# The "Mantis Shrimp" Third Book New Release Promo (Interesting Update?)



## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Hi everyone!

Alright, the former Plankton promo, upgraded to Prawn promo is now for book three, courtesy of Dawn Lee, the Mantis Shrimp promo!  Some quick background for our newer members...

Book one was published at the end of February (2015) and flat lined flatter than a pancake. Insert plankton promo and post and we got some very small traction. There was a faint heartbeat after all. Book two came out at the end of May and with nothing more than a prawny email subscriber list, managed to rank (not that hard to do) on the HNR lists in several categories and has done fairly well until it ran off the 90 day cliff. That prawny promo utilized a KCD just after the 30 day window when it was eligible. Book three is an experiment. Instead of fantasy, it is a Contemporary Sci-Fi & Techno-Thriller that I used to submit to the Kindle Scout program. The editors over there promptly stamped the book, sub plankton material and sent it back, return to sender. However there is a neat "notify nominees" button that I intend to use and I plan to promote this bad boy right out of the gate. This is the Mantis Shrimp promo as Dawn so kindly knighted me as I had some small success with my second book and can no longer use plankton or prawn anymore.

There you go. So let's get right to the promo then some more commentary from the peanut gallery (me again) 

*LUNAR DISCOVERY*

New Release, September 24th, up for preorder one month prior.
Ranking in preorder status: 100k-400k

*Promo Details*

Preorder: No promo, *13 sales*, N/A pages read. (Thank you Bates for buying book 1 and starting my ranking clock ticking LOL!)

September 22: Personal Facebook Page, *3 sales*, N/A pages read. (Cumulative sales: *16*)
Best Rank: 248,116k

September 23: Newsletter, Organic list, 37 subscribers, *5 sales*, N/A pages read (Cumulative sales *21*)
Best Rank: 62,188k

September 24: Book goes LIVE! Newsletter, FKG Bronze (138 subscribers) and FKG Platinum (971 subscribers). Kindle Scout Nominees via Amazon, social media blasts (Twitter, Facebook and Website/Blog). *Sales 6, 1,018 pages read.* (Let's use the word total sales* 27*)
Best Rank: 23,534k

September 25: Bknights ($21), Genre Pulse ($32). Added free submissions today to GetBooksDaily, IndieBookLounge, EbookLister, and Armadillo eBooks. *Sales 40, 4 pages read*, (Total sales *67*).
Best Rank: 7,287k

September 26: BargainBooksy ($35), Ebookhounds ($5), Ebookhunter ($15), Pixelscroll ($15). FKBT posted that they may run me today in their 'New Releases' section due to a drop. (Ran!) *Sales 60, 707 pages read*, (Total sales* 127*)
Best Rank: 2,984k

September 27: None (See comments below) Added Just Kindle Books ($15) as well as Ebooksaurus, BookHippo (UK Site), ReadFree.ly, and a Fiverr gig for 50 social media sites via 'bestgraphic201 ($5). *Sales 20, 1,742 pages read*, (Total sales *147*)
Best Rank: 3,055k

September 28: BettyBookFreak ($, Flurries of Words ($5), Bookbarbarian ($, Ebooksoda ($10), Awesomegang ($10). *Sales 45, 1,342 pages read*, (Total sales *192*)
Best Rank: 3,801k

September 29: ChoosyBookWorm ($1, SweetFreeBooks ($5), BookScream ($10-Featured Author with all three of my books) *Sales 33, 1,792 pages read*, (Total sales *225*)
Best Rank: 3,278k

September 30: Booksbutterfly (pending approval)(Note the date change), Pretty Hot, Discountbookman & BookReaderMagazine (Thanks Vinny! Helping me on my last day in case BB doesn't approve.) Added New Free Kindle Books ($5)* Sales 12, 1,277 pages read*, (Total sales* 237*)
Best Rank: 3,371k

October 1: Read Free.ly ($5)* Sales 14, 3,291 pages read*, (Total sales *251*)
Best Rank: 5,768k

October 2: )BooksSends ($25 +$10 FB Boost), Riffle ($50) *Sales 82, 1,885 pages read*, (Total sales *319*)
Best Rank: 2,254k

October 3: BooksButterfly ($15)* Sales 44, 2,824 pages read*, (Total sales *363*)
Best Rank: 1,754k

October 4: BooksButterfly Day 2, Booktastik ($5, New Release)* Sales 31, 5,131 pages read*, (Total sales *394*)
Best Rank: 2,165k

October 5: Priced at normal, $3.99,* Sales 15, 3,593 pages read*, (Total sales *409*)
Best Rank: 3,133k

Total spend: $202 $327

Rejected by: (Bookbub, didn't apply LOL), ENT, Booksends, Robinreads & OHFB 
Pending: ReadCheaply

Notes: The big fat hole on the 27th was OHFB where I mistakenly took the payment ($100 Gold) as a successful submission. Nope, they refunded my money. I applied for ENT at the 30 day mark and was rejected just over a week later. Booksends also rejected for lack of reviews as did Robinreads. Booksbutterfly also won't run me without reviews, so I'm hoping my half dozen ARCs go live by the weekend as they need a 3 or 4 day lead time for this genre, ergo they are pending.

It wasn't pleasant trying to get a new release with no reviews promoted. It will be in Select, but not eligible for the KCD till after 30 days. I'm trying to get some traction from day one and see if I can't maximize the HNR lists better than I did on my second release. My one potential ace in the hole is the Kindle Scout program. The book had well over 600 views and who knows how many nominations (other than kind kboarders). That wasn't very good for that program, but I was pleasantly surprised to see that Amazon will notify the readers who nominated the book once it's published, unless they opt out. Another pretty large variable and experiment is that I invested in the FKG Bronze and Platinum contests. I have no idea how that will go, but I'm trying to pitch my first email to them as a second chance at a $25 rafflecopter as well as promoting future contests and trying to engage as many of them as I can. This should be interesting.

I can't say too much other than this is in a different genre. I wrote the book specifically for the Kindle Scout program and cause I wanted a quick change in pace from my fantasy writing. I am hoping that a promo right out of the gate will help the book's visibility. I have no idea what will happen, will it do well, fair or crater badly? Will there be sales, if so how many, and will there be a tail. I'll quote one of my favorite authors here: "Please, let there be a tail!" (Credit, Mrs. Ross) 

Final thought: I am the epitome of an author with ADHD!  Do NOT write in the order that I am writing. Three book one's in potentially three different series is not the way to success, at least not the easier way imho. However, I got the urge to write and (to use a Russian phrase) I had to "scratch that itch". Sometimes I just write what I want to write even though I know I should be more focused on my fantasy series. Also, when I first published I didn't have any funds for my books/publishing. I posted elsewhere that I ate soup for two months to save enough funds to properly edit my book and I received the help of several kboarders, Cagnes foremost amongst them. Finally, I went from low two digit royalties to very low four digit royalties and finally the Amazon payment lag is over and I am receiving some funds. I actually get enough back this month to put me way into the black. It makes a big difference when your books are financing themselves as opposed to you financing them. It makes it feel less like a hobby and more like a business.

So, having said all that, buckle up kiddies, time to ride!


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## Cap&#039;n Crunch (Aug 10, 2009)

Eager to see how much of a push you get from the Kindle Scout exposure. Should be a good one!


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## J.T. Williams (Aug 7, 2014)

Congrats on the next book! I look forward to seeing your results! Good luck!


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## Steve Vernon (Feb 18, 2011)

Proto-prawn here - but someday I too will aspire to Mantis Shrimp status.

I'll be watching this thread closely. Go, Salvador, go!


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## Adair Hart (Jun 12, 2015)

Awesome Salvador! I picked up a copy, but it said it was in preorder. I hear yas about the reviews. It seems getting an ARC and some editorial reviews lined up pre launch is the way to go, but it's rough trying to get them (at least for me). One day, I too hope to be a mantis shrimp! I'm rooting for you and hope it goes well!


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## James R Wells (May 21, 2015)

Somehow you need to tie in to the Supermoon eclipse this Sunday.

Mantis Shrimp on the moon!


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## smikeo (Dec 1, 2014)

Good luck Salvador! That's a nice lineup


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

Congrats, Salvador! And good luck with the promo - watching your progress with interest, as always.


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## Jane Killick (Aug 29, 2014)

There are some sites that specifically have a "new release" catagory that understands you might not have many reviews. Betty Book Freak is one. Can't remember any more (why didn't I write this down?!).

But you have a good list of promos there. Hope it goes really well.


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Salvador: I'm a huge fan of your posts!  They are always so well crafted and chock full of data!  This is awesome.  Kboarders rock.  *heart warms*

My household was one of those pre-order purchases.  My hubby--a big SF nut--LOVED your excerpt over at KindleScout.    Wait…time out...in fact, I just saw him slink away with his Kindle and coffee.  Now I know what he's stuck into!!

Go, go, go long tail!!


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Book is live!

Updated to show 5 sales from my home grown email list.  Clicked on the Kindle Scout notify button.  It asked for either the ASIN or URL to be input.  We'll see how that goes.  My two email blasts go out at 9 am and 11 am EST.  Rank was/is 55k this morning.  So far out of 37 subscribers, I have 13 opens at 35% and click rate of 7 at 19% with one unsubscribe (first time that happened) so my organic list is down to 36.  Oh and one reviewer/subscriber wrote me to offer her services as a beta reader (she read/reviewed Ranger Rising).

Most importantly, my five year old is now six 

Thanks for the support and well wished and hope you get your hubby back before his coffee runs out HN  

Off to the day job.


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## JVRudnick (Sep 12, 2014)

Knew that cover looked familiar ! 

Good choice there Sal...I liked it too!


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## Elliott Garber (Apr 8, 2013)

Congrats, Salvador! I'm excited to follow along with your promotion.

And happy birthday to your little one!


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## CourtneyHunt71 (Sep 3, 2015)

Hi Salvador, 

Fellow Scouter? Scoutee? Whatever.   Just snapped this one up for my plane ride to Boston tomorrow. Looks like a great read. Congrats on publishing it and looking forward to your continued success. 

And happy birthday to your little one.

Courtney


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

September 24: Book goes LIVE! Newsletter, FKG Bronze (138 subscribers) and FKG Platinum (971 subscribers). Kindle Scout Nominees via Amazon, social media blasts (Twitter, Facebook and Website/Blog). *Sales 6, 1,018 pages read.* (Let's use the word total sales* 27*)

I was hoping for a bit better result on my first day, but this release is fine by the standards of my first book. My second book had 8 sales on day one and 3 sales on day two with 3 & 2 borrows respectively. This release I sent my email subscribers notification the day before so perhaps I can't quite compare apples to apples with my second book. Book rank only showing about 32k though I did see it once at 23k, but that didn't appear to be captured in the stats on my author page. Also book is showing up in the HNR lists, a couple of places on page 1 at the bottom of a drilled down sub category so not sure about that exposure.

If any one had nominated my book on Kindle Scout, please post or PM me when/if you received notification that the book was published. I clicked on that early yesterday morning and received a confirmation email from KS that my nominees would be notified, as usual I don't know when.

Today we start the paid promos. I'm going to need some serious mojo to break into the four digit range and every day is critical. Up today, Bknights and Genre Pulse.


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Salvador, I definitely nominated Lunar but did not get an email from KS.  Hmmmm….that can't be good.


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## Steve Vernon (Feb 18, 2011)

Jane Killick said:


> There are some sites that specifically have a "new release" catagory that understands you might not have many reviews. Betty Book Freak is one. Can't remember any more (why didn't I write this down?!).
> 
> But you have a good list of promos there. Hope it goes really well.


