Writer Sanctum
Writer's Haven => Marketing Loft [Public] => Topic started by: The Bass Bagwhan on October 01, 2025, 07:06:47 PM
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I thought I'd try to Boost a FB post rather than put together an actual FB ad and the usual process is simply paste the (in the case) Amazon US store link into the post and add your blurb, etc. The image should be the book cover, right? Taken from Amazon.
But when I do, Amazon shoves my image into one corner and dominates the post with a big "Prime Day Special!" advert flogging its own promotiuon. Is this normal? I'm not paying to boost Amazon's damn business!
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No idea.
But the wisdom is NEVER boost a post.
They simply don't work.
Facebook itself is for brand awareness, not for selling books. It's basically throw money in the pond and hope some of it floats.
That and a lot of people like me will block every single ad they see, because the algorithm used to put it in front of people is total crap and getting worse.
The stupid thing about FB is, I'd pay to put my posts in front of 100% of my friends and page and group followers. And yet, the way the ads work, that is impossible to get more than 5% coverage.
So they push ads at people who don't want them, and withhold them from the people that do.
Give FB a miss. You'd be better off playing the AMS lotto.
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Umm... I do really well with FB ads. Always average at least 2:1 ROI and sometimes better. What's happened recently is that FB has a definitive interest group in "horror fiction" and that's started to shift my horror books, whereas in the past horror was buried in some "urban fantasy" rubbish category. But I wanted to dabble with Boosting a shortish novella for 3-4 days rather than construct a complete ad because being short fiction it might not work. Looks like I might have to do that anyway...
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Or maybe just wait until after Prime Day (October 7-8). Presumably, Amazon will stop hyping it after it's over.
It's been more than a decade since I had any luck with FB ads. You're obviously very skillful with them to achieve such good results.
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Or maybe just wait until after Prime Day (October 7-8). Presumably, Amazon will stop hyping it after it's over.
It's been more than a decade since I had any luck with FB ads. You're obviously very skillful with them to achieve such good results.
Talking of which (or something similar) should everyone be pausing promotions while the US Government is shut down? How hard do these things hit the economy and people's willingness to spend? Although I suppose that KU might actually improve if people have already paid their sub for the month.
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If the shutdown is long, probably yes to shutting down promotions. If it's short, it probably won't make that much difference.
Ironically, I have my first discounted sale in some time in October. But maybe that kind of promotion will still work, as discounts become more appealing...
I was also planning on raising prices. That will for sure wait until we have clarity on the economic situation.
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Talking of which (or something similar) should everyone be pausing promotions while the US Government is shut down?
What is this?
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Talking of which (or something similar) should everyone be pausing promotions while the US Government is shut down?
What is this?
Trolls and troglodytes govern our fine country. Unfortunately, they are unable to agree on the sky being blue, so the budget resolution hasn't yet passed. No pass the bill, no money to pay non-essential gov'ment workers. At least 750k will miss a paycheck if the impasse continues long enough.
R.C.
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This used to be comparatively uncommon and last less than a day. The first really long ones were in the 1990s. They have been getting more frequent, and the last one was the longest one. It's another byproduct of polarization.
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Not to get political, but here's the latest AI response:
AI Overview
The last U.S. government shutdown began on October 1, 2025, and is currently ongoing. Prior to this, the most recent shutdown occurred from December 2018 to January 2019.
No shutdowns during the Biden administration. Just keeping it real. :cheers
(This is not an endorsement for either side...just a stickler for US history.)
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I'm saying this without taking sides--we need to work out a better system and/or become less polarized.
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I agree. The idea that there are "sides" is what's so ridiculous. Political parties shouldn't be more important than the American people. This isn't an NFL playoff. It's our country.
I go out of my way NOT to take sides most of the time, but I will say that the idea of families skipping holidays because they can't be in the same room with someone due to political beliefs...that's a huge problem.
Personally, I don't want another Civil War. If we can't learn to agree to disagree in family settings, how are we going to move forward as a country?
ETA: Here's hoping this shutdown doesn't last long!
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I think that a yay or nay on one thing at a time would be a good idea, not stuff everything into a single thousand page bill that no one will or can read in time. And none of this, well, if you vote for my x, then I'll vote for your y. How about is spending on x a good idea? Is spending on y a good idea? And vote that way, not, well, I think we need to spend money on x but not y, but if you vote to spend on x, then I'll agree to spend on y because that's how you rack up debt.
Another alternative might be taxing Congresscritters at twice the rate an average American in their income situation would pay. That might get them to be more responsible.
Or tie Congressional pay to the National Debt. As the debt increases, their salary decreases. And, if they increase taxes, they pay double the tax rate of everyone else, plus their salary also decreases. And if you vote for a budget that passes that spends more than it offsets or collects, then you can't run for re-election.
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I was asking more because there are always political and social situations that can affect, or not, people's willingness to spend disposable income and usually nothing matters a damn.
But this is a definitive "millions of people won't get paid" circumstance and millions more may fear they'll be impacted soon. For that matter, how many does it affect?
