I spent $99 on a Good Reads contest and got 4,000 people looking at my book and interested in buying but I have not seen any of those sales happen! It's weird, right?
So, Carlos, I’m going to say this and another post just made my day. Despite difficulty breathing without an iron lung pumped by two bounding kangaroos disguised as blood-sucking dropbears, I managed to laugh for both. Wait a minute, that’s me coughing. Bugger me, that’s close enough, I suppose.
Seriously, you have brought some illumination to a dismal rainy morning. Thanks heaps, mate.
And yes, there is some inspiration there too, for which I’m also thankful.
Oh man, I went down the Amazon ads rabbit hole for my book for a while and sold some books but the math didn't add up in my favor, but I do think there is something to the refining/gathering data thing. And also I told myself that it was exposing some people to the book and maybe they would come back to it ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
In any event, thanks for shouting out the challenge and for providing a great prompt!
Yeah, my thinking is that if I can at least break even on ads then it’s worth it for getting the book into more hands, but it remains to be seen whether I’ll get to that point. And I didn’t get into it in the post, but I can imagine the economics for a traditionally published versus self-published book could be even tougher depending on the royalty earnings per book.
Seems like the AMZN ads were significantly more effective as well -- perhaps not surprising since you can buy the book directly inside the web store. More importantly, in the battle of evil vs. evil, Bezos is always the right bet.
Hoping you triangulate to some needle-moving promotions soon!
Edit: By the way, finally left a review on Amazon. Sorry it took so long!
Thanks! Yeah I expected the Amazon ad to do a bit better since it was already targeting book buyers searching for keywords related to my book. But zero Facebook sales was a shock. In theory, Facebook’s algorithm is supposed to refine its audience targeting and learn who to serve an ad to based on engagement, but maybe (conveniently for them) it only starts being effective after you’ve already spent $1000s. I’ll probably stop lining Zuck’s pockets for now and focus on lining Bezos’ pockets.
I love this, so helpful, and also I am happy to spearhead a letter writing campaign to Facebook. Either you get that 200 bucks back or they put a Carlos-Shaped Spoilers billboard in the metaverse.
I spent $99 on a Good Reads contest and got 4,000 people looking at my book and interested in buying but I have not seen any of those sales happen! It's weird, right?
So, Carlos, I’m going to say this and another post just made my day. Despite difficulty breathing without an iron lung pumped by two bounding kangaroos disguised as blood-sucking dropbears, I managed to laugh for both. Wait a minute, that’s me coughing. Bugger me, that’s close enough, I suppose.
Seriously, you have brought some illumination to a dismal rainy morning. Thanks heaps, mate.
And yes, there is some inspiration there too, for which I’m also thankful.
I loved your prompt on Julie's humor challenge.
For what it's worth, my partner worked as a social media manager for years and he was constantly infuriated by Facebook ads being suspiciously scammy.
Thanks! Glad you enjoyed it. And yes, I think a lot of people (myself included) tend to tune out Facebook ads because most of them look so sketchy
Oh man, I went down the Amazon ads rabbit hole for my book for a while and sold some books but the math didn't add up in my favor, but I do think there is something to the refining/gathering data thing. And also I told myself that it was exposing some people to the book and maybe they would come back to it ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
In any event, thanks for shouting out the challenge and for providing a great prompt!
Yeah, my thinking is that if I can at least break even on ads then it’s worth it for getting the book into more hands, but it remains to be seen whether I’ll get to that point. And I didn’t get into it in the post, but I can imagine the economics for a traditionally published versus self-published book could be even tougher depending on the royalty earnings per book.
Makes sense and I think that’s true on trad vs self pubbed. But I do know some self pubbed authors say they have success with the ads.
Seems like the AMZN ads were significantly more effective as well -- perhaps not surprising since you can buy the book directly inside the web store. More importantly, in the battle of evil vs. evil, Bezos is always the right bet.
Hoping you triangulate to some needle-moving promotions soon!
Edit: By the way, finally left a review on Amazon. Sorry it took so long!
Thanks! Yeah I expected the Amazon ad to do a bit better since it was already targeting book buyers searching for keywords related to my book. But zero Facebook sales was a shock. In theory, Facebook’s algorithm is supposed to refine its audience targeting and learn who to serve an ad to based on engagement, but maybe (conveniently for them) it only starts being effective after you’ve already spent $1000s. I’ll probably stop lining Zuck’s pockets for now and focus on lining Bezos’ pockets.
Hmmm… How can we get you to have a book signing appearance at Book People here in Austin?
Unfortunately, when I reached out to them about doing a book signing for Spoilers, they passed. But I’m determined to do a signing there someday.
I love this, so helpful, and also I am happy to spearhead a letter writing campaign to Facebook. Either you get that 200 bucks back or they put a Carlos-Shaped Spoilers billboard in the metaverse.
Haha, thanks Jennie! I hadn’t thought about advertising on the metaverse but a free billboard is the least they could do.