Paperback marketing

[alhawke]

Just sending out a general thread regarding paperback marketing advice.

There are ads for ebooks. Promos for ebooks. What are you guys using to move paperbacks? Your newsletter? The only thing I've ever found regarding promotions for paperbacks is an Indie promo company that runs a paperback promotion. Never tried it.

It's weird because audiobooks are advertised now. Why not our traditional paperbacks?

And now, with covid, it's an even harder sell.

[notthatamanda]

I used AMS and picked specific paperback book pages. It would advertise my ebook but people could look and see that I had a paper copy. Did I move a lot of books on Amazon? No, but I got some. I don't know how I sell paper books but the sales pop up on Ingram. I'm not in AMS anymore so I don't even know if that's still an option.

[Lorri Moulton]

My paperbacks are on my Amazon page and my website.  I sell more non-fiction than fiction.

[alhawke]

I used AMS and picked specific paperback book pages.

Yeah, AMS seems to be the only method of advertising that's ever worked for me for paperbacks. Sometimes paperbacks are purchased instead of ebooks even if you advertise the ebook. But I stopped using AMS because I was spending way more $ than selling.

My paperbacks are on my Amazon page and my website.  I sell more non-fiction than fiction.

Lorri, do you mean you sell paperbacks on your website??? I don't get a huge amount of traffic on my site, but during promotions, and so forth, I might land a sale this way.

[LilyBLily]

I have a nonfiction title with a long-running AMS ad and at least one third of the sales are paperbacks. I really think it depends on the readers' preferences, not on the type of ad that is run. For instance, my short romances barely sell in paper, but my much longer women's fiction titles do sell in paper quite steadily.

[alhawke]

I really think it depends on the readers' preferences, not on the type of ad that is run.

I'm learning a lot from you guys about nonfiction sales here. Apparently they sell more. Certainly, textbooks and the like haven't entered the ebook craze.
Thanks for sharing Lily. All my books are fantasy,sci fi romance and I don't sell 30 paperbacks/70 ebooks like some people. More like <5/95.

edit: btw, for more hard data, at the moment I sell all my paperbacks at $12.99. On Ingram I set 45%. If any of you believe I'm overpriced, or under, with my books, I welcome advice. My ebooks do fine at $3.99, so I hesitate to drop much further with pricing paperbacks. Not to mention, the royalty starts getting pretty abysmal at lower rates--currently, my royalty back is only around $2-3 for paperbacks, similar to the ebooks.

[okey dokey]

@Alhawke

Where do you get a paperback printed for $2 to $3

[notthatamanda]

I think alhawke meant his profit on a paperback was $2-3.

[alhawke]

Yes, royalty back, revenue averages = $2 to $3

[Anarchist]

Regarding AMS and paperback sales...

I recommend separating ads by format. One ad for ebooks. One ad for print.

The bids are different. The audiences are different. And my data show that targets can convert like gangbusters for one format and fail to convert for the other.

Creds: Impressions in the 10 figures, clicks in the 7 figures, and several thousand paperback sales per month.

[notthatamanda]

Yes I did that, but we aren't actually allowed to advertise our print books, or did they change that? In other words, the link on the AMS ad will always go to the ebook and it's up to the customer to click on the paper format.

[Hopscotch]

Creds: Impressions in the 10 figures, clicks in the 7 figures, and several thousand paperback sales per month.

  

[alhawke]

Yes I did that, but we aren't actually allowed to advertise our print books, or did they change that? In other words, the link on the AMS ad will always go to the ebook and it's up to the customer to click on the paper format.

You can create an ad now specifically for paperbacks on AMS; I did that, but have not been successful.

[notthatamanda]

Oh that is interesting. Thanks. I may try one of those.

Edit - how do you do it? Does it have to be a Kindle Print paper book? I can't add my Ingram paper books that I can see.

[alhawke]

It has to be Kindle only for AMS

[notthatamanda]

Okay, thank you. Do you know if you can use the same cover and text files for Ingram and Kindle paper books? If it is as simple as that maybe I should publish what I have on Kindle print. If I need new files ack, run away, run away, 

[alhawke]

Do you know if you can use the same cover and text files for Ingram and Kindle paper books? If it is as simple as that maybe I should publish what I have on Kindle print.

Different cover for Ingram, same PDF text files for both. That's how I do it. You have to have two different covers.

For ads, Amazon will only advertise Amazon.

Interestingly, Bookbub can advertise audiobooks but not paperbacks. Bookbub can technically advertise anywhere with a custom URL, which makes me contemplate connecting to paperback links. But typically, when I've experimented with custom URLs with BB ads, it's been useless (tried it once for Booksprout). Not sure of Facebook ads--never tried them..

AMS is an interesting option for me to try again. I was seeing if you guys knew of any other methods too ... say promos and so forth.

[alhawke]

Just remembered, for those folks using Ingram, Ingram has a marketing option for new releases. From my past readings, this has not sold any books for writers. It's close to $100 for ads to run on pamphlets and such for libraries and book stores. SO ... anyone use the Ingram marketing service recently? I'd be willing to give it a shot if people have had positive experiences with it.

[notthatamanda]

I tried it last fall, with a Sept release and it was in the January catalogue. Save your money. (Not to be bossy.) Even the trades released in Sept were in the Jan catalogue.

Thanks for the info on Amazon print. I can't make another version of the cover for it so