Mind you, my current cunning plan is targeting KU readers, so it's likely a moot question.
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I was asking more because there are always political and social situations that can affect, or not, people's willingness to spend disposable income and usually nothing matters a damn.
But this is a definitive "millions of people won't get paid" circumstance and millions more may fear they'll be impacted soon. For that matter, how many does it affect?
Mind you, my current cunning plan is targeting KU readers, so it's likely a moot question.
Don't sweat it, man. These things happen every now and then. Most Americans barely notice, much less let it affect their purchasing decisions. My advice is to just do whatever you'd normally do.
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Agree. It affects tourists who want to visit our nation's capital and only have a few days to see buildings that now will be shut, including the jewel of DC, the Smithsonian. But tourism from outside the U.S. is hugely down, so that's not as big a deal as it could be. Government workers are the ones who will be tormented by this nonsense. They're already in hell, so what else is new?
Oh, and I guess this means they'll shut all the national parks, or something.
A book is a cheap pleasure even in hard times. Ignore this absurd situation; people who read books will ignore it, too.
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Offering further information here: I tried Boosting a Facebook (I don't think I'll EVER call it "Meta) and discovered the process has everything I need and usually found in the Facebook Ads GUI. I can target my exact audience, use my own imagery (and not have to stuff around with variations to suit other "channels" I don't want to use), set a budget and runtime, you can add a Learn More button with the desired URL ... in fact, it lets me avoid NOT doing most of the stuff I try to deselect in FB Ads. However, I had to pause because I discovered much of the Metadata for my book needed updating, so I'm on hold waiting for it to republish.
Any questions, just ask, if you're interested.
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Offering further information here: I tried Boosting a Facebook (I don't think I'll EVER call it "Meta) and discovered the process has everything I need and usually found in the Facebook Ads GUI. I can target my exact audience, use my own imagery (and not have to stuff around with variations to suit other "channels" I don't want to use), set a budget and runtime, you can add a Learn More button with the desired URL ... in fact, it lets me avoid NOT doing most of the stuff I try to deselect in FB Ads. However, I had to pause because I discovered much of the Metadata for my book needed updating, so I'm on hold waiting for it to republish.
Any questions, just ask, if you're interested.
Reading this, I took a poll, and my unpolarized backside says I should look at FB ADs again. re: "... can target my exact audience ..." How, exactly?
R.C.
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I'm interested.
Please explain CPC marketing to me as if I were a golden retriever.
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re: "... can target my exact audience ..." How, exactly?
This.
My target is 100% of those who follow my page, and joined my group.
How do you target them?
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Okay, my point is ( specific to me), as I mentioned earlier, that when you "create" an audience for a FB ad you're prompted to target particular gender, age, location and "special interests". It's that last parameter that is most important, while the others can be tweaked ( for example, you would not target "men" if you're promoting a romance book, and it's reasonable to perhaps have an age cut off of above ... maybe 30?).
Trying to narrow the "Special Interests" into a target audience of "not too broad", meaning smaller and focused, isn't easy because you always hit popular categories like Thriller, Mystery or Cozy, etc., and it means your ad is competing in an enormous pool.
In the past, Horror was buried in this ridiculous and irrelevant genre of "Urban Fantasy", but recently FB has given it a niche Horror Fiction category of its own ? even separate to horror movies, series and so on, so FB has suddenly made my targeting much, much easier.
For Tim, something like "Military Sci-Fi" might now exist, or "Sci-fi action" ... anything that pinpoints your genre within the broader, huge genre of simply science fiction.
CPC ads have a simple rule. If you're writing James Patterson-esque novels and you're competing against JP ... you're cooked. You won't have the budget balls to risk the same level of spending just to play on the same page. But if something in your narrative allows you to compete in a much, much lesser narrative concept like, "James Patterson Bakes Cakes" and you kind of sneak into his target audience through a loophole, your CPC can be much reduced.
Apologies, I'm on my tablet and it's difficult to explain in full.
Bottom line (and this has always been the case) targeting a much smaller but avid audience is always better and cheaper.
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Bottom line (and this has always been the case) targeting a much smaller but avid audience is always better and cheaper.
And it never worked.
You need to specify NOT INDIA, because a massive number of clicks will come from there, and they don't buy eBooks. Still.
What I need is 100% of the people I know want a new release post on release day getting it. Instead of the 5% I get now.
None of the targeting will get me that. As far as I can tell, those people are excluded from the targeting deliberately.
And given how many ads I get that I would never in a million years actually want to see, the targeting is crap anyway.
Sorry, you didn't add anything to convince me otherwise, just confirmed what I already knew.
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What I need is 100% of the people I know want a new release post on release day getting it. Instead of the 5% I get now.
That's why you need a mailing list.
Of course, if they are on a crummy free eMail service like gmail, your message will probably go straight to their junk folder, but everyone else should hopefully get it.
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What I need is 100% of the people I know want a new release post on release day getting it. Instead of the 5% I get now.
That's why you need a mailing list.
