# The $616 "WTH" am I doing, BOOK 4 Promo Thread (Sort of)



## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Yeah, that is the correct number or my spreadsheet isn't working right. Book 4. What the hell am I doing? I have three books, all of which are literally book one types in series, though one series can be read in any order and that is the book I'm promoting... sort of. Let me try to explain first.

Book 1, Black Dragon, Dragon Series (Standalone novels, interconnected in same world, one main chronicler).
Book 2, Ranger Rising, Ranger Series (Definitely a series, same characters, one long story arc).
Book 3, Lunar Discovery, Sci-Fi & Technothriller Series (Not named yet, was a standalone, left the ending open to a continuation and book is doing well, so there will be a series).
Book 4, Blue Dragon, Dragon Series. Finally a second book in a series that... well... isn't really a series. Independent story that can be read in any order.

So book 4 is the "new release" so to speak. Didn't really have my ARC reviews, so hard to set up a promo right out of the gate. Then I read this on Bookbub: http://insights.bookbub.com/which-book-in-your-series-should-you-discount/

I'm not preaching any BB doctrine, I just didn't know how best to promote this latest release. Add something of a perfect storm in my Select promo opportunities which are running out at the end of the November (use them or lose them) and I'm going to promote ALL three of my Claire-Agon fantasy books. The promo looks like this:

Ranger Rising, KCD from Nov 11-17. (Starting Rank=50,237k)
Black Dragon, FREE from Nov 14-16. (Starting Rank=42,068k)
Blue Dragon, 99 cents anytime I can get a promo slot for the book. (Starting Rank=31,561k)

Promo currently is running from around Nov 11-20th with one ENT day on December 4th.

*Objective*: EYES on the product, REVIEWS for each book, NAME/BRANDING recognition. Tails and ROI are optional.

Here's the line up:

*Wed, November 11th*
_Ranger Rising, KCD 99 cents_ *Sales: 29, Best Rank=8,520k*
BargainBooksy ($40)
BookScream ($3)
ChoosyBookWorm ($48 Note: This is for their premium 7 day promo package, all week long)
Bknights ($5)
Reading Deals ($0, Two for one deal, paid $15 for the first one)

*Thu, November 12th* *Sales: 15, Best Rank=7,122k*
_Ranger Rising, KCD 99 cents_
Just Kindle Books ($15)

*Fri, November 13th* *Sales, 13, Best Rank=8,592k*
_Ranger Rising, KCD 99 cents_
Riffle ($40)

*Sat, November 14th*
_Black Dragon, FREE KDP Day 3/5_ *Sales, 0, Free, 3,572k, Best Rank=48 in free store*
ENT ($25)
Reading Deals ($15)
OHFB ($75)
FreeBooksy ($100)
Bknights ($5)
EbookSoda ($15)
EbookHounds ($10)

Ranger Rising, *Rank=9,321k*
Black Dragon, *Rank=46 overall free store*
Blue Dragon, *Rank=2,740k*

*Sun, November 15th*
_Ranger Rising, KCD 99 cents,_* Sales, 31, Best Rank=7,781k*
_Black Dragon, FREE KDP Day 4/5_, *Sales 0, Free, 1,317, Best Rank=46 in free store*
_Blue Dragon, 99 cent manual_ *Sales 76, Best Rank=2,472k*
BooksButterfly Combo ($80)

*Mon, November 16th*
_Ranger Rising, KCD 99 cents_ *Sales 42, Best Rank=5,380k*
Booksends ($25)
SweetFreeBooks ($5)

_Black Dragon, FREE KDP Day 5/5_ *Sales 0, Free, 1,120k, Best Rank=69 in free store*
Riffle ($40)
Awesomegang.com, Pretty-hot.com, Bookreadermagazine.com, and DiscountBookMan.com (Last minute adds, THANKS Vinnie!)

_Blue Dragon, NO Promo_, *Sales, 57, Best Rank=1,959k*

*Tue, November 17th*
_Blue Dragon, 99 cent manual_ *Sales 27, Best Rank=2,219k*
Bknights ($5)

_Ranger Rising, 99 cent, KCD_ *Sales 21, Best Rank=4,013k*
Awesomegang.com, Pretty-hot.com, Bookreadermagazine.com, and DiscountBookMan.com (Last minute adds, THANKS Vinnie!)

_The Black Dragon, No Promo (Regular Price), _*Sales 18, Free, 12, Best Rank=7,700k*

*Wed, November 18th*
_The Blue Dragon, 99 cent, manual_ *Sales 19, Best Rank=2,706k*
Awesomegang.com, Pretty-hot.com, Bookreadermagazine.com, and DiscountBookMan.com (Last minute adds, THANKS Vinnie!)

Ranger Rising: *Sales 1, Best Rank=4,457k*
Black Dragon: *Sales 7, Best Rank=5,830k*

*Thu, November 19th*
NO Promotions

Ranger Rising: *Sales 1, Best Rank=6,505k*
Black Dragon: *Sales 12, Best Rank=6,134k*
Blue Dragon: *Sales 17, Best Rank=3,364*

*Fri, November 20th*
_Blue Dragon, 99 cent manual_ *Sales 19, Best Rank=3,564k*
Riffle ($40)

No space in calendar: BookBarbarian, Fussy Librarian
Rejected by: RobinReads, FKBT
Pending: BookHippo, Ranger Rising, 11/12, Read Cheaply & Read Free.ly, Black Dragon, 11/14

*Total Spend: $616*

I'll try to add a few more this week, but I'm exhausted with my day job and my boys at home. I'm pretty sure we'll learn something out of this, either how to blow over half a grand and not even use a Bookbub, how NOT to promote a second book in a sort of series or, my wishful thinking, optimistic side is hoping for how to revive interest in your brand with a new release.

Let me know if any one has any questions or any words of support. I'll post later on the method behind the madness, but I'm too tired right now and I wanted to just get the line up and basics out there for your entertainment


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

WOO HOO!!!  This is so exciting!  I can not wait for this to roll out because it's going to be stonkin!  Go Salvador.


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## James R Wells (May 21, 2015)

I have not heard of Riffle - have you promoted with them before and do you know what results to expect? 

Found the site and signed up (lots of torture trying to get you to follow people and get all social etc), but I see no place to apply for a promotion.

And - good luck ascending the sea creature food chain!


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## Chinese Writer (Mar 25, 2014)

Good luck. Sometimes madness is the road to opportunities.


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## Adair Hart (Jun 12, 2015)

Good Luck Salvador! This looks like a great lineup and you got an ENT in there. I will be following with great interest.


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## Mark Tyson (Sep 22, 2014)

GO SAL GO!


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## Lucian (Jun 8, 2014)

Good Luck! Thanks for all you've shared with us.


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

This is kind of a who's who of the advertising world! Looks like fun! And a kitchen sink promo worked well for Sever, so fingers crossed for you, Salvador. Hope you shift a metric ton of books.


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## fantasy-writer (Dec 12, 2014)

James R Wells said:


> I have not heard of Riffle - have you promoted with them before and do you know what results to expect?
> 
> Found the site and signed up (lots of torture trying to get you to follow people and get all social etc), but I see no place to apply for a promotion.
> 
> And - good luck ascending the sea creature food chain!


Signup section:
http://www.rifflebooks.com/advertise/overview


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## ufwriter (Jan 12, 2015)

Wow, what a line-up! Really looking forward to seeing how this done. And congrats on your newest release. The cover is gorgeous.


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## Steve Shelley (Jan 10, 2015)

Go, Salvador! Cheering you on from the sidelines.


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## A Woman&#039;s Place Is In The Rebellion (Apr 28, 2011)

Good luck, Salvador! Hope the promos are a huge success.


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## Susanne123 (Jan 9, 2014)

Fingers crossed for you, but you won't need my wishes of luck. This is going to work really well.


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## RuthNestvold (Jan 4, 2012)

Good luck! Will be looking forward to hear how it does.


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## James R Wells (May 21, 2015)

Ella Summers said:


> Signup section:
> http://www.rifflebooks.com/advertise/overview


Thanks!

Can anyone advise re experiences with Riffle and whether they got good value?


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Popping in to say thanks everyone for the well wishes. Trust me, I wasn't real sure I wanted to post this promotion because it isn't a very clear one. There is a high probability of failure, or at least a let down with a spend of this magnitude. Also, I just ran out of gas and have left a few promo sites off the list, I'll need to either add them or take off the kitchen sink cliché.

I am posting this in the hopes that, good or bad, my fellow prawns can see the effectiveness, or lack thereof, and make their own decisions accordingly. After 8 months of being in this business as an indie, I'm still way too new, way too behind and way too ignorant in the ways of being successful in our business. Something that I've always posted before is that the wonderful thing about being an indie is the freedom to experiment, especially when it's with our own money.

I purposely left off the musings and ramblings about my financial situation, I didn't want that to cloud the promo, but I can say I've gone from eating soup every day at lunch for two months to pay for my editing to finally being able to have my books support/finance themselves. I attribute most of this knowledge and prawny success to kboards and specifically the Writer's Café. Without the shared knowledge of the authors that came before me, I'm pretty sure I'd be wallowing in the million rankings, if that. I'm fortunate enough to have a day job that takes care of my family's needs and allows me to keep my book's finances separate, thus the 'investment' of my earnings/royalties into my brand/books.

So far today a slow start, so we'll see how this pans out.



James R Wells said:


> Thanks!
> Can anyone advise re experiences with Riffle and whether they got good value?


James, I only have the one promo for my third book with them, I ran them and Booksends on the same day. I got like 82 downloads at 99 cents. I have run Booksends several times and usually received around 25-39 downloads with them Assuming something similar the last run, that would have meant that Riffle accounted for the rest of the 82 downloads or easily 40+. The good news is that I'll report back for you so you can see the results. I have a Riffle only promo on Friday the 20th so that data should help.


