Now I know why I will never get a BookBub

[notthatamanda]

Good luck.

[Gerri Attrick]

Nice one. Good luck!

[Pemry Janes]

Got a Bookbub today!  It's intl for a witch book which is quite appropriate this upcoming month.
For those of you like me who've suffered with rejections, this is after 16 rejections since my last one a year ago. Never give up.

Very nice, good luck!

[notthatamanda]

I applied for Int'l only for book 1, permafree of my contemporary romance trilogy and got it. No idea what to expect but I'll post the results when it happens, only 105 bucks.

[alhawke]

I applied for Int'l only for book 1, permafree of my contemporary romance trilogy and got it. No idea what to expect but I'll post the results when it happens, only 105 bucks.

Awesome. Good luck! 

[notthatamanda]

Thank you. I've only ever had 2 book bubs, both Int'l, one good one not. I'm cautiously optimitic.

[Pemry Janes]

I applied for Int'l only for book 1, permafree of my contemporary romance trilogy and got it. No idea what to expect but I'll post the results when it happens, only 105 bucks.

Congratulations.

[Jeff Tanyard]

Am I the only one who thinks this thread title has become something of a misnomer?  ;)

Seriously, though, congratulations to Amanda and everyone else for sharing their Bookbub success stories.  I wish those with upcoming promotions the best of luck. 

And to those who apply but have yet to be accepted, keep applying!  You never know when they'll have an opening that your book would suit to a T.

[Eric Thomson]

Am I the only one who thinks this thread title has become something of a misnomer?  ;)

Seriously, though, congratulations to Amanda and everyone else for sharing their Bookbub success stories.  I wish those with upcoming promotions the best of luck. 

And to those who apply but have yet to be accepted, keep applying!  You never know when they'll have an opening that your book would suit to a T.

Meh... Got my 72nd rejection since Feb 2020 yesterday. Haven't snagged a BB in over a year and a half

[alhawke]

Am I the only one who thinks this thread title has become something of a misnomer?  ;)

Seriously, though, congratulations to Amanda and everyone else for sharing their Bookbub success stories.  I wish those with upcoming promotions the best of luck. 

And to those who apply but have yet to be accepted, keep applying!  You never know when they'll have an opening that your book would suit to a T.

Meh... Got my 72nd rejection since Feb 2020 yesterday. Haven't snagged a BB in over a year and a half

There's definitely a lot of pain in the applications process. Hopefully posting an occasional win helps spur us on.
72nd ... ugh ... "Never give up. Never surrender."

[LilyBLily]

It occurs to me that BookBub is replicating for us the exact process we have deliberately avoided by not seeking to be traditionally published: rejection after rejection after rejection.

Kind of funny.

Perseverance is a valuable trait in a writer. Also a thick skin. We're all winners because we keep trying.

[JRTomlin]

Being turned down for a promotion isn't quite the same as being rejected for publication. I simply run my promotion somewhere else. And some months I simply choose to do my promotion somewhere that is cheaper. Fortunately, unlike publishers used to, BB does not have complete control of the entire industry. 👍

[idontknowyet]

Odd question?

Has anyone ever heard of an author that's made it big and not had a bookbub?

I'm not talking midlister. I'm talking a big name.

[notthatamanda]

Intl. Bookbub just went out a few hours ago and I have Amazon - 1000+ downloads and 8 sales of books 2 and 3 combined, conahura, knock wood. I won't bore you guys with updates every hour, but that's pretty much all I'm going to be doing the rest of the day.

[idontknowyet]

Intl. Bookbub just went out a few hours ago and I have Amazon - 1000+ downloads and 8 sales of books 2 and 3 combined, conahura, knock wood. I won't bore you guys with updates every hour, but that's pretty much all I'm going to be doing the rest of the day.

i love updates. real experiences with promos are informative.

[alhawke]

Intl. Bookbub just went out a few hours ago and I have Amazon - 1000+ downloads and 8 sales of books 2 and 3 combined, conahura, knock wood. I won't bore you guys with updates every hour, but that's pretty much all I'm going to be doing the rest of the day.