FREE KINDLE BOOKS AND TIPS has a New Release promotion spot - but it seems to me that is just reserved for certain Saturdays of the month.
http://fkbt.com/for-authors/


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

HN Wake said:


> Salvador, I definitely nominated Lunar but did not get an email from KS. Hmmmm....that can't be good.


Same, but I may have opted out. Don't remember. T.T


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Congrats on the new book, Salvador, and go get those readers!


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

HN Wake said:


> Salvador, I definitely nominated Lunar but did not get an email from KS. Hmmmm....that can't be good.





JACipriano said:


> Same, but I may have opted out. Don't remember. T.T


Thanks, it may take more than a day. I signed up to follow a Sci-Fi author that I like and he had a new release on the 22nd, I got the email notifying me of this today, early in the morning. It will be good to know when those emails hit/arrive. Just got notified that Bknights (DigitalBookSpot) has started their promo today so keeping my fingers crossed!


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Steve Vernon said:


> FREE KINDLE BOOKS AND TIPS has a New Release promotion spot - but it seems to me that is just reserved for certain Saturdays of the month.
> http://fkbt.com/for-authors/


I did see that, but availability isn't till late October so I didn't have a chance to book a spot. I gotta be quicker on the draw, Steve


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## vlmain (Aug 10, 2011)

Congratulations, Salvador, and best of success on your promo. I am looking forward to seeing your results.


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## Michael Gallagher (Jan 23, 2010)

Salvador Mercer said:


> I did see that, but availability isn't till late October so I didn't have a chance to book a spot. I gotta be quicker on the draw, Steve


Lunar Discovery looks like something I would enjoy reading. That fact, combined with I had a cancellation due to a KDP timing error I will run it on fkbt.com in tomorrow's new release post. While there are never any guarantees on the number of downloads or borrows, I hope it leads you to several new fans who will buy the rest of your catalog at full price!

Michael


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Michael Gallagher said:


> I will run it on fkbt.com in tomorrow's new release post.


Michael, that's awesome!


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Michael Gallagher said:


> Lunar Discovery looks like something I would enjoy reading. That fact, combined with I had a cancellation due to a KDP timing error I will run it on fkbt.com in tomorrow's new release post. While there are never any guarantees on the number of downloads or borrows, I hope it leads you to several new fans who will buy the rest of your catalog at full price!
> 
> Michael


Michael,

Wow! Thank you very much. I tried to book a spot on your site, but those new release spots are taken in a hurry. I could extend my promo by a few days, but not by a month LOL  This is very much appreciated as I have a big hole on Sunday the 27th, so much thanks! I'm still chasing the Amazon Algo Love and running into walls with it 

Looking forward to it, will add it to my line up then if that's ok with you?

Regards, SM


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## R.U. Writing (Jul 18, 2015)

Great post! Love the attention to detail. I'll be following closely, as I'm trying to concoct a strategy for an upcoming release. Best of luck with the rest of the days


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## Michael Gallagher (Jan 23, 2010)

Salvador Mercer said:


> Michael,
> 
> Wow! Thank you very much. I tried to book a spot on your site, but those new release spots are taken in a hurry. I could extend my promo by a few days, but not by a month LOL  This is very much appreciated as I have a big hole on Sunday the 27th, so much thanks! I'm still chasing the Amazon Algo Love and running into walls with it
> 
> ...


Sure, but it will run tomorrow (Saturday) and not Sunday!


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Michael Gallagher said:


> Sure, but it will run tomorrow (Saturday) and not Sunday!


Understood, but I'll take it so that there is more room to slide on Sunday!


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

September 25: Bknights ($21), Genre Pulse ($32). Added free submissions today to GetBooksDaily, IndieBookLounge, EbookLister, and Armadillo eBooks. *Sales 40, 4 pages read*, Total sales *67*.

Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,240 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store) 
#38 in Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction > Genetic Engineering 
#45 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers > Technothrillers 
#48 in Books > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers & Suspense > Technothrillers

I briefly hit #3 in the Technothrillers HNR list as well as #5 in Hard Sci-Fi, #7 in Genetic Engineering, #9 in Space Exploration and #13 in First Contact. That was when I saw the ranking at around #4,460 before it dropped by nearly 2k in one update.

The obvious question is the 4 pages read. The first release day showed my book at 1018 and my KENPC is 510. Subtract one page from each book read (back matter skipped?) and it would look like two people read the entire book from start to finish. I'm not sure what to make of the 4 pages read other than some folks downloaded the book, but didn't read it online. This morning, pretty early around 7 am (early for my weekend!) my KDP dashboard showed well over 600 pages read, nothing earth shattering, but who knows what to make of that. I was hoping for more pages read, but what we want and what we get are two different things. Also the rank isn't sticky yet, that only comes after a few days of good sales. This definitely shows that spikes in sales won't last long in the rankings unless they are sustained for a period of time.

Thanks for following the ride, at this point we've only left the launch pad and I'm hoping to escape the gravity well of author obscurity 

Edited to add that I had a theory (that I forgot when I posted) that each "borrow" showed up as one page read. I noticed it when the program first started in July and my first book had several single pages read before getting hundreds. So, I'm hopeful the 4 pages read were in actuality 4 downloads/borrows of the book for future reading. Just a theory of mine.


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## Annabel Chant (Feb 24, 2015)

Been away from KBoards for a few days, only to discover I've almost missed Salvador's promo. Ugh. Congrats, Salvador. I've a very prawny promo running from tomorrow to Tuesday, so I'll definitely be following along from hereon in.


Good luck for the remaining days   .


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

September 26: BargainBooksy ($35), Ebookhounds ($5), Ebookhunter ($15), Pixelscroll ($15). FKBT posted that they may run me today in their 'New Releases' section due to a drop. (Ran!) *Sales 60, 707 pages read*, (Total sales* 127*)

I also woke up to this:

Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,055 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store) 
#24 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers > Technothrillers 
#25 in Books > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers & Suspense > Technothrillers 
#27 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction > Hard Science Fiction

I don't expect it to move much, (unless it drops) but on the HNR lists its #3 in Technothrillers, #4 in Hard Sci-Fi, #5 in Genetic Engineering, #10 in Exploration and #13 in First Contact.

Pages read continue to be a disappointment, though improving by prawny standards. I started the morning off with just over 600 and ended the entire day with just over the 700 that I reported on above. Early this morning it's sitting at just over 1k, but as yesterday showed, it may not improve at all.

The one good thing I've noticed, not sure if anyone else has as well, is that I usually do very well on Sundays. It seems most of my readers take Saturday off and then by late Sunday night I see higher page reads and sales. Again, an observation from a very limited perspective not meant to be empirical.

So, I updated my page 1 post to show some steps taken over the last two days to beef up my promo line up. I have Just Kindle Books ready to go. The cost is only $10 for the bargain submission, but I paid $5 as an add on to stay on their page for an extra three days. Glad I did now. I also saw someone that commented on a fiver gig that did fairly well and I dropped $5 there to have my book promoted on 50 sites on social media. The provider has over 2k ratings, most very good and for $5 I'll try (almost) anything at least once. I'm too tired to try to go and post myself. I also got confirmation that Booksbutterfly can run me in Sci-Fi on the 2nd of October which is great news. I extended my promo to give them the 2nd and 3rd and then up the price to normal at $3.99.

I'm thinking of filling in some gaps in early October with FB ads. I watched Dawson's videos again (The guy is just brilliant!) and will give it a shot at a paid sales campaign to see what happens. I'll try to target KU (if possible) and some Sci-Fi interests like NASA and the hot book out now (movie to follow) The Martian. I have no idea how that will do.

My overall thoughts so far? I may demote myself back to Prawn level and even think of Plankton status again if I screw anything else up again. I'm pretty happy with the sales, but the KU performance via pages read are abysmal. Not sure what's going on there, but again, this is my first foray into Sci-Fi and as Pauline commented in her thread, Fantasy readers may have more KU interest than other genres, who knows? I think my ranking reflects the lack of borrows and that hurts visibility.

Can't expect the same results today so I'll be looking for the long slide (hopefully it will be a slow slide) back down the rankings until Monday's promo sites hit.

Now, I have to go to work (I moved from admin to operations and we have to move thousands of folks for the Browns game via rail and I run the rail control center so got to work every Browns home game)


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## Susanne123 (Jan 9, 2014)

This is looking very promising for you and way to go on all your efforts! Lots of work.

Don't worry about the pages read yet. I think a lot of people download, check out a few pages, and then go back to it when they have the time. If they're anything like me, I download so I won't forget the book, and go back to finishing my current book. So many books, so little time! 

Thanks for the post. I've bookmarked it.


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## RuthNestvold (Jan 4, 2012)

Awesome results so far, congrats! 

For what it's worth, when I recently did a 99c promo for Yseult, I got next to no pages read -- until it was over and the book returned to normal price.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

I appreciate the sentiment, thanks for taking the time to post 

I guess we'll see.  My biggest worry is the algos that the Zon uses and whether or not I can tickle them enough to get some attention.  Without borrows, I don't think that will help much, but we will see.  That is the theory I'm working off of and I'm trying hard (maybe too hard?) to get a steady stream of sales/borrows in the book's first week after launch.

Today is definitely worst than yesterday, but the rank is dropping slower than I thought so I'm hoping for the best.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

I'm looking to fill in Oct 1 and Oct 3.  Any ideas on what sites I'm missing to promote on?  At least those that would accept a new release?


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## fantasy-writer (Dec 12, 2014)

Salvador Mercer said:


> I'm looking to fill in Oct 1 and Oct 3. Any ideas on what sites I'm missing to promote on? At least those that would accept a new release?


Try Booktastik.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

September 27: None (See comments below) Added Just Kindle Books ($15) as well as Ebooksaurus, BookHippo (UK Site), ReadFree.ly, and a Fiverr gig for 50 social media sites via 'bestgraphic201 ($5). *Sales 20, 1,742 pages read*, (Total sales *147*)

Ranking has slid early this morning to almost 6k even though the book sold 20 copies yesterday. Pretty amazing how much one has to sell in order to rank up there with the big boys, er, I mean whales. Pages read improved, thank goodness, but again, nothing earth shattering or worthy enough to phone Mom about, LOL. 

I have a good line up of smaller sites today, so I have higher hopes than yesterday, which still exceeded my expectations. I'm still thinking however, without some massive influx of borrows then my promo drive may end up falling off a 10 day cliff 

I'll try a few other ideas to improve the promo as I think of them or as folks mention them (Ella and Booktastik for example).


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## Annabel Chant (Feb 24, 2015)

Hi Sal,


I see you're on the ebookSoda site with me today. Have you received their email? I only ask because I usually receive it every day, but haven't had one since Saturday.


Good luck for the rest of your promo   .


Annabel


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## fantasy-writer (Dec 12, 2014)

*Salvador*, you could also try Riffle. They're kind of pricey (I believe it was $40 for fantasy), but I had pretty good results with them on a new release back in June. As far as I remember, they only send out mails on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays.

*Annabel*, I got my ebooksoda mailing already today. There was just one book on it (not either of yours), but I think I might be signed up to receive only fantasy.


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## Steve Vernon (Feb 18, 2011)

Check your spam folder as well, Annabel - sometimes promo letters go right straight down the chute.


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## Elliott Garber (Apr 8, 2013)

Thanks for the updates, Sal, and good luck with the promos running today!


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## Annabel Chant (Feb 24, 2015)

Thanks, guys,

I got in touch with them and I received it shortly afterwards. I don't know why I hadn't received it, because I usually always get them about 1 pm GMT. This didn't arrive until about 4 pm. They said I didn't receive one yesterday because it didn't have books in any of the categories I'd chosen.