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

James R Wells said:


> Can anyone advise re experiences with Riffle and whether they got good value?


I ran my first Riffle promo in October, and I wasn't swept off my feet by them. They charged me $50 (they have a range of prices, but THEY choose how much you pay, which seems odd to me). I also had ManyBooks that day at $25 and ReadCheaply (free). I had a total of 25 sales. It was the first day of the promo, and it wasn't way out of line from other days, but still - it seemed a low result for that amount of money.

But, as always, so much depends on the actual book, genre, blurb, bla de bla. So YMMV.


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## James R Wells (May 21, 2015)

Salvador Mercer said:


> James, I only have the one promo for my third book with them, I ran them and Booksends on the same day. I got like 82 downloads at 99 cents. I have run Booksends several times and usually received around 25-39 downloads with them Assuming something similar the last run, that would have meant that Riffle accounted for the rest of the 82 downloads or easily 40+. The good news is that I'll report back for you so you can see the results. I have a Riffle only promo on Friday the 20th so that data should help.





PaulineMRoss said:


> I ran my first Riffle promo in October, and I wasn't swept off my feet by them. They charged me $50 (they have a range of prices, but THEY choose how much you pay, which seems odd to me). I also had ManyBooks that day at $25 and ReadCheaply (free). I had a total of 25 sales. It was the first day of the promo, and it wasn't way out of line from other days, but still - it seemed a low result for that amount of money.
> 
> But, as always, so much depends on the actual book, genre, blurb, bla de bla. So YMMV.


Thanks, that's the kind of info I was hoping to get, to decide whether to apply to add to a promo November 19-25. Based on this I'll hold off having a good lineup already.


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## Chris Fox (Oct 3, 2014)

Good luck, Sal. Four books have come about very quickly for you. Nice work, man!


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## J.A. Cipriano (May 27, 2014)

I'm curious to see how this works out for you. I've done some promo where I put a couple books in the same series up at once, but never across series before. Good luck.

If I could recommend one thing, it'd be to list all the promo books on each book to maximize your advert dollars. I've done this and it helps a lot. I think Sever did this too. 

like on black dragon I'd have "get ranger rising and blue dragon for 99 until x date" and on blue dragon I'd have "get ranger for 99 and black for free."


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## passerby (Oct 18, 2015)

Best wishes, Salvador!  I'll be watching this thread over the next few days.  Keep us posted!


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## smanaher (Dec 2, 2013)

Wishing you the best on this Salvador!


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## Matthew Eliot (May 4, 2015)

Best of luck!


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Chris Fox said:


> Good luck, Sal. Four books have come about very quickly for you. Nice work, man!


Coming from you, that is a very nice compliment, thanks Chris!  Just for the record however, I did write my second book first last year from July-October of 2014 then parked it till this May.



JACipriano said:


> ...If I could recommend one thing, it'd be to list all the promo books on each book to maximize your advert dollars. I've done this and it helps a lot. I think Sever did this too.
> 
> like on black dragon I'd have "get ranger rising and blue dragon for 99 until x date" and on blue dragon I'd have "get ranger for 99 and black for free."


Done for what I can do and will update late Friday night for Black Dragon. Great idea, thanks JA! 

Thanks everyone, going to bed, will update tomorrow morning.


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## SeanDGolden (Jan 28, 2015)

Good luck. I'll be watching this. We're in some of the same genre lists.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Hope it goes great!


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Ranger Rising, (Starting Rank=50,237k)
Black Dragon, (Starting Rank=42,068k)
Blue Dragon, (Starting Rank=31,561k)

*Wed, November 11th*
_Ranger Rising, KCD 99 cents_ *Sales: 29, Best Rank=8,520k*
BargainBooksy ($40)
BookScream ($3)
ChoosyBookWorm ($48 Note: This is for their premium 7 day promo package, all week long)
Bknights ($5)
Reading Deals ($0, Two for one deal, paid $15 for the first one)

Ranger Rising, (Rank=8,520k)
Black Dragon, (Rank=33,080k)
Blue Dragon, (Rank=29,314k)

Thoughts: Well, on the low end of my estimates by about 10-20 at least. Still, it is hard to gauge a site on day one. I had six sales before the next promo went out today and I'm sure they came from the tail of this day.

I also started a Goodreads giveaway for Black Dragon, my second giveaway and something interesting happened. I was sent two friend requests. Despite the first giveaway, that has never happened before. Another metric is that I started this promotion with 56 organic subscribers to my newsletter, up from 0 in April  Since the objective of this promo is primarily branding, I'll be looking at reviews, subs, and other metrics (website visits, facebook page likes, etc.) to gauge its success.

I added the ranking to see how the cross promoting works. I didn't notice much, if any, crossover from my contemporary sci-fi/technothriller to my fantasy series. I like fantasy and sci-fi, but my readers seem to stick to one genre or the other. So far, Ranger Rising obviously ranked up nicely to sub 10k, though that should drop a bit tomorrow and slight improvements on the other two books, but nothing to call mom about...yet.

Finally, thanks to all of you that have posted and wished me well. I'm most happy to share this run, hope I'm not using up too much of Harvey's bandwidth, LOL  I appreciate the camaraderie from my fellow writers. You folks rock!  (In case anyone thinks I'm not sincere, let me know how many friends and family have read your works. I can't get a single one to get through a single book of mine, seems the only place where folks understand me, at least the writer, publisher side, is right here with those in the same trench as me.)


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## Abderian (Apr 5, 2012)

Salvador Mercer said:


> I didn't notice much, if any, crossover from my contemporary sci-fi/technothriller to my fantasy series. I like fantasy and sci-fi, but *my readers seem to stick to one genre or the other*. So far, Ranger Rising obviously ranked up nicely to sub 10k, though that should drop a bit tomorrow and slight improvements on the other two books, but nothing to call mom about...yet.


I've found this too. I write mainly scifi but my free giveaway book is fantasy. I literally can't give it away. 

I read both and the other large speculative fiction genre, horror, but it seems most readers prefer one or the other.


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## Bbates024 (Nov 3, 2014)

Thanks for sharing Salvador I'm looking forward to seeing the results.

I'm doing a small promo on Ascendancy the Arena at the end of the month lowering it to 1.99 for Thanksgiving week. I have an ebooksoda and a Barginbooksy lined up, and ma waiting to hear back from ENT.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Abderian said:


> I've found this too. I write mainly scifi but my free giveaway book is fantasy. I literally can't give it away.
> 
> I read both and the other large speculative fiction genre, horror, but it seems most readers prefer one or the other.


And I thought they were closely related, they are paired up when you first search on Amazon...



Bbates024 said:


> Thanks for sharing Salvador I'm looking forward to seeing the results.
> 
> I'm doing a small promo on Ascendancy the Arena at the end of the month lowering it to 1.99 for Thanksgiving week. I have an ebooksoda and a Barginbooksy lined up, and ma waiting to hear back from ENT.


Thanks Bates! You have caught some of that genie in the bottle algo love from the Zon, so congrats there. I can't touch your rank even with promos, but that is the purpose (long term) of this promo. Gotta get noticed, for good or bad, hehe


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## Indecisive (Jun 17, 2013)

I'll be interested to see how this plays out. Thanks for posting!


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## passerby (Oct 18, 2015)

Hi Sal,

I read Chapter 1 of _Ranger Rising_ on Amazon. It looked interesting, so I bought a copy. I won't be able to leave a review for you, unfortunately, (Amazon policies) but two of my nephews who love your genre will be staying with me over the holidays. They are both avid readers who love this genre, and one of the first things they do when they walk in the door is ask to look at my Kindle library so they can see if there's anything that appeals to them. They are not the types to leave reviews, but each has a wide circle of friends, and they do exchange book recommendations. If one or the other likes the book, I'll also ask their parents to put your book on their Christmas wish list. (They both will read online, but they prefer print copies of books.)

Hope this helps, and good luck with the rest of your promo!

Vanessa


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## Felix R. Savage (Mar 3, 2011)

Also put your mailing list signup link in the description for the "book of the day" on each day!


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## Bbates024 (Nov 3, 2014)

Salvador Mercer said:


> And I thought they were closely related, they are paired up when you first search on Amazon...
> 
> Thanks Bates! You have caught some of that genie in the bottle algo love from the Zon, so congrats there. I can't touch your rank even with promos, but that is the purpose (long term) of this promo. Gotta get noticed, for good or bad, hehe


It's true. While my first two books have kinda stayed slow Ascendancy The Arena has started to do really well. I just got lucky and ENT actually picked it up for a promo. So Maybe a good sale will boost it and then January we will rock book 2. So now I have ebooksoda, Barginbooksy and ENT had to drop it .99 to get the ENT but I just did a step up on my KDP deal.

I'm eagerly awaiting your results. It's only going to be a matter of time before one of your books gets a little shot in the arm and it will be much deserved.

I'd still kill to get a book bub but no luck with thta so far.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

*Thu, November 12th* *Sales: 15, Best Rank=7,122k*
_Ranger Rising, KCD 99 cents_
Just Kindle Books ($15)

Ranger Rising, (Rank=7,122k)
Black Dragon, (Rank=46,635k)
Blue Dragon, (Rank=19,250k)

Thoughts: Nice Ranking, Black Dragon down a bit, Blue up. Tomorrow is the big day, several promos lined up for the 3 last remaining days for The Black Dragon using the last of its Select days. Not holding my breath as this isn't a Bookbub, but I've never had more than 475 free downloads in a single day and I'm really hoping to crush that number. If not, I'll be singing da blues


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

ameliasmith said:


> I'll be interested to see how this plays out. Thanks for posting!


