy you a coffee one day when we meet :)
Click to expand...
There is no bknights listed on the site anywhere. Not that I can find... But a google search found it. Pretty much sums up my experience of the site.
 
That was the one Richard uses. They show great reviews but...you never how many of those reviews are fvvrs...ahha
 
ratsy said:
That was the one Richard uses. They show great reviews but...you never how many of those reviews are fvvrs...ahha
Click to expand...
Ha! I'll give it a go next week when I'm on promo.

On that note, this is what I've lined up

Kindle promo starts Mon 9th - 99p
Tuesday I have a bargain booksy - £25
Wednesday a Booksends - £15
Thursday - the Bknights - £4
Friday - Book Barbarian - £10

so that's £54. From that, if I get 70 sales I'll have broken even. I'll report back. (In case everyone thinks I'm suddenly Carnegie, I had retained some of what I made from Bookbub to reinvest. So this is Inish paying for its own promotion. At the moment, I'm just about even on it against what I paid upfront and what I've made.)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Thread starter Similar threads Forum Replies Date
Astro Pen Tried to join facebook. The Orwellian nightmare... Technology 10
M Anyone tried Patron Hunt? Publishing 0
Christine Wheelwright Has anyone tried Kindle Vella? Publishing 2
D Has anyone tried their hand at writing a "Choose Your Own Adventure" or "Fighting Fantasy" type book? Book Discussion 12
Plucky Novice Anyone tried Mark Dawson's Self Publishing 101 Marketing Course? Publishing 0

Similar threads


Back
Top