Two days ago we marked our first year of selling eBooks on that vast and uncertain market… the Internet.
While the very idea is intimidating for an unknown site/novel/author, a small, glimmering hope shone out amid the risks and fears. Though unpredictable and incomprehensibly enormous, the worldwide audience retains its promise as living, breathing potential customers.
I never expected the books to sell. While I like my stories and my husband’s we could not rely solely on the glowing praises of our friends and families… a focus group consisting of rather biased initial mindsets. 1000 customers later, I am pleasantly proved wrong and we have furiously added to our small collection of novels available. The repeat business is very encouraging; with each new title completed the sales strengthen, as does our resolve to write more.
What worked? Writers like us may be interested to know that free advertising sites like craigslist or free ads on myspace proved nearly worthless, and time consuming. Facebook, however was a gold mine; the folks there appear ardently curious. As we joined book and reader groups and commented on various posts, wrote blogs, etc… (never spamming the boards with ads) people felt compelled to click in our signature links, check out our page/site and clamor to be added on our friends list.
Another thing that did not work: giving out a free/discounted eBook as an advertising strategy; we tried a promotional month of ‘99-cent’ books and subsequently sold the fewest number we ever had. After the promotion ended, the numbers increased. With reading audiences, they appear to like paying more for a good story, or at least what they deem a good price. 99-cent books may work for some genres, but in fiction audiences seem to think that a cheap price reflects the books contents. The standard acceptable price for a fairly good full-length novel by an unknown writer seems to be about $6.99.
We also sold more books once we re-designed our covers; we walked around several well-known books store chains and looked at the best seller racks until we got a good idea of the cover trends. The covers still look rather homegrown, but the response of customers showed us that our efforts wrestling with Fireworks was well worth the time and exasperation.
Regarding increasing web traffic, writing and updating several types of blog helped bring in visitors to the site and paying customers; eBay blog, Live Journal, Gather, Facebook Notes, WordPress, Book and Reader forum and others all proved themselves worthy fishing holes, along with several book reviews sites like Library Thing . Sometimes a simple thing like writing humorous, insightful reviews of your favorite books is all it takes to attract new audiences.
Lastly, don’t limit yourself you your own neighborhood, city or even your own country. I was stunned by the number of customers from India whom are interested in my books; I have found them well-read and willing to give excellent criticism. Half the books we’ve sold have been outside the USA including Canada, France, Indonesia, India, Australia, New Zealand, the UK, Ireland, Germany and Denmark. Several of these countries have popular review sites and book forums; many new writers there are eager to write for American audiences and want advice and subject matter to study.
As for persistence, any writer knows that one must try repeatedly in order to succeed even slightly. While our efforts do not yet support us, it supplements our income a little, all the while offering that wonderfully inspiring force- hope.
Keep up the pen,
MG