Thanks for following! Hope some of this data helps.



vprelatte said:


> Hi Sal,
> 
> I read Chapter 1 of _Ranger Rising_ on Amazon. It looked interesting, so I bought a copy. I won't be able to leave a review for you, unfortunately, (Amazon policies) but two of my nephews who love your genre will be staying with me over the holidays. They are both avid readers who love this genre, and one of the first things they do when they walk in the door is ask to look at my Kindle library so they can see if there's anything that appeals to them. They are not the types to leave reviews, but each has a wide circle of friends, and they do exchange book recommendations. If one or the other likes the book, I'll also ask their parents to put your book on their Christmas wish list. (They both will read online, but they prefer print copies of books.)
> 
> ...


Too kind! Most appreciated, hope they enjoy it! 



Felix R. Savage said:


> Also put your mailing list signup link in the description for the "book of the day" on each day!


I have it on each product page at the end. Do you mean I should move it up??



Bbates024 said:


> It's true. While my first two books have kinda stayed slow Ascendancy The Arena has started to do really well. I just got lucky and ENT actually picked it up for a promo. So Maybe a good sale will boost it and then January we will rock book 2. So now I have ebooksoda, Barginbooksy and ENT had to drop it .99 to get the ENT but I just did a step up on my KDP deal.
> 
> I'm eagerly awaiting your results. It's only going to be a matter of time before one of your books gets a little shot in the arm and it will be much deserved.
> 
> I'd still kill to get a book bub but no luck with thta so far.


Most of us would be in the news, cold blooded for da Bub 

I have no idea what gets a book noticed or how. Some books seem to just fly with little to no promotion. That is uber cool for those that experience it, sort of like getting a nice head start in a race, though the end goal is to just reach the finish line, hehe. For the rest of us, there is this... get NOTICED, get VISIBLE. I figure its time to go FREE in a large way (not huge, definitely not BB huge) and see what happens. FWIW, the rankings improved from just releasing the third book in the fantasy genre as the other two were flirting with six figure ranking territory way too often each day. No matter what happens, I'll continue to enjoy working on my books and my stories. I love to write.

Thanks for the support everyone, hoping I have a good day tomorrow. Hope you all have good days with your books too!


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## Bbates024 (Nov 3, 2014)

Salvador Mercer said:


> Most of us would be in the news, cold blooded for da Bub
> 
> Thanks for the support everyone, hoping I have a good day tomorrow. Hope you all have good days with your books too!


True THAT!

I'm thinking I might try and go for a free bookbub on my first book, instead of .99 when my second book is ready to go. I've heard stories of people getting crazy download numbers 10k-20k-30k if you could even get 25% of those folks into book 2 or some of your other stuff it would be an amazing success.

Also, I heard boxed sets work really well so if you have three books at 2.99 and toss them in a box set say for .99 for a bookbub when you're launching the 4th seems to be a good way to get in. Granted that means I just have to write three more books in that series so maybe at the end of next year I can give it a try. LoL


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

May the force be with you!!


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## Northern pen (Mar 3, 2015)

Good luck with the promo !!


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## Adair Hart (Jun 12, 2015)

Salvador Mercer said:


> *Thu, November 12th* *Sales: 15, Best Rank=7,122k*
> _Ranger Rising, KCD 99 cents_
> Just Kindle Books ($15)
> 
> ...


You're off ot a great start Salvador! Looking forward to seeing how Riffle did for you yesterday. Are you seeing any noticeable page reads? I know Wilden mentioned they can pop up more in the tail, but also recall Angela had mega reads during her promo.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

*Fri, November 13th* *Sales, 13, Best Rank=Waiting for Author Central to update*
_Ranger Rising, KCD 99 cents_
Riffle ($40)

Ranger Rising, (Rank=8,592, down from 7,122k)
Black Dragon, (Rank=51,389 down from 46,635k)
Blue Dragon, (Rank=19,254, down from 19,250k)



HN Wake said:


> May the force be with you!!


Oh yeah, big SW's fan here too! 



Robyn Wideman said:


> Good luck with the promo !!


Thanks for all your support Robyn, love the newer covers on Amazon btw, you should look into getting your sig updated unless it's just my viewer 



Adair Hart said:


> You're off ot a great start Salvador! Looking forward to seeing how Riffle did for you yesterday. Are you seeing any noticeable page reads? I know Wilden mentioned they can pop up more in the tail, but also recall Angela had mega reads during her promo.


Thanks Adair, but actually, compared to my other promos, these numbers are underperforming. Yesterday was pretty much a very low day and I promised I wouldn't look at ROI, but for paid promos I like to get as close to 1:1 ratio as possible (1 sale:$1). Yesterday's 13:40 was way off as was day one at 29:55. Day two at 15:15 was good, though there was a tail from day one.

Still, today is the start of the real promo so to speak. Ranger Rising is the start of another series and the exposure that book received actually boosted sales of both my Dragon Series book by some prawny numbers (from almost zero to several per day for Blue and 1-3 for Black) so I'd say there was some crossover selling.

Using the advice of some boarders here, I updated my sales page to show the specials on Ranger and Blue from the Black page as I expect Black to have a huge amount of views and hopefully the same in downloads. The next three days is where the bulk of my promo costs come in.

On a side note, I've been using Author Central to post my best ranks and they don't update this early in the morning. Data from the 13th should be updated in a few hours and I'll update my thread to reflect that. So far today, still very early, I've got like 46 downloads so I'm fairly certain no promo sites have listed my book other than EbookSoda which I just saw in my inbox. Note, it's now up to 62 in a short span since posting so I guess that promo blast is working a bit.

So, to just summarize my thoughts, I'm hoping to get eyes on Book 1 of my latest realease, which is Book 2 in that series, though remember, they are like Pauline's books, they can be read independently and in any order, so not sure how that will stack up against say my Ranger series which is a true series (same characters, continuation of the story from the end of Book 1).

Oh and one question for my fellow authors. The title for Book 2 in the Ranger Series is "The Dead Druid". Can I get away with calling it "Dead Druid" or do I need the article in the title? I ask because as part of the branding I intend to have both the adjective and noun start with the same letter and Book 1 doesn't have the article on it (Ranger Rising, not The Ranger Rising, and Book 3, The Mad Mage, or Mad Mage). Here are the two cover mockups that Cagnes did for me:

















Thoughts on the title?


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## A past poster (Oct 23, 2013)

James R Wells said:


> Thanks!
> 
> Can anyone advise re experiences with Riffle and whether they got good value?


Riffle butchered my blurb. It was so bad that I wouldn't have bought the book. There were no sales, which wasn't surprising. I asked for my money back and got it. It would be interesting to see if anyone has had a good ROI from them.


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

Salvador Mercer said:


> *Sat, November 14th*
> _Black Dragon, FREE KDP Day 3/5_
> ENT ($25)
> Reading Deals ($15)
> ...


Wow, this is a helluva one-day lineup! You've got three big hitters in there, each of them capable of bringing in 1,000 downloads, so you could get 3,000+ today, which would be awesome.

PS I saw Black Dragon on OHFB (right above The Mages of Bennamore ).


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

I usually don't receive my OHFB mailer till last or later in the day (use to be evenings!).  FreeBooksy just hit my inbox, I shouldn't do this but... I'm at 392 right now.  Wasn't aware you were running a promo Pauline.  Good luck with Bennamore!


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

Salvador Mercer said:


> Wasn't aware you were running a promo Pauline. Good luck with Bennamore!


Thanks - it's just a couple of free days, to try to get some more reviews, really. I have OHFB today and FreeBooksy tomorrow, plus a couple of smaller sites, so nothing like your splash.  Hoping for a couple of thousand downloads over the two days.

I'm on 61 so far.


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## passerby (Oct 18, 2015)

Just looked at the book covers for the second novel in your "Rangers" series, Sal. I like the first one - the one with the article in front of "Dead" - better. So, _The Dead Druid_gets my vote.

Vanessa


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

Salvador - look at you, #82 in the whole free store!!! So cool.


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## Bbates024 (Nov 3, 2014)

PaulineMRoss said:


> Salvador - look at you, #82 in the whole free store!!! So cool.


That is pretty freaking awesome!


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## passerby (Oct 18, 2015)

Salvador - You are number one!  You are number one!  You are number one!

The Black Dragon: A Claire-Agon Dragon Book (Dragon Series 1) Kindle Edition
#1 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Teen & Young Adult > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Fantasy > Sword & Sorcery


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## Patricia Watters (Aug 24, 2014)

Salvador - This is great planning and great success! Congratulations on your #1 listing. Way to go! Now you can add in your promo material that you're an Amazon Bestselling Author.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Patricia Watters said:


> Salvador - This is great planning and great success! Congratulations on your #1 listing. Way to go! Now you can add in your promo material that you're an Amazon Bestselling Author.


Thanks Patricia, but technically, it's more like I'm an Amazon Bestgiving Author  The Black Dragon promo is for the FREE list, hehe. Still, such a wild ride that I need to get to bed, but am having trouble shutting the computer down. I'm hitting refresh way to often for my sanity, LOL. Nice to at least see the line move more than once or twice a day 



vprelatte said:


> Salvador - You are number one! You are number one! You are number one!
> 
> The Black Dragon: A Claire-Agon Dragon Book (Dragon Series 1) Kindle Edition
> #1 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Teen & Young Adult > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Fantasy > Sword & Sorcery


Yeah, hoping to add to my downloads organically with the ranking. Still will have two more days on the free list.



PaulineMRoss said:


> Salvador - look at you, #82 in the whole free store!!! So cool.