I have a mailing list. But my social media is slowly growing, where the mailing list is not. Mind you, the social media is often followers with their own agendas, and not actually fans.
But yes, mail to any of the free services is often spam blocked.
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But my social media is slowly growing, where the mailing list is not. Mind you, the social media is often followers with their own agendas, and not actually fans.
And, what good is it if you can only reach 5% of those who want to see your messages?
I don't follow many people/things on Facebook. I don't think I've followed anyone/anything new since 2010 or whenever I last sorta kinda used Facebook. But, I've been on Facebook more these past couple months or so and it's so stupid. My feed is cluttered with stuff I never asked to see and a lot of stuff I never cared to see. And there is so, so, so much stupid, especially in videos. The depths of stupidity are deeper than the deepest cavern in the real world or fiction. It's a bottomless pit of stupidity. So, yeah, people might follow you, but what's the point? What's the point of following anyone or anything when you're not likely to see their stuff anyway? I see more stuff from accounts I don't follow and don't care to follow than ones I do. And, of the ones I do, I don't see the most recent stuff usually. I see stuff they posted days or weeks ago.
Social media isn't designed to be social anymore. It's designed to keep people on the site so they see ads for crummy products that supposedly work great and whatever but if you look up reviews elsewhere (like on Amazon), you find out they are usually complete trash. Or, if you buy them, you'll find out for yourself it's complete trash. I'd be hesitant to run ads on Facebook for the very reason that you might become associated with garbage products because of the plethora of junk on there. I thought we had truth in advertising laws, but either we don't or they don't apply online or they're not enforced or something because there's a lot of junk that gets advertised that doesn't match the claims at all.
On top of that, okay, let's say I follow you because I want to receive messages from you, be they messages on new releases or whatever. Odds are that, because of all the trash I see from accounts I do not follow, I will never or rarely see your messages. And, if you have to pay to boost your message to better the odds that maybe I will see it, that strikes me as stupid and more than a little manipulative on the side of the social media site. I mean, they all wanted us to use their sites and post our content and bring our followers over from our websites and blogs and whatever platforms we had back in the day because they will help us grow our audience and all that jazz and now that they've largely decimated the blogging landscape and captured people on their sites, they turn around and want us to pay the reach some of the very same people we helped move to their platform to begin with.
So, yeah, I'm not a fan. When these social media sites eventually crash and burn--and I hope I am around to see it--that will be a great day for humanity. These sites need to die and go away.
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What I need is 100% of the people I know want a new release post on release day getting it. Instead of the 5% I get now.
My newsletter is 2000 with a 1000 open rate after loads of removing over the years. My purchases on a new release... paltry. :icon_sad: Our ebook prices of $2.99 are too high. :icon_rofl:
Social media isn't designed to be social anymore. It's designed to keep people on the site so they see ads for crummy products that supposedly work great and whatever but if you look up reviews elsewhere (like on Amazon), you find out they are usually complete trash. Or, if you buy them, you'll find out for yourself it's complete trash.
I'm new to social media. Didn't start up with Twitter/Instagram until this year. My findings? 50-75% followers are bots. PMs are ads wanting to run ads with my money. Hardly a place to trust real people. Any PM I get now is immediately trashed. Which is sad because, I hear, people used to talk with one another on these sites.
That's why this forum, and select others, is a gem. I know you guys aren't bots. :ws When this forum fades, as all things do, what are people going to trust online?
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I don't know if social media works unless you already have followers. I lost a lot of followers during Covid (people left the platform over the political issues), but there are still readers there.
Readers like groups more than pages (IMHO), so having a group might help. I don't really push my books as much as things in my books...but some authors seem to do well with their own reader groups.
Larger Facebook reader groups are tricky. Most are full of authors billboarding each other. I doubt those are very effective.
ETA: When I posted that I might close the tea group, I had a LOT more comments than I usually do...so people are still there, they just aren't commenting. It's easy to forget how many lurkers there are. :angel:
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A mailing list is doubtless better. Even then, you have people mostly interested in the next giveaway or the next sale, but my opinion on social media is similar to PDD's.
What I always found about targeting FB ads is what Bass Bagwhan is alluding to--it's hard to drill down to exactly the audience you want. If there's one good thing about AMS ads, it's that you have a lot of latitude--pretty much any keyword you can think, or any product available on Amazon, can become a target. With FB, it's only identified interests, and when you get much beyond the top-level genre, it's iffy whether you'll find an appropriate one or not.
Some time ago, I read a theory that we should leave the audience undefined and let FB learn who to serve it to. But I only heard that idea once.
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As much as anyone may dislike social media and Facebook (or any platform), and feel dismayed at what this sector of the internet has become, it is the primary promotions and advertising medium of today. AMS and Amazon may not be social media, but the concept and process of selling your book is still the same -- people browse at times almost mindlessly, or perhaps with increasing frustration, waiting for a book cover or blurb to smack them in the face. Whether your advertisement is in the bottom right-hand corner of an Amazon product page or the side-panel newsfeed of Facebook, the challenge is also the same. Grabbing the reader's attention for longer than about five seconds. On a public websitefilled with countless distractions.
