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 Stacy Eaton on October 6, 2011 at 1:33pm: Once we have 10 people - I will put that together and put out the schedule for when we are going to do the buys. I''ll be in touch with people directly then!

Comment by Nevada Drake on October 6, 2011 at 1:36pm: Great! I'll be watching for the list.

Comment by Catherine Green on October 6, 2011 at 6:36pm: Hey, my sister-in-law was asking what I wanted for Christmas yesterday, and I said money towards buying a Kindle. She said no problem, and I wouldn't be surprised if she ropes my parents-in-law, hubby and friends into helping me achieve my target (she's good like that!) So I will be on a Kindle shopping spree in the new year!

Comment by Stacy Eaton on October 6, 2011 at 6:42pm: Sweet Catherine!!

Comment by C. A. Lofton on October 6, 2011 at 11:34pm: kay,

Sorry to hear about your husband. Stay strong! Thanks for info on book reviews.

Comment by Stacy Eaton on October 7, 2011 at 3:07pm: Steve Norris (Our main man here)

Stacy Eaton (yours truly)

George Stringfellow

C.A. Lofton

Catherine Green

J. Walker

Nevada Drake

Sean Noonan

We are now up to 8!! Two more and we can move forward!

Comment by C. A. Lofton on October 15, 2011 at 7:46pm: I need information regarding ebook royalities. Is a download via public library use considered as a sale or just shared reading or a loan? Most books,records,ect. are purchased by the state/city agency for use by their patrons. What is the deal with amazon'snew hook up with public library usage? Will writers be paid per their readership?

Comment by James Nelson on October 17, 2011 at 8:53pm: You actually do not need a kindle Amazon offers a free software; kindle for pc which works perfectly well.

Comment by James Nelson on October 17, 2011 at 8:56pm: It will be some time before I have a book in kindle format, still studying HTML. I will purchase others books if it will help fellow authors

Comment by Steve Norris on October 17, 2011 at 8:58pm: I don't know for sure but unlikely unless Amazon charge a fee. They would have to pay the author for that. Interesting question though.

By the way - we need a couple more names for our e-book promotion - can we all re-publicise again and see if we get any takers. Need 10 at least to make it work