I may have just peaked at #54 overall in the free store. I noticed the top 50 or so are almost all Bookbub promos from the last week. Sever hit #8 or #9 with his Bookbub and I stayed at the same ranking for several refreshes, so I am thinking non Bookbubs peak out somewhere in this range. Still, not shabby to hit the top #100 in any list, even free 



vprelatte said:


> Just looked at the book covers for the second novel in your "Rangers" series, Sal. I like the first one - the one with the article in front of "Dead" - better. So, _The Dead Druid_gets my vote.
> 
> Vanessa


Thanks, vote noted, it's now 1-0 for the article. Hoping at least two more folks chime in so I have the best two out of three, hehe


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## E.M. Cooper (Feb 27, 2015)

I'm cheering from the sideline. Thanks so much, Salvadore for sharing this and best of luck with the rest of your promotion.

The Bookbub link you shared about promoting books was very useful, thank you.


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## Abderian (Apr 5, 2012)

I prefer Dead Druid for consistency with the other titles in the series. Congrats on your massive success!


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## ufwriter (Jan 12, 2015)

It's at #46 now!


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

*Sat, November 14th*
_Black Dragon, FREE KDP Day 3/5_ *Sales, 0, Free, 3,572k, Best Rank=46? in free store*
ENT ($25)
Reading Deals ($15)
OHFB ($75)
FreeBooksy ($100)
Bknights ($5)
EbookSoda ($15)
EbookHounds ($10)

Ranger Rising, *Sales 20*
Black Dragon, *Giveaway 3,572k*
Blue Dragon, *Sales 91*

Well, here are the numbers. The second in series had 91 sales with no promotion at the 99 cent price point (manually set) while the crossover series (different series, same world) had 20 sales with it's 99 cent KDP promotion and no promos for it, at least on this day. I think the % of sales/downloads is about 2.5% which seems pretty standard based on other numbers I've seen posted. I'd say the promote the first book in a series and lower the second (for its release) does work (and the Bookbub blog that I linked to, says the same thing) and there is a small amount of crossover, about a half of a percent, to the related series and literally no crossover to the other genre book. A simple illustration:

Series A Book 1: FREE promo
Series A Book 2: 2.5% sell-through
Series B Book 1: 0.5% sell-over
Series C Book 1: 0% sell-over (different genre)

So while I had a fairly slow start to the KCD for the other series, the first of three free days seems to have been very successful in accomplishing my objectives, though the tail, or lack thereof, will be the determining factor.



CadyVance said:


> It's at #46 now!


Means Bookbub sends out 45 books a day in its flyer 



Abderian said:


> I prefer Dead Druid for consistency with the other titles in the series. Congrats on your massive success!


Thanks! It's now 1-1 for preference on the title.



E.M. Cooper said:


> I'm cheering from the sideline. Thanks so much, Salvadore for sharing this and best of luck with the rest of your promotion.
> 
> The Bookbub link you shared about promoting books was very useful, thank you.


Glad it helped, it also makes sense to me after seeing it first hand and watching Sever's promo with Bookbub.

I'll add the ranking data later in the day when it updates, still only showing me the 13th, however as anyone can see, the other books in the same genre improved dramatically and continue to do so for at least this morning.


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Salvador, your strategy is looking very successful from where I sit!  3,500+ downloads on first plus the 91 sales of second book is superb!  Thanks for sharing=invaluable.

I prefer Dead Druid.  

Go Salvador Go!!


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## James R Wells (May 21, 2015)

Salvador, thanks for great info, and congratulations. I always read your threads carefully to get more info for my next time (which actually is next week).


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## smanaher (Dec 2, 2013)

Salvador, having spent $250 for 3,500+ downloads, would you say you were pleased with those numbers or no?  Love to hear your perspective and congrats on your promotion efforts!


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

HN Wake said:


> Salvador, your strategy is looking very successful from where I sit! 3,500+ downloads on first plus the 91 sales of second book is superb! Thanks for sharing=invaluable.
> 
> I prefer Dead Druid.
> 
> Go Salvador Go!!


Thanks HN! The proof is in the pudding however, and I'm glad I read that link on the BB blog. I can see how so many others promote the hell out of their first book in a series as there is literally no way anyone read the entire 77k first book then decided to buy the second book. Seems that, at 99 cents, there were 91 or so readers who felt comfortable enough to buy book 2 based on what they saw/liked from the blurb/cover on book 1. Sort of like a faith only decision (at least in the quality/risk).

So this begs the question from the vets on these boards... do you price a series like this: FREE, 99 cents, Reg Price, Etc. or like this: 99 cents, Reg, Price, Reg Price, Etc. ? (Or obviously just regular price?)

Dead Druid up 2-1 over The Dead Druid. Any other thoughts on this?

So much to learn... 



James R Wells said:


> Salvador, thanks for great info, and congratulations. I always read your threads carefully to get more info for my next time (which actually is next week).


Good to hear James, that is the whole idea of sharing data on promos, and congrats with your promo next week!



smanaher said:


> Salvador, having spent $250 for 3,500+ downloads, would you say you were pleased with those numbers or no? Love to hear your perspective and congrats on your promotion efforts!


You must be referring to that day only. Numbers wise, short of any Bookbub, then I'd say, yes, I'm very pleased with the number of downloads for the money and consider that particular day a success, especially in terms of what I was trying to accomplish. Understand that ROI wise, Bookbub is the better choice, problem is that it's not a choice, not for all of us authors...

I think each author has his or her challenges, strengths and weaknesses. We shouldn't compare ourselves to other writers, but it's human nature to do so. I felt that for as long as my books have been published, for the promos I've conducted, etc. I felt that a couple of my challenges were getting reviews and subscriber signups. I've never tried to do a heavy 'free promotion' and, more importantly, I've never had a second book in a series (if we can still call it that) in order to promote. To that end, I felt I had to do something to promote my books, my name, and my brand.

I don't know if other authors see Amazon (publishing in general) the same way I do, but either you're moving forward or moving backwards. It's my opinion only, but I think that barring a few exceptions, if we don't do something to keep our product fresh, promotions or new releases or ads or something, then we risk becoming irrelevant in the world of readers. I have seen plenty of books with critical reviews have more than 100 of them and do well in the rankings. Readers are willing to be flexible and enjoy us indies more than we know sometimes, but we have to let them know we exist. Who cares if you wrote a masterpiece if only a few dozen people have ever read it? Again, just my opinion, but this whole promotion is centered around the idea of visibility and obtaining it. To that end I feel it's been successful so far, however the ROI will be interesting as we don't know yet what, if any, tail my books will have.

Finally, I don't want to chat about money, but I was fortunate enough to go from $20 royalties my first month to four figure royalties (just barely) on month number five. That took me from the red into the black. Months six through eight allowed me to increase my capital and to fund this expensive promotion. My first two months, I had no means to even edit my first book so I ate soup for two months and saved until I could. I understand that not everyone has the ability to fund an elaborate promotion, Lord knows I didn't just a few months ago, but when you do, it's good to invest in yourself, especially when starting out.

Hope I don't sound too preachy or teachy, just sharing some of my thoughts with my fellow writers. I'm amazed at how difficult the entire process is and I have a lot of respect for those who came before me and have been doing this for years. NOT easy, IMHO.

I appreciate all the well wishes and wonderful comments. Thanks to everyone for the support, I often times feel that I am running forward blindly, not knowing for sure what I'm doing, still learning each month and hope you all do well this weekend. Excited for the holidays that are up and coming!


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## IreneP (Jun 19, 2012)

Congrats Salvador! I've been following this thread and I'll be interested to read your final thoughts on this promotion.

I love how well-thought-out and organized some of these promotion threads are.


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Salvador Mercer said:


> So this begs the question from the vets on these boards... do you price a series like this: FREE, 99 cents, Reg Price, Etc. or like this: 99 cents, Reg, Price, Reg Price, Etc. ? (Or obviously just regular price?)


Yes! This is a great question. Would welcome input across genres on this one.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Quick update...

I'm not sure if my promos ran today, got an email in to Booksbutterfly, will confirm tomorrow I hope.

I messed up my line up and left some sites off and tried to get responses at the last minute.  Vinnie from Awesomegang, showed up to hit a home run for me and scheduled each of my books on their last day of promos all on a Sunday night (for Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, so I updated the original post).  Can't expect that every time, but wow, very nice service, so thanks Vinnie!


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## Vinny OHare (May 3, 2013)

You are very welcome. It is my pleasure working with you after seeing how hard you worked to put this promo together.


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Vinny OHare said:


> You are very welcome. It is my pleasure working with you after seeing how hard you worked to put this promo together.


I love KBoards. Go Vinny!


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

My mini-promo (2 free days for The Mages of Bennamore) has been running in parallel to Salvador's, so I'll just add my numbers here for comparison.

Saturday 14th: 1404 (OHFB, BookScream, FlurriesOfWords)
Sunday 15th: 2941   (FreeBooksy, FussyLibrarian, PeopleReads + EbookDaily - unsolicited)

Total: 4345  with a best free rank of #61, and #1 in Sword & Sorcery (snuck past Salvador very late in the day)

Not sure why Sunday was so spectacular. Saturday was good, a little better than expected, but Sunday was awesome. Maybe it got picked up by some other site?? Not complaining, anyway!

ETA: the weekend cost me $203 so I feel I've definitely had my money's worth. Now for a tail... pretty please?


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

*Sun, November 15th*
_Ranger Rising, KCD 99 cents,_* Sales, 35, Best Rank=7,781*
_Black Dragon, FREE KDP Day 4/5_, *Sales 0, Free, 1,317, Best Rank=46*
_Blue Dragon, 99 cent manual_ *Sales 76, Best Rank=2,472*
BooksButterfly Combo ($80)

Those are very awesome numbers, Pauline!  Yes, indeed you snuck past me into #1, but was happy to switch places with you for the day, hehe.

So, Booksbutterfly did indeed run, just ran late and the Zon lagged a bit. This was the first day where all three books were promoted. Prior to this it was either just Ranger Rising or Ranger Rising and the free days for The Black Dragon. Today's ranking should reflect my new release around the 1.7k range that I saw it at briefly before it fell into the 2k range again.

