# For those making good sales, have they just stopped for you...



## ChristopherDavidPetersen (Mar 24, 2011)

For those making good sales, have they just stopped for you... like they did for me?

It's so strange. I've been doing well with sales (between $3k-$5k/month), then yesterday - nothing. In the past two days, I've sold literally nothing, as if a switch just suddenly turned off. I've checked my other channels (B&N, Kobo) and found sales to be the same. It's only Amazon that has come to a complete stop.

At first I thought that maybe sales haven't caught up yet as sometimes this happens with Amazon's reporting, but the anticipated flood of sales never materialized. Even more disturbing are the rankings on my books: they're all tumbling (something that doesn't happen if there's a lag in reporting).

I can only speculate that Amazon has once again "tweaked something." It's also the MAIN reason I'll NEVER put all my eggs in the Amazon basket (prime). They're just too unstable an organization.

So is anyone else experiencing similar sales patterns?


----------



## Skye Hunter (Apr 30, 2013)

It could be just the lull of the slow sales season. Once the warm weather comes, sales drop off a clip from Mid May - whenever it gets cold again.


----------



## Marti talbott (Apr 19, 2011)

I actually had a slow week and a good day yesterday. However, I don't expect much on weekends when most people in Select make their books free. My top selling days are now usually during the week.


----------



## Ty Johnston (Jun 19, 2009)

Christopher, I wish you luck. The same thing happened to me a while back and I've never fully recovered on Amazon. The good news is Amazon now only accounts for about 30 percent of my writing income, so I'm not as dependent upon one company.

I'm not sure it's an algorithm change with Amazon, but might simply be a push off some sales list ... the also-boughts, a top 100 list, etc.


----------



## Incognita (Apr 3, 2011)

I haven't noticed any real change. There are minor fluctuations from day to day, but overall my sales have been plugging along at a decent rate this month.


----------



## EC Sheedy (Feb 24, 2011)

My sales started the month okay, then dropped off dramatically in the last three/four days. I'm not a great seller, but until now I've been experiencing some steady growth, but May...    My titles are only on Amazon.


----------



## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

ChristopherDavidPetersen said:


> For those making good sales, have they just stopped for you... like they did for me?
> 
> It's so strange. I've been doing well with sales (between $3k-$5k/month), then yesterday - nothing. In the past two days, I've sold literally nothing, as if a switch just suddenly turned off. I've checked my other channels (B&N, Kobo) and found sales to be the same. It's only Amazon that has come to a complete stop.
> 
> ...


Not this time, but it has happened to me before. Sometimes it's just around the 10th to 15th of the month when Amazon starts working out royalties etc that its system grinds to a halt, sometimes it's a change to their search engine and also bots etc. Thank God nothing has happened to mine this month as I am trying to watch results after a bookbub promo.


----------



## Guest (May 13, 2013)

Maybe it's just Lady Luck at work. With Amazon, this answer is as good as any other.


----------



## scottmarlowe (Apr 22, 2010)

Maybe just b/c of Mother's Day weekend?

I know I didn't get any writing in since my mom was visiting from out of town, but then I did get a lot of reading in. ;-)


----------



## Lisa J. Yarde (Jul 15, 2010)

Definitely, but there's also been an odd uptick in paperback vs. ebooks. Not clue why, not complaining.


----------



## Willo (May 10, 2013)

ChristopherDavidPetersen said:


> It's so strange. I've been doing well w It's also the MAIN reason I'll NEVER put all my eggs in the Amazon basket (prime). They're just too unstable an organization.


I've experienced changes with another pen name, and I have the same concerns about Amazon being too unstable to focus on exclusively. The algorithm changes are a major drawback for indies publishing through kdp.



Lisa J. Yarde said:


> Definitely, but there's also been an odd uptick in paperback vs. ebooks. Not clue why, not complaining.


Could be the ridonkulously high pricing "method" trad publishers have stuck with. Their hopes to reverse the tide might finally be paying off for them.


