[Philip Gibson]

Apart from Bookbub of course, which seems to pretty much guarantee a positive ROI. However, they have so far declined my submissions (but at least they answer). I strongly suspect they have a policy of only promoting proper books.

Of course, making a profit on individual promotions is not the whole picture. Other considerations are: getting your name/books out there, getting mailing list sign ups, getting more reviews, generating placements on also bought lists and benefiting from readers who enjoyed our promoted books eventually buying our other books.

Still, it would be nice to achieve an immediate actual profit on paid promotions if possible. My last promotion did that in a tiny way, mainly because I took advantage of the discount BKnights offers to KBoards authors (full promotional package for $5.50) and running the promo as a KDP Countdown deal in which we get paid 70% of the sale price. For the cost of the ad., I had 17 sales at $0.99 which works out at a $6.30 profit. Small beer indeed, but if calculated as a % ROI is nevertheless pretty impressive.

Because I've been running ads for a while now, I believe I know which sites are cost effective, or near cost effective, for my books. So my upcoming paid ads for my Countdown deal on '#Houston69: Apollo 11 -- When Men Walked on the Moon' in which the book is priced at $0.99 for the length of the promo, is limited to the few following sites which I have found to be cost effective in the hope of experimentally achieving a significant ROI:

16 Mar.. No promo
17 Mar.. Genre Pulse.. $24..
18 Mar..BKnights.. $5.50
19 Mar..Robin Reads $10
20 Mar..Booksends.. $50
21 Mar..FKB&T.. $25.. / .. ENT.. $30.

Total Cost: $145
I figure I need to sell about 207 copies to make a profit. I think that should be do-able based on past results.

I would have preferred the ENT ad to have been on the requested 19 March date, but was happy that they accepted me for the only date they could offer. Would be nice though if they could respond to submissions in a more timely fashion.

I considered using BargainBooksy but didn't since I thought the $80 price tag would not be likely to bring in the positive ROI I want to see for this experiment.

I estimate the following sites need to bring in the following sales to achieve a positive ROI for the individual sites and the promo as a whole:

Genre Pulse needs to sell 35 copies
BKnights needs to sell 8 copies
Robin Reads needs to sell 15 copies
Booksends needs to sell 71 copies
ENT needs to sell 43 copies
FKB&T needs to sell 36 copies

If people are interested, I will post results as the Countdown promotion progresses.

Philip

 

[FMH]

Always interested in what promotions work, and where good money can be spent wisely! Looking forward to your results.

I also love:
Read Cheaply (no cost)
Fussy Librarian (7 or 11, or something now?)
ereader cafe (25 or 30?)
And all take other than romance, which helps you. The others I use all specialize in romance.

And take heart...Bookbub turns me down, too. So far...

 

[PearlEarringLady]

Of course, making a profit on individual promotions is not the whole picture. Other considerations are: getting your name/books out there, getting mailing list sign ups, generating placements on also bought lists and benefiting from readers who enjoyed our promoted books eventually buying our other books.

The one that I look for is: an increase in ranking. So an individual ad doesn't necessarily have to bring in a lot of sales, so long as it's more than I usually get and will lift the book in the rankings. That alone makes it more visible, especially with KU.

Still, it would be nice to achieve an immediate actual profit on paid promotions if possible.

I look at the campaign as a whole AND the tail (if any) for ROI. I find a number of sites have a noticeable second-day bounce - good sales the day after, even when there's no other ad running. It seems unfair to judge just by a single day's performance. For instance, for me OHFB brought in 48 sales on the day, 29 the day after, and 7 the day after that, with no other ads running. ENT is another one with good second-day sales.

For those in KU, there may also be borrows on the day of an ad that don't show up until days/weeks/months after the event, when the reader hits the 10% point.

If people are interested, I will post results as the Countdown promotion progresses.

Ooh, please do!

 

[ArchangelEST]

Good luck Philip!

Have you submitted to Buck Books? Their requirements are somewhat lower than BookBub (though still fairly strict), they cost nothing and bring great results. 

 

[C. Gockel]

Do you know what your sell-thru is for 99 cent sales?  If your sell-thru is high earning out on 99 cents isn't the be-all-end all. But it's nice to earn out. Ebook butterfly, Manybooks.net, bestebookreaderlovers, ReadCheaply, and some of the other free sites will do it for you.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[GwynnEWhite]

I will watch your results with interest and thank to all the 'veterans' who commented. We all learn so much from you.