Importantly, you can't judge the effectiveness of promotions on any platform by comparisons of your own experience. Sure, you may hate Facebook and think it's full of crap, but millions of people are addicted to it and scroll stupidly for hours on end. It's very likely your demographic is within reach in huge numbers. Filtering out all the others is the hard bit.
Like I said, the FB interest group "Horror Fiction" was an absolute boon to me -- it cut through to my target audience immediately. However, for my WW2 dramas (which include a strong love story) I'm so far stuck with "Historical Fiction", which could be anything from Ancient Rome to last week in New York, or "Historical Romance" which again could be anything from 18th century bodice-rippers to the hippie movement in the 1970's. So far, finding a FB interest group with a better focus on my era/genre has been hard. You have to think outside the box... it's a work in progress. I've successfully used those two interest groups in the past, but I want to "drill down" as Bill says.
It's also worth considering that if only a small fraction of Facebook users are ignoring the flood of garbage, are immune to the avalanche of ads, and yet will still decide to engage with social media for (likely) family or personal reasons -- that's still a heck of a lot people. People who might actually welcome a relevant advert about a book they might enjoy.
Actually, Bill's idea isn't silly. I'm pretty sure you can tell FB Ads to figure out the audience for you. It's probably worth gambling $50 of budget to try it. I could spend a huge amount of time trying to achieve the same thing manually.
Horses for courses ... I've never cracked the AMS code.
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The difference between social media ads and AMS ads is that people are on Amazon to shop--and, if they're looking at book pages where our ads would appear, probably shopping for books. Obviously, some people on FB, Twitter, or whatever are readers, but if they're in a serious shopping mood, they're much more likely to simply jump on an online bookstore than wait for a relevant ad on social media. Book-Tok might be an exception. Or maybe something like an FB group dedicated to book recommendations. But in general, the audience is going to be more focused if it's on an Amazon book page.
Of course, that makes it all the more frustrating that Amazon ads don't work better. I still wonder if part of it may be that one of the relevant algorithms isn't displaying ads in the right places. I've mentioned this before, but I frequently see ads having nothing to do with the search term I used or the books whose page I'm on. And often, they linger. One memoir author in particular has a video ad that was showing constantly on some of my pages. I don't buy memoirs myself, so it wasn't a question of my history. Anyway, I tried in incognito mode and got the same thing. Unless this person is an elf or something, why would their memoir ad keep showing up on fantasy book pages?
If you turn off your ad blindness and really look, you'll see this happening a lot. Some of it may be due to an author using inappropriate keywords or products. But I think some of it must be an algorithmic malfunction. It may account for the huge numbers of impressions that don't convert on some ads, but more important, it may cost us money if someone clicks on the ad without looking at it carefully.
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Following through, I did some digging into trying to get the best FB interest group link and found a guy who recommends not using them at all ? similar to Bill's hypotheses about making FB find your target audience.
The idea is that NOT targeting any audience at all forces FB to use the keywords in your ad's heading, description and blurb to figure out the best audience itself ... a kind of SEO approach for target audience. He claims it takes longer for FB to crunch the algorithm and you have to hang in there, but the results are worthwhile.
It makes sense. It makes FB use an Amazon AMS keyword-style formula rather than the interest group process.
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Hmmm... That may be worth trying, then.
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I have purchased a couple things via Facebook ads, and a couple were decent while others were less than ideal. And then you get hit with more ads for things that are almost exactly the same. And your trust level goes down and I don't know that I want to buy anything that advertises via Facebook anymore. And, almost always, there are "posts" on the ads from "people" claiming to have bought it and saying how great it is. Eventually, every Facebook ad just looks like a big red flag at a certain point.
And, again, there is just so, so much stupid out there. Despite the ease of access to information these days, I think there's a good chance that future historians will see this era as the Second Dark Ages.
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A more well-known author than myself has been using Facebook ads and told me it's improved her sales. She writes several Women's Fiction series and a couple of mystery/suspense (one with a male lead). She's not Debbie Macomber...but she knows her.
I have no idea what she uses for keywords, but she did put all her books back into Kindle Unlimited. That may help? I haven't tried Facebook ads nor AMS, so I have no experience of my own.
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If she put the books back into KU at about the same time she started advertising on FB, it would be difficult to know which move generated the sales. Maybe both. Maybe one or the other other.
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She had most of the books in KU...she had a few end of series wide. Sorry for the confusion. :dog1:
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Read the whole lot if you like, but the "unconventional strategy" is what I'm talking about. The idea of only running Facebook feed is solid ... a lot of the alternatives are almost worthless and it avoids having to create multiple images of the required dimensions, but I also think Instagram Feed might have value.
https://kindlepreneur.com/facebook-ads-for-books/
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The big question is what's the monthly ad spend? How much is necessary to move the needle in any meaningful way?
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The big question is what's the monthly ad spend? How much is necessary to move the needle in any meaningful way?