I did receive another 1.3k free downloads and the 31 Ranger Rising KCD sales beat the opening day multi combo by 2 (it was 29).

Some quick thoughts again  the free days actually gave the new release book 2 of the series more sales with no dedicated promo than anything else. I'm guessing that lowering the price to 99 cents, with the first at free, gives any potential readers the chance to read two books for a dollar. That is a pretty low entry barrier for readers that don't know me or my work. I can see how a nice series can do well with a good promo of book 1 and maybe even book 2 in conjunction with book 1. In the future, I may just repeat the free book 1 for any new release in a series. Sever's Bookbub promo gave similar data, but on a much larger scale (read whale vs prawn here )

Still hoping for more feedback on my next cover title as well as any thoughts so far. The support posts have been wonderful so thank you all very much. Let me know if anyone sees any flaws in the promo or ideas that could have been utilized, or anything I could have done better or different.


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## Mark Tyson (Sep 22, 2014)

Great Promo Sal, 

What was cool is at one point yesterday Pauline was #1, The Black Dragon was # 2 and my Dawn of the Sacred Land was #3! You are currently at #1 and Dawn is #4. My other book, Wielder: Apprentice is #7. But alas, I did not advertise I was making them free and I only did it for Sunday and Monday so mine will fall off after today.

Good Job! 
Also, I like the article too. The Dead Druid.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Mark Tyson said:


> Great Promo Sal,
> 
> What was cool is at one point yesterday Pauline was #1, The Black Dragon was # 2 and my Dawn of the Sacred Land was #3! You are currently at #1 and Dawn is #4. My other book, Wielder: Apprentice is #7. But alas, I did not advertise I was making them free and I only did it for Sunday and Monday so mine will fall off after today.
> 
> ...


But did you get a screenshot!!??!! I did see your book in Booksends, I think so I hope you have a nice mini tail too with Pauline, I fall out after today and will be rooting for all three of our books. Next time we need to get a Kboards genre specific free giveaway, like what Patty does and corner the market for free at least for a weekend 

Thanks for the vote, we are now at 2-2


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## Mark Tyson (Sep 22, 2014)

That would be fun. We should do it for a weekend. And stop hogging our mutual editor Courtney Umphress www.courtneyumphress.com I am about to send her the next Sacred Land book and she keeps getting booked up! I think she said she is booked up for the rest of 2015. I believe one of those books has to be The Dead Druid LOL! maybe I can talk her into editing my book before the end of the year, but I'm not holding my breath haha.


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## angela65 (Oct 8, 2014)

I'll break the tie- Dead Druid.


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## Adair Hart (Jun 12, 2015)

Wow, I go away for two days and you light the rankings on fire! Maybe that is the special ingredient. I will plan to go out of town everytime you do a promo   On the cover, I like Dead Druid, since it matches with Ranger Rising. Also like the cover art, that druid looks like he is contemplating whose rear he is going to kick.

Your results for the free/.99 are encouraging and those Sunday numbers are sweet! Keep rocking it!


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Mark Tyson said:


> That would be fun. We should do it for a weekend. And stop hogging our mutual editor Courtney Umphress www.courtneyumphress.com I am about to send her the next Sacred Land book and she keeps getting booked up! I think she said she is booked up for the rest of 2015. I believe one of those books has to be The Dead Druid LOL! maybe I can talk her into editing my book before the end of the year, but I'm not holding my breath haha.


Yeah, she is getting popular nowadays LOL. We'll have to plan something, I noticed a few Kboarders all on the same top 20 page in our Fantasy genre including you, me and Pauline along with the Winemaker books. 



angela65 said:


> I'll break the tie- Dead Druid.


Thanks for making your first post and helping me Angela! 3-2 it is, favor of no article and WELCOME to Kboards! 



Adair Hart said:


> Wow, I go away for two days and you light the rankings on fire! Maybe that is the special ingredient. I will plan to go out of town everytime you do a promo  On the cover, I like Dead Druid, since it matches with Ranger Rising. Also like the cover art, that druid looks like he is contemplating whose rear he is going to kick.
> 
> Your results for the free/.99 are encouraging and those Sunday numbers are sweet! Keep rocking it!


Hehe, I don't think we need to be that drastic and get you out of town, LOL. I'm still working out the kinks in promoting, but when I do the second book of the Ranger Series, I'm thinking about letting it go off the HNR list and setting up the FREE/99 Cent with the KDP Select free days on book 1 and the KCD on book 2 to maximize the ROI. I'll go in heavy for all 5 days with maximum promoting of book 1. I'm still in shock at getting 91 downloads of a book that I didn't promote! I'm sure the whales out there routinely get more than that at full price, but for us prawns, that was awesome! 

Also, thanks for the vote, it makes it now 4-2 in favor of no article. I would like to get a lot more votes. I'm thinking maybe I need to add a poll to this thread?


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## Azalea (Mar 22, 2014)

Great promo. As always, both entertaining and informative! 

Dead Druid.


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## ufwriter (Jan 12, 2015)

Wow, fantastic results. Look at that ranking on The Blue Dragon!

As for the title of Druid, I would probably go with Dead Druid because it better matches the first book's cover. Plus, it gives the text more room to breathe.


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Salvador Mercer said:


> When I do the second book of the Ranger Series, I'm thinking about letting it go off the HNR list and setting up the FREE/99 Cent with the KDP Select free days on book 1 and the KCD on book 2 to maximize the ROI. I'll go in heavy for all 5 days with maximum promoting of book 1.


Salvador--go mate! Just so I understand, you will wait the 30 day grace period after release to then do a KCD with both books 1 and 2? If so, I may agree. For my latest: I wasn't convinced the HNR ranking (after manually dropping to $.99 at release) helped sales and would rather get the 70% royalties after the grace period. Did I get you right? Thanks as always. Your thinking is extremely logical, well planned and appreciated!


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## Bbates024 (Nov 3, 2014)

HN Wake said:


> Salvador--go mate! Just so I understand, you will wait the 30 day grace period after release to then do a KCD with both books 1 and 2? If so, I may agree. For my latest: I wasn't convinced the HNR ranking (after manually dropping to $.99 at release) helped sales and would rather get the 70% royalties after the grace period. Did I get you right? Thanks as always. Your thinking is extremely logical, well planned and appreciated!


The way I read it is after book 2 falls off the Hot New Releases list (30 Days) he is going to make book one free, for the 5 days, and then make book 2 .99 to drive people into the series. I personally love the idea, but for me I'll be doing something like that when book three comes out. I want to have something to drive the readers into that still makes me some money, granted I'm still at the point where getting new readers is the key, so maybe it wouldn't do well to wait.

When I have book two come out in January I'm going to do a freebie for book one.

I'm using this thread to figure out a little bit more on how I want to play it. I have sale going at the end of the month. I also decided to make book one in my other series free, and then am doing a step up KCD mon-turs .00 Fri-Mon 1.99. So really readers could pick up 2 books for .99.

Keep up the great posts Salvadore!


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## passerby (Oct 18, 2015)

Hi Salvador,

Just opened a couple of newsletters in my inbox and saw _The Blue Dragon_ prominently displayed (and looking great, too!) Is today the last day of the promo? I hope you achieved all you set out to do - and more!

Vanessa


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## angela65 (Oct 8, 2014)

Salvador Mercer said:


> Thanks for making your first post and helping me Angela! 3-2 it is, favor of no article and WELCOME to Kboards!


Thanks so much for the welcome, Salvador! I've been a lurker on Kboards for...ever.  I always enjoy your posts, how you give so much back, and are supportive of everybody. Congrats on the promo.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

*Mon, November 16th*
_Ranger Rising, KCD 99 cents_ *Sales 42, Best Rank=5,380k*
Booksends ($25)
SweetFreeBooks ($5)

_Black Dragon, FREE KDP Day 5/5_ *Sales 0, Free, 1,120k, Best Rank=69 in free store*
Riffle ($40)
Awesomegang.com, Pretty-hot.com, Bookreadermagazine.com, and DiscountBookMan.com (Last minute adds, THANKS Vinnie!)

_Blue Dragon, NO Promo_, *Sales, 57, Best Rank=1,959k*

*Tue, November 17th*
_Blue Dragon, 99 cent manual_ *Sales 27, Best Rank=2,219k*
Bknights ($5)

_Ranger Rising, 99 cent, KCD_ *Sales 21, Best Rank=4,013k*
Awesomegang.com, Pretty-hot.com, Bookreadermagazine.com, and DiscountBookMan.com (Last minute adds, THANKS Vinnie!)

_The Black Dragon, No Promo (Regular Price), _*Sales 18, Free, 12, Best Rank=7,700k*

*****

Sorry for missing the Monday update, didn't feel well yesterday and finally got caught up today. I posted the numbers for Monday and Tuesday. Final free giveaways ended up at 6,021k copies moved over three days or 2007k copies per day on average. Highest rank was indeed 46 in the free store staying in the top 100 once it got there.

Some thoughts...

The Bookbub blog that stated that promoting the first book of a series would result in five (5) times more impact on discounting the first book of a series than any other book is good advice. Then, right below that chart, it states that downloads at the "Free" price point result in ten (10) times more downloads than at paid. Then, the third chart right after these two state that pricing the first book at "Free", instead of 99 cents, results in eight (8 ) times more sale through than paid promotions. Added together, they summarize that an effective free campaign of the first book in a series ends up in seventeen (17) times increase in sales (I assume overall sales).

