Authors, Writers, Publishers, and Book Readers

E- Book Promotion Days

Those of us in the independent sector of publishing will no doubt know that marketing a new book is akin to burning pound or dollar notes. You do all the promotion, you blog like mad, network like a social prostitute and throw money on great ideas, and all you get as a reward is one measly sale on Amazon.

But the other great thing you notice is that one measly sale makes a significant difference on your chart rating, promoting your book thousands of places up the scale. Many of us will know with the monolithic world of Amazon, that being at the top of your various genre charts is vital to the Mr and Mrs Bloggs of the world seeing your book and considering a purchase. But whilst you are dwindling in the realms of number 100 or even 1000 in the genre not even the most avid book searching geek is going to delve that far to find you.

This week I have attempted a bit of a promotion and it seemed to work in pushing my kindle book ( A Very English Revolution) to the front page of the Political Thriller chart, and that’s with only minimal additional sales (less than 10 I think). Maybe there is a chance that Bloggs will get his wallet out now.

This morning I thought of a great way for all of us to do something similar to help each other.

My idea is to promote our e-books as a collective. I have chosen e-books rather than paper copies because most of us sell e-books a much lower cost so it makes the exercise more viable than paper, although if it’s successful maybe we can consider paper as well.

Here’s the idea.

We create a list of interested authors who all possess a kindle. I can keep a register of interested parties or publish it somewhere, whatever we choose. Each author agrees a promotion day and the others share this on their blogs and social networks. When that day comes around each of us buy and download the book on the same day, therefore boosting that days sales ranking. If there are enough of us doing it then there is a chance of success.

Success breeds success, so if it works for one person then others will follow and each of us will have more of a chance to make front page heaven. Of course this does require trust in our fellow authors to do the deed, but what can I say? It’s an idea, if it works then we all win. You never know we might be downloading a great book we might otherwise totally bypass.

Interested to know what people think. Please share it around writer sites, as the more people are interested the more we can make this work. People can find me out in the virtual world but otherwise a mail at norristeve@gmail.com will engineer a direct response.

7 members like this

Comment by Steve Norris on January 13, 2012 at 12:51pm: Thank you All, amazon ratings are unmoved so far

Comment by Stacy Eaton on January 13, 2012 at 12:52pm: You won't see change for a few hours - the numbers are very slow in teh morning as they recalculate all the numbers after free day promotions and such. By around 8-9 the numbers might change.

Comment by Catherine Green on January 13, 2012 at 12:55pm: I have ordered both your books and tweeted and Facebooked. I will go on again later today and resend some more posts to keep up the interest. Good luck!

Comment by Matt T. Schott on January 13, 2012 at 1:16pm: I just brought 2, soon to be legendary, books. I will "like" them to twitter and FB all day today. Good Luck

Comment by Steve Norris on January 13, 2012 at 4:27pm

Looking good - UK Stats

Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #9,025 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
- #20 in Books > Crime, Thrillers & Mystery > Political
- #28 in Kindle Store > Books > Fiction > Political
- #30 in Books > Fiction > Political

Comment by Sarah Luddington on January 13, 2012 at 4:37pm: Yeah! Great news.

Comment by George Stringfellow on January 13, 2012 at 4:47pm: Have purchased your book, Steve. Political thrillers are right up my alley. Have no Twitter account, just Facebook. My Amazon rankings are down there at the bottom of some deep mine shaft at 540,726. Thanks everyone for your support today.

Comment by Stacy Eaton on January 13, 2012 at 8:48pm: George - Actually you are at #46,576 Paid in Kindle Store right now.

Steve!!! That is awesome! Best Seller Status for you!

Comment by Steve Norris on January 13, 2012 at 9:15pm

Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #7,672 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
- #15 in Books > Crime, Thrillers & Mystery > Political
- #25 in Kindle Store > Books > Fiction > Political
- #26 in Books > Fiction > Political

Even better now. Great day...thank you all so much!!!!

Comment by Steve Norris on January 13, 2012 at 9:18pm: US Amazon.com stats

Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #39,112 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)

Not a bad days work