To make matters worse, Ebooklister has come out and my book isn't on their newsletter. I've contacted them, but haven't heard back. One of their emails said something about having to pay to appear in it (a paid promo), but I assumed it _was_ a paid promo because I'd already...well...paid.

Still feeling under the weather today, and could do without having to chase promo sites up  .

Sorry, Sal, to hijack your thread. Hope it's going better for you!


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Annabel Chant said:


> Hi Sal,
> 
> I see you're on the ebookSoda site with me today. Have you received their email? I only ask because I usually receive it every day, but haven't had one since Saturday.
> 
> ...


Annabel,

Yes, I received the email very early this morning for my genres so I didn't see your book with mine, but that sounds cool!  I'm doing better than yesterday so several smaller sites linked together are effective as well imho. Good luck with your book too!! 



Ella Summers said:


> *Salvador*, you could also try Riffle. They're kind of pricey (I believe it was $40 for fantasy), but I had pretty good results with them on a new release back in June. As far as I remember, they only send out mails on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays.
> 
> *Annabel*, I got my ebooksoda mailing already today. There was just one book on it (not either of yours), but I think I might be signed up to receive only fantasy.


Ella, I found them, I'll check them out tonight and post on what I find out. Thanks for taking the time to share! 



Elliott Garber said:


> Thanks for the updates, Sal, and good luck with the promos running today!


Thanks Elliott! I'm just hoping my book does half as well as yours! I've seen it on the promo rounds (as in my inbox and other places) and it's doing fantastic. Congrats on your success too! 



Annabel Chant said:


> Sorry, Sal, to hijack your thread. Hope it's going better for you!


Never an issue Annabel, feel free to post away here! We're all in the same Kboards boat (Author boat that is). I'm just glad you're promoting as well, hope we get you some answers and as I said, I did get my email early this morning


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Salvador, great data--keep it coming.  This is helpful to all of us who thank you on the boards and all of us that lurk!  

PS: Looks like you're getting some really nice 5* reviews too!  That's gotta make this worthwhile.  

Go go go long tail!


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## Northern pen (Mar 3, 2015)

Damn it Salvador,

I was going to skip doing a promo thread for my new release, and now you go and put all this effort into your awesome thread. Now I got the feel guilties


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Robyn Wideman said:


> Now I got the feel guilties


Do it. Do it.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

HN Wake said:


> Salvador, great data--keep it coming. This is helpful to all of us who thank you on the boards and all of us that lurk!
> 
> PS: Looks like you're getting some really nice 5* reviews too! That's gotta make this worthwhile.
> 
> Go go go long tail!


Yeah, getting some luck for a change! 



Robyn Wideman said:


> Damn it Salvador,
> 
> I was going to skip doing a promo thread for my new release, and now you go and put all this effort into your awesome thread. Now I got the feel guilties


Haha, Robyn, I'm chasing your dream  You had a great run on your releases for the Soron series. I'm chasing Amazon algos and starting to think I won't catch any with my low reads. I can't think of too much more promotion I can throw at this release 



HN Wake said:


> Do it. Do it.


I agree with HN Wake, do a post and share! You did awesome with your last releases, would be a fun ride for the rest of us!


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## Northern pen (Mar 3, 2015)

I'll probably do one.  I was going to keep it on the down low as I starting from scratch with a pen name. But a huge chunk of the success I've had comes from others helping me, so I'll face the firing squad post results.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

September 28: BettyBookFreak ($, Flurries of Words ($5), Bookbarbarian ($, Ebooksoda ($10), Awesomegang ($10). *Sales 45, 1,342 pages read*, (Total sales *192*)

Back to this:

Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,491 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store) 
#32 in Books > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers & Suspense > Technothrillers 
#32 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers > Technothrillers 
#33 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction > Hard Science Fiction

Another new release knocked me back to #4 on the HNR list for Technothrillers. On a bright note, one fell off of Hard Sci-Fi so it's #4 there as well, though conventional wisdom is that a HNR list in the #1-3 spots are much more visible in that side bar. Also, I'm not cracking into the top 20 on the best sellers rank, which would put it on the first page for visibility. A few other authors posted that they noticed a difference in sales with a spike when they hit that first page and then another nice boost if they managed to hit a top 3 (ie first row).

I think the sales are fantastic, but the lack of borrows are keeping the ranking down a bit. Not sure what algos are necessary to trigger some sort of visibility with the KU crowd. I also submitted for the next available date for Booksends, Riffle and Booktastik and will submit today for ENT for later. Overall, I'm pretty happy with the sales and performance of the paid promo sites, they've done well for me this week.

One interesting promo today is BookScream. I went with the featured author spot and though I only have three books, I have my first set for a free day via Select, the second is discounted a dollar and of course this book is down to 99 cents. Will be interesting to see what happens across the board.


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## Adair Hart (Jun 12, 2015)

Great stuff Salvador! I am living vicariously through your promos   Love drinking my morning coffee and seeing you and paulines updates!


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Adair Hart said:


> Great stuff Salvador! I am living vicariously through your promos  Love drinking my morning coffee and seeing you and paulines updates!


Thanks Adair. I've found that watching other promos have helped me to design mine. Of course each book is different, and we see that genre may or may not have an impact, but it's fun to do a promo and see your baby fly for awhile and always, live and hope for a tail  Motivates me to write more. For this book, I really enjoyed writing it, found the characters fun and had a blast with my second love (science). However, I am going to release my second dragon book next month then write the next two in my Ranger series before I think of playing around again in other genres  Hehe.


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## SidK (Jul 7, 2015)

Salvador Mercer said:


> I think the sales are fantastic, but the lack of borrows are keeping the ranking down a bit. Not sure what algos are necessary to trigger some sort of visibility with the KU crowd.


I think the KU crowd is not as interested in discounted ebooks since they already have a large supply of books available to them that are 'free'(prepaid sunk costs), so those with KU probably don't sign up for these lists.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

September 29: ChoosyBookWorm ($1, SweetFreeBooks ($5), BookScream ($10-Featured Author with all three of my books) *Sales 33, 1,792 pages read*, (Total sales *225*)

Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,371 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store) 
#30 in Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction > Genetic Engineering 
#30 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction > Hard Science Fiction 
#31 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers > Technothrillers

Another good day for sales and pages read are the most of any day by a whopping 50 (thanks whoever you are that read those few chapters!)  Bookscream was fun, I got a few sales for Ranger Rising at $2.99 (4 sales) and I got 281 free downloads of The Black Dragon, though I did send out an email to the 1k subscribers so that helped. There was no other promo done for it and it went for one day only.

I'm noticing my rank is getting 'stickier' to use the phrase thrown around here. I posted about that on Pauline's thread. The other issues remain that I posted on yesterday, sitting at #4 on two HNR lists (Technothriller and Hard Sci-Fi) and unlikely to break into the top three there and of course as noted above, I am at #30 and #31 in my best top 100 categories, not first page.

One thing to note is that I applied for and was accepted by Booksends for the 2nd, same day as Booksbutterfly, so maybe that day will be the day to break into the top tier, even if it's only for a day  I'll take it. I don't mind sitting just below Hugh Howey and Larry Niven in the HNR list for Hard Sci-Fi 

Today will mark the end of my book's first week released. I'm hoping that those Amazon algos pick up on a rolling 7 day schedule and not some funky calendar schedule. Knowing my luck, it will be every other day, hehe 

So, still facing a hole on October 1, thinking of trying some FB ads for effect and of course, will drink lots of coffee and enjoy the current ride till the weekend. Looking forward to Friday, it's a payday, plus yesterday I got paid finally for my first really nice royalties earned in July. Love the dual hit to my bank accounts.


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Looking really good, mate!


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

September 30: Booksbutterfly (pending approval)(Note the date change), Pretty Hot, Discountbookman & BookReaderMagazine (Thanks Vinny! Helping me on my last day in case BB doesn't approve.) Added New Free Kindle Books ($5)* Sales 12, 1,277 pages read*, (Total sales* 237*)

Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,810 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store) 
#41 in Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction > Genetic Engineering 
#47 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers > Technothrillers 
#49 in Books > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers & Suspense > Technothrillers

Got into double digit with the sales so it was a good thing I had some promos lined up this day (Thanks Vinny!). I took Ella's advise and submitted to Riffle and they accepted for, wait, guess it, yup, the 2nd, (Friday) along with Booksends and hopefully Booksbutterfly. This means that I've got nothing lined up for today so the sales and ranking should drop, however, tomorrow I go out with a bang (hopefully). I'll adjust my price on Sunday since it's always a good idea to give readers one more day after a promo goes out in any email newsletter etc. (my opinion only).

I appreciate the well wishes, I'm getting more pages read slowly, already at 7 am it has almost 1.3k, so prawny like progress, though again, Friday and Saturday not always my best days for sales, pages read etc. Sunday's I seem to do much better. I'm hoping after 1 full week of being released that something kicks in over at the Zon. Getting much colder in Cleveland now


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

Salvador Mercer said:


> This means that I've got nothing lined up for today so the sales and ranking should drop, however, tomorrow I go out with a bang (hopefully).


Mine has just snuck ahead of yours, temporarily. 



> I'll adjust my price on Sunday since it's always a good idea to give readers one more day after a promo goes out in any email newsletter etc. (my opinion only).


I always do this, too, especially when I have ENT or another late one right at the end. It seems courteous to give people a full 24 hours, at least, to take advantage of a discount.


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## Tuttle (Jun 10, 2010)

SidK said:


> I think the KU crowd is not as interested in discounted ebooks since they already have a large supply of books available to them that are 'free'(prepaid sunk costs), so those with KU probably don't sign up for these lists.


The only discounted lists I've signed up for (as a KU reader) are ones which are more selective. In those cases, they do some sorting for me, and then only provide me books in genre preferences. I can look at those books, put them on a KU interest list if I'm interested, and get to it at some point. I am unlikely to read them immediately, but they are useful for finding books. However, I absolutely won't use most of the less selective ones, because I find them less useful than just sorting through amazon.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Actually, I had Read Free.ly show up today and it looks like it helped a bit with some late afternoon downloads.  I'll update tomorrow morning.  Reads are looking much better today, we'll see how that pans out longer term.


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## Ian Jaymes (Jan 22, 2015)

Nice stuff- don't know if you remember me, but I was *supposed* to be in touch about sci-fi after reading your fist book... um sorry  

I love your threads- as a not-even-a-virus, your rise to large crustacean status is inspiring. Keep it up. One more borrow for you!


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

sakurajima said:


> Nice stuff- don't know if you remember me, but I was *supposed* to be in touch about sci-fi after reading your fist book... um sorry
> 
> I love your threads- as a not-even-a-virus, your rise to large crustacean status is inspiring. Keep it up. One more borrow for you!


Haha! 

Yes I do remember, been awhile though and you've been absent from the boards, but thanks for the support and glad my mini rise to a crustacean gave you some enjoyment. I'm enjoying the ride as well


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## Adair Hart (Jun 12, 2015)

Salvador Mercer said:


> Thanks Adair. I've found that watching other promos have helped me to design mine. Of course each book is different, and we see that genre may or may not have an impact, but it's fun to do a promo and see your baby fly for awhile and always, live and hope for a tail  Motivates me to write more. For this book, I really enjoyed writing it, found the characters fun and had a blast with my second love (science). However, I am going to release my second dragon book next month then write the next two in my Ranger series before I think of playing around again in other genres  Hehe.


I'm with you there. I have an epic fantasy series I want to do, but will stick to my first series for a while.  You have a busy schedule ahead of you. I'm glad you enjoyed writing Lunar Discovery! I have it slotted for my Sunday reading time.