These experts usually quote $20 a day as a daily budget, but I always do just $5.00 a day ... and that's Oz dollars ... and I can see if things are working within 5-7 days. When they DO work the temptation is there to double or triple the spend, assuming the ROI will follow suite, but I've always gotten cold feet and never done that. If it gets me an audience, and I'm in the black, that's good enough.
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There was a time not so long ago that ad spends were measured in the tens of thousands of dollars per month to get a 20% or less return - AMS/Facebook, etc.
Has that changed?
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There was a time not so long ago that ad spends were measured in the tens of thousands of dollars per month to get a 20% or less return - AMS/Facebook, etc.
Has that changed?
I once had discussions with a romance writer who was making $110,00 a year in sales but spent $40,000 in promotions to achieve it ... different ROI but figures in the realm you're talking about.
One of my books peaked (long story) at about AUS$1000 sales per month, for which I spent AUS$400 per month to achieve it, however the figures are slightly skewed by my primary market being the US and I saw a benefit from the exchange rate. Theoretically, I could have spent $4,000 to achieve $10,000 but I just couldn't go down that path. Also, mind that I was promoting a single title whereas the majority of the "big players" are promoting multiple books and even multiple series and perhaps reaching towards a 100 titles in all.
Early days in my recent experiments but I'm seeing a trend where horror fans will use KU and not buy, and historical fiction/romance will definitely buy, maybe because the latter will read a much-enjoyed book more than once?
But you need the "buys" to make the ROI work. KU isn't really enough. I'm tempted to drop my horror prices to a level where the royalty is still markedly more than a full KU read and see if that prompts more sales... we're talking 5.95 to maybe 3.95
I could also drop all the Interest Group targeting on my horror and see if the ads start to reach people more willing to buy.
Either way, nothing is worth doing until the ads have run for a month or so.
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An observation on lower prices:
As a rule, consumers do not value free or discounted products and services. The commodity end of the pool generally has zero brand loyalty because free and discounted work requires no personal (ego) investment, therefore it offers no validation in return. There are no stakes.
Brand loyal consumers will pay a higher price because their fandom provides validation - they're invested in the brand's success because it's an extension of their own beliefs/worldview - in a way, it's an extension of themselves - an investment in themselves. This is why people lose their minds over Star Wars movies and shows, both good and bad. It's why fandom is a thing.
This is why I go on and on about branding and the 1000 True Fans approach. With this strategy, you're not competing against every book ever printed, or even new books in your genre - you're just letting readers (who are already predisposed to enjoying your work) know that you exist. That's it. They'll happily do the rest on their own, including recommending and sharing your work.
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While I actually agree with a lot of the brand loyalty and true fan ideas...posting on social media is not necessarily going to get that done.
VISIBILITY is a challenge, so who has real examples? Anyone? I have some followers on Facebook, but I doubt I could retire by sending them to my subscription platform.
So...outside of paid advertising, who has actual numbers on social media returns? I'm not saying it can't work, but there's a difference between theory and results.
And independent authors without huge fandoms already in place are what I'm talking about. Not musicians, not trad authors, not already famous creatives. Thank you!
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While I actually agree with a lot of the brand loyalty and true fan ideas...posting on social media is not necessarily going to get that done.
VISIBILITY is a challenge, so who has real examples? Anyone? I have some followers on Facebook, but I doubt I could retire by sending them to my subscription platform.
So...outside of paid advertising, who has actual numbers on social media returns? I'm not saying it can't work, but there's a difference between theory and results.
And independent authors without huge fandoms already in place are what I'm talking about. Not musicians, not trad authors, not already famous creatives. Thank you!
I hear you, Lorri. I doubt that free, social media activity has any potential to attract new readers and sales. You occasionally hear of outliers who somehow snag a multi-million seller without paying a cent of promotional money, but these are anomalies... if they even exist at all. Social media did have its day, and now it's more of a support platform to keep people already following you engaged with a drip-feed of hopefully interesting "news".
I boosted a Facebook post simply because it seemed a less complicated process than creating an advert - any FB ad is really just a glorified post. The target was a defined demographic, not a social media audience.
Branding makes perfect sense, but it's a chicken-before-the-egg challenge of achieving visibility first otherwise it might be pointless. Then again, if fame and fortune come to visit, are you prepared?
We keep thrashing these ideas and subjects around and around and even repeating ourselves, but I do think that's a good thing. We have to keep the discussion going in the hope that something new might poke its head up, so I'm never going to whinge about revisiting these thoughts or complain about PJ repeating himself grint.
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...so I'm never going to whinge about revisiting these thoughts or complain about PJ repeating himself.
Thanks.
I'm literally sharing the secret sauce, at least for now, (although, it's not really all that much of a secret). I could post success stories all day long - just not self-publishers, because, for whatever reason, they categorically refuse to go down this road.
However, if some of the people here keep doing what they're doing with Substack, Patreon and Kickstarter, which are all social media platforms, then we'll have some self-publisher examples I can point to. It's just going really slow because they're not using the platforms as effectively as they could be. And now I'm repeating myself again...