Good luck, notthatamanda!

My international 99c is ending today. All stores back to regular price except Amazon (I try to stop price matching). Got >600 sales and that paid for the promotion in 2 days. Ranked in the top 100 in the whole store in UK, CA (23), and Australia. This is the first time a promotion has paid for itself. 
BB is still king. We'll see if I get any tail as the days go by. Needless to say, I am quite stoked (its that word even used anymore?).

[JRTomlin]

Sounds like a great start! Good luck.

[notthatamanda]

Okay I lied. 10 paid books. It does amaze me that people buy books 2 and 3 before reading book 1 but thank you each and everyone one of you.

Canada Amazon Rankings;
Best Sellers Rank: #6 Free in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
#1 in Contemporary Women's Fiction
#2 in Contemporary Romance (Kindle Store)
#2 in Contemporary Romance (Books)

UK:
Best Sellers Rank: #12 Free in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
2 in Women's Romance Fiction
2 in Women's Contemporary Fiction
5 in Contemporary Romance (Kindle Store)

[LilyBLily]

Woo-hoo! 

[LilyBLily]

Since we've revived this hoary old thread, I should add that, prior to the international BBs I had this spring, I couldn't get arrested on Kobo. No sales, like, ever. I think it took four years to get my first little payment from Kobo. Now I've been getting small but steady money. A tail, by gum.

[JRTomlin]

You have to love people who do that! 😜

[notthatamanda]

I've got over 700 downloads on Kobo today. Like you Lily, couldn't get arrested over there.
Thank you all for the good wishes.

[JRTomlin]

You do get some action over at Kobo with BB and that's the only way I ever have. I don't know what you'd have to do to get regular sales.

[LilyBLily]

You do get some action over at Kobo with BB and that's the only way I ever have. I don't know what you'd have to do to get regular sales.

The usual: Goat sacrifices. 

[JRTomlin]

I ran out of white goats for sacrifices. Looks like I need to stock up.

[notthatamanda]

Still dark here update:

Amazon :2700 free, 19 paid, $44
Kobo: 1035 free, 2 paid, $5.24
D2D: none
Google: nothing or can't tell yet

Promo cost $105.
Hopefully the readthrough pays off the rest of the promo.

Amazon ranks in CA are still all top 5. UK top ten.  Aus, India top 20 free, so hopefully that visibility will make for another decent day.

[notthatamanda]

It looks like I made back the price of the Bookbub ($105) plus two lattes, (conahura, knock wood) that's with D2D and Google not reporting for yesterday yet.

Downloads for Amazon so far - 3238 (which includes 47 for the US, surprisingly)
Kobo - 1176
Google - 222
D2D (all apple) - 707

I'm interested to see how the tail holds in the international markets since I got really good rankings in free and the sub categories. Should be good visibility - conahura knock wood, again.

[Jeff Tanyard]

It looks like I made back the price of the Bookbub ($105) plus two lattes, (conahura, knock wood) that's with D2D and Google not reporting for yesterday yet.

Downloads for Amazon so far - 3238 (which includes 47 for the US, surprisingly)
Kobo - 1176
Google - 222
D2D (all apple) - 707

I'm interested to see how the tail holds in the international markets since I got really good rankings in free and the sub categories. Should be good visibility - conahura knock wood, again.

 

 

[notthatamanda]

Thanks Jeff.

I've made back the cost of the promo on Amazon alone (conahura, knock wood) the rest is lattes for everyone!

[JRTomlin]

Always great news to have even a small profit and hopefully some tail. My last one had a tail that is still tapering off, so good luck on that part! 👍

[Gerri Attrick]

Congrats! Hope you get good sell-through on the rest of the books.

 

[notthatamanda]

Thanks Gerri!

Jeff - when was your last Bookbub?

[Jeff Tanyard]

Thanks Gerri!

Jeff - when was your last Bookbub?