I have been watching yours, paulines, elliots, wildens, and angelas to get an idea about my first prawnylicious promo in five weeks. I saw that you have Booksends today and having heard a lot of good things about them, decided to check them out along with pixel of ink. They had a five review minimum and I'm at three  I got some work to do! Anyways, my morning ramblings as I sip my coffee


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## Steve Vernon (Feb 18, 2011)

Like Adair, I have been watching this promo with much interest. Taking notes and trying to learn a few tricks of prawny promotion.

My big push starts on October 27. I hope to do as well as you have, Salvador.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

October 1: Read Free.ly ($5)* Sales 14, 3,291 pages read*, (Total sales *251*)

Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,645 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store) 
#40 in Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction > Genetic Engineering 
#50 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers > Technothrillers 
#52 in Books > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers & Suspense > Technothrillers

Ranking actually got as far down as the 8k range before bouncing up a bit. Today I am hoping to go out with a bang. The obvious takeaway from yesterday was the KU reads are way up, nearly double my prior best at 3.3k read. Again, nothing earth shattering, but liking the numbers much better than before and the 14 sales has to be some spill over from prior promos so that bodes well I think post promo.

If I get Booksbutterfly, and Booksends to perform as they usually do then I'll be looking very good. Riffle is an unknown to me and a bit on the pricey side, but they were recommended so let's see what happens today.



Adair Hart said:


> I'm with you there. I have an epic fantasy series I want to do, but will stick to my first series for a while.  You have a busy schedule ahead of you. I'm glad you enjoyed writing Lunar Discovery! I have it slotted for my Sunday reading time.
> 
> I have been watching yours, paulines, elliots, wildens, and angelas to get an idea about my first prawnylicious promo in five weeks. I saw that you have Booksends today and having heard a lot of good things about them, decided to check them out along with pixel of ink. They had a five review minimum and I'm at three  I got some work to do! Anyways, my morning ramblings as I sip my coffee


Yes, I've been watching everyone you have listed here as well. I actually got some ideas for promoting a new release from Angela's promo post. Booksends initially rejected me and I only reapplied when I got to five reviews (which was NOT expected). My second book, out since the end of May only has five reviews, so one has to go with the flow I guess. Enjoy your coffee! 



Steve Vernon said:


> Like Adair, I have been watching this promo with much interest. Taking notes and trying to learn a few tricks of prawny promotion.
> 
> My big push starts on October 27. I hope to do as well as you have, Salvador.


Steve, here's hoping you do BETTER!


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## JalexM (May 14, 2015)

Salvador Mercer said:


> September 28: BettyBookFreak ($, Flurries of Words ($5), Bookbarbarian ($, Ebooksoda ($10), Awesomegang ($10). *Sales 45, 1,342 pages read*, (Total sales *192*)


How did you get bookbarbarian with only 5 reviews?


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

JalexM said:


> How did you get bookbarbarian with only 5 reviews?


What you should be asking is how I got them with NO reviews... hehe  My book is a new release so my ARC's couldn't post till after the book went live. That is part of the reason why my first couple of promo days was to my subscriber list.

Also I told them I would sic my Black Dragon on them if they didn't comply with my demands LOL  I've actually been accepted by ENT with no reviews (first book, not this book), Booksends with 1 review (second book), though this time around they turned me down at first (no reviews) then accepted me for today when I applied with five.

It doesn't hurt to ask/apply and let them decide.

Now I'm wondering if I helped myself or if I'm going to get spanked for my sins.


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## TraciLoudin (Sep 10, 2013)

I've been following along in preparation to push my post-apoc sci-fi adventure during my KCD coming up October 8. Thanks so much for all the detail! I only have seven reviews, but your notes here have encouraged me to go after some of the ad sites that I'm only one or two reviews away from. What's the worst they can do, right?


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

TraciLoudin said:


> I've been following along in preparation to push my post-apoc sci-fi adventure during my KCD coming up October 8. Thanks so much for all the detail! I only have seven reviews, but your notes here have encouraged me to go after some of the ad sites that I'm only one or two reviews away from. What's the worst they can do, right?


Correct. This morning I received yet another BookBub rejection email, they sting less after you get use to them.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

October 2: BooksButterfly ($15), BooksSends ($25 +$10 FB Boost), Riffle ($50) *Sales 82, 1,885 pages read*, (Total sales *319*)

Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,990 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store) 
#18 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers > Technothrillers 
#19 in Books > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers & Suspense > Technothrillers 
#20 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction > Space Exploration

A very good finale for my new release. Can't complain about finally hitting a sub 2k rank this morning as well as making it onto the page one's of a couple of bestseller ranks, even if it is temporary.

I'd say my experiment is over, we'll just have to see how much attention I get from the Zon moving forward, if any at all. Glad a few of you posted and shared that my info/data was of help to you. If I can help a fellow author or two then I'll feel pretty good about that, after all the assistance I've gleaned this year from these boards.

One takeaway, don't be afraid to submit your book to any promo site, the worst they can do is to bookbub you and say 'thanks, but no thanks'. I'll post through Sunday/Monday then go weekly if there is anything worthy to note. I can't think of too much more I could have done to promote a new release and the experiment is pretty interesting due to the fact that I wrote in a different genre than I usually do and that I tried to promote this right out of the gate. Future new releases may not see this much attention, but I feel much more comfortable about lining up some sites to take advantage of the HNR lists. You can never predict which release will do well.


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

That is an awesome finale!  Well done Salvador.  This entire thread was incredibly helpful.  Enjoy the well deserved break over the weekend.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Thanks Ward!  Still waiting on my Kindle Scout Nominees to be notified


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## Gone Girl (Mar 7, 2015)

We miss you, Harvey Chute.


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Salvador Mercer said:


> Still waiting on my Kindle Scout Nominees to be notified


 I wonder if they will address this?


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Well, I think this may be good news, but I got my dates mixed up and Booksbutterfly will run TODAY, October 3rd, not yesterday. This means that somehow, Booksends with the extra Facebook boost and Riffle, who I have never heard of before Ella mentioned them, accounted for 82 sales yesterday between the two. This means if Booksbutterfly does well today then I may be positioned well on Sunday to transition out of 99 cent new release special land and hit the ground running.  For the record, 82 sales is the best for me ever. My second book had 65 in one day with ENT so that record (for me anyways) is broke. Next milestone will be breaking 100 sales in one day.



CarlaBaku said:


> Great stuff, Salvador--thanks for your generosity with the numbers! Fun to see how far you've come since you first started here a few months ago.


Thanks Carla, I'm just getting my mojo on. The Blue Dragon (Book 4) is in revision then off to the editor next week (she already did the first half of the book) and then I'm off to do my sequel to my second book and series, so I'm very excited and having lots of FUN! 



HN Wake said:


> I wonder if they will address this?


They will I'm sure, just probably not before my book goes up to $3.99


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## JalexM (May 14, 2015)

Salvador Mercer said:


> What you should be asking is how I got them with NO reviews... hehe  My book is a new release so my ARC's couldn't post till after the book went live. That is part of the reason why my first couple of promo days was to my subscriber list.
> 
> Also I told them I would sic my Black Dragon on them if they didn't comply with my demands LOL  I've actually been accepted by ENT with no reviews (first book, not this book), Booksends with 1 review (second book), though this time around they turned me down at first (no reviews) then accepted me for today when I applied with five.
> 
> ...


Hmm, that sounds great. I'm going to try your method when I release a book in December.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

JalexM said:


> Hmm, that sounds great. I'm going to try your method when I release a book in December.


There's an old saying: "Better to ask for forgiveness than to ask for permission." (I'm an old fart compared to you) 

Just ask, the worst they can say is no. (ask=submit). So better to say submit, don't mention a lack of reviews and roll with it.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

October 3: BooksButterfly ($15)* Sales 44, 2,824 pages read*, (Total sales *363*)

So not too bad for two days. Today is the last day of the promo. I'm not seeing anything to indicate that I got Amazon's attention (yet), but I'll settle for a long tail that drops my rank slowly, though it also wouldn't surprise me if I plummeted within a couple of days. I can't say I have any real insight into how Amazon's algos work, but I gave this new release as much attention that I could think of. I'm sure I missed a few things, but it was fun lining it up and while it cost a pretty penny, it was the first time all year (well, in my entire publishing career) that the promo was being financed with prior royalties.

I'll post tomorrow on today's results then I'll post weekly if there's anything to report. I had a fun 11 days


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

I like your style, Salvador!  Very helpful.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

HN Wake said:


> I like your style, Salvador! Very helpful.


You are too kind.

On another note, I noticed you have "Deceits of Borneo available for pre-order, congrats! Still over a month away, but it looks good in your sig line!


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Thanks!  It's out to my new editor this week which is extremely exciting.


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## Adair Hart (Jun 12, 2015)

Salvador Mercer said:


> Thanks Ward! Still waiting on my Kindle Scout Nominees to be notified


Looks like maybe they have begun going out. I got mine today at 4:30 PM EST.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

October 4: BooksButterfly Day 2, Booktastik ($5, New Release)* Sales 31, 5,131 pages read*, (Total sales *394*)

Didn't capture my rank at this time as I got busy, but it was low 2k range after peaking at about 1.7k.

Page reads were finally way up, though no where near any whale level, still at prawn level if not plankton level, but I'll take what I can get. With my other two books I broke a new record in one day for page reads at 8k. My other two books for a couple of months averaged between 2k and 4k before dying down after my last book fell off the 90 day cliff. Page reads so far today are half what they were yesterday, but no idea how this will pan out long term.

I finished the promo and bumped the price of the book to a normal level then came this:



Adair Hart said:


> Looks like maybe they have begun going out. I got mine today at 4:30 PM EST.


I got three folks to notify me that the kindle scout notification went out today only a week and a half after the release date. Maybe other scouters can take this into account when releasing. I'll post tomorrow if it helped any. With no promos being run, my sales are way down and will most likely remain that way. I don't think I get the attention of the Zon's algos this time around, though it was one hell of an effort. I feel pretty good about the try.

So maybe one more post tomorrow then I'll update this weekly if there is a tail to my release run, if not, I'll let this thread float into Kboard's basement


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## Jane Killick (Aug 29, 2014)

Salvador Mercer said:


> With no promos being run, my sales are way down and will most likely remain that way. I don't think I get the attention of the Zon's algos this time around, though it was one hell of an effort. I feel pretty good about the try.


I think it was an excellent effort and a fun ride. Sales maybe in the hundreds, not the thousands, but should be good enough to keep the book visible for some time yet.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

October 5: Priced at normal, $3.99,* Sales 15, 3,593 pages read*, (Total sales *409*)

Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,718 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store) 
#31 in Books > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers & Suspense > Technothrillers 
#31 in Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction > Genetic Engineering 
#31 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers > Technothrillers

This will probably be the last daily post on my new release for my third book this year. Some observations from the one man peanut gallery...

Finally, Kindle Scout notified my nominators that my book was out. I already had six sales when that happened so I can't say sales were huge due to the notification. However, any Scouter may very well be subscribed to KU because while my book fell in rank, it stopped falling around 4.3k then very, very slowly crawled back to where it's sitting right now at 3,718k. It was at the exact same rank (within the 3.7k range) when I went to bed last night about 9 hours ago. I almost never see my rank go up overnight, it usually falls then rises throughout the day as folks buy the book. Pages read were 3.5k so down from my record high (for 1 book and for a total) of 5k, though for this early in the morning they are at 1.6k. I'm hoping that I'm getting some borrows and that those are reflected in the current rank.