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I'm literally sharing the secret sauce, at least for now, (although, it's not really all that much of a secret). I could post success stories all day long - just not self-publishers, because, for whatever reason, they categorically refuse to go down this road.
All I see being posted are signposts.
I've yet to see an actual road.
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I'm literally sharing the secret sauce, at least for now, (although, it's not really all that much of a secret). I could post success stories all day long - just not self-publishers, because, for whatever reason, they categorically refuse to go down this road.
And yet there are successful self publishers, so if literally none of them choose to go down this road, that suggests that there must be ways for self pubbers to succeed by doing something else.
As I've mentioned at other times, I've checked some of the social media for successful self publishers (and also some traditional authors). It's generally unexceptional.
However, if some of the people here keep doing what they're doing with Substack, Patreon and Kickstarter, which are all social media platforms, then we'll have some self-publisher examples I can point to. It's just going really slow because they're not using the platforms as effectively as they could be.
And you know this because you've done a detailed study of what all of us are doing? Lorri's offerings, for example, seem to be very well branded.
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If someone truly had the secret sauce, you'd think they'd be using it themselves and could use themselves as an example as to how well it works.
:shrug
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Thank you, Bill.
I don't think this is working on a large scale, or someone would be saying...it's working! I'm doing it!! Whether they shared the details or not, I think we'd be seeing some celebrating. :cheers
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However, if some of the people here keep doing what they're doing with Substack, Patreon and Kickstarter, which are all social media platforms, then we'll have some self-publisher examples I can point to. It's just going really slow because they're not using the platforms as effectively as they could be.
It's true that I, among others, aren't using (in my case) either Substack or Medium as well as I should because that really requires spending advertising money on promoting your posts. Visibility on these platforms is just as challenging as visibility for your actual books. I can imagine a potential benefit and gain from promoting your posts, as long as those posts are appealing and well structured with links to your website/body of work, but jeez ... how much do you spend before assessing whether you're getting any traction? Because it would be advertising that isn't designed to result in immediate ROI. You're getting eyeballs on your website, your platform, your brand, and hopefully building a fan base.
A problem for me is that such endeavours and writing/publishing "business models" are, as always, a long game. Most days, I feel like it's too late for me to start playing.
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It's true that I, among others, aren't using (in my case) either Substack or Medium as well as I should because that really requires spending advertising money on promoting your posts.
I can't speak directly to Medium, but at least for Substack, it doesn't sell ads in the way that most social media companies do. There's literally not a way to do paid promotion there--unless you mean advertising a link to a Substack post on another social media platform.
Substack visibility does take time, but it needn't take money at all.
Contributing factors include consistent posting (probably at least once a week, though some people do less), getting out the word through Notes (the social media part), interacting with others. The last part is the one that can be a time suck, but it can bear fruit with some patience.
Lately, there are more political trolls. Generally, don't engage. If they get in your face, mute or block and move on. It's quite possible to filter out that noise and focus on serious authors. Substack is not totally transactional. (In fact, I stay away from the subscribe-to-me-and-I'll-subscribe-to-you crowd. We used to do that back in the day to get more social proof such as likes and follows, but it really doesn't lead to lasting engagement.) But even though people don't automatically reciprocate, the old axiom about making friends still holds true--take an interest in what somebody else is doing, and they're more likely to take an interest in you. Take time to read some posts of others each day, and if you like the content, then like, comment, share, whatever. On Notes, the 10-5-1 formula makes sense. (Like ten, comment substantively on five, engage one author directly through DM.) The last part I think can be overly intrusive, but we can substitute post one yourself to complete the 10-5-1 pattern. As a daily habit, that won't take much time, but it will draw more eyeballs. There is some theorizing about Notes being given more of a role in discoverability algorithms, but either way, Notes is the way to reach people who don't yet subscribe.
I've taken a look at some of the Substack growth gurus. They all advocate interaction. None of them, as far as I've seen, advocate paying for advertising on another platform to drive people to Substack. I put info on my Substack in my other newsletter and get a tiny flow from there. I also put up info on my non-Substack website.
Oh, I've mentioned this before, but participating in themed days can help with post views. So can getting yourselves on one of the growing number of fiction lists (Top in Fiction, Library, Bookstore, and the new FicStack. The bookstore is really a collection of links to places like Amazon rather than a separate store, but it's a way to get visibility for your books through Substack. That one does involve a paid subscription, though.)
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A problem for me is that such endeavours and writing/publishing "business models" are, as always, a long game.
I think this is the problem. Most self-publishers want immediate returns, and not all business approaches work that way. Establishing a brand takes time. Social media takes way more, like a year or more to pay off.
Which is why I advocate getting started sooner rather than later.
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And I hear you about the 'being too late'. I may have some suggestions on that soon, but I don't want to get out over my skis, as they say.
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--unless you mean advertising a link to a Substack post on another social media platform.
Substack visibility takes time
Contributing factors include consistent posting
...interacting with others. The last part is the one that can be a time suck, but it can bear fruit with some patience.
Substack is not transactional.
[Substack growth gurus] all advocate interaction.
...participating in themed days can help with post views.
