Monthly Archives: February 2015

Promotion, Darwin’s World, by Bargain Booksy

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Darwin’s World is being promoted today by Bargain Booksy, a company I’ve not tried before. I’ve dropped the price to 99¢ to coincide with the sale. It’s also available at the same price through iBooks (Apple), Nook (B&N) and other outlets.
http://www.amazon.com/Darwins-World-Epic-Survival-Book-ebook/dp/B00K1PWI6S/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8
http://www.amazon.com/Darwins-World-Epic-Survival-Book-ebook/dp/B00K1PWI6S/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/darwins-world-jack-l-knapp/1119390924?ean=2940046236361&itm=1&usri=2940046236361

Wilderness survival is never easy.
It’s even more difficult when you’re alone, equipped with only a camp-axe and a knife, surrounded by predators.
But suppose the wilderness is North America at the end of the ice age, the Pleistocene?  And suppose those predators include huge short-faced cave bears, grizzlies, lions, dire wolves, and saber-toothed cats?
Alone, at least in the beginning, surrounded by predators…
And some of the predators are human.

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Publishing

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I’ve spent a lot of time recently analyzing sales and patterns.
Despite having four novels and a novella on Apple, B&N, Kobo, and Tolino, the best sales continue to come through Amazon. The numbers are overwhelming.
Yesterday, I published Home, the third book in the Darwin’s World Series; I put it on Amazon Select, which means it’s eligible for the the Kindle Unlimited lending program. While my sales to those other outlets bring in better royalties, that means nothing if the books don’t sell. I should also mention that my recent promotion efforts have listed those other outlets as well as Amazon. Still few or no sales, even though my most recent promotion went very well.
I’m now working up a method of rating the companies I promote through. I track sales carefully up to the day of a promotion, then freeze the numbers as soon as the promotion email goes out. I also include cost of the promotion and include second-day results; some don’t read the emails the first day, so in most cases, there will be additional sales on the second day. I make it a point not to raise the price of the promoted book until the third day.
Results, so far: ENT delivers approximately twice the break-even value in sales. BookSends delivers about 1.2% of breakeven.
What does this mean?
For my most recent promotion, I paid $15 to promote The Trek at $0.99. Break-even, figuring $0.35 in royalties per sale, was about 43 sales. The promoted book sold not quite twice as many the first day, but brought the numbers up the second day to twice break-even. Result, 200% of cost.
I also ran a recent promotion via Fussy Librarian, which claims a high number of subscribers. Result, $14 paid, less than half break-even achieved. I did get a couple of sales from Apple/B&N Nook, so I also included those.
If that promoter charged $7 for a promotion, you’d have a good chance of at least breaking even in my categories, action-adventure/science fiction. At $14, you’ll get about 0.5 of cost back, 50%.
Kindle Book Review had the worst results, less than 1% return on investment.I intend to continue this rating system. Let me know if you have similar information.
Meantime, here’s my newest book, just published: http://www.amazon.com/Home-Book-Three-Darwins-World-ebook/dp/B00TCZBVWK/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1423487128&sr=8-1&keywords=Home+by+Jack+L+Knapp

Marketing, by Genre

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I’ve been conferring with fellow authors on Goodreads, gathering information.
All of us are faced with the same need, getting our book noticed. The best way I’ve found is to market through any of several companies that send out daily emails to subscribers. Not all are the same; as noted above, Kindle Book Review is a total waste. I wrote, asking for information, and my email was ignored.
There are at least twenty promoters who’ll mail out your ad for a fee. Costs can range from about $14 (Fussy Librarian) to hundreds of dollars (BookBub).
So which sites pay off? Will you make money from an ad?
Some promote their books free; they believe that the books will sell after the free period, based on how far up Amazon’s list of bestsellers they are. Others promote their books at a discount, often 99¢. sometimes more.
Some genres are popular, including various romance categories. Others, science fiction for example, are not popular. Promoters offer their subscribers a choice as to which book ads they might be interested in. So your science fiction book won’t be mailed to the ones who are interested in romance. Action-adventure, for example, is also not particularly profitable. Some sites charge a flat fee, even though your genre might only be mailed to comparatively few. Others adjust the fee based on the genre your book fits into.
I’ve been working with fellow authors to find out which promoters give the best bang for the buck. As we get information, I’ve been asked to publish it here.
So far, two promoters are recommended based on personal experience, BookSends and EReader News Today.
BookSends offers this genre list:
Free Book of the Day 100,000
Mysteries/Thrillers 48,000
Romance 36,000
Erotic Romance 12,500
Fantasy 26,500
Science Fiction 20,500
Teen/YA 19,000
Horror 17,000
Action/Adventure 29,500
Historical 30,500
Literary 14,000
Nonfiction 26,000
Children’s Books 15,000
Men’s Fiction 4,500
Women’s Fiction 11,500
Christian/Religious Fiction 7,200

Fussy Librarian has this breakdown:
Historical fiction, 88381 ($14)
Literary fiction (87,703) $14
Science fiction (87,072) $14.
Young adult (86,461) $14.
Mysteries (79,475) $14.
Women’s fiction (78,676) $14.
Thrillers (78,315) $14.
Romance-contemp. (78,056) $14.
Romance-suspense (77,913) $14.
Biography/memoir (69,486) $9.
Humor (37,077) $9.

I’ll add more information as it becomes available. Good promoting!