----------



## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

My sales are holding steady as they always do.  They virtually never go up into big spikes, but they hold at steady levels...or have historically since about the fall of 2011.  So I don't know what is with these mythic slow months/big months people always talk about.  I sell around the same numbers every month.  Go figure.  I can't explain any of this.


----------



## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

Lisa J. Yarde said:


> Definitely, but there's also been an odd uptick in paperback vs. ebooks. Not clue why, not complaining.


Paperbacks make great mother's day gifts. 

I have seen a bit of a drop in the last week.


----------



## David Adams (Jan 2, 2012)

Slight drop in the last couple of days, on the back of generally poor sales this month and last.


----------



## JFHilborne (Jan 22, 2011)

I notice a trend like that about once a month where nothing moves for a day or two, and then the sales kick in again. I always assumed Amazon hadn't included my books in any of their promotional pushes on the days when it happened.


----------



## Ty Johnston (Jun 19, 2009)

Willo said:


> I've experienced changes with another pen name, and I have the same concerns about Amazon being too unstable to focus on exclusively. The algorithm changes are a major drawback for indies publishing through kdp.


Exactly. Whenever I bring this up, someone usually tells me something like, "you're doing it wrong." Okay, fine, but I've never had this problem at any of the other sites where my e-books are available. Steady and regular sales elsewhere, but with Amazon I have the occasional big drops for some reason unknown to me.


----------



## Fictionista (Sep 14, 2012)

Mine have dropped way off compared to last month, my first full month being self published. In April I was averaging 5 - 8 books a day (which I know is a drop in the bucket compared to some) and since this month began, there have been two to three days in a row with zero sales..and then a trickle of sales here and there...


----------



## mrv01d (Apr 4, 2011)

Check to be sure you haven't been filtered.  Abrupt cessation of sales can be a sign. Go to Sales Rank Express and enter the ASIN for your book. If it says ADULT after your title you've been filtered. You can appeal, but the mere act of filtering cuts all the also bot links and divorces you from search results. Even if they do remove it, your book will likely still be doa b/c they don't set your book back to where it was.

Yes they mostly filter erotica, but other genres do get hit.

M


----------



## wolfrom (May 26, 2012)

My Amazon US sales have fallen way lower than ever before just over the past day or so, from a rank of 15k-20k down to 40k. UK and CA are doing okay, better than before...

It's all very strange. But I've given up on understanding why, and I'm going to wait until Book Two comes out in June before I get back to weeping.


----------



## Fictionista (Sep 14, 2012)

mrv01d said:


> Check to be sure you haven't been filtered. Abrupt cessation of sales can be a sign. Go to Sales Rank Express and enter the ASIN for your book. If it says ADULT after your title you've been filtered. You can appeal, but the mere act of filtering cuts all the also bot links and divorces you from search results. Even if they do remove it, your book will likely still be doa b/c they don't set your book back to where it was.
> 
> Yes they mostly filter erotica, but other genres do get hit.
> 
> M


Thanks for the helpful tip. I had no idea about any such thing. Now mind you, my books aren't erotica, but rather, erotic romance but I suppose those probably fall into the same category as well.

I went to Sales rank express and typed in my ASIN but am unsure what I should be looking for as an indicator I've been filtered?


----------



## SEAN H. ROBERTSON (Mar 14, 2011)

Thanks for the filter tip. Just discovered my romance erotica book has bee  filtered as adult.  My sales are doing great...53 between USA & U.K. since May 1st release!


----------



## mrv01d (Apr 4, 2011)

Fictionista said:


> Thanks for the helpful tip. I had no idea about any such thing. Now mind you, my books aren't erotica, but rather, erotic romance but I suppose those probably fall into the same category as well.
> 
> I went to Sales rank express and typed in my ASIN but am unsure what I should be looking for as an indicator I've been filtered?


You'll see ADULT next to your title. If you don't see it, you're not filtered.

M


----------



## mrv01d (Apr 4, 2011)

SEAN H. ROBERTSON said:


> Thanks for the filter tip. Just discovered my romance erotica book has bee filtered as adult. My sales are doing great...53 between USA & U.K. since May 1st release!


You may have been filtered upon publication which isn't quite as devastating as being removed from general search and losing your also bots.