So can getting yourselves on one of the growing number of fiction lists...
This should sound pretty familiar. These are literally the same tactics I've been recommending for a few years now, the same ones you guys keep saying don't work because reasons. The other thing I keep saying is that this same methodology works across all social media platforms, which creates synergy, which in turn levels up your brand - same work, better results.
This is how you establish a brand as an Author (Creative) in 2025. This is how you find fans, how you generate demand for your work (Content), how you take control of your career.
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Saying that interacting on Substack bears fruit is not the same as saying that it does on all social media platforms. We've discussed that before. Algorithmic crunch forces paid advertising to get much of anywhere, and it's hard to get a positive ROI from it. One of the reasons Substack still has value is precisely because there is no paid advertising for an algorithm to favor. That's not to say that social media has no value, but at least, its value isn't as much as you claim.
Also, at the risk of being repetitive, when I looked at some of your social media not so long ago, you weren't practicing what you preach. I'm sure that's because of the demands of your day job and not because you don't believe what you're saying. But the point is, you speak authoritatively on something without even having full personal experience with it. Yes, you have studied branding and advertising a lot, clearly. But as I learned in education, practical experience often trumps theory, even when the theory is well founded. That's partly because human behavior is not as predictable as things governed by natural law, like gravity. And there are a huge number of variables.
Is branding important? Yes. Is spending time on every single social medium important? Not necessarily. Companies with large budgets still make it work. Companies that can afford a person to run social media (or even more than one) can still focus on doing things like developing new products without having to sacrifice manpower to social media.
I'd argue that authors experiment, find what works best for them, and then focus their energy there, rather than scattering it across every conceivable medium. That's what I've done. When I started, I got on several platforms and worked them all. in that era, that was actually more worth it. I started dropped them when returns no longer justified time (and money) spent. Facebook is a good example. It used to generate real fans. Now, the same process is much more time consuming, more expensive, and not worth it, at least for me. (Aside from money, I used to spend one and a half to two hours a day curating social media content. It's not as if I haven't given SM an ample chance.)
Here's an interesting case study, however, that shows FB can still be worth it. You all remember Amanda M. Lee, I'm sure. She used to post here. When last she mentioned income, she was making low seven figures a year, so I think we can agree that she's successful. The fact that she's a publishing machine with a new release practically every month may be the foundation of that success. What talent and self-discipline that must take! But she still feels it worthwhile to use FB. https://www.facebook.com/AuthorAmandaMLee/ (https://www.facebook.com/AuthorAmandaMLee/)
She's active, but the frequency is lower than what you advocate, PJ (once a month most of the time, more in October) and entirely geared to things like new releases. This seems to be a books-are-the-brand approach. There doesn't seem to be much about her. Her blog, aside from a brief bio, is the same way. Books, books, books, books, books.
That said, about half of her FB posts are short book videos. I imagine she's using a content creator for those, so there would be money involved (or time, if not). These are way more impressive than what I see on the average author page, even from trad authors. If I had the money, I'd be tempted to try a similar approach. But of course, it also helps that she has one or more new releases a month. It's easy to have fresh content if you have fresh books at that frequency. It's not clear that one could achieve a similar level of FB engagement with a less frequent publishing model. We also don't know how much she used FB ads. She could easily be someone who got a fan base when FB is more productive and managed to hold on to it.
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First to clarify, yes Bill, I was talking about paid FB ads (for me) that promote any posts on Medium or Substack. I know those platforms don't offer advertising. It's why I mentioned that it didn't really offer a ROI because you're only promoting yourself and your writing without any "Buy" button unless you added links - and we all know how hard it is to convince anyone to click through multiple pages and links. You'd be spending money on building a following and hopefully that eventually translates into sales down the road.
Bill's advice about Substack and Medium was a useful poke for me. Shorter but more frequent posts (obviously with excellent content) should be the way to go to increase engagement rather than trying to impress a smaller audience with longer, clever articles. And returning that engagement too.
A factor is that Medium has a similar model to Kindle Unlimited in that people subscribe and can then either access or provide as a writer material that's behind a paywall (the paywall being the subscription). As a writer you get paid a "per word/page read" rate which is a pittance but can potentially add up over time. Some people claim to be making thousands, of course, but it's not unreasonable to aim for maybe $100 a month if you put your mind to it over the first year or so. I can't explain what voodoo/algorithmic black magic that Medium employs to certify someone has actually read your post - but it's there. FWIW, I've written about eight posts and made something like 0.34 all up, but the learning curve is flattening.
The point being it's tempting to write longer pieces on Medium to get paid more, but then you spend far more time and don't reach as many readers. I have to resist the urge to write long and focus on writing more. Find a schedule and discipline like Bill's 10-5-1 to adopt. And there's no reason I can't duplicate it on Substack and vice-versa. I won't go into details but there are "publications" on Medium that will increase your exposure if you can get them to accept your post as a submitted article, and it's only then that exclusivity is required.