On a side note as an author, this release, in a different (but closer) genre, has me highly motivated to get a book two out in any of my series. I set some writing goals that I intend to keep so that I can finish both book two's in my fantasy series then come back to this book and see where it's at. (Actually my second dragon book is almost done now, so really just need to write one more book then revisit this genre). The motivation was great and if Book Report is correct, then this book just paid for its promotion costs and now I'm working on its production costs (maybe I should have that in reverse order?)

I think quite a few lurkers here based on number of reads for my post, so I'm hoping this promo gave some of you a few useful ideas to do (or NOT to do!) on your own promos. I'm still a newbie and this is only my third book, but the first was released with no promos till it was out almost two months, then the next was released to a post 30 day KCD promo and now I tried to promote right out of the gate to see if there is any strength in the Zon's algos with the HNR lists. The tail, or lack of one, will be the main indicator.

Now, to get back to writing my fourth book and to make it as good as it can be


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Jane Killick said:


> I think it was an excellent effort and a fun ride. Sales maybe in the hundreds, not the thousands, but should be good enough to keep the book visible for some time yet.


Agreed Jane. We put so much effort into writing our books and, for me at least, I have attachments to them and thier characters, so giving it some promo love and allowing it to fly a bit in the rankings is beneficial to my mind (and wallet) as an author. I'd hate to write a book and watch it plummet into the deep six figure rankings and not be read and enjoyed. I did that with my first book and swore I'd not to it again, especially now that I know better (been here on kboards long enough!).

I also think each book builds on the others and progress is measured in prawny milestones. I am always reminded of those retirement growth charts that show a small amount of money being put into a retirement account each year and with added interest keeps going up, but the increases get crazy high in the years just before retirement. I think being an author CAN be like that. For those of us who don't have a breakout hit with just one book, we can count on perhaps building that author branding and investing in our future with good books written every year. All just my opinion of course


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

Salvador Mercer said:


> I'd hate to write a book and watch it plummet into the deep six figure rankings and not be read and enjoyed. I did that with my first book and swore I'd not to it again, especially now that I know better (been here on kboards long enough!).


I did exactly the same. It's very sad-making.



> I also think each book builds on the others and progress is measured in prawny milestones. I am always reminded of those retirement growth charts that show a small amount of money being put into a retirement account each year and with added interest keeps going up, but the increases get crazy high in the years just before retirement. I think being an author CAN be like that. For those of us who don't have a breakout hit with just one book, we can count on perhaps building that author branding and investing in our future with good books written every year. All just my opinion of course


Absolutely this. Progress seems very slow, sometimes, especially when other people leapfrog to lobster status and make it look easy-peasy. But for those of us not destined to be superstars, it's all about incremental progress. And more books. Always more books.

This has been a fun promo to watch - thanks for sharing!


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

Salvador Mercer said:


> I also think each book builds on the others and progress is measured in prawny milestones. I am always reminded of those retirement growth charts that show a small amount of money being put into a retirement account each year and with added interest keeps going up, but the increases get crazy high in the years just before retirement. I think being an author CAN be like that. For those of us who don't have a breakout hit with just one book, we can count on perhaps building that author branding and investing in our future with good books written every year. All just my opinion of course


I think this is exactly the right attitude, especially for those of us who don't knock it out of the park on try one. As long as each book you write brings in additional income, you're in a good place.

I also think you've set yourself up well to continue on and write a bunch of book 2s and 3s and really take off.


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## Vinny OHare (May 3, 2013)

Great thread and glad to see we could help you fill a gap


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

PaulineMRoss said:


> I did exactly the same. It's very sad-making.
> 
> Absolutely this. Progress seems very slow, sometimes, especially when other people leapfrog to lobster status and make it look easy-peasy. But for those of us not destined to be superstars, it's all about incremental progress. And more books. Always more books.
> 
> This has been a fun promo to watch - thanks for sharing!


Pauline, likewise, much of what I learned was just following in your footsteps 



JACipriano said:


> I think this is exactly the right attitude, especially for those of us who don't knock it out of the park on try one. As long as each book you write brings in additional income, you're in a good place.
> 
> I also think you've set yourself up well to continue on and write a bunch of book 2s and 3s and really take off.


Thanks JA, I'm hoping you're right and I'm excited to finally get a couple of book twos out and published. 



Vinny OHare said:


> Great thread and glad to see we could help you fill a gap


Vinny, thanks, you're_* AWESOME *_to work with!  (Pun intended)


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

You are too kind Nirina.  Time will tell however, we'll see how the rest of this year goes.  As long as we're having fun though it's all good.


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## R.U. Writing (Jul 18, 2015)

Good stuff, Salvador. Always a good read. I really appreciate the time you put into each breakdown; it definitely helps me make some upcoming decisions


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Thanks Wilden, I recall reading a promo thread of yours not that long ago, unless I'm mistaken.  I am a promo thread junky, LOL.  Love to compile the data, see what sites do well, look at the individual books, genres, covers and try to extrapolate, and at the end of the day roll the die and hope for the best!


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## Adair Hart (Jun 12, 2015)

Salvador Mercer said:


> Agreed Jane. We put so much effort into writing our books and, for me at least, I have attachments to them and thier characters, so giving it some promo love and allowing it to fly a bit in the rankings is beneficial to my mind (and wallet) as an author. I'd hate to write a book and watch it plummet into the deep six figure rankings and not be read and enjoyed. I did that with my first book and swore I'd not to it again, especially now that I know better (been here on kboards long enough!).
> 
> I also think each book builds on the others and progress is measured in prawny milestones. I am always reminded of those retirement growth charts that show a small amount of money being put into a retirement account each year and with added interest keeps going up, but the increases get crazy high in the years just before retirement. I think being an author CAN be like that. For those of us who don't have a breakout hit with just one book, we can count on perhaps building that author branding and investing in our future with good books written every year. All just my opinion of course


+1 to this! I just hit the 30 day cliff, and am watching my rankings plummet, but I do have a promo end of month.

On an unrelated note, did you look into doing audiobooks for your books? I didn't see it on your pages, then again, I don't know if they would show up there alongside the digital, print options.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Adair Hart said:


> +1 to this! I just hit the 30 day cliff, and am watching my rankings plummet, but I do have a promo end of month.
> 
> On an unrelated note, did you look into doing audiobooks for your books? I didn't see it on your pages, then again, I don't know if they would show up there alongside the digital, print options.


I'm just going with paperbacks and ebooks for now. I'll get into audio once I feel I have some traction, I am still a pretty new author, only published my first book at the end of February just over 7 months ago. I'm not being facetious when I say there is only so much self-publishing info I can absorb, even since I joined Kboards on January 1 of this year. I just set up my first Facebook ad tonight, to start tomorrow and I signed up for, and received, my Amazon Affiliate account and I feel like a serious idiot on both of these new platforms.

Writing by comparison is the easiest of what I have to learn right now, though the more I write, the more comfortable I feel with it. I'm agonizing less over my prose, word choices and plot holes, trying to keep them small enough that only compact cars can get through them.


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## Cap&#039;n Crunch (Aug 10, 2009)

Thanks for doing this, Salvador. It's been a while since I've posted a book one or a standalone, so it's good to see that they can do well. An encouraging thread.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Thanks Tricia and congrats on your Scout Nomination win!  Very encouraging for the other submitters.  I just wanted to give my Scout reject some special loving to make me feel better LOL


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

I second the congrats to Tricia!!  That was superb news.  So happy for you.

Salvador, I'm with you on the audio books.  I'm thinking once I get out 3 in a series, hopefully with some traction, it may be worth doing audiobooks.  Keep me posted.


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## Overrated (Mar 20, 2015)

Thanks for this whole post, Salvador! I love promo posts, and this is fantastic for helping me to make decisions moving forward. I am also pleased to see how well you did - congrats!!!!!


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

I'm very happy that a few of you either found my promo interesting, entertaining or informative!  

Now for some more news, I set up the damn Facebook ads that went live today and used up $0 so far.  Yeah, I didn't like the 50 cent to $2.00 bid range, so I put it at 25 cents.  I'm pretty sure I messed that up and need to tweak it tonight so that it does CPC auction (at least that is what I think Dawson said, though I can't remember).  For those of you that have no idea what I just wrote, I think I am trying to say that NO facebook ads went out today and it may be due to me not knowing what the hell I am doing.  (Yeah, that sounds about par for the course...)

On a second note, ENT finally got back to me for my SECOND submission and accepted my book for October 10 in only 3 days!  So, I'll manually lower the price to 99 cents for that day only hoping for a last hurrah/rating bump.

One surprise for this prawn is the number of reviews I've gotten in less than 2 weeks.  I can't see it, but a seventh just got posted and on Goodreads it's up to three.  For comparison, my second book which has twice the number of sold copies out there if not three times has only five reviews in four and a half months.  I have no idea what gives there, though I had 1 ARC, 1 fan and maybe one author's husband from here who found my book via Kindle Scout.

So, the ride isn't quite yet over, I'm trying to work some last minute magic to keep the tail going.  Wish me luck!


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Salvador, I missed that part about ENT.  Did you first apply without any reviews and get dinged, so then you applied again and it worked?  Thanks!


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

Salvador Mercer said:


> On a second note, ENT finally got back to me for my SECOND submission and accepted my book for October 10 in only 3 days! So, I'll manually lower the price to 99 cents for that day only hoping for a last hurrah/rating bump.


ENT is quite the last hurrah! Talk about going out with a bang.  Fingers crossed for a spectacular day for you.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

HN Wake said:


> Salvador, I missed that part about ENT. Did you first apply without any reviews and get dinged, so then you applied again and it worked? Thanks!


Yes, it's on the page 1 post, I applied when my book was in pre-order so NO reviews and NO ENT. I then applied after a few reviews posted and asked for the soonest date available and got the 10th.



PaulineMRoss said:


> ENT is quite the last hurrah! Talk about going out with a bang.  Fingers crossed for a spectacular day for you.


Thanks Pauline! Rank has slid to mid 6k, but I just went from 3 sales to 11 in the last couple of hours and still no facebook ads  I'm liking the small tail so far, over 3k pages read at 9:30 pm EST. Hoping for the best and up to 7 reviews on the Zon and 4 on Goodreads. Gotta get through one more day of no promos then hoping ENT gets me some more visibility!


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Your intel on ENT is solid info.  Thanks Salvador.  I would have bypassed them with a new launch but I like your strategy!  I've done really well with them in the past.

And congrats on the reviews.  Well deserved.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

HN Wake said:


> Your intel on ENT is solid info. Thanks Salvador. I would have bypassed them with a new launch but I like your strategy! I've done really well with them in the past.
> 
> And congrats on the reviews. Well deserved.


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## Adair Hart (Jun 12, 2015)

Congratulations on ENT and the reviews! I may use the patented Salvador Launch Strategy (SLS) for book 2 in December    Look forward to hearing about the tail!


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Adair Hart said:


> Congratulations on ENT and the reviews! I may use the patented Salvador Launch Strategy (SLS) for book 2 in December  Look forward to hearing about the tail!


WAIT! You mean another Salvador patented my launch strategy!?! 

Hehe, what tail? (reverse psychology for the anti-author-amazon-demi-god)


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Adair Hart said:


> patented Salvador Launch Strategy (SLS)


This is so sticking.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

HN Wake said:


> This is so sticking.


Ha, ha! 

Sounds like I can use the acronym in my second book... "The launch of the SLS Mercer..."


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Salvador Mercer said:


> Sounds like I can use the acronym in my second book... "The launch of the SLS Mercer..."


Yes. Yes, I do believe you can.


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## Ian Jaymes (Jan 22, 2015)

So far much more interesting and successful than the 'real' SLS!