M


----------



## Quiss (Aug 21, 2012)

Not a single sale since yesterday evening. That doesn't happen very often. Glad I'm not the only one.


----------



## Al Dente (Sep 3, 2012)

My sales have completely stopped as of today. My latest book has been holding steady at roughly 5k in the rankings all month. Yesterday, I managed to get 11 sales, most of which came later in the evening (my average on that book is 20 - 24 a day). I thought it was the holiday, but as of this morning, I have ONE sale and my ranking dropped into the 12k range. I hope whatever weirdness has just happened corrects itself soon.


----------



## scottmarlowe (Apr 22, 2010)

I had 1 overnight and 1 this morning, which is about my usual pace right now.


----------



## CoraBuhlert (Aug 7, 2011)

My COM and UK sales have been slow this month, but Amazon Germany is doing great for me this month.


----------



## Quiss (Aug 21, 2012)

Okay, seriously?

I have never gone without a single sale for more than a day since I started publishing through Amazon.
Is it just me?  This just can't be right!  I might be in denial, or something, but this just seems too odd.


----------



## P.C. (Peter) Anders (Feb 6, 2013)

ChristopherDavidPetersen said:


> For those making good sales, have they just stopped for you... like they did for me?
> 
> It's so strange. I've been doing well with sales (between $3k-$5k/month),


$3k-$5k is like the moon, for me: stupendous, congratulations.
I do think it's just one of those inexplicable things. My sales have slowed in the past 2 days, but, such as they are, May has been mildly better than last month, all thanks to the lift of one book. I am still doing much, much worse on Apple & Nook; Amazon accounts for the lion's share, around 75% or more, of my sales.


----------



## valeriec80 (Feb 24, 2011)

I actually am in a small slump right now. I'm looking at maybe selling 500 books this month, which is not a great month for me.

However, I have been up and down like crazy. The first couple times you go through a bit slow down, it's really scary. And there is no guarantee that things will get better. 

You've got to get yourself to a place where you can be okay with that--with the sheer uncertainty of the whole thing. It's the only way to maintain sanity. 

Hope this is just a temporary slow down for you. A new release or a promo or something will get you back up again at some point, maybe even higher than you've been in the past. If you wait long enough, something amazing is sure to happen. Just hold on until then.


----------



## Vera Nazarian (Jul 1, 2011)

mrv01d said:


> Check to be sure you haven't been filtered. Abrupt cessation of sales can be a sign. Go to Sales Rank Express and enter the ASIN for your book. If it says ADULT after your title you've been filtered. You can appeal, but the mere act of filtering cuts all the also bot links and divorces you from search results. Even if they do remove it, your book will likely still be doa b/c they don't set your book back to where it was.
> 
> Yes they mostly filter erotica, but other genres do get hit.
> 
> M


What and where is Sales Rank Express?

I cant find it in Author Central.


----------



## Mel Comley (Oct 13, 2010)

Sorry to hear that Chris, have you booked an ad with ENT or POI lately? Are all your books priced at $2.99? Can you offer one at $0.99 to hook new readers maybe, hon?


----------



## Quiss (Aug 21, 2012)

Well, I woke up to a bunch of overnight sales.
It really does seem like something was holding them up and then they got posted to my sales all at once. What a way to mess up your ranks


----------



## ChristopherDavidPetersen (Mar 24, 2011)

Quiss said:


> What a way to mess up your ranks


Amen, Sister! lol...

Same happened here. I had a flood of sales, but now all my rankings suck (relatively speaking). I'm holding my breath, hoping these sales last


----------



## Andrew Ashling (Nov 15, 2010)

ChristopherDavidPetersen said:


> Amen, Sister! lol...
> 
> Same happened here. I had a flood of sales, but now all my rankings suck (relatively speaking). I'm holding my breath, hoping these sales last


I had the same thing happening, but it started somewhat later.

I still had one of my books I hadn't bought myself, so I did&#8230; two hours ago. Still hasn't shown up.

Even if sales show up in a few hours (touching wood), my rankings are borked.

