Holding a Physical Book in Your Hand

There’s something about holding a physical book in your hands.  People love it.  The pages smell like paper and ink.  It makes the writing more real.  Therefore, I decided to hand out physical copies of my first book in the (after)life lessons series.  Rather than a link or a post that you can swipe past, handing out the book started a real conversation and ignited interest.  

I brought my books to my jazz dance class.  We took a picture with the books.  I posted it and tagged them on Facebook, hoping their friends might see it and vote for the book, too!

I would recommend this book marketing plan!

Nominate my book to be published by Kindle Scout: https://kindlescout.amazon.com/p/24VKXYPLERGLP

Here’s some pictures documenting the experiment:

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#Dancing for #Book Votes!

Sharing is caring!  That’s why I shared my books with my dance friends.

In an effort to expand my social network reach, I created this video and posted it on all my social media sites with various overlapping book and dance hashtags.

My book, The Curse of the Winklevoss Twins, is “Hot & Trending” on Kindle Scout right now and for the past week.  I’m hoping to keep that momentum going!  22 more days!

Vote: https://kindlescout.amazon.com/p/24VKXYPLERGLP

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My Second Kindle Scout Campaign: Pig Marketing

While surfing the Kindle Scout Forums, I recently read a story about one lucky author’s successful Kindle Scout campaign. She insisted she was the epitome of an indie author, building her grassroots author platform from concept to completion. So how did she manage to gain enough votes to win Kindle Press publishing?

The answer was two words: PIG MARKETING.

I was at a loss for what this meant, but she explained how she leveraged her personal network. She was a member of a Facebook group for pig owners. One picture of Miss Piggy posing with her book was enough to touch the hearts of the group members. Lo and behold, 20,000 fellow pig owners voted for her first novel on Kindle Scout.

I don’t have a pet pig, but for my second Kindle Scout campaign, I will attempt to leverage my personal network. Any advice or suggestions?

Vote for The Curse of the Winklevoss Twins Here: https://kindlescout.amazon.com/p/24VKXYPLERGLP

Results of the #Facebook Ad for My #Book on #Amazon

As I mentioned in my last post, I setup a $100 Facebook ad for my book available on Amazon, The Light of Supremazia, to run for a week. Facebook requires a Facebook page to be linked to the ad, so I set that up as well: https://www.facebook.com/AfterlifeLessons.

I created 2 different ads for the campaign. They both had the same parameters for who should see the ad: English speaking citizens, 18+, who have a credit card. This is because the book is only written in English, and it can only be purchased if you have an Amazon account, for which you need a credit card. The only difference between the ads was the picture displayed, as shown in my last post.

The results were interesting and surprising. Here are a few overview stats:

• Click-through Rate (CTR): 1.01% – I read anything above 2% is great.
• People reached: 26,796
• Website Clicks: 336
• Cost per website click: $0.30

The Facebook ad brought people to my Amazon site, but when I checked how many books I had actually sold during the ad campaign, it was only 2.  Therefore, my cost per customer is $50.  Pretty sad.

 

For the varying pictures, there wasn’t an obvious difference between the results.

Perhaps sending the ad to the Facebook page instead of the Amazon site would have different results.

What are other authors doing to market their books?

Amazon Web Services and Facebook Ads for Books

My husband and I spent our Monday working on our side projects.  As a modern day author, marketing and publicity is just as crucial as writing, so I make an effort to understand the current technology trends.

Amazon Web Services

Amazon Web Services is the latest rage, and I wanted to get myself acquainted with it.  My husband explained Amazon Web Services is like buying a computer at a hosted location. It has less restrictions than locations hosted by others, and best of all, its free for a year!

My husband and I setup my account, following step by step instructions from a youtube video, and patted ourselves on the back when we were done. Then what?

I had hoped Amazon Web Services would allow me to use Google Analytics for my blog. Google Analytics supplies statistics on who clicks on your site.  Eventually, I would like to use that information to tailor my blog and website to the interests of my readers.