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

Salvador Mercer said:


> Yes, it's on the page 1 post, I applied when my book was in pre-order so NO reviews and NO ENT. I then applied after a few reviews posted and asked for the soonest date available and got the 10th.


I don't think that was the reason, Salvador. I applied for ENT when mine was in pre-order, and got in. BUT I applied exactly 30 days before my required date. They've been getting booked up very quickly lately.

As another data point, I've just been accepted for a promotion later this month. I only gave them 3 weeks' notice, but I was more flexible over dates.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Well, like wow!  ENT ran yesterday as a sort of final hurrah and my KDP dash is showing *106 sales *and my ranking is showing:

Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,461 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store) 
#13 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction > Space Exploration 
#13 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers > Technothrillers 
#13 in Books > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers & Suspense > Technothrillers

In case the three of you following this thread closely are wondering, my last update on total sales dated October 5th, had rung up 409 including pre-orders. Since then I've added 167 sales so total since launch is 576. Book Report says that total pages read is at over 42k. I forced my way back to the #3 spot on the Technothriller HNR list and I'm sure Vaughn Heppner either doesn't know/care or is wondering who the hell this Salvador guy is, LOL  I'm also on a few more HNR lists at #3, at least for a brief time. I'm hoping for a tail, and I'm hoping that my little book is being seen more often and perhaps a few folks will wonder who I am hanging around the big boys and girls on those lists. Key word here, my fellow kboarders, is *HOPING* 

Pretty much all these numbers are personal bests for me, though as noted before, nothing is earth shattering. Still, overall I'm pleased at how the launch went as well as the performance of the paid promos and the amount of learning I've experienced with each launch. I read Chris Fox's post on his first year publishing and think that these kind of experiences are what helps us to develop as self-published authors. I'm pretty humbled at how steep the learning curve is, and had I known that it would have been this difficult, I'm not so sure I would have been looking forward to diving off the deep end head first 

As an author, my mailing list is getting new subscribers, I'm feeling that my craft is improving, and the business end of this is starting to make sense.

That's enough self indulgence for now. As I said, still hoping for a tail, hoping some of you found this post worthwhile (especially on how to promote a new release with NO reviews on day one) and of course, a big thanks for all the support and encouragement that I find on my author online home. If you're like me, you understand that very few other folks, including family and friends, have any idea about most of the things we discuss here. I said ENT and my kids said it was an old Spielberg movie and what was the big deal, LOL


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

I've been watching your rank shooting into the stratosphere, and doing a little happy dance for you! Awesome performance, well done.


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

WOW is right!  Go ENT!  Amazing news and amazing rankings!  Very excited for you--and I'm one of the 3 following this thread closely.


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## Steve Vernon (Feb 18, 2011)

That is awesome news, Salvador - especially when you consider that it wasn't more than a short time ago that you wandered onto kboards with nothing more than a plan to figure out how things work.

Go man go!


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## TraciLoudin (Sep 10, 2013)

Thanks again, Salvador! Your "self-indulgence" has definitely illuminated some things for me as a fellow newb. Best of luck with the tail!


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## Adair Hart (Jun 12, 2015)

Congratulations man, you keep rocking it! I remember you were concerned about page reads before, but 42k is awesome to these prawnful eyes. I agree the learning curve is steep, but thankfully we have kboards to help. Just wait until the second and third books of your series are out, that will be nuts! Self indulge away, I think there is probably more than three that enjoy seeing you succeed and what you are doing to attain it. You have come a long way since my lurking days.


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## JalexM (May 14, 2015)

Congrats! I'm going to steal your strategy for the next release of mine 
How far in advanced did you set up the promos?


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

JalexM said:


> Congrats! I'm going to steal your strategy for the next release of mine
> How far in advanced did you set up the promos?


My KDP Bookshelf says I submitted my book for pre-order on August 27th. Release date was the September 24th, so I had about 28 days to set it up. I started with ENT right away and was rejected and didn't resubmit until my book had been out for about a week. I mentioned a few other rejects on my initial post, but every other promo site got behind me and we got it done. I'm not so sure you have to go a month of pre-release, but it is necessary to have a ASIN number and product page to submit to the sites.



Adair Hart said:


> Congratulations man, you keep rocking it! I remember you were concerned about page reads before, but 42k is awesome to these prawnful eyes. I agree the learning curve is steep, but thankfully we have kboards to help. Just wait until the second and third books of your series are out, that will be nuts! Self indulge away, I think there is probably more than three that enjoy seeing you succeed and what you are doing to attain it. You have come a long way since my lurking days.


Thanks Adair, the 42k is total, Anjela was getting more than that per day, but I won't compare each launch because some do better than others for unknown reasons (at least to me). Yeah, I'm hoping to get my second dragon book out by the end of this month and then the Ranger second book out by the month after that, so I've got hopes to give my Fantasy series a punch in the arm with those. Not sure who' s lurking on my thread, so I just went with an average number when I posted an update 



TraciLoudin said:


> Thanks again, Salvador! Your "self-indulgence" has definitely illuminated some things for me as a fellow newb. Best of luck with the tail!


I saw you have quite a few books, hardly 'newb' material, AND, I saw your FB icon, I have the same invites so see you there! 



Steve Vernon said:


> That is awesome news, Salvador - especially when you consider that it wasn't more than a short time ago that you wandered onto kboards with nothing more than a plan to figure out how things work.
> 
> Go man go!


Yup, and STILL trying to figure things out Steve, I'll let you know IF I ever obtain that objective, but the milestone for now is that I know a hell of a lot more than I did when I joined Kboards on 1/1/15!



HN Wake said:


> WOW is right! Go ENT! Amazing news and amazing rankings! Very excited for you--and I'm one of the 3 following this thread closely.


Yes you are, and part of my prawny success to boot, thank you very much. ENT just crushed it yesterday, my prior record with them on my second book was 65 downloads and my prior best on any single day was 82 that I reported here with two bigger sites, so goes to show you that not all promo days are created equal.



PaulineMRoss said:


> I've been watching your rank shooting into the stratosphere, and doing a little happy dance for you! Awesome performance, well done.


Thanks Pauline! For full disclosure, I've pretty much just been following in your footsteps with a few side experiements (Kindle Scout submission, New genre, etc.) so thank YOU for leading the way as far as I'm concerned and thank you for the happy dance!


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## Christine_C (Jun 29, 2014)

This is awesome! I'm very excited for you. Congratulations!

Now I'm off to make a similar promo thread. Starting from the same low numbers so I'm just hoping it goes as well as yours did!


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Is there a consensus on Riffle?  $50 seems a bit steep for the ROI I'm seeing on these threads.  Thanks!  HN


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

My problem is that I never heard of Riffle, but wanted to throw the kitchen sink at this launch, so I got them and Booksends on the same day.  In the past, Booksends has gotten me around 35-40 downloads, but ENT went from around 65 to 106 with this book so maybe Booksends also got closer to 50?  Hard to say.  At any rate, the two together got me 82 downloads and I don't know what came from which company etc.  I'm pretty sure that a got a few dozen from Riffle though, maybe more if Booksends underperformed.  Until my ENT day, those two together got me the most downloads of my entire promotion.

$50 is getting steep, but only $10 more than Bargainbooksy and a good sight less than OHFB so let us know what you decide to do Ward 

I really should do an update on weeks 1 & 2 post ENT and my tail which is doing well for a prawn.  Maybe this weekend...


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

After much deliberation I've decided to not pursue the patented Salvador Launch Strategy (SLS).      My reasoning: I will release book #3 in the series in Jan/Feb - so will throw everything I've got at that.  That being said, I've got submissions in or confirmations for the following for a Nov 7-11 launch of novel #2 (and will dutifully provide updates.)    

FKBT
Bookscream 
ebooklister
Robin Reads
readfeely
booktastic
Sweet free books
awesome gang
ENT


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

What is the title of book 2?  I'm still experimenting, but I am under the impression that a solid promo launch on day 1 is definitely positive.  So far that strategy has netted me the most in revenue as well as the best tail I've ever had in my little tiny three book experiment.  I'm about to launch book 4 soon and will try a combo promo like Pauline did for her third book release and see how that goes.  Do post and let us know, Nov is not far away 

BTW, are you doing that Patty Jansen November 3 promo?


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Thanks Salvador.  That's superb news on your sales and tail!  The Mac Ambrose series book #2 is Deceits of Borneo.  When that goes live Nov 7, I'm also putting up book #3 (Serpents in the City) on pre order for Jan/Feb.  (With book #2 on pre order I have to upload the final by next week so am pushing through copy editing etc this weekend!  Eeks.)  1.  Is the Pauline post in this thread or another?  2. And what's the Patty Jansen Nov 3 promo??  3.  I've signed up for the next platinum Kindle Free Giveaway but we need a few more folks or that.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

I'll post when those threads pop up in my "new replies" over the weekend and give you the links.  Sounds like you have a great plan.  I'll update on my tail as soon as I can this weekend.  Things just started to cool down today and I finally lost my 4 digit ranking, entering 5 digit territory for the first time since the book's launch a month ago.  Revenue wise I've already broken my best month two days ago, well into 4 digits for rev.  Gotta keep moving forward, I feel like this is either a move forward or fall back kind of treadmill, LOL


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

4 digits!!!!  That's freaking awesome.  And 10 reviews already! Go Salvador Go!  I found the other threads, so no need to link but you are very kind for offering.  Pauline is killing it too!  These promo posts are ridiculously helpful.  

I hear you on the treadmill.  I'm trying to think up a better analogy that doesn't sound so exhausting.


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

HN Wake said:


> Pauline is killing it too! These promo posts are ridiculously helpful.
> I hear you on the treadmill. I'm trying to think up a better analogy that doesn't sound so exhausting.


Actually, treadmill is quite a good analogy. You run faster and faster just to stay in the same place, and the moment you stop, you whizz backwards. 

As for me, 'killing it' is a bit of a stretch. I love doing promos, and they do bump the books up the rankings a bit, but they always drift back down again afterwards, and sometimes it seems as if the tail gets shorter and shorter.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

I believe my last post with numbers was 106 for ENT on October 10th, a Saturday, 2 weeks ago today.  Since then I've sold 118 books and had 51k pages read in the last two weeks.  Rank has drifted slowly all the way down to about 11k from a high of 1.5k or so.  Also today marks the 1 calendar month since it was published on September 24th and it has fallen off of the 30 day cliff and the HNR lists 

I read another post where some folks talked about ROI and the overall sentiment, or at least my takeaway, was that if the ROI wasn't good then a promo site would not be used OR a stacked promo wasn't worth it.  I didn't really want to engage in contrary thinking on that post, but here I will add some facts and takeaways that I can own as my own opinion only.

As my sig clearly shows, I have three books published now.  Book 1 was launched with NO promotion.  It did what any book would do with this type of launch and a newbie author with NO subscribers to his/her mailing list and no name recognition (not that I have that now, but at least a few hundred readers have heard of me).  I was estatic if the book got down to about 100k and I ended up selling it for the better part of 3 months at 99 cents.  Revenues were, as one would expect, low two digit.  With a small promo to get it ranking better and with the KU1 borrows, the book managed to reach low three digits in rev.

Second book, soft launched, no promos until it was out for about 40 days then I ran a KCD on it.  Revs hit mid 3 digit then with KU2 and pages read (they are fair sized novels) I hit low 4 digits in rev for July until sliding in Aug and Sept back into high 3 digit revs.  Ranking stuck for a long while, till the 90 day cliff.

