I think the world of reading has changed and maybe we haven't kept up.
Do people still join book clubs?
Do they tell all their friends when they find a good book?
Which social media platform actually works when it comes to promotion? (Not ads, just being social?)
Is there a way to pool our data, figure out what truly works and why?
Is there a way to pool our ad money and therefore cut costs?
Just asking.
In theory, if we had enough writers involved in the sharing, yes. However, my guess is that there is a lot of variables. I'm sure you've noticed the same thing I have--any thread on marketing with a lot of posts probably contains contradictory data. A strategy works really well for some and not at all for others. The trick is isolating what variables might be at work. That requires a huge number of data points and some very good statisticians. Only then can the contradictions in the anecdotal evidence be explained well enough to get that evidence working for us.
To throw a small amount of data into the mix, I'm familiar with several book clubs. They are all trad-centric in their choices, hence probably not a good vehicle for indies most of the time. If you had a major celebrity who started a book club and included at least some indie titles, that might help change that culture.
The people who talk books with their friends are usually also trad-oriented, though I'm sure there are exceptions. (These days some of the talk occurs online, but it still occurs.)
What little data I have suggests that we are really dealing in some ways with two separate markets. When I look at the also-bought for trad books, they are mostly other trad books. When I look at the also-boughts for indies, they are predominately other indie books. (Yes, there are exceptions.) It appears that there are still many shoppers who buy mostly trad books. People who have overcome that bias may in some cases end up buying mostly trad books. In an ideal world, we'd find a way to break that barrier.
As far as pooling resources is concerned, I'm all for it, but there are a limited number of ways to do it. I've had luck with promos through companies like BookFunnel, both for newsletter signups and for sales. (The sales ones don't produce as many sales as the bigger newsletter-type ads do, but you can do as many of them as you want for the same basic fee, making them less expensive. The one I'm currently involved in appears to be converting clicks to sales at a 9% rate for one and an 13% rate for the other. (I wish my AMS ads did that well!) Of course, books do better when they are on sale, but even at sale prices, this is one of the few things I do that seems to have a positive ROI.
Another way to pool resources which I've mentioned before is the multi-author anthology. Some are united by theme, some by genre, some by season. They are often distributed free (which avoids messiness with dividing the royalties), but, despite what I said about free losing some of its impact, I've seen jumps in sales every time I've been in an anthology like that, and one helped me break into markets I hadn't had much presence in before. (Australia became my #2 market then and has stayed that way, even though I think that was three or more years ago.) The idea behind them is that each author promotes the anthology, and readers get a chance to sample the works of a number of different people. That seems to still have some appeal, though I haven't had a good opportunity in a couple of years. They are a lot of work for the editor(s) and don't seem to be happening as often.