After watching Sever's Bookbub free promotion, and having my own small, mini free promotion, I am starting to think that these Bookbub folks know what they are talking about. I was prawny flabbergasted to get 18 sales of my first book that I just promoted on its first day returning to paid status at full price and the second book in the series had that 91 sales day on the first free day of book one. That was the second best sales day I've ever had for a single title (Lunar Discovery, with ENT and several good reviews, netted me 106 that day)

So what does this all mean? If you're following along, this means that I have a plan for future promos for my second and subsequent books in their next series. I now intend to use the free day promos of Select for book 1 in any of my three series and perhaps wait the thirty days to run a KCD on book 2 at the same time. This time, I'll use all five days together for free and start the KCD on day 1 of the free and let it run two more days after (7 days total).

I also suggest front loading a free promo for maximum effect. Despite the fact that the top half of the top 100 free books were all Bookbub books, this shows that with some effort, and perhaps luck, anyone can break into the top 100 in free and gain added exposure. I think that really maximizes the effectiveness of the free promo. My free book was literally either #1, or #2 in every one of its sub-categories, depending on whether or not a Bookbub book was promoted in my sub-cat that day or very recently.

Again, not really wanting to talk finances here, but the last two days I have broken personal bests in revenue collected for a single day. From Nov 1, through Nov 10, according to Book Report, I earned roughly $355. From the start of the promotion on Nov 11, through today, Nov 18 (partial day), I'm at $480 with the bulk of that coming the last two days. Nov 17th, the first day that my first book returned to regular price, I hit $97.84. My prior best was $71.28. The big reveal will be in the tail, or lack thereof and if there is a tail, how long does it last?

Ranking on all three of my fantasy genre books have them in the sub 10k range. Dragon book 1 is around 8.6k right now, Dragon book 2 is around 3.2k and the Ranger book 1 is at 5.7k. I'm sure all of them will drop as the days go by, but it was/is a very nice shot in the arm for my fantasy series/books as the first two books sort of fell off their 90 day cliffs and I wasn't sure how much interest could be revived in an older title (ok, NOT that old, but not 90 new, which is what I'm referring to for those who have books out for years and years).

I really hope this data helps, It sort of helps me to put my thoughts, experiments and experience to paper (e-post) so I am gaining some benefit and of course, it is very nice to have well wishers and that fellowship from my fellow authors. You have all been very supportive and kind.

Special shout out to Vinny, who helped me at the last minute to keep my promo from running out of gas, he set up three promos for three different books the last three days. Wonderful man to work with, very kind and helpful, a real gentleman. Also a shout out to Sever for running his Bookbub post and giving me this idea along with Pauline and her free day promos and posts and HN Wake and her Joe for their well wishes and support, especially during my Kindle Scout campaign. A last thank you to Kboards, our two mods and Harvey for allowing a place for us indies, and especially us indie prawns, to gather and share information, data and experiences. The collective wisdom here is priceless to me and a huge part of any success that I have.

I'll end up posting a final post after the 20th last promo runs with numbers on the 21st. I'll break this last one down by individual book so you can see what effect each book had on each other and how they fared independently. Hope I'm making sense here 

I think I am at 5-2 for Dead Druid over The Dead Druid. I am very grateful for the feedback, I am so 50/50 on it that I feel paralyzed on it. Also Cagnes, our own Kboarder who does my covers, prefers The Dead Druid, so that would make it more like 5-3.

Oh and yes, Bates, your summary of HN Wake's question on the promotion is correct. I tried to address that above. I also think that while the HNR list is very nice for any book, I don't think the 30 day cliff is nearly as bad as the 90 day one. Any one disagree with this? If so, the ROI can be maximized as I outlined above with a 70% KCD royalty on book 2 (or other) while book 1 is free.

Thanks again everyone, time to post this and get some dinner!


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

vprelatte said:


> Hi Salvador,
> 
> Just opened a couple of newsletters in my inbox and saw _The Blue Dragon_ prominently displayed (and looking great, too!) Is today the last day of the promo? I hope you achieved all you set out to do - and more!
> 
> Vanessa


Ah, missed some questions... One more promo on the 20th for The Blue Dragon then I up its price and promo/experiment over (it's almost over now). Thanks for your support Vanessa! 



Azalea Ellis said:


> Great promo. As always, both entertaining and informative!
> 
> Dead Druid.


Thank you Azalea! 



angela65 said:


> Thanks so much for the welcome, Salvador! I've been a lurker on Kboards for...ever.  I always enjoy your posts, how you give so much back, and are supportive of everybody. Congrats on the promo.


Thanks Angela, glad you're not lurking anymore. Do share your experiences if you care too. Great place here to be for us authors.



CadyVance said:


> Wow, fantastic results. Look at that ranking on The Blue Dragon!
> 
> As for the title of Druid, I would probably go with Dead Druid because it better matches the first book's cover. Plus, it gives the text more room to breathe.


You are too kind Cady, and one of my favorite Kboarders  I appreciate the feedback too, love your covers too btw!


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## Vinny OHare (May 3, 2013)

Great recap. I am glad to help. Between this post, Pauline's, and Server's it is full of info that will help authors for a long time.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Vinny OHare said:


> Great recap. I am glad to help. Between this post, Pauline's, and Server's it is full of info that will help authors for a long time.


Thanks Vinny, and I updated at least today's post to spell your name correctly, my sincerest apologies 

I just have the urge to type Vinnie


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## Adair Hart (Jun 12, 2015)

Salvador Mercer said:


> So what does this all mean? If you're following along, this means that I have a plan for future promos for my second and subsequent books in their next series. I now intend to use the free day promos of Select for book 1 in any of my three series and perhaps wait the thirty days to run a KCD on book 2 at the same time. This time, I'll use all five days together for free and start the KCD on day 1 of the free and let it run two more days after (7 days total).
> 
> Thanks again everyone, time to post this and get some dinner!


Awesome post man! I enjoyed a cup of coffee while catching up on your post and seeing your sales numbers.

Do you still plan to do anything for the launch of a new book similar to your other promo aka set the new book to 99 cents with promotions? I was thinking of a variation of your idea of maybe 1 free day on book 1 and a manual .99 for book 2 for a few days with promotion. Then after the price change on book 2 and 30 days out, four free days on book 1 with a full KCD on book 2. Just some thoughts I am playing around with 

Enjoy your Dinner!


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## Sever Bronny (May 13, 2013)

Congratultions, Sal, this was a great campaign


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## Northern pen (Mar 3, 2015)

Dead Druid.


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## Bbates024 (Nov 3, 2014)

I have heard from almost everyone that the 90 day cliff is the worst. So it pays especially when doing a series to get a book out once a quarter if you can manage it.

It's going to be very close on mine because of my pen name project, but hey if it's a little over I should be ok. plus with Tom Edwards rocking the cover for book 2 it should catch a ton of eyes.

I'm going to share my promotional stuff in this thread at the end of next week. Just to kind of keep it in one place and not have too many new promo threads. Plus I like to piggyback of Salvador whenever possible! I followed him through Kindle Scout and beyond!

Awesome promo buddy, and thanks for tying in the bookbub stuff. I hope I can get one of those someday!


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## Vinny OHare (May 3, 2013)

Salvador I am the youngest of 6, I answer to whatever name they call at the dinner bell. I actually spell it both ways so it is no big deal


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Ridiculously helpful post, as always, Salvador!  First, I'm sorry you aren't feeling well.  Hope you recover soon.  Second, congrats on your fab run.  So fun to watch you soar in the rankings!  Third, great news on the $ side of things.  Personal bests are so rewarding and it's nice to see you recoup big for such an enormous effort.  Fourth, your findings re: new strategy for launches aka Salvador Launch Strategy aka SLS    (waiting 30 days = first novel free for 5 days + second novel KCD for 7 days) is my new normal.  

Big thanks for experimenting and especially for sharing.  It's all very clear in my mind now.    

Go, tail, go!!

Adair: I'm pretty sure some of the promo sites require that a book hasn't been at a reduced price for a certain time beforehand.  Not sure how that impacts your thinking.

Bates: I should have tagged along on Salvador's other promo post!  Great idea.    All in one place is awesome.

Kboards rocks it today.


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## Bbates024 (Nov 3, 2014)

11/23/15 Read Cheaply Fantasy 0.00

11/24/15 GenrePulse Fantasy 18.00

11/24/15 Awesomegang 0.00

11/25/15 eBookSoda Fantasy 27.00 This included being posted on their FB and Twitter.

11/25/15 Bargain Booksy Young Adult 25.00

11/25/15 ENT Fantasy 25.00

I think I also got a free spot on Choosy Bookworm but am Not 100% sure. I really wanted to do a Fussy librarian but when I started booking these they were already full for those dates, so maybe next time. I was also turned down by Robin Reads and Bookbub. The book will be .99 Monday through Thursday and then 1.99 Friday-Monday. I'll also be sending out an email to the about 1200 folks I have signed up. Thanks to the Ipad promotion from the Kindle giveaway team found here on Kboards.

During this time I have also updated the back matter to reflect that the first book in my spin-off series is free Mon-Friday. I'm not doing nay paid advertising for the free book.

Tiny bit of background for this book for November my highest day of sales was 34 my lowest 11 although today I'm at 7 so that could change.  Then for page reads My best day was 12248 and my lowest day was 2835. For rankings my best was on 10/30/15 at 1306 right now I'm hovering around 3k. This will be the first sale ever for the book.


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Good luck, Bates!  I hope you kill it.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

*Wed, November 18th*
_The Blue Dragon, 99 cent, manual_ *Sales 19, Best Rank=2,706k*
Awesomegang.com, Pretty-hot.com, Bookreadermagazine.com, and DiscountBookMan.com (Last minute adds, THANKS Vinnie!)

Ranger Rising: *Sales 1, Best Rank=4,457k*
Black Dragon: *Sales 7, Best Rank=5,830k*

Ok, almost over, thanks for hanging in there for so long 

Quick observation that my three fantasy books held ranks in the 2k, 4k and 5k ranges for highs yesterday  Another benefit that is not obvious (my fault) is that my page reads have started to climb for all three books. Today I am literally at my second best ever sitting at 7,971k pages read for all four books (Best was Oct 4, at 8,495k). I'm hoping that I can break 8.5k tonight (not holding my breath, but hoping). 

