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 December 30, 2011 at 12:37pm: Hi Guys - Catherine - Glad you got your Kindle !! I got a Kindle Fire for X-mas! Excited! Bring it on Steve!

Comment by Catherine Green on December 30, 2011 at 7:35pm: Ooh very exciting! What is a Kindle Fire exactly? Thanks Steve, I await further instruction...

Comment by Steve Norris on December 30, 2011 at 11:04pm: Kindle Fire is US only currently. Think cross between IPAD and Kindle, but loads cheaper

Comment by Stacy Eaton on December 31, 2011 at 12:28am: Steve - no where near as intense as a IPAD or tablet - I have one of those too - which is awesome for working on when I am away from my computer. But you can watch movies listen to music and surf the web on it. It's pretty cool

Comment by Steve Norris on January 1, 2012 at 1:00pm: Steve Norris A Very English Revolution $2.40

http://www.amazon.com/A-Very-English-Revolution-ebook/dp/B004NIFT88...

Stacy Eaton My Blood Runs Blue $3.08

http://www.amazon.com/Blood-Runs-Blue-Stacy-Eaton/dp/1432769286/ref...

C.A. Lofton African-American Guide to Prosperity

http://www.amazon.com/African-American-Guide-to-Prosperity-ebook/dp...

George Stringfellow Renegades $3.33

http://www.amazon.com/Renegades-ebook/dp/B004ZLE8QC/ref=sr_1_1?s=bo...

Catherine Green Love Hurts $2.40

http://www.amazon.com/Love-Hurts-Catherine-Green/dp/1908200243/ref=...

Matt.T.Schott $1.48

http://www.amazon.com/Program-Thicker-Than-Water-ebook/dp/B005NVRGN...

Amanda Chambers Promoting us all at http://www.livinglearninglovinglife.com/p/book-reviews.html

Amanda will you still be interested in promoting us.

Here is my proposals for how we would do it.

Each of the nominees post publicly on the site to say they will agree to buy.

Schedule works like this assuming everyone agrees by Friday 6^th January. On the scheduled day we all purchase the books from the links above which should move the book radically up the ratings on those days, hopefully for one or two days improving Amazon visibility for a short period.

Matt & Catherine 7^th January

George & Stacey 9^th January

Steve & C.A. 11^th January.

The others below I don’t have books listed so if you wish to join the promotion we can just add you into the schedule.

Remember everyone this will only work if we all buy and help eachother.

Nevada Drake

James Nelson

Sean Noonan

Julius Thompson

J.Walker

Comment by Matt T. Schott on January 2, 2012 at 12:36pm: I agree to the schedual

Comment by Catherine Green on January 2, 2012 at 3:18pm: Yes I agree, it's on my schedule. Thanks for your hard work Steve! Oh, and I will review each book I read, I just can't guarantee when it will be since I get distracted a lot...Ooh something shiny, gotta go! ; )

Comment by Stacy Eaton on January 2, 2012 at 3:29pm: I'm there.

Comment by George Stringfellow on January 2, 2012 at 4:06pm: Count me in. Looking forward to this.

Comment by Steve Norris on January 2, 2012 at 4:58pm: thanks everyone

Matt has changed his book, please note

http://www.amazon.com/Skyler-Earth-Defense-Force-ebook/dp/B004SI4AR...

Matt also suggested spreading the promotions to once a week. My view is to keep the momentum over as few a days as possible but wondered what you all think.