Could be a server problem or one of Amazon's little experiments. Either way I'm beginning to feel more and more like a lab-rat. 

ETA:

I also didn't receive the customary email to confirm my purchase. When I looked into my account, "your orders" it says, "Your order is being processed," although I downloaded the book more than two hours ago. This means it is almost certain that Amazon is having a good sales day and is taking away processor power from the reporting end.


----------



## Error404 (Sep 6, 2012)

My sales have been in spurts, but I've been selling 2-14 books most every day this month so this curse hasn't rubbed off on me yet


----------



## ChristopherDavidPetersen (Mar 24, 2011)

Andrew Ashling said:


> Even if sales show up in a few hours (touching wood), my rankings are borked.
> 
> Could be a server problem or one of Amazon's little experiments. Either way I'm beginning to feel more and more like a lab-rat.


Amazon is the only channel I've ever had a problem with. It's funny... they want exclusivity but don't provide a stable environment to attract it. In essence, they cut their nose off to spite themselves. I'm certain Amazon loses a tremendous amount of cash, simply because of the roller coaster ride they create. Just imagine how much larger and more powerful they'd become if those they did business with felt secure dealing with them.


----------



## Al Dente (Sep 3, 2012)

Unfortunately, I still haven't recovered. I ended up getting a whopping 6 sales yesterday and 4 today, which cannot be correct. I have never seen a book drop that far in a matter of a day or two. At least, I've never seen one of my books do that. Oh well. I'm releasing a new book today or tomorrow in hopes that it will help me get another boost.


----------



## HeidiHall (Sep 5, 2010)

Mel Comley said:


> Sorry to hear that Chris, have you booked an ad with ENT or POI lately? Are all your books priced at $2.99? Can you offer one at $0.99 to hook new readers maybe, hon?


Sorry, this is totally off topic, but, Mel, I just noticed your new covers... LOVE THEM!!!

As for sales, this is my third year of doing this indie thing and I had already prepared for the slump. Weird that Quiss is seeing a complete lack of sales, but a slowdown is inevitable without a manual marketing push during this time of the year (I'm not going to bother until my next book is out). Good luck peeps! Don't panic too much, there is a normal ebb and flow to the cycle. Stop checking those reports and go write more!!! (Now I need to take my own advice!)


----------



## Ty Johnston (Jun 19, 2009)

ChristopherDavidPetersen said:


> Amazon is the only channel I've ever had a problem with. It's funny... they want exclusivity but don't provide a stable environment to attract it.


Yep. Yep. Yep. I couldn't have said it better.


----------



## Guest (May 15, 2013)

Well, time to join the club. First night without any sales in a very long time. Kind of a bummer.


----------



## CarolineJaneWetherby (May 8, 2013)

mrv01d said:


> Check to be sure you haven't been filtered. Abrupt cessation of sales can be a sign. Go to Sales Rank Express and enter the ASIN for your book. If it says ADULT after your title you've been filtered. You can appeal, but the mere act of filtering cuts all the also bot links and divorces you from search results. Even if they do remove it, your book will likely still be doa b/c they don't set your book back to where it was.


Thank you for this information. I've just checked on SalesRankExpress, and two of my books are listed as Adult. This is strange. One of them is 'A Private Collection' (the second book of a four volume novel), and this in fact contains less erotic content than the others. The other is a (short) novel I've recently published, which is indeed designed to be 'adult'. Can't work out why they've selected these two, unless it is the cover picture. I'm nervous about asking in case they slap the 'Adult' label on the others as well.


----------



## AriadneW (Feb 16, 2013)

Today has definitely been my slowest day for the month, I've had double figures every day since the beginning of the month and then today thought I had nothing until a batch came through of 6 as if they had taken a while to process.


----------



## Al Dente (Sep 3, 2012)

Well, I guess I finally recovered, if recovering means that my sales picked up again but are only half of what I've been making.


----------



## scottmarlowe (Apr 22, 2010)

Now my Amazon sales, as slow as they usually are, have stopped as of yesterday morning but Nook, iTunes, and even Kobo have all gotten hits. Guess my Amazon customers have migrated over.