I like seeing your promo next week Bates, sounds good. I only have one more promo day tomorrow for The Blue Dragon (my new release) with Riffle. I made most of my comments and observations yesterday. I'll save my final thoughts for this weekend and hopefully report on a tail. A nice side effect was three reviews today in three different books, all five stars (Thank Agon!) 

Oh and Dead Druid=6, The Dead Druid=3 (so far?)

One more day then the tail and final thoughts. Thanks everyone!


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## Lisa Blackwood (Feb 1, 2015)

Congrats! Still holding down some great ranks on amazon. Go tail, go!


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## Bbates024 (Nov 3, 2014)

Salvador Mercer said:


> *Wed, November 18th*
> _The Blue Dragon, 99 cent, manual_ *Sales 19, Best Rank=2,706k*
> Awesomegang.com, Pretty-hot.com, Bookreadermagazine.com, and DiscountBookMan.com (Last minute adds, THANKS Vinnie!)
> 
> ...


Such an awesome promo! Those results couldn't have happened to a better guy and one that works hard at his craft.

Man, those page reads are nothing to sneeze at when you are in KU I'd love to get to the point where I could average somewhere in the 10k-20k range daily. It's not happening now but with more books coming out and some advertising I'm hoping that at some point next year I could get there. (Maybe) If I can that might be just enough to not have to go back to the day job. (ultimate goal) This month I'm probably going to come in around 6k a day, maybe more depending on if the promo bumps them up.


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## A Woman&#039;s Place Is In The Rebellion (Apr 28, 2011)

Congrats, Salvador. Glad it's going well for you!


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## Adair Hart (Jun 12, 2015)

HN Wake said:


> Adair: I'm pretty sure some of the promo sites require that a book hasn't been at a reduced price for a certain time beforehand. Not sure how that impacts your thinking.


Hmm, I had not factored that in, but will check on that. Appreciate the heads up!

Congratulations on the page reads Salvador! Hope your tail goes well and looking forward to your final thoughts.


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## James R Wells (May 21, 2015)

Just want to say thanks to Salvador for sharing great info, which I always read carefully.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

*Thu, November 19th*
NO Promotions

Ranger Rising: *Sales 1, Best Rank=6,505k*
Black Dragon: *Sales 12, Best Rank=6,134k*
Blue Dragon: *Sales 17, Best Rank=3,364*

No promo yesterday. Sales for the free book jumped up from 7 the prior day to 12 and the rank is slipping on most of them, but still very nice.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

A picture is worth a thousand words. I prefer to spend them thousand on my latest WIP. Here you go:










The bottom of the climb is the first of three days free. Went from 500 or less pages read per day to over 2k in a steady climb. This is what the free promo did for one book. (The FREE book, just to be clear here).

Now for the next thousand words...










This is the chart for all my books. Key metric here is that my KU2 page reads went from roughly 2.5k per day to 7.5k per day or a threefold increase. I'm assuming that page reads go up for free promos? This is my first real experience with it. Thought I'd share the graphs since they involve page reads and I really haven't touched much on that facet of this promo and now, after seeing this data, I realize that it is a pretty important component to both revenue and in assessing the promo itself (at least for those who are in Select).

Hope this helps.


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## Guest (Nov 21, 2015)

Nice!


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## Bbates024 (Nov 3, 2014)

Man, that's a pretty chart. The page reads is a huge bonus, and those days at over 100 units are pretty spectacular. I'm super happy for you. People really underestimate the power of page reads, from what I can tell the help me more then sales with my rankings, granted I'm not selling over 20 copies a day most days, and the money adds up. If you can average 5000 pages read a day that is 750 bucks a month at .005, not a bad little take and if you can do 10k a day with some sales you are on your staying home (At least I would be). I see those numbers and I think that is a pretty obtainable goal, especially when I know we have authors on Kboards that get between 100k and 500k a day.

Awesome promo Salvador. Update us after next week and let us know if you had a tail.

I decided to do a little freebie promo with my pen name as well so I'm going to have all kinds of data soon.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

What great results, Salvador. 

And a belated vote for _Dead Druid_. Even with the issue of matching _Ranger Rising_, I like it better without the article.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Thanks everyone.  I intend to update tomorrow and Sunday then I'll go weekly if anyone is still interested.

We are at 7-3 for Dead Druid, no article.


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## Nicholas Erik (Sep 22, 2015)

Thanks for sharing all the detailed info, Salvador. It's extremely generous.

Free runs w/ promo do spike page reads. I ran a BookBub that hit #1 on the free chart and that series was getting 25k+ per day for a couple weeks. Of course, that all drifts off and eventually evaporates, unless your book attains the mythical stickiness. 

Nick


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## Bbates024 (Nov 3, 2014)

Ok so in my head I like the sound of "The Dead Druid" better, on the cover I like "Dead Druid" better. I think the text just looks cleaner.


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## passerby (Oct 18, 2015)

Bbates024 said:


> Such an awesome promo! Those results couldn't have happened to a better guy and one that works hard at his craft.


Ditto.


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## Dan D. Lion (Nov 2, 2015)

Congratulations on your results! Hard job setting up all those promotions!

So, if you didn't have $616 to spend, where would you concentrate your dollars? Let's say you had $100...

Thanks so much and Happy Thanksgiving! ~


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

*Fri, November 20th*
_Blue Dragon, 99 cent manual_ *Sales 19, Best Rank=3,564k*
Riffle ($40)

This was from the last day, Friday.



Nicholas Erik said:


> Thanks for sharing all the detailed info, Salvador. It's extremely generous.
> 
> Free runs w/ promo do spike page reads. I ran a BookBub that hit #1 on the free chart and that series was getting 25k+ per day for a couple weeks. Of course, that all drifts off and eventually evaporates, unless your book attains the mythical stickiness.
> 
> Nick


I noticed it always seems to drift off, at least for this author. Bookbub right now is pretty much a wish for most of us newer authors. The few that have gotten them to date, and are relatively newer authors, seem to have pretty solid books out, good blurbs, covers and reviews and usually on more than just the Amazon platform. Sever had a great free giveaway and he did very well with his Bookbub. Having said that, he was doing very well for a newer author period. It was helpful to me to see what he was up to.



Bbates024 said:


> Ok so in my head I like the sound of "The Dead Druid" better, on the cover I like "Dead Druid" better. I think the text just looks cleaner.


Well, not quite sure how to score that, perhaps 1 each, so 8-4? 



Dan D. Lion said:


> Congratulations on your results! Hard job setting up all those promotions!
> 
> So, if you didn't have $616 to spend, where would you concentrate your dollars? Let's say you had $100...
> 
> Thanks so much and Happy Thanksgiving! ~


Thanks and that is a hard question. I think each promo site could perform differently based on the genre, day of week, time of year etc. Having said that, I'd have to go with the following for my genre:

For a PAID, 99 cent book promo:

ENT, $20
BooksButterfly, $15
BookBarbarian, $15
Robin Reads, $15
Awesomegang, $10
Bknights, $5
Fussy Librarian, $10
SweetFreeBooks, $5
BookScream, $0, $3, or $10

Total Spend, $95 ($98 or $105)

This is just my opinion of the best ROI for a paid promo in my genre (Fantasy). If I want to move copies, gain in ranking and ROI isn't the only factor, and I am not limited to only a C note, then I'd add the following promo sites as well:

Booksends, $25
BargainBooksy, $40
OHFB, $75
ChoosyBookworm, $25
Ebook Soda, $15
EbookHounds, $10
GenrePulse, $40
FKBT, $15
EbookHunter, $15
PixelScroll, $15
ReadCheaply, $15 (Free for limited time if you can get it)
ReadFreely, $0 (Free with link to their site on your site)
BookHippo, $0 (Free if your book has UK reviews and you can get a slot)
BettyBookFreak, $8

I'm sure I'm forgetting a few. This list is also pretty basic and has caveats with it. For example, GenrePulse usually is good for a 20% discount code so I usually pay $32 when I use them. Also the quoted prices are for paid/guaranteed features. Some have free submissions, but no guarantees that your book will run. There are new release spots too for some sites. BookScream has a featured author position for $10 and up to six books at one time making the ROI pretty good, BooksButterfly has a prorated refund policy making them pretty safe for hitting targets and ROI assessments, etc.

I think each author has to decide what the objective is. I didn't try to make a "Free" promo list because I only have experience with this the one time. I've actually had four paid promos since April, so I have an idea of what promo sites work for me, and which ones don't. YMMV of course.

I'll wait a week and report on any possible tail, or lack thereof. Thanks everyone for the support! Hoping my long fourth promo run helped with your data collection and site assessments. I really enjoyed working with Vinny from Awesomegang and Abhi from BooksButterfly. Bridget at ENT, Jay at Choosy, Michael at FKBT, and Chloe from BargainBooksy. This has just been my personal experience, I'm sure others have different ones, both positive and negative.

Enjoy your Sunday!


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## Bbates024 (Nov 3, 2014)

Ascendancy The Arena

11/23/15 Read Cheaply Fantasy 0.00 and my mailing list about 1400 people mostly obtained from doing the free kindle giveaway. Probably more like 35 people organically.

*Totals 50 sales at .99 and 7762 page reads Rank starting maybe around 3k finished at 1660 went from in the fifties to 30 in Swords and Sorcery and from 50 to 38 in coming of age.*

Perspective wise yesterday I had 24 sales at 2.99 and 6654 page reads. Average for the month is probably closer to 15-17 sales and 6k page reads a day.

I also made the first book in my spinoff series free today and am not doing any advertising except in the back of my .99 book and on my mailing list. People downloaded 81 copies so far and it hit #9 in the free store for historical fiction.