My Fallout with Amazon Web Services

Unfortunately, I came to the conclusion that most sites on Amazon Web Services use WordPress because they are easy and free to build. This was disappointing since free WordPress sites don’t allow free use of Google Analytics.

Another reason to use Amazon Web Services is to manage the computing power your site needs. While I have dreams and hopes of having a highly read website, at this point, WordPress can handle my number of readers.

I learned a lot, but ultimately, I decided not to use Amazon Web Services. I’d be interested in the benefits others are finding for their blog / author website hosted on Amazon Web Services.

Facebook Advertising

I wasn’t going to let my disappointment with Amazon Web Services ruin my day off. I turned to advertising, and where best to advertise but Facebook!

My goal was to determine what type of ads potential readers respond to the best. I created two ads.  One with a cover of the book and one with a witty picture. Both are included below:

Facebook is picky about the amount of characters in the message and the amount of text in your picture. They also require you to create a facebook page for your service or product.  Here’s the link to my book series facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/AfterlifeLessons

I setup a campaign for these ads with a budget of $100, and after a week I will go through the data and report back.  In addition to which ad resonated best, I will also see the breakdown by demographics, age, and geography.  Pretty neat!

What other facebook advertising tests are others running?

Recap of The Light of Supremazia Kindle Scout Campaign

I may not have won Kindle Scout, but I learned a heck of a lot about blogging and marketing.  This blog post is recapping my 30 day campaign:

Launch on #KindleScout and a #CoverReveal

Using Real People as #Fictional #Characters – #ArtisticLicense and #TBT

The Proper #Setting for a #MagicalRealism #Book

Made Up Words, the #Language of a #Fiction #Novel

Who would you want as your #art #teacher?

#MondayBlog – Mapping Out Your Novel’s #Fantasy #World

#BookTrailer #BookMarketing and #KindleScout

My #cat Baby Thor is #marketing my #book

What Influences Your #Setting Descriptions?

Write in Your Own Voice

Technology in Literature

#BookMarketing for my #KindleScout Campaign

3 Qualities of a Great #English #Teacher

Ensuring the Proper Sequence of Events for Your #Book

Managing Your Social Media Presence – #twitter #facebook #youtube #pinterest #wordpress #tumblr

A Cast of #Actors for Your #Book

#BookMarketing and #TagsForLikes.com and #Einstein

New York, the City I Love

That Time I Elbowed Jimmy Fallon

GhostFeed and Wikispirit

My Kindle Scout Experience

Introducing The Light of Supremazia on Amazon

CLICK HERE TO BUY THE LIGHT OF SUPREMAZIA!

Managing Your Social Media Presence – #twitter #facebook #youtube #pinterest #wordpress #tumblr

That’s a ton of hashtags!

As a millennial, it isn’t surprising that I LOVE social media.  I am the person walking down the street with her phone in her hand.  I guess I don’t need to “disconnect.”  It’s fun to catch up with friends, or read local news, or post my favorite cat meme.

However, as an author, the task of sharing on social media is daunting.  I don’t mind if my Aunt Sally doesn’t comment on my picture of dinner last night, but there is a negative outcome if people don’t like my author posts…they won’t read my books!  The trick is to ensure the information you share is interesting and useful for the reader.  Keep ’em coming back for more!

Today’s post is an example.  I prepared the picture below, which is a setting for my book called The Light of Supremazia, and I’m going to write this blog post on managing your social media and post it on all my sites.  The picture might be intriguing for a potential reader, but if not, at least they got some value out of my post on social media presence.

Here are all the sites today’s theme will be posted on:

Twitter: https://twitter.com/AlanaSiegel

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AfterlifeLessons

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCd7P2UhtpCMBLajIDOlYH6A

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/alanasiegel/afterlife-lessons/

Tumblr: http://makeeverymisadventureanadventure.tumblr.com/

Vote for The Light of Supremazia on Kindle Scout!

How do u manage ur social media? #twitter #facebook #youtube #pinterest #wordpress #tumblr share with @alanasiegel (click to tweet)