----------



## Aya Ling (Nov 21, 2012)

CoraBuhlert said:


> My COM and UK sales have been slow this month, but Amazon Germany is doing great for me this month.


My Germany sales actually surpassed by US and UK sales this month--shows how little I've sold! Kobo sales have dried up completely as well. My second book is almost done (finally pushed past the 50k mark yesterday, yay!), so I'm crossing my fingers and hoping for a boost in a couple months.


----------



## ChristopherDavidPetersen (Mar 24, 2011)

My sales have come back to life... almost. I'm running a bit slower than normal and my rankings haven't returned back to normal levels, but movement is good . 

Personally, I think its the Chinese government is messing with Amazon's data again. I'm certain they feel Amazon is a threat to their social and economic stability and have found a way into their "system" and tweaked their numbers. I don't have proof mind you, but my other personality is positive of this and that's good enough for me. Stay tuned for more updates...


----------



## CoraBuhlert (Aug 7, 2011)

Aya Ling said:


> My Germany sales actually surpassed by US and UK sales this month--shows how little I've sold! Kobo sales have dried up completely as well. My second book is almost done (finally pushed past the 50k mark yesterday, yay!), so I'm crossing my fingers and hoping for a boost in a couple months.


My German sales are higher than Com and UK sales as well, but then this is my homemarket and I have German language books available, so it's not that surprising. Still unusual, though. My German sales exceed my UK sales on occasion, but not my COM sales. Personally, I suspect that Amazon is stuck and slow to update at the moment.

I used to get fairly regular Kobo sales, but these past two months Kobo has dried up for me completely. Odd, because March was my best month ever on Kobo.


----------



## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

I'm happy to report that sales have picked back up, and are within 10% of last month's daily average. Another week of this and the average will climb to within 5% of April, which considering the seasonality I saw last year, would be all kinds of awesome. As I recall, I saw about 50% of the sales in May that I did in March and about 40% of what I saw in April, so a 5-10% slump this year from the prior two months would be cause for me dancing in the streets. Not that I generally need much cause beyond tequila. But still...


----------



## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

It has been more than a year and a half since I've had a month this bad. On the other hand, for me a bad month still pays the bills--or so far it does. Sucks though and I have no explanation for a falloff across both genres. But I'll soon have new novels out and have a new promotion in a few days.

Still... not fun to see a 50% drop in sales.


----------



## Paul Clayton (Sep 12, 2009)

Uh... define good sales.


----------



## Aya Ling (Nov 21, 2012)

CoraBuhlert said:


> My German sales are higher than Com and UK sales as well, but then this is my homemarket and I have German language books available, so it's not that surprising. Still unusual, though. My German sales exceed my UK sales on occasion, but not my COM sales. Personally, I suspect that Amazon is stuck and slow to update at the moment.


Hope that it is Amazon being slow! Still, I'm happy that I've finally reached the €10 amount, unless they separate my France and Germany sales. When I first sold a book in Germany, I honestly assumed it would be several years before I would pass the threshold. Next goal--make 10 Canadian dollars


----------



## SEAN H. ROBERTSON (Mar 14, 2011)

My sales are higher and better than ever...grateful!


----------



## ChristopherDavidPetersen (Mar 24, 2011)

blakebooks said:


> I'm happy to report that sales have picked back up, and are within 10% of last month's daily average. Another week of this and the average will climb to within 5% of April, which considering the seasonality I saw last year, would be all kinds of awesome. As I recall, I saw about 50% of the sales in May that I did in March and about 40% of what I saw in April, so a 5-10% slump this year from the prior two months would be cause for me dancing in the streets. Not that I generally need much cause beyond tequila. But still...


I'm seeing the same thing... very encouraging when you consider last years "early" summer slump. I'm a Crown Royal man myself, add in a quality cigar and I'm perpetually smiling


----------



## wolfrom (May 26, 2012)

If it wasn't for this board, I would be assuming that my glacial sales were the result of the death of a short-lived writing career. I wake up in the morning now and am no longer shocked if my sales haven't budged from the night before.

