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Is there any way to reach early readers, not on mailing list?

1K views 17 replies 11 participants last post by  toddhicks209 
#1 ·
Fourteen months ago I released my first book into KU without any audience and it took off by word of mouth. I was new to the writing world, shocked at the unexpected popularity of the book, and had no idea what to do to engage readers. It took me several months to figure out I needed a Facebook page and MailChimp list and although I've accumulated an engaged, organic following in the past ten months (~2000), I missed out on a large number of potential readers for the series I created months after Cake took off. I often hear from early readers that they've stumbled onto my second and third books and that they had no idea I had a series. By marketing Cake, I'm able to reach new readers, but what I'm wondering is if there's a way to reach the 'old' ones who might be interested to know I have turned the first book into a series. Any ideas?
 
#2 ·
That is a tough one given the constraints that you outline on your OP. It's hard to say without direct interaction with the readers. It has me brainstorming...

Is your newsletter audience super-responsive? Will they respond to a direct call to action such as "Hey, if you know someone who read the first book, please let them know about book X. For those readers who are not part of the newsletter, help me spread the word... " Set up a specific email or email filter and ask them to reply directly. Segment the replies to an email segment. Follow up with that.

You might also consider going to forums where your book is discussed and start a thread there. Basically, I'm thinking that the key is to get readers responding to you directly. That will take some work.

The general idea is to re-create or tap back into the original word-of mouth that surprised you with your first book.

Hope that helps. Will bookmark this post to see what you come up with.

PJC out.
 
#3 ·
The first thing to do is edit your blurb on 'Cake'. When you say it's a standalone without mentioning the series you create the impression that it's not part of a series. Then, wherever you advertise any of the books, keep pointing out that they're in a series. I don't know if you have a name for the series, but you might either call it the 'Cake' series or mention Cake as the first book whenever you advertise the others. That way anybody who happens to see the ad will know it's tied to 'Cake', hopefully remember it if they've already read it and be inclined to try the others. You might also have a look at Facebook ads and see if enough people have mentioned 'Cake' to be worth targeting in a special ad.

That's about it, I think. Just take every opportunity to mention 'Cake' in conjunction with the other books in the series.
 
#4 ·
Thanks for the replies. I totally forgot about the blurb mentioning it being a standalone. I hadn't planned on making Cake into a series early on so this information was way outdated. Thanks for finding that. I just corrected it and added the name of the other books to the end of the blurb. Also, how might I go about finding out if Cake is mentioned on Facebook? I occasionally get notifications if a book blog mentions it. Is that what you are referring to?

I have a Bookbub coming up for Cake and hopefully the ad will find its way back to some of those early readers.
 
#5 ·
Make sure you also have a series ribbon for the series. Edit the books in your dashboard to reflect the name of the series and the book number, then email Author Central using the form in the Help section. There's even a handy-dandy pulldown for "if you have a series and want a series page" option. You can also upload an updated book file that has a link to your newsletter and an updated "other books in this series" section with links to the next books. After you've updated information to reflect your new reality, use a few free days to promo the book, use an AMS ad to get it in front of new readers. The updated book file may ping some older readers, but don't sweat it--if they like it enough, they'll look you up. If not, take it as a lesson learned, and as long as your number of sales is less than 7.5 billion, there are still more new readers out there than existing ones.
 
#6 ·
You could put a link to your landing page for your mailing list in your blurb. I see you've got your other media there, so ad the mailing list with a message to people to sign up if they want to learn about new releases. If people have enjoyed your book, they will probably go looking for more. Although there is a follow button, it is not often that Amazon actually send out notifications of new releases and even when they do, it's likely to be six months later.  :-X
 
#7 ·
I think the most actionable advice is that your covers don't look like a series. The title font is the same but the concept is different for each cover. I'd change covers two and three to match the concept of the first. I'd also count your titles so they're all one word if that's possible.

In general, it's hard to get readers to come back for the next standalone no matter how much they loved the first book. It's just the way it is. Even with a mailing list and all the social media links in the world, most people will read the book then forget about it.
 
#8 ·
Crystal_ said:
I think the most actionable advice is that your covers don't look like a series. The title font is the same but the concept is different for each cover. I'd change covers two and three to match the concept of the first. I'd also count your titles so they're all one word if that's possible.