I had two in 2019--a free one for Clouds of Venus and a 99-cent one for Hostile Planet--but I stopped applying soon after.  Diminishing returns are a thing, and I wanted to save the next ones for when I had audio versions available.  Then the whole Audible returns scandal happened, and I held off on audio until things got sorted out.  Then 2020 happened and I had bigger fish to fry in my personal life, and, well...     I'm still not sure how I want to go about doing audio, so Bookbub applications are on hold for now.

[Crystal]

Odd question?

Has anyone ever heard of an author that's made it big and not had a bookbub?

I'm not talking midlister. I'm talking a big name.

I'm not aware of any, but I'm not sure what your intent is with this question.

BookBubs aren't a big deal anymore. Lots of authors get them. Lots of authors get rejected for them. Big authors also get rejected by BookBub, but they keep applying until they get a BookBub.

I've had 5-10 rejections in a row and I've had 4-5 acceptances in a row too. It depends on the books and whether or not BookBub is favorable to KU books at the time I apply (sometimes they are, sometimes not).

[JRTomlin]

For a while, Bookbub seemed to have decided that no one wanted to read medieval historical fiction so getting a BB in that subgenre was very iffy. Now they seem to have changed their minds. They judge their market and what their customers want and we may or may not agree, but eventually, markets and their judgments change. Or that's my experience anyway. 🤷‍♀️

[Eric Thomson]

Haven't snagged a BBFD since February 2020 even though I've been applying, and quite frankly, it hasn't mattered. My business is motoring along quite well on its own, so I no longer bother. At 3-4 releases a year, my mailing list, social media and other internet presence, the sales and cash flow are such that I don't really need BB.

[LilyBLily]

Looking at my stats for the year so far, I note that Amazon US has not been affected long-term by the three international BB ads I had, but Amazon in other countries has been, and all the other major sales venues were.

Meanwhile, the monthly KU countdowns coupled with lower tier newsletter ads I've run this year have had pathetic returns. For the first time, I'm actually considering pulling all my remaining books out of KU. 

Aiming for a BB ad makes sense for me while I remain in limbo regarding other, more continuous ads, but I'm going to wait a little until I try again.   

[notthatamanda]

Lily - have you ever tried a B&N bookbub ad? That was the only one I could ever get sales on with bookbub, only with my historical fiction. I've got a real Bookbub high going here so I may try that again, especially since my WW2 book has a sequel now.

[JRTomlin]

Bookbub ads take a lot of work figuring out what graphic works and the right targeting. It generally takes some test ads the cost of which can add up, but if you can get a solid list of targets they can be effective.

[R. C.]

Bookbub ads take a lot of work figuring out what graphic works and the right targeting. It generally takes some test ads the cost of which can add up, but if you can get a solid list of targets they can be effective.

 

R.C.

[notthatamanda]

I've applied for a US only book deal on my permafree that I had the Int'l only on. I made enough on the Int'l only to cover the cost of the US too. Hope they don't give me a date on US Thanksgiving weekend.

[LilyBLily]

Good luck!

As for me, my BB click ads have not been successful and the advice given is contradictory. Choose five or fewer authors, for instance, versus choose a lot. And so on.

There's a BB click ad I've seen over and over again with a hot guy and good copy, but as much as I enjoy looking at him day in and day out, I've already checked on the book and know it's not for me. So just hurling a huge amount of money at repetitive click ads seems a bit pointless to me.

It's an irony of the self-publishing paradigm that our ads run whether they make money or not. Years ago, an old pro at the ad business told me if I saw an ad in a magazine run more than once, they were making money. We indies simply throw money at ads and mostly we don't make money and we ascribe the ads' failures to our own personal inability to do ads right.

[notthatamanda]

Thank you.

I used to get the same ad over and over for a book about the benefits of tumeric. I never clicked on it.

I pretty much use one author per ad on bookbub. It gets me into the good range they recommend. I did manage to sell some of my WW2 book on B&N with that strategy. I'm trying it again, but I'm bidding really low (10-20 cents) so my impressions are barely anything so my data right now is kind of useless.

[JRTomlin]

Good luck!