I can't imagine what KDP authors who don't come to KBoards WC are thinking right now. Summer must be an effective culling process.


----------



## CoraBuhlert (Aug 7, 2011)

Aya Ling said:


> Hope that it is Amazon being slow! Still, I'm happy that I've finally reached the €10 amount, unless they separate my France and Germany sales. When I first sold a book in Germany, I honestly assumed it would be several years before I would pass the threshold. Next goal--make 10 Canadian dollars


Alas, unfortunately Amazon has separate accounting for all four continental European markets, thus you need to reach the 10 EUR threshold separately for Germany, France, Spain and Italy. It's rather annoying, especially since all four countries have the same currency.


----------



## scottmarlowe (Apr 22, 2010)

Not my week, I guess. Now my title is stuck in publishing on KDP. Support is looking into it. That's what I get for messing with the categories! Meanwhile, I think it's gotten disjointed from its also bought buddies. No sales for the past couple of days where before I was eking out a little at least.


----------



## Aya Ling (Nov 21, 2012)

CoraBuhlert said:


> Alas, unfortunately Amazon has separate accounting for all four continental European markets, thus you need to reach the 10 EUR threshold separately for Germany, France, Spain and Italy. It's rather annoying, especially since all four countries have the same currency.


----------



## SEAN H. ROBERTSON (Mar 14, 2011)

My sales are still soaring after I combined my serials into three full novels and one novella, while pricing all of them temporarily at 99 cents each. At least one hundred sales in May and multiplying.  Grateful and wishing your sales a boost today, friends!


----------



## Patty Jansen (Apr 5, 2011)

CoraBuhlert said:


> Alas, unfortunately Amazon has separate accounting for all four continental European markets, thus you need to reach the 10 EUR threshold separately for Germany, France, Spain and Italy. It's rather annoying, especially since all four countries have the same currency.


And if you're in a country where bank transfers are not an option, it's $100 or more per country.

[expletive] ridiculous


----------



## Quiss (Aug 21, 2012)

Gah!  Worst week in months and a bunch of them are 35%  That's just cruel


----------



## CoraBuhlert (Aug 7, 2011)

I finally got another sale in the UK, which is positively anemic this month, and promptly got a return. Of course, it is a long holiday weekend in much of Europe and probably the US as well (is Memorial Day this weekend?), so that may be why sales are slow.


----------



## scottmarlowe (Apr 22, 2010)

CoraBuhlert said:


> I finally got another sale in the UK, which is positively anemic this month, and promptly got a return. Of course, it is a long holiday weekend in much of Europe and probably the US as well (is Memorial Day this weekend?), so that may be why sales are slow.


Memorial Day is 5/27, so coming up this weekend.


----------



## CoraBuhlert (Aug 7, 2011)

Ah, so I can't blame slow US sales this weekend on a holiday, just slow sales in Europe (it's the long Pentecost weekend in much of Europe). Meanwhile, I know on what to blame slow sales in the US next weekend.


----------



## EC Sheedy (Feb 24, 2011)

Quiss said:


> Gah! Worst week in months and a bunch of them are 35% That's just cruel


T.S. Eliot said:

APRIL is the cruellest month, breeding 
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing 
Memory and desire, stirring 
Dull roots with spring rain....

*Wrongo!* I'm with you, Quiss. May is my "dead land." Cruel, indeed.

On a positive note--and not to tempt the Amazon Gawds or anything, I have not had even one return this month. 
Free run coming up, so we'll see how _that_ goes...


----------



## Al Dente (Sep 3, 2012)

Well, after kind of a rough week, things seem to be getting better. I just had a flood of sales pour in out of nowhere. I'm definitely not complaining.


----------



## morgan_n (Oct 21, 2011)

Reminds me of last fall, when sales plummeted for so many people (me among them) that a "Kindlegate" conspiracy theory was born, in which all kinds of nasty behaviour was attributed to Amazon. Maybe it was true, maybe not... It's simply not the kind of thing that can be investigate by anyone outside the organization.


----------



## Guest (May 20, 2013)

"Kindlegate"?  Good grief.  Don't you people do anything besides check your sales on an hourly basis?