I have the first book in a romance free this week under my pen name and I can say book butterfly is rocking that one. 355 free units moved and it had zero sales or reviews going in. 

11/24/15 GenrePulse Fantasy 18.00 (31 Clicks) so far

11/24/15 Awesomegang 0.00 Didn't run, maybe I messed up, could have sworn the confirmed. Never had an issue before so I'm going with I missed something there.

*Starting Rank today 11/24/15, 1575 overall, 28 in Swords and Sorcery. 35 in Coming of Age (Woke up to 4 sales and 2592 page reads).*
*End of Day 1781, 35 in S&S, 36 in Coming of Age, 46 sales and 6549 page reads.*
Pen name is still going strong top ten in Science Fiction Romance (free)(trying not to out myself for the pen name) and my other free book is #8 in historical fiction (free).

11/25/15 eBookSoda Fantasy 27.00 This included being posted on their FB and Twitter.

11/25/15 Bargain Booksy Young Adult 25.00

11/25/15 ENT Fantasy 25.00

Also doing an email blast to those that didn't open my first email.

*Starting Rank today 11/25/15, 1615 overall, 32 in Swords and Sorcery. 38 in Coming of Age (Woke up to 8 sales and 2946 page reads).*
* Daily Total 1472 28 in S&S, 33 in COA, 67 sales and 6806 page reads*
As a side effect of making book one in the spin-off series free, I have had more sales in the second book of that series it is now in the top 100 in Dark Fantasy and Historical fantasy and sitting around 10k overall.
The pen name is hanging on to a top ten in Science fiction Romance (free), and my free fantasy book is number 12 in historical fiction with no advertising outside of the mailing list.
For some reason I had one hundred books sold in my head for this day I ended up with 73 sales and 97 free across all my titles, It was my best day pure volume wise since I started, so I count it as a win.

Today 11-26-15, I woke up to a very pleasant surprise in my rankings.

*Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,149 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
#23 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Fantasy > Sword & Sorcery
#24 in Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Fantasy > Sword & Sorcery
#25 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Fantasy > Coming of Age*

Thanksgiving numbers No Advertisements
*Rank 1521 30 in S&S 33 in COA 36 sales and 4233 page reads.*
*My free spin-off book is 14 in Historical Fiction and 44 in Dark Fantasy, and my SyFy Romance is still in the top 10 of the free store.*

*Black Friday Arena Price Increased from .99 to 1.99
30 sales and 4708 page reads Rank 1842, 37 in COA and 39 in S&S*
I finished in the top ten for SYFY Romance for my Pen Name and In the top twelve for my spin-off. (Subcategories, Highest in the free store total was 300). I also had two days in a row of 6 sales on the second book in my spin off at 2.99

Saturday Arena is still 1.99 all of my free books are done with their promos
6 sales and 2510 pages reads so far.

That should wrap it up.

On my big day I had hoped to move closer to a hundred books, but all in, all I am happy with my first .99 promotion I moved over 200 books. Since the name of the game is bringing in new readers right now, I would call that a success.

When the second book comes out I'll do my first ever free promotion on Arena hopefully I can score a bookbub for that if not I'll be doing the same thing I did here but with more sites. I guess we will see what the rest of the weekend brings in at 1.99 for Arena and then how that effects sales when it goes back to 2.99 on Monday.

Penname got a chance to get off the ground, the spinoff brought in new readers and over 200 books went out at .99 followed by 30 at 1.99. I really couldn't have asked for much more. I hope the numbers I have shown in some way help someone else that is trying to line up so advertising.


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## Northern pen (Mar 3, 2015)

Salvador Mercer said:


> *Fri, November 20th*
> _Blue Dragon, 99 cent manual_ *Sales 19, Best Rank=3,564k*
> Riffle ($40)
> 
> ...


Salvador has a pretty good list there for $100 options. It would depend on if you promoting a new release or something you've had out a while. Some of the best ones like book barbarian require reviews.

I'd probably have bargainbooksy and Booksbutterfly as my anchor promo's if it was a new release. BKnights on fiverr is a mandatory one as well.


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Thanks Salvador and Robyn for the great lists!  

Bates--good luck tmrw with the big hitters.


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## Bbates024 (Nov 3, 2014)

Updated on page five with stats from a smaller promotion that I ran. I'll get and end of day today and tomorrow just to round them out.

Hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving!


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Interesting to see Bates and I'd like to also say HAPPY THANKSGIVING to everyone at Kboards!


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## Vinny OHare (May 3, 2013)

BBates I just went and looked at why you said your book didn't run on Awesomegang on the 24th. Actually it did run but wasn't selected for the newsletter. We don't put free submission books that submit with affiliate links into the newsletter. The software rejects them and we have to process them manually.


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## Vinny OHare (May 3, 2013)

Bbates - Just sent out a social media blast for you. Happy Thanksgiving.


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## Bbates024 (Nov 3, 2014)

Ahh, I figured it was something I did. I did the paid one under my pen name must have just flip-flopped them in my head! Vinny as always you are a rockstar!


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## Vinny OHare (May 3, 2013)

Bbates024 said:


> Ahh, I figured it was something I did. I did the paid one under my pen name must have just flip-flopped them in my head! Vinny as always you are a rockstar!


If you want to dm me the pen name book title I will take a look at that also. This football game is boring and need something to do lol.


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## Bbates024 (Nov 3, 2014)

The good news is I saw that one go out in the newsletter so we are all set!


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## Bbates024 (Nov 3, 2014)

I added my final thoughts to my post on Page five. I really do hope those numbers help someone with their own advertising. Just like a lot of folks here I'm still trying to figure this whole thing out.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Bbates024 said:


> I added my final thoughts to my post on Page five. I really do hope those numbers help someone with their own advertising. Just like a lot of folks here I'm still trying to figure this whole thing out.


I agree with your thoughts/observations, right now for us newbies, getting some branding going, eyes on the books, a modicum of name recognition for those readers in our genres are very important. I think your book is doing just fine without the promotion, but as you stated, you moved a couple hundred copies and hopefully a few of those will be life long fans. That is the real key I think and you seem to be right on target


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## passerby (Oct 18, 2015)

Hi Salvador,

Just wanted to say" thank you" for sharing your promo strategy and results.  I had no idea how to do a "stacked" promo until I saw how you did yours.  I went ahead and did a two-day free promo on November 24-25 and got over 3,000 downloads.  Now I am experiencing the "tail" effect, which is really gratifying.  So thank you again for leading the way and showing me how it's done!

Vanessa


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Very happy to hear that, but for the record, I'm adding a bit of 'Salvador' flavor to the collective wisdom here on these boards which came before me.  I think I was hoping my data would be recent, helpful and relevant and it sounds like it was, so I'm glad I shared.

I probably have read close to a hundred promo threads this year, going back a year or two when I couldn't find any that were fresh.  It is a wealth of information.  You have good reviews on your book and a good start.  I read a bit of your inside and it flows wonderfully.  Key is to get more than one book out there so that when readers find one of yours they have something else to turn to.

You're in the right place, keep posting, sharing and learning, and most importantly, keep writing.


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## passerby (Oct 18, 2015)

Thank you for your positive words about my book. Most kind of you to take a look inside and give me some feedback!
I'm almost two-thirds of the way through my second book in the Cimarron-Melbourne series. I'm hoping to have it finished by the end of the year. Then off to be edited and proofread, formatted, etc. I'm hoping to launch it by late February or early March. Meanwhile, I saved three of my free days for _When the Tiger Kills_, and I plan on using them at the end of my current enrollment period, with an announcement that Book Two will be coming up shortly. Maybe I should do a Pre-Order? Then, after Book Two is launched, I'm going to take a page out of your book, wait thirty days, and then do concurrent promos, offering Book One for free and Book Two for .99. Meanwhile, I plan to do some giveaways of Book One. Definitely on Goodreads, and maybe on Rafflecopter as well? I also need to work on getting my webpage up and ready. Much, much to do!

Other people I need to thank, just in case they are watching this thread: 
1. Anma Natsu: Her thread entitled "Aisuru's Super Stacked 99 Cent Promo (Yes, Another Promo Thread)" was the first I ever saw. It was very helpful.
2. Patty Jansen: I was agonizing about giving my book away for free. I just couldn't bring myself to do it. Then I read a thread started by another author who was going through the same thing. Many people responded with good advice, but Patty's reply really struck me. She talked about using the first book to "addict your readers" and make them want more; also about using it as a "loss leader", making your profits on the later books in the series. She was so clear, and she made so much sense that I finally decided to do it!


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Good info.  I just want to clarify my next step here...

When I am done with the second book, in my second series, I'll publish it with the paperback at the same time.  Then, I'll notify both my fans, etc. but I will wait 30 days and line up a good promo on book 1 for free, and use my KCD for 70% royalties to maximize my ROI for the new release.  If I can wing it, I'll get a couple of great ROI sites for the KCD book 2, but focus on book 1 similar to what I did here and I'll promo book 1 for 5 free days and then use 7 days on the KCD for book two, both to start at the same time.

The overall goal this time is to work on maximizing the ROI as promoting a free book isn't cheap.  What really sold me was the big free day that resulted in 91 sales of my second book (first series) with NO promotion.  I had one day with ENT with 106 sales on book 3 (sci-fi genre), after that my prior best sales day was 82.  91 blew that out of the water and really demonstrated to me the power of free.

OMG, I am such a prawn  

Good luck Vanessa!

PS: If this works, then that may be my 'recipe' moving forward.  I would like to settle in a bit and not have to experiment so much. (It gets expensive LOL).

PSS: Watch the dragon soar, still sub 10k two weeks later!    (Though the Zon God of the Abyss is trying mightily hard to pull it back down into the oblivion, known to us indies as obscurity).


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