 

[Mxz]

I like the idea.  I'm interested in seeing the results.

 

[A past poster]

Good luck! I'm looking forward to hearing about your results.

 

[KReadnour]

Good luck, Phillip. I'll be waiting for your results! Thanks for sharing the information.

 

[Guest]

Thanks for sharing this

1) Got good results with eReaderCafe a couple of years ago. At that time they used to show number of clicks.

2) As mentioned above, some sites have very good Day 2 results. ENT is a very good example.

3) Bookbub, ENT - those are the two that have definite high ROI if you're looking just for day of promotion and next. Perhaps I'm mistaken - however, there's not really any other sites that give that type of instant ROI. Perhaps Bknights too. Looking ahead to seeing your promotion results.

 

[Sever Bronny]

Good luck, Phillip

 

[Mark at Marble City]

Best of luck, watching with interest. Love your covers.

 

[Philip Gibson]

I just added Robin Reads into the blank date I had for the 19th. I don't know anything about them except I saw them mentioned here so thought I'd try them out. Not sure if I'll be able to evaluate their effectiveness though, sandwiched as they are between BKnights and Booksends.

Waiting now for the Genre Pulse campaign to go live later today and hoping to receive the cool tracking link before it does.

Philip

 

[velicion]

Good luck, Philip!

I'll be keeping an eye on your results as well. My promotions start at the beginning of April, and I've booked the same companies.

 

[Lucian]

Add me to the chorus of people wishing you the best of luck, thanking you for sharing, and eagerly awaiting your numbers.

 

[Philip Gibson]

The countdown promotion on #Houston69 has just ended. Results are:

Day 1.. 2 sales (no promo)
Day 2.. 10 sales
Day 3.. 17 sales
Day 4.. 22 sales
Day 5.. 44 sales
Day 6.. 176 sales

Cost of promo..$145
Total sales.. 269
Total income.. $188
Immediate profit from promo.. $43

Well, at least not a loss. My aim had been to see if I could break even or make a small profit.

The promo will continue to generate profit going forward, mainly in the form of sell-throughs to other books in the series. There have already been 3 sell throughs to books priced at $4.99. Also the greatly enhanced ranking due to the promo should net significant organic sales at full price due to the greatly enhanced visibility in the best- seller lists. The book's current rankings in those lists are:

#1,147 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
#1 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > History > Science & Medicine > Astronomy
#5 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > History > Modern (16th-21st Centuries) > 20th Century
#7 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > History > World

What I will be looking at most carefully now is how long the book can stay on Page 1 of those best seller lists. One week? One month? I have no idea at this point.

Philip

 

[PearlEarringLady]

Some great numbers there, Philip, especially that last day. Combining FKBT and ENT was a good move. Well done! And you covered your costs right away, so double well done.

Thanks for sharing.

 

[Philip Gibson]

Some great numbers there, Philip, especially that last day. Combining FKBT and ENT was a good move. Well done! And you covered your costs right away, so double well done.

Thanks for sharing.

Thanks, Pauline. Actually, combining ENT and FKB&T was more by accident than design. Nevertheless, stacking sites from the weakest to end in the strongest had been my plan from the start. The aim being to achieve (as per Wayne's advice) the maximum benefit from the ranking algorithm by having a pretty sales graph that trends upwards throughout the promo with no unsightly zig-zags. The resulting sales graph looks like this:

Philip

 

[Mark E. Cooper]

Thanks for sharing this

2) As mentioned above, some sites have very good Day 2 results. ENT is a very good example.

3) Bookbub, ENT - those are the two that have definite high ROI if you're looking just for day of promotion and next...

My favourites are Bookbub, ENT, Freeboosky, Midlist. I always get epic downloads at freebooksy, but because they're always free downloads, I have to rely upon read through. 2 of my series are only 2 books long atm, so I obviously see better results from my longer series (just because there are 3 paid books after the freebie, not 1)

I know there are tons of other sites, and all have their uses, but the 4 above are the ones I keep returning to whenever I need a promo.

 

[Mark at Marble City]

That's an interesting result. I know you can't take the daily results in isolation because of the cumulative effect, but looks like RobinReads did well enough (might give them a try), and Bknights (of course, as always). The last day was great - perhaps FKB&T and ENT don't have a lot of crossover in their lists, or was it the cumulative effect of rankings by that stage? Does ENT still share download numbers since they changed their charging strategy?