Not that I'm guilty of that myself...


----------



## Al Dente (Sep 3, 2012)

Joe Vasicek said:


> "Kindlegate"? Good grief. Don't you people do anything besides check your sales on an hourly basis?
> 
> Not that I'm guilty of that myself...


Every few minutes here.


----------



## SEAN H. ROBERTSON (Mar 14, 2011)

Who's doing a freebie this upcoming holiday weekend? Anyone have success with giveaways during holidays before?


----------



## ChristopherDavidPetersen (Mar 24, 2011)

I'm SERIOUSLY dreading this coming holiday. My sales have declined again since my last posting and now with the big holiday approaching (which will officially kick off the Summer Slump), I'm fearing the worst. I won't be quitting my day job anytime soon


----------



## MQ (Jan 5, 2011)

Sales were bad in April and May has been terrible  

In fact, this year has been worse than last...I am now out of Select so I'm going to have to start uploading books on other platforms and hope sales pick up elsewhere.


----------



## SEAN H. ROBERTSON (Mar 14, 2011)

Sorry for your sales slump friends. What's everyone doing regarding book promotion this week?


----------



## Al Dente (Sep 3, 2012)

ChristopherDavidPetersen said:


> I'm SERIOUSLY dreading this coming holiday. My sales have declined again since my last posting and now with the big holiday approaching (which will officially kick off the Summer Slump), I'm fearing the worst. I won't be quitting my day job anytime soon


Man, that's got my pretty freaked out. As of July I will only have been at this for a year, so this will be my first Summer Slump for my self-publishing career. The same thing occurs with my freelance writing jobs, though, so at least I kind of know what to expect. Kind of.


----------



## ChristopherDavidPetersen (Mar 24, 2011)

David Scroggins said:


> Man, that's got my pretty freaked out. As of July I will only have been at this for a year, so this will be my first Summer Slump for my self-publishing career. The same thing occurs with my freelance writing jobs, though, so at least I kind of know what to expect. Kind of.


The problem I saw last year was that after the summer slump, my sales didn't recover until January of THIS year. Hope I don't see a repeat performance


----------



## Guest (May 21, 2013)

Just keep swimming.


----------



## kCopeseeley (Mar 15, 2011)

Joe Vasicek said:


> Just keep swimming.


That's what I keep telling myself.


----------



## Al Dente (Sep 3, 2012)

My sales died again today. Two days ago I recovered with a swarm of around 75 sales. Yesterday? 44. Today? 7. Yep... 7. What's up with that?


----------



## Edward W. Robertson (May 18, 2010)

I dunno, what are the surrounding circumstances? Were those 75 sales distributed across several books, or mostly just one? You see any Google hits for the book on that date? Run any promos 30ish days ago? That's pretty weird behavior, Amazon's usually much steadier than that.


----------



## Al Dente (Sep 3, 2012)

Edward W. Robertson said:


> I dunno, what are the surrounding circumstances? Were those 75 sales distributed across several books, or mostly just one? You see any Google hits for the book on that date? Run any promos 30ish days ago? That's pretty weird behavior, Amazon's usually much steadier than that.


All but maybe 3 or 4 of the sales in question were for my most recent book, which launched earlier this month. I haven't seen any new mentions of the book online since the free run I did when it first launched. It seems to just be one big, weird mess.


----------



## Patty Jansen (Apr 5, 2011)

Edward W. Robertson said:


> I dunno, what are the surrounding circumstances? Were those 75 sales distributed across several books, or mostly just one? You see any Google hits for the book on that date? Run any promos 30ish days ago? That's pretty weird behavior, Amazon's usually much steadier than that.


No, it's not very steady at all. You'd get 2-3 days with barely a sale, and then they're all logged at the same time. That's been going on for months. Not that it's a real problem, mind you, but it does happen.


----------



## Sam Rivers (May 22, 2011)

My sales were good last month and are looking good this month too.  I don't worry about sales so don't promote my books. My main interest in writing new books.

I think the best thing to do is slowly build up a base of readers that like your books.

As my books drop out of Select I am putting them in D2D so I can sell to other markets..