Finally, this is the third book launch and I took time off to submit it to the Kindle Scout program and also some RL issues reared their ugly heads, slowing my momentum.  I got the idea to launch with promos from Pauline and that is exactly what I did.  Revs for this month, October, have now exceeded my best month in July and are in the low 4 digit range again and I think the overall idea is a sound one.  I can't be 100% certain however, because my first two books are in the fantasy genre and this one is sci-fi/technothriller, so hard to say.  I spent just over $100 to promote my second book and over $300 to promote this book.  Both books returned that investment with plenty to spare.

A side lesson to any author thinking of writing in more than one genre, is that according to this book's "Also-Boughts", there isn't much crossover between my genres, even though Amazon initially lumps fantasy with science fiction.  I also think writing three books, in three different (potential) series was not the wisest course of action.  It makes sell-through difficult and I believe that a series will do better once there is that funnel we've all read about.  Initially, I was going to have this book as a stand alone and NOT write a sequel, but the promo and the feedback I've received allows me to be optimistic that perhaps I should consider a second book.  Not to be coy, but I've decided that when I'm done with the second book's sequel (first book's sequel will publish soon), then I'll write a second book for my third book (Am I confusing anyone else other than myself?)  

Back to the stats, since launch I've sold roughly 700 copies and had about 100k pages read.  My takeaway is to at least have a launch plan, continue to learn, write good books (as good as one's talent will allow since that is such a relative term), promote, promote, promote, and hope for a dash of luck.

Just wanted to also take a moment to thank my fellow writers as well as those readers who have helped this newbie figure out what the hell I'm doing. (Again, another relative term). I'm pretty sure I'd be toast if it wasn't for the shared wisdom that I've found here.


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

Those are great numbers - congrats!


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## Nicholas Erik (Sep 22, 2015)

Just wanted to come in and say thanks for laying this out and following up. I know you might've jokingly said no one's watching (this thread has almost 10k views, I think, so that's not the case unless Google's spiders have been particularly interested in Amazon's algorithms), but I've definitely been following along closely.

I write science fiction, and while I've had decent success promoting other authors' books, I've gained pretty much no traction with my own work thus far. I'm dramatically revamping my launch strategy, in that I used to just put stuff out there with little initial promotion. Between the threads you and Pauline have put out, along with some others, I've got some ideas on how I can organize that way, way better. 

So thanks.

Nick


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

I appreciate the comments Nick.  Yeah, I'm pretty dense, wasn't paying close attention to page views, so you're probably right there.  I think my main reason for posting each tactic/strategy for each of my launches is to share with newer authors what each one does and what kind of result they give to us.  When you aggregate most of the promo threads together we can extrapolate and get a pretty good idea of what may work, how it works and what we can do to maximize our own results.  As individuals, it is such a long process to write a book (not to mention the plotting, idea brainstorming, etc.) that goes into our works that unless you produce like Amanda does, we can only release a book every now and then so I'm pretty grateful for the other promo posts that share data, especially numbers, sites, and dates.

My biggest takeaway is that we have to be proactive if we want anyone to see our work.  Amazon made it easy for anyone to publish, so now the real challenge is to be seen, to get noticed.  When I first started my journey as an author, I thought that writing would be the hard part.  Now I know better and I have a huge amount of respect and admiration for the indie authors that came before me and paved a path for us to follow.  Until you do it, it's difficult to appreciate the complexity and efforts necessary to succeed, and get a book to market.

Thanks for chiming in.  Happy to report 8 sales yesterday, though only 2k+reads and a side benefit of having my book flirt with the high 4 digit rankings again.  Oh, and I found my book still in the HNR lists yesterday, I assume they'll disappear soon enough, but I'll take every extra day over 30 that the Zon will give me LOL


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## Adair Hart (Jun 12, 2015)

Great numbers Salvador! I know you did it with book 1 of your series, and am wondering how it would fare with a book 2. The question I am debating internally for my own series is, which book is promoted? For my Book 2 launch in December, I plan to do the free promotions for Book 1 while book 2 uses paid (set to .99), but what about when book 3 is launched?  The end goal as you mentioned is visibility but wonder how future books in the series need to be promoted aka what happens when I release book 7 for example. I wonder if the SLS can be applied to any launch in the series or if the best gains are for the first book in the series only. Looking forward to your next promo thread on book 2 of any of your series!

Also appreciate you taking the time to post all this data. I used it along with other promo threads to plan my first KCD next Saturday. I too thought writing would be the hardest and longest, but with Book 2 I found the writing to be much easier.  I have found that the longest part of my pipeline is copyediting. 4 months for Book 1, and 2 months for book 2 (shorter since I learned from the first one). What have you found to be the longest part in your pipeline?


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

My biggest slow down is a combination of 'butt-in-seat' time for writing and simply learning the self-publishing part of the business.

Initially I wrote two books, before I published one of them.  That literally took months of reading everyday and trying to set up a platform for my brand/work.  After that, add a healthy dose of reality and I spend 7 am till 7 pm working, come home and watch my boys, 1, 6, & 14 till my wife gets home at 11 pm from her evening job.  Do that Mon-Fri and it leaves scant time for writing or publishing.  Every day is a challenge.

On a good note, my wife has only one more week of work left and then I can get to the library in the evenings for a hour or two for writing.  Weekends I try to work on my platform/publishing tasks.  I've found that when my book goes to the editor, all is good, I start on the next one and don't worry about the one I sent.  Right now, my fourth book is proofing while I work on book five.

With regards to promoting, I'd say promote the hell out of everything you can.  Get visible then let the tail bring in your revenue.  After throwing the kitchen sink at my third book, it is doing well at full price so look up Pauline's thread on her third book promotion.  Make as much as you can free, 99 cent or discounted.  Work the tail.  Pray for a tail.  I don't have too much experience to know any better and I need a hundred reviews, or something close, before Bookbub will consider me.  I don't think my work special enough to get in with less than 20 reviews right now.  There is too much competition.  In fact, I may not get a BB ad till I group a series together from $9.99 and discount to 99 cents, then, just maybe, the bargain part will get me in.

Watching your progress with interest as well.  Good luck on your upcoming promo!


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## Adair Hart (Jun 12, 2015)

Salvador Mercer said:


> My biggest slow down is a combination of 'butt-in-seat' time for writing and simply learning the self-publishing part of the business.
> 
> Initially I wrote two books, before I published one of them. That literally took months of reading everyday and trying to set up a platform for my brand/work. After that, add a healthy dose of reality and I spend 7 am till 7 pm working, come home and watch my boys, 1, 6, & 14 till my wife gets home at 11 pm from her evening job. Do that Mon-Fri and it leaves scant time for writing or publishing. Every day is a challenge.
> 
> ...


Sweet Chtulhu man, that's some dedication to the craft! You're putting in the time though and it shows.

I went back and reread paulines thread in detail, and am now building my list of promos for book 2. My first promo will only use about ten advertisers because I don't want to begin the saturation of the others until book 2 is out. I am thinking I probably won't touch promotion after books 2's release until book 3 is launched sometime in March/Early April. Bookbub seems so far out of reach for me, and ENT has already rejected me due to the dates not being availible.  I am hoping the release of book 2 will shake its tailfeathers! 

Newbilicious question time! By grouping of series, is that creating a separate ASIN that has all your work in one big ebook, with a special cover or some other type of Amazon functionality that allows you to setup a series for sale as a group?


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Salvador: you are one committed man.  I had no idea you had such incredibly long days.  I'm ridiculously impressed with both your biz savvy and your Kboard posts!  (And you know what a huge fan my sci fi nut husband is of your writing.)  A big thank you from all of us who you've helped.

That's great advice on making the tail the goal.  I've been tweaking my promo strategy because of this thread.  SLS is a real thing now.  

I'd be keen to get your thoughts on boxed sets as well.  (I recently mucked around with making the 3d boxed set cover with help from another thread and the $5 template.  Not easy, but doable.)


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Wish I could give advice on a boxed set.  Never done it before, not sure how complex it would be, though sure lots of other kboarders have.  I can only think that at $2.99 x 5 books a boxed set of all 5 of my dragon books would retail individually for $14.95 so I could box set them for $9.99 and then pray for a BB at 99 cent LOL.  I got the idea from Ploof and his post where he shared that he had BB rejections for his boxed set at $2.99, but they accepted at 99 cents.

I had more time in my training position earlier this year, but now, running the rail control center, I'm kept very busy and my writing is again lagging way behind.  As I said, however, only three more days (this week) then I'll have some evenings free to split with the misses, (she studies TOEFL and I will write).

So, with 10k page views, any box set authors out there with some advice?


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## Nicholas Erik (Sep 22, 2015)

Yes, a box set is a separate ASIN/product. It's the same publishing process to release as you would a regular length book. This is different than the series slider Amazon will put on your product page that allows buyers the opportunity to buy an entire series at once. The latter is just a feature of Amazon, and offers no discount/is not a separate product - it is merely one-click ordering convenience. 

So no, it's not complex. 

Assorted thoughts on box sets - TLDR is do it, but be aware of the side effects. Slashing the price to $0.99 can be very effective, but it can also be an extremely expensive loss leader. No one size fits all solution. If you get "sticky" on the charts, you can make 5 figures a month very quickly. Stickiness is rare, in my experience. 

I have three box sets out. Four, technically, but I have one advertised as an omnibus w/ a 2D cover. I would recommend just getting a 3D cover (iTunes won't accept you, but whatever) and saving like $200+. But that's your call. 

Two of the sets are books in the same series.
Two of them are assorted books by the same author in the same genre.

The series ones do best, as you might expect. Buyers will snap up a $0.99 box, even if it has no reviews/middling reviews. I got accepted for a three book box at BookBub with like 11 reviews. It might've been less. 

The main problem is two fold: one, delivery costs eat into your profits at $0.99, depending on the royalty rate you choose on Amazon. This is going to be a bigger concern with epic fantasy, where your file size might be like 3 or 4 megs or something. Granted, I do my ePubs with Indesign, and I don't think it's the most efficient with the code. Second, when you sell a box at $0.99, the sell-through isn't all that great to the next books with promo.

I got 4.02% sell-through off a $0.99 BookBub promo to book 4. Not bad, but not great.

If you can get your set to stick - this one didn't - however, your organic sell-through can be awesome. I get around 30% organic sell-through from the 1 - 3  series box to book four (the other one is a complete trilogy, so no sell-through). I'd assume this is fairly low; I've been doing better since I updated the links/included an excerpt in the back. 

It will cannibalize sales of the other books - e.g. books 2/3 have sold a combined 700 or so copies, but the box has sold about 5000, most at $0.99. I recently put this set in KU (couple months after its BB run) and it doesn't get many page reads. 10k in two months. KENP is 835.

Page reads vary based on the set. For example, in the crime box set I did for one of my authors (two books in same series, plus one in same genre), page reads were like through the roof (I released it when I had a BookBub free ad for one of the books within the set, then had a link in the back of the free book to the set). 100k for that quarter. Only fifty sales, though, but that's not bad at $7.99. The cover cost me $50, so that's an easy $700 profit.

The sell-through rate on the clicks from the back matter was pretty bad, though. Like 850 clicks, but just those 50 sales. And the actual conversion rate off the # of free copies was like 0.1%. People would have probably preferred I send them to Book 2 in that series, rather than a set with an extraneous book in it.

I'd definitely do it, since it gives you another SKU for minimal additional work, thus granting you access to HNR lists etc. BookBub loves them, as do readers. For promo tips, what I'd try to do is try to get it sticky right out of the gate - this is really the only time I'd put it up for $0.99 with assorted promos, other than BookBub. I wouldn't spend a bunch of money advertising it for $0.99 anytime else, because you get murdered giving away that much content away at that price. I'm all for giving books away for free and cheap, but there gets to be a point where it's very difficult to make the numbers work. 