In general, it's hard to get readers to come back for the next standalone no matter how much they loved the first book. It's just the way it is. Even with a mailing list and all the social media links in the world, most people will read the book then forget about it.
I've done this without intending to since I read a ton of books. Fortunately Amazon usually eventually puts the next book in their links of books I might be interested in. So this might not be the end all you think it is.

I agree you need the covers to look like a series or have a book number visible so a reader can tell they are getting a series. Also, make sure you have a series page. Vital for standalones in a series so a reader like me can look at that and see if I've missed any. Heck, I wish they had a quick and dirty check like that for all the author's books. Show me the ones I haven't bought at a glance!
 
#9 ·
Crystal_ said:
I think the most actionable advice is that your covers don't look like a series. The title font is the same but the concept is different for each cover. I'd change covers two and three to match the concept of the first. I'd also count your titles so they're all one word if that's possible.

In general, it's hard to get readers to come back for the next standalone no matter how much they loved the first book. It's just the way it is. Even with a mailing list and all the social media links in the world, most people will read the book then forget about it.
I agree with the first point (covers and title aren't as branded as would be ideal for a series), but not the second, necessarily. I think sales history of my first book in first series is somewhere in the same neighborhood as CAKE. I have about 55-60% the # of sales/borrow-equivalents on Book 2 & 3 as of Book 1. That's probably not as good as sell-through in a "true series" with the same couple, but it's not too bad, especially considering that Book 1 was 99 cents for most of its life (it's now $2.99), and that I didn't have a mailing list at all for the first--3 years? Something like that.

Same thing is true of my Montlake series--Book 2 sales are about 65% of Book 1. Both same price.

By contrast, my one "true series" with the same couple has MUCH lower sell-through, hah, much as it pains me to admit it. But there was a year-plus between Book 1 and Book 2, and like Jill, I intended and ended Book 1 as a standalone at the time. It may have more to do with length of time between publication of Book 1 and Book 2 (my first three books in my first series were published on the same day) as anything else. (Montlake series is different because of course they push the heck out of all the books. But Book 1 has had more price promos of course, and not everybody reads on, amazingly. :) )

I think you can get pretty good sell-through from Book 1 to Book 2 and onward with standalone books. But they do have to be branded really tightly. The other BIG plus of standalones is that you can promote any of them. I've promoted the first 6 or 7 of the 10 books in my first series at various times, and they've all given me a good bump. That could be something else to consider.

I got a lot of traction early on by doing price promos every 3 months or so. You might consider doing more of that. I'd up the price of Books 2 and 3 also. :)

Best of luck.
 
#10 ·
Usedtoposthere said:
I agree with the first point (covers and title aren't as branded as would be ideal for a series), but not the second, necessarily. I think sales history of my first book in first series is somewhere in the same neighborhood as CAKE. I have about 55-60% the # of sales/borrow-equivalents on Book 2 & 3 as of Book 1. That's probably not as good as sell-through in a "true series" with the same couple, but it's not too bad, especially considering that Book 1 was 99 cents for most of its life (it's now $2.99), and that I didn't have a mailing list at all for the first--3 years? Something like that.

Same thing is true of my Montlake series--Book 2 sales are about 65% of Book 1. Both same price.

By contrast, my one "true series" with the same couple has MUCH lower sell-through, hah, much as it pains me to admit it. But there was a year-plus between Book 1 and Book 2, and like Jill, I intended and ended Book 1 as a standalone at the time. It may have more to do with length of time between publication of Book 1 and Book 2 (my first three books in my first series were published on the same day) as anything else. (Montlake series is different because of course they push the heck out of all the books. But Book 1 has had more price promos of course, and not everybody reads on, amazingly. :) )

I think you can get pretty good sell-through from Book 1 to Book 2 and onward with standalone books. But they do have to be branded really tightly. The other BIG plus of standalones is that you can promote any of them. I've promoted the first 6 or 7 of the 10 books in my first series at various times, and they've all given me a good bump. That could be something else to consider.

I got a lot of traction early on by doing price promos every 3 months or so. You might consider doing more of that. I'd up the price of Books 2 and 3 also. :)

Best of luck.
It's different if people read book one when book two is already out. I have anything from 50-90% sellthrough day to day from book one to book two. I think most authors of series of standalone report 40-60% day to day.