Summer is normally slow, but the market is so unpredictable that it may not be true any more.


----------



## Edward W. Robertson (May 18, 2010)

David Scroggins said:


> All but maybe 3 or 4 of the sales in question were for my most recent book, which launched earlier this month. I haven't seen any new mentions of the book online since the free run I did when it first launched. It seems to just be one big, weird mess.


What were the dailies like leading up to that? If there were no web mentions, that smells like a Facebook or a private forum mention.. big bump on the first day, smaller one on the second, then back to normal after it gets buried. There are days I would kill for actual traffic data. Like all days.



Patty Jansen said:


> No, it's not very steady at all. You'd get 2-3 days with barely a sale, and then they're all logged at the same time. That's been going on for months. Not that it's a real problem, mind you, but it does happen.


What kind of stuff are you seeing? Here's what I'm talking about--daily stats in April. (For a book that was $0.99 for the whole month.) The first few days were buoyed by typical start of the month bumps plus some lasting residuals from a good promo that happened March 3-4 and stopped counting toward my ranks by April 6 or so, then it looks very steady:

59, 46, 59, 46, 47, 43, 49, 42, 31, 34, 45, 34, 25, 31, 34, 34, 27, 27, 22, 22, 22, 32, 25, 26, 20, 28, 33, 23, 21, 23

A general decline, obviously, partially influenced by declining sales from a new release in that series in late Feb. But day to day, there are no giant spikes up or down. It's kind of amazing to me how even it is from one day to the next.


----------



## Al Dente (Sep 3, 2012)

Edward W. Robertson said:


> What were the dailies like leading up to that? If there were no web mentions, that smells like a Facebook or a private forum mention.. big bump on the first day, smaller one on the second, then back to normal after it gets buried. There are days I would kill for actual traffic data. Like all days.


Starting with the day before my sales fell off a cliff:

05/12/2013 - 26
05/13/2013 - 06 (Dropped on this day from an average of 24)
05/14/2013 - 18 
05/15/2013 - 14 
05/16/2013 - 15 
05/17/2013 - 14 
05/18/2013 - 08 
05/19/2013 - 75 
05/20/2013 - 44
05/21/2013 - 15 (I managed to claim a few more sales today)

It was pretty even, dropped hard for a day, recovered somewhat, went steady for a few days, dropped again for a day, soared pretty high and then started dropping again. It's like an up and down wave this month.


----------



## Edward W. Robertson (May 18, 2010)

AuthorDianaBaron said:


> Edward - what type of promo led to the extra bump?


It was a Kindle Books and Tips ad that netted me about 450 extra sales over a couple days (March 2-3, now that I look at the numbers, meaning they probably stopped counting April 4-5). The main factor was a new series release around Feb 20 that was still going pretty well heading into April, but the KBT mention definitely gave me a second wind that looks to have improved things on that book by 10-20% for the next 30 days afterward.



David Scroggins said:


> Starting with the day before my sales fell off a cliff:
> 
> 05/12/2013 - 26
> 05/13/2013 - 06 (Dropped on this day from an average of 24)
> ...


Interesting stuff. Like Terrence says, they don't tell me these things, but 5/13 is obviously very weird, whereas 5/18 looks like it could just be a down day that's not wildly out of whack with its surroundings. My best guess is this--your free run gave you some nice alsobots that reset on 5/13, leading to lower sales afterwards. But that's just a guess. It looks like 10-18 ought to be your daily sales going forward for the next week or two. Hard to predict after that. That spike on 5/19 is cool though, apparently someone thought the book was worthy of mention to a decent-sized group of people. Bodes well for its long-term appeal.

I could be wrong about everything, but this is my best read on the situation.


----------



## Al Dente (Sep 3, 2012)

You make very good points. The day those 75 sales came in had me glued to my computer all night. I had 6 sales and decided to go to the store. I came home an hour later and it was up to 23. I did a few things around the house for about an hour and checked again, and it had shot up another 10 or so sales. It kept going until I hit 75. I ended up hitting 1,800 overall in the rankings that day, which was awesome.


----------