As for me, my BB click ads have not been successful and the advice given is contradictory. Choose five or fewer authors, for instance, versus choose a lot. And so on.

There's a BB click ad I've seen over and over again with a hot guy and good copy, but as much as I enjoy looking at him day in and day out, I've already checked on the book and know it's not for me. So just hurling a huge amount of money at repetitive click ads seems a bit pointless to me.

It's an irony of the self-publishing paradigm that our ads run whether they make money or not. Years ago, an old pro at the ad business told me if I saw an ad in a magazine run more than once, they were making money. We indies simply throw money at ads and mostly we don't make money and we ascribe the ads' failures to our own personal inability to do ads right.

To give you some more contradictory advice, the number of authors you choose has a lot less to do with a successful ad campaign than that they are the right authors. Do they have enough BB followers and do they have the same target audience as you matter a lot more. Even with those, you have to go through and cull the ones that won't still click on your ads. Bernard Cornwell and I should have the same target audience but his followers won't touch my ads, so I don't target them. After a lot of experimenting, I have a list of eight authors whose followers I can count on giving me a CTR of better than 2%. But finding them and figuring out what kind of ad works for my target took months of work. And I still limit my spend because even with low bidding, my ROI with ads (as opposed to promotions) is not that great.

Normally BB makes sure that the same ad is not shown to the same subscriber more than five times. The only way that could be happening is if the author cancels the ad and then does a new one, which really is a waste of money if you are running the same ad with the same target authors.

What works for me in my genre as far as the appearance of the ad itself may be very different than what works in some others, but there again I did a lot of experimenting, trying out different styles of ads to find out what worked with my target audience. Frankly I don't think they look that great, but my targets click on them and that's what counts.

[JRTomlin]

On a related subject, I recall when Bookbub first started doing their 'New Release for Less' promotions which are within a month of a novel's release that I read some feedback that the results were very disappointing. I've never tried one for that reason, but I wondered if anyone has tried one more recently? The price is eyewatering, even higher than their regular promotions so I'm not in a huge hurry to try one unless I hear that they are doing well these days.

[notthatamanda]

Two weeks out from my Int'l bookbub. Things have slowed down considerably.

Amazon - 4000+ downloads, about a 2% read through so far, still getting double digit downloads on the permafree daily.
Kobo - 1400+ downloads about a 1.5% read through so far, downloads down considerably more than Amazon
D2D - pretty much all apple - almost 2000 downloads, read through 4.6%, downloads down a lot.
I've made $68 bucks on google. Too lazy to figure out how many downloads that was with their reports.

I've sold at least one copy of all but one of my other books. It was a profitable promo. They turned me down for a US on the same book. I applied for an Int'l on the permafree on my other trilogy.

[idontknowyet]

On a related subject, I recall when Bookbub first started doing their 'New Release for Less' promotions which are within a month of a novel's release that I read some feedback that the results were very disappointing. I've never tried one for that reason, but I wondered if anyone has tried one more recently? The price is eyewatering, even higher than their regular promotions so I'm not in a huge hurry to try one unless I hear that they are doing well these days.

I have heard they are effective only if you discount your book (.99cents or less). otherwise a complete waste of money

[JRTomlin]

Ugh. I consider $2.99 to be a discount. I could do that but have some doubts if it would be worthwhile in the 4th in a series.

*ponder ponder ponder*

On the other hand... I may give it a try when I release The Douglas Bastard next year.

[notthatamanda]

Maybe you'd be better off trying to time a Bookbub for Book 1 in the month before the new book in the series is released.

[notthatamanda]

I got an Int'l bub for my other trilogy, first book. New Adult Romance so only $59. It's on Nov. 22, Thanksgiving week, which shouldn't matter for Int'l, but I have jury duty that day and I have to cook and my college classes gave us a full workload for the week cause we can just do our assignments on Mon-Wed and then have our Thanksgiving????

So I am happy about the bub but I'm also looking at that week and going holy crap I'm in trouble. No jury duty, please, please please. I'll find out Friday if they need me.