But only so many of those people come back for the next book in the series once it's released. Some people will have every intention of buying the next book and just forget. Some will like the books enough to keep reading but not enough to pay attention to future releases. (If you have cliffhangers, the results are different. I wouldn't write a same couple multiple book series without cliffhangers).
 
#11 ·
I think the big difference for me has been the promo of later books in the series. For example, I got a huge, many-months-long bump on the whole series after last December's promo of Book 3--four and a half years after Books 1-3 were released, and a year after the latest release in the series. That bump was bigger than anything I'd had on Books 1 & 2 for years. Book 3 however is a very good book, and appealed to a somewhat difference audience slice than Books 1 & 2. (My books even in same series can be quite different.)

Things like that CAN be the beauty of standalones within series.

My second series also has very good sellthrough from Book 1 to Book 2, and the books came out about eight months apart. Again, I've promo'd Book 2 as well as Book 1, and they're quite different books. But Book 2 actually had a huge bump when Book 3 came out months later. Far from people not coming back for Book 3, MORE people picked up the whole series.

Lots of things can happen. I've promoted the whole series using one of the earlier books when a new book comes out (using a price promo and whatever ad sites are available), and that's always worked well. When I release a new book without any kind of promo, I usually don't get more than the initial bump until I do a price promo on one of the earlier books.

But of course, normally, sell-through will be more on "same-couple" series with cliffhangers, by the nature of things. However, that doesn't mean you can't get 65% or more sellthrough from Book 1 to Book 2 on standalones. I know you can. :)
 
#12 ·
Usedtoposthere said:
But of course, normally, sell-through will be more on "same-couple" series with cliffhangers, by the nature of things. However, that doesn't mean you can't get 65% or more sellthrough from Book 1 to Book 2 on standalones. I know you can. :)
No one said otherwise. But series sales work a certain way and they work that way for almost everyone. And I think you ignored my point that people who will buy book two if it's out won't necessarily come back for it if it's not out. That's how it is for everyone, period. No matter how good your books are.

I love series of standalones from a writing and marketing perspective. You do get a nice bump for all the books with each new release and each promo, but you will still never get all or even most readers coming back for the next book in the series.

That doesn't mean you shouldn't write series of standalones, but it does mean you should set your advertising goals based on the idea that you'll always get more total sales when you have more books in the series.
 
#13 ·
Hey, I'm not arguing anything, I hope. Just saying that what I do with standalone series, personally, is promo later books in the series some too, and it works super well.

On my second series, Book 3, which came out almost a year after Book 1 and 4 months after Book 2, has sold more than Book 2. I have about 85-90% sellthrough in that series (of sold and borrowed books, not free to paid--and that matters) from Book 1 to Book 2. I just went and checked, now that KDP gives you a way to do that, and I was surprised! Did not know that. They've always been the same price. For me, because my standalones tend to be pretty different, it depends how appealing that hook/subgenre of the particular book is to my readership. Same thing's true with my Series 1 books. Also, the better that particular book is (from the point of view of satisfying most readers), the more sell-through there is to earlier and later books in the series. Which is of course what you would expect. Good thing, since Book 1 of Series 1 was my first fiction. :) I'm pretty happy to have lots of other entry points.

So yeah, I have actually had a majority of the number of Book 1 readers who read Books 2 and 3 even when those weren't out when Book 1 was. BUT who knows if they're the SAME readers. Probably lots of them are not. My recent Book 3 promo on Series 1 picked me up a whole bunch of brand-new readers who may or may not have gone back to read Books 1 and 2. People have jumped into the series at any point, and sometimes they will skip books, because they can do that.

I did know that would be the case going in, and I planned for that. I write the books very much as standalones, so you don't have to read earlier books to understand. Past characters make appearances, but I try to make those "complete in themselves" rather than cameos--there's a reason for the characters to be there, and they're fully fleshed out within that book. That's my strategy to try to get the most out of my standalones. I'm sure not offering it as argument of anything in the wide world, just because I thought it might be useful to the OP.

Best thing for me with standalones has been to do a free giveaway of any of the books (except the latest ones, which I don't want to offer free). Obviously lots and LOTS of people who pick up the book free won't go on to read any others, but a free period will give me 5-10 times more sellthrough than a 99-cent sale, I've found. Also--huge bump in KDP borrows on both the formerly-free book and the others. So short free periods are pretty much all I do now. Again, my experience FWIW.
 