For max success, you really need a bunch of books behind the set at full price. You're essentially selling three books for $0.33 each, which is an 11 cent or 23 cent royalty per book. This isn't getting you rich. If you don't have anything behind it, and the 30 day release window is already done, I wouldn't discount it unless you get a BookBub. For example, you might be thinking goshdarnn, 5k sales, I'd like to get my hands on that.

Yes, but - it's only generated $4k in revenue or so. Which isn't bad, but after promo costs it hasn't done much better than the one that's sold 50 copies/100k reads that I've never dropped the price on. I never will drop the price on that, unless BookBub accepts it. Just not worth it. 

They're also really effective for hitting USA Today, FWIW. 

Nick


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Thanks Nick for this great post!  Lots (!) to consider here.  *She says as she goes off to research tracking clicks from back matter and other new concepts.*

Salvador: Your fans will appreciate whatever time to write you get!  I know this for a fact.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Wow, great info Nick, thanks for sharing!  

HN, got an interesting 4 star review today that would disagree with your assessment, LOL.  I think it was more critical than the three star review there.

Now I have to figure out how the hell to launch book 4 (Book 2 of my dragon series).  I keep second guessing myself on how to launch this one.  It is suppose to be back from the editor on Saturday and it takes me only a day to get the ebook version ready.  Despite my lessons learned, I got an itchy trigger finger and I'm real fearful that I won't be able to stop myself from throwing that bad boy out there as soon as I can.  Geez, you'd think I would have learned by now...  

Also, no sales so far today and my ranking tanked big time.  I'm wondering if I finally got officially removed from the HNR lists, though page reads were at 3.5k today.


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## Nicholas Erik (Sep 22, 2015)

HN Wake said:


> Thanks Nick for this great post! Lots (!) to consider here. *She says as she goes off to research tracking clicks from back matter and other new concepts.*
> 
> Salvador: Your fans will appreciate whatever time to write you get! I know this for a fact.


Use bit.ly (that's the complete web address). It's free. SmartURL is another option.

Basically you enter any link you want and it shortens it into a url like bit.ly/hnwakesawesomebooks (you can choose what the link says). Then it tracks the number of times it's been clicked on. I would enter the link to your Amazon page for Book 2, since you're in KU.

For example, here is one my links: bit.ly/idcomplete - if you add a + to the end of the link (bit.ly/idcomplete+) you can view its stats, and that it it has 11 clicks (maybe a couple more, now, if people viewing this thread click it). I had 9 signups, I think from that link, so I can see that my newsletter page's conversion rate is ~85% (too lazy to do math right now). Not bad. But I also know that I've given away ~400 copies of the first episode of that particular serial, which means not many people are reading it/reaching the end/compelled to keep reading after they consume episode 1 - not even when they can get the full book for zero dinero. Not so good.

You can also see how effective other author's campaigns are by copying their bit.ly links into your browser and adding the +. Good way to see if back matter is generating leads etc. - and whether their layout etc. might be worth imitating.


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## HN Wake (Feb 24, 2015)

Salvador Mercer said:


> HN, got an interesting 4 star review today that would disagree with your assessment, LOL. I think it was more critical than the three star review there.


I am a firm believer that 1,000 people with have 1,000 opinions. And I'm pretty sure most people believe that also when they read Amazon reviews. For me it's all about the cliff overhang of positive to negative reviews. I don't get bogged down in the weeds. Don't think another second about that. (PS I'm pretty sure he'll buy your next in series and I'm pretty sure most people read it that way too.)

Nick: You have just given me something new to play around with (well outside my comfort zone) when I don't want to write. I can't decide if I should be thankful or grumpy about that this morning.  Thank you.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Any ideas on how to promote book 2 in a series?  Promote book 1 heavy as a FREE day and go 99 cent with book 2?  That is what I'm thinking right now.  Any ideas on something better, especially those who have launched a second book in a series?  For the record, as I mentioned earlier, I literary have three book 1's and no book 2's (yet).


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## Nicholas Erik (Sep 22, 2015)

I just did a launch for a Book 6 at $0.99.

What I did was put the first book free, put the box set at $0.99 and books 2 - 5 in the series at $0.99. I heavily advertised (~$600) on the book one freebie and the box set. Needless to say, despite selling ~700 books and even with the Kindle Countdown royalties on the first five/the box, I look at the ROI and basically my reaction is :|

I wouldn't do it this way again. If the second book is a standalone, get as much ad support as possible - a la your Lunar Discovery launch - for book 2 at $0.99 with some mix-in for book 1 @ $0.99. If it can't standalone, I might release book 2 on day one at $0.99 to your newsletter subscribers (then bump to $3.99) and try to heavily advertise book 1 @ $0.99 for a week or two, unless it's been free super recently and you can't. During these promos be sure to put a link in the top of the book 1 description saying, hey, new release, super awesome, buy, buy, buy.

It obviously depends, but any time I load up on non-BookBub ads for freebies, I always lose money. Any time you can get someone to pay for a book, even at $0.99, I think that's the route to go. A paying customer is more inclined to read the books, buy the next ones etc. You also get murked on the paid charts when your free book returns, unless you got a ton of page reads, since your book hasn't sold a single copy for like two, three, five days.

Another thing I don't like about Select free runs, particularly when using smaller promo sites, is your also-boughts become nonsensical and unrelated...like you'll have a book on zombies, a paleo recipe book, a diet smoothie book with your fantasy book - and the # of downloads these books got along with yours makes it so that these unrelated books bump your book 2 from the first page of the also-boughts.

This also happens with BookBub, but sometimes you get paired with a mega-selling book, and all the books in general are of decent quality/traffic, so it can actually help you not having your own book in the also-boughts, if say, the latest Jack Reacher is number one on your also-boughts and vice-versa (we can all dream).

Example: here's one of my books - it takes until PAGE 7 for any of the books in the series (the omnibus) to show up in the also-boughts. That definitely hurts any chance of the omnibus being sold through organic browsing traffic (no, the current reviews don't help either), since it also doesn't appear in the Amazon slider for the series (being an omnibus at all).

With a free run these days, I'm basically hoping for a nice bump in page reads...if that doesn't happen (it doesn't seem to unless you use BookBub and get a jillion downloads), then I'd rather use the Countdown Deal.

Nick


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## fantasy-writer (Dec 12, 2014)

Salvador Mercer said:


> Any ideas on how to promote book 2 in a series? Promote book 1 heavy as a FREE day and go 99 cent with book 2? That is what I'm thinking right now. Any ideas on something better, especially those who have launched a second book in a series? For the record, as I mentioned earlier, I literary have three book 1's and no book 2's (yet).


To promote Book 2, you could set Book 1 to free or $0.99 and run promos on that. Put in big bold letters at the top of both the Book 1 blurb and the Book 2 blurb something like "Limited time sale! November 1-3 (or whatever). Book 1: FREE (or $0.99), Book 2: $0.99". Then run promos on Book 1.

Decide if you want to make Book 1 free or $0.99. If you go for free, it's easier and cheaper to move free copies, and it will give you more eyes on that blurb which is advertising the sale. A good number of people going to the free Book 1 page will see the sale line and buy Book 2. Going for $0.99 will get you paid on Book 1, though. It's up to you.

Another idea... If you have a 2.5 book, you can sandwich the $0.99 book (Book 1: FREE, Book 2: $0.99, Book 2.5: FREE), which will convince some people to buy the book in between the 2 free books.


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## Nicholas Erik (Sep 22, 2015)

Update: I did break even on the above $600 launch promo today. Took ten days. But that's with 6 books (7 total products) in the series, and a fair amount of effort went into that. Debatable whether I would consider it effective. Book 6 also displays zero stickiness, since ~100 sales or whatever plus page reads aren't really enough for Amazon to even sniff at.

If you don't have that massive backend, doing free + $0.99 like I did is probably going to murder your earnings. I personally won't be doing it again, even with the backend in place. But if you want the highest visibility/more reviews for Book 1 etc. then it could be effective. Depends on what your goals are.

To follow-up on a good point Ella made: a number of people who visit the free book will buy the $0.99 book when it's advertised at the top of the free book's description. My own stats are about 1200 people bought book 2 at $0.99 with book 1 (54,000 freeloads) during the same period. That was good for a 2.2% conversion rate with that particular strategy. 

I just gave away 1000 copies of a sci-fi novel and advertised a $0.99 series omnibus at the top and got about the same conversion rate (20 or so sales). 

Nick


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Thanks for the feedback.  It would be interesting to know the final conversion rate, after folks get around to doing something with book 1.  2% seemed low, though I have nothing to benchmark it against.  I'm also sure that some free book giveaways will eventually get read and hopefully help to convert a few readers into fans.  As mentioned above, I'm leaning towards the Free/99 cent strategy for now.


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## Nicholas Erik (Sep 22, 2015)

I think, from the boards at least, 2% is pretty standard - maybe even high - when you're doing paid promo (particularly with BookBub, where the sheer number of downloads is going to naturally result in some less targeted traffic). People getting rates of 5 - 10% from their freebie to the next book are generally referring to the organic freeloads from their permafree. 

That being said, a little info on the tail: sold another 300 copies of Book 2 at full price ($3.99) in the six weeks thereafter. So the combined conversion (promo itself + tail) is 2.8%. Also, the link in the free book 1 back matter goes to the crime series box set I talked about above, which is Book 1 + Book 2 + another crime book. So if I put the Book 2 link straight after the end, then the CR probably would have been higher. If we throw in the sales for the box, we get a conversion rate of 2.9%. 

This isn't including page reads, as I don't really see a way of tracking the CR with any reliability.

Also, a correction to what I said above: gave away 997 copies of a free sci-fi book. Had the $0.99 link to the series omnibus in the description. Checked my data and I apparently got 47 sales off that on the same day (not 20 as stated above). So that was actually good for a 4.7% conversion rate.

Hope that helps in some way. 

Nick


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

Yeah, I want to hear closer to a 5% conversion rate, not 2%  especially as I'm going to try this for the first time, hehe.


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## Salvador Mercer (Jan 1, 2015)

This thread should be dead...

Well, I'm posting an update with some promising, if not certain, news.  I was contacted just over a week ago by Podium Publishing and we set up a telephone call for this book with the topic being publishing an audiobook for it.  A few days ago I signed a contract and hopefully we'll see this bad boy in audio format.

I'm trying to manage my expectations, but this is a newer company, three years in the business, and they have won numerous awards for the quality of their work.  The kicker for me is that when they started their business, they reached out to an unknown author and published his book, in audio format, which later did very well.  The author's book?  The Martian.

Significant for me because my book was turned down by Kindle Press (Kindle Scout) so just wanted to share a lesson with my fellow indies, never give up, put out your best and believe in yourself.

A disclaimer, the business of publishing anything, by anyone, is speculative, so while nothing has been accomplished on this front, the fact that someone in this business read my work and felt it had merit is most pleasing for my plankton mind   So this thread may, or may not, get an update the next year if anything noteworthy happens.  I did want to share this bit of small news with my fellow prawns


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## J.T. Williams (Aug 7, 2014)

That is seriously exciting. I'm happy for you!


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

That's great news, Salvador. I hope the audio works out for you.


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## Lu Kudzoza (Nov 1, 2015)

Congrats! I suspect you'll be leaving us soon to enter the big leagues. Wonderful to see authors succeed!


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## Gone Girl (Mar 7, 2015)

We miss you, Harvey Chute.


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

Congrats! I've heard that Podium put out a top-quality product, so I'm sure you'll be pleased with the results. Good luck with it!


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## Guest (Dec 20, 2015)

Congrats!  I've seen lots of good things about them so far.


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