#14 ·
Wow you guys are great. So much constructive advice and so many things I can try. And since you are all so helpful, maybe I can pick your brains a little further.

1. Is a 'series ribbon' located on the book page? I think I already have that-a box under the blurb that shows all the books in the series? Is there a separate series page? Would you mind sending me a link to one just so I can see what you are referring to? :)
2. On the top of each book cover (except for Cake) I have "Cake Series Book Two" and "Cake Series Book Three." Is this the numbering you mention or is there a different numbering system you are referring to? I agree my covers could have better cohesion (especially book two) but I really didn't think things through when I picked Cake's cover and now I've discovered matching it is proving difficult to do. I mean, it's a guy's butt and a guitar-where do you go from there? ;D. So instead I just went for a similar coloring and font. Any suggestions on how I could tie in the other two covers without changing Cake's cover, which I definitely don't want to do because it is so recognizable now?
3. I think I have pretty good sell through from new readers who discover Cake now, I'd say 60-90%, judging by the book ranking and the number of books sold/pages read- but then, I'm not really sure what is considered 'good.' My expectations are perhaps a bit warped after Cake's mega success. Haha
4. How would you classify a series that features a new member of the family for each book and has a fully formed storyline but keeps an underlying back story running through all of them? There are no cliffhangers and technically they can all be read as standalones.
5. I never thought it feasible to run ads on the later books in a series but now I definitely want to try it.
6. And yes, I do think I should raise the prices on the books. I've always kept them low because I was a new author but with three books out now, I guess I'm no longer considered a newbie. Should book one stay at $2.99 or should it be raised with the others to $3.99. (Cake still sells really well so I don't think I need to lower it to $.99 yet).

Again, thanks for all the great advice.
 
#15 ·
You've got a series page and you have the series marked. Put the series marker on the cover of Book 1 too. (Cake Series, Book One.) I'd go to a cover artist about the covers for Bks 2 & 3, get her/his ideas. Book 2 especially isn't serving you as well as it could be IMHO, and the title is awfully long. Personally, I'm nowhere near a graphics expert. I tell my artist what I'm looking for and she makes it happen.

I'd raise 2 and 3 to at least $3.99. Maybe $4.99. CAKE was VERY successful. No reason people won't pay that. I'd leave CAKE at $2.99.

Yeah, I think you should be doing better with 2 and 3. I really do. I know your reviews are great on the later books. I think it's branding. Rebrand before your BookBub. My advice. And put in bold in "From the Author" on your Author Central page--"Books 2 and 3 now available" and list them. In BOLD.
 
#16 ·
I'd have a designer do you a FB graphic (and maybe Instagram and Twitter) with this:

"Did you love Cake? Well then, have another piece. Book Two available now!"

Then I'd put both book 1 and book 2 covers on that graphic.

As far as the covers, the cover for book 2 and 3 do not match book 1 at all. I'd ask the original designer for book one to use that same guy with the checked shirt and guitar, but push him waaaaaay back on the cover, and have his brother (? whomever the new H is) be front and center, also showing his back, as though he is following the hero from cake. That image worked the first time around, so this would kind of duplicate it but adding a hero and will brand the books together and show them there's a new hero that's somehow in relation to the hero in Cake.

Be sure to use the same colors and placement of typography on all 3 books.
 
#18 ·
PJ_Cherubino said:
That is a tough one given the constraints that you outline on your OP. It's hard to say without direct interaction with the readers. It has me brainstorming...

Is your newsletter audience super-responsive? Will they respond to a direct call to action such as "Hey, if you know someone who read the first book, please let them know about book X. For those readers who are not part of the newsletter, help me spread the word... " Set up a specific email or email filter and ask them to reply directly. Segment the replies to an email segment. Follow up with that.

You might also consider going to forums where your book is discussed and start a thread there. Basically, I'm thinking that the key is to get readers responding to you directly. That will take some work.

The general idea is to re-create or tap back into the original word-of mouth that surprised you with your first book.

Hope that helps. Will bookmark this post to see what you come up with.

PJC out.
Amazon provides a option you can use to let readers know when your book will be available for purchase.
 
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