If anyone's interested in Medium, here's a big tip. If you want to write on Medium about any of your favourite subjects, DON'T list in your profile "interests" that you're a writer and interested in writing - just list the other stuff you're interested in. (For me it's humour, horror, music, etc.) Because like many platforms, Medium is an absolute glut of writers, wannabe writers, and writing "experts" who pen endless "How to write" and "10 Things a writer should do" and "What the readers really want..." articles that will infest your Feed/Inbox worse than any Black Plague. Hundreds of the damned things.
You still need content that engages readers - controversial reviews or opinions on TV/Books/Films ... whatever prompts a response. And whack a website link at the end (or Amazon book product page) because you never know, right? I only need to keep things brief and not write an essay. Can't seem to help myself ...
More food for thought for me.
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Also, at the risk of being repetitive...
Sometimes repetition can be enlightening, so no worries. Sometimes it's even necessary.
I think a lot of my recommendations get discussed too granularly. First, we need to step back and see the big picture (the stuff they teach in business school - what self-publishers and Burger King have in common, for example), and then focus on specific tactics relevant to our business models/brands. And just because a strategy works across all social media platforms doesn't mean we should use all of them. Yes, we should use as many as makes sense given our business model and resources, but that doesn't mean all of them. For example, if you're writing LitRPG, Facebook probably won't be all that helpful because the Facebook audience skews older while the LitRPG demographic is typically younger.
I'd argue that authors experiment, find what works best for them.
I'd argue that most self-publishers (ignoring the black and gray hatters) desperately follow dogmatic forum advice from ten years ago, except the ones still trying to get a traditional deal, they're hanging on to dogmatic advice that predates the internet.
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Bass Bagwhan, It's good that at least one of us is trying Medium. Thanks for that.
How brief posts need to be depends on how much time you have to write and how fast you are. When I'm serializing, I aim for about 2,000 words, but occasionally (as with a first episode), it has occasionally almost hit 6,000. Short stories, of course, can be any length, though Substack is kind of flooded with microfiction. (A lot of that is from people who publish daily and/or people who participate in a lot a challenges ("Write a 500-word story in which the protagonist has amnesia," or something like that.)
Essays (long or short) can also work, and I've done a few, but I find the best posts are fiction (since I'm trying to gain new readers for my fiction).
A word on writing gurus. There are a lot of them on Substack. Many of them actually have good advice. I have noticed a tendency to state something as generic writing advice when it's applicable primarily to nonfiction. But there is quite a bit available for free. (At the other end of the spectrum are people who give discounts on their paid coursework to paid subscribers--that can get pretty expensive.)
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Also, at the risk of being repetitive...
Sometimes repetition can be enlightening, so no worries. Sometimes it's even necessary.
I think a lot of my recommendations get discussed too granularly. First, we need to step back and see the big picture (the stuff they teach in business school - what self-publishers and Burger King have in common, for example), and then focus on specific tactics relevant to our business models/brands. And just because a strategy works across all social media platforms doesn't mean we should use all of them. Yes, we should use as many as makes sense given our business model and resources, but that doesn't mean all of them. For example, if you're writing LitRPG, Facebook probably won't be all that helpful because the Facebook audience skews older while the LitRPG demographic is typically younger.
I'd argue that authors experiment, find what works best for them.
I'd argue that most self-publishers (ignoring the black and gray hatters) desperately follow dogmatic forum advice from ten years ago, except the ones still trying to get a traditional deal, they're hanging on to dogmatic advice that predates the internet.
I apologize for misunderstanding you. But you have made statements of the everywhere-all-the-time variety that sound an awful lot like people should be on every social media platform. Yes, we need to use those platforms that fit our genre and other considerations best.
As far as the second point is concerned, I'm sure some self-publishers do that. I'm not sure about most. I can think of one example of a guy who seems to be giving outdated advice--but it works for him. He's in nonfiction, however, which is substantially different from fiction. But generally, I see an openness to new approaches, at least among my Substack brethren.
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what self-publishers and Burger King have in common
Nothing.
You can compare Burger King to Steven King, but not to Indie authors.
I wouldn't even compare the likes of Amanda Lee and Michael Anderle to Burger King.
You could compare me to a fish and chip shop business with a couple of stores.
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But you have made statements of the everywhere-all-the-time variety...
I try to remember to throw in the caveat - "without burning out". Most of us don't have staff, so we can only do so much - and still have time to write, right? Which forces us to be selective. For example, some will do way better focusing on Kickstarter than wasting time on Instagram. The toolbox is the same, but the tactics will vary by business model, brand, resources and goals.
But generally, I see an openness to new approaches, at least among my Substack brethren.
I would argue that they're not the typical self-publisher.
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Not Burger King for most of us. They have national recognition and are competing against McDonald's, Wendy's and a few others. Not exactly an oligopoly, but close. Barriers to entry can increase even in a monopolistically competitive market.
For most of us, maybe Joe's local burger place on the end of a long street of burger places? With the caveat that any and every burger place in the world can also be on that street?
Visibility is what gets overlooked time and again. We can't become visible just because we post on social media. It might have been that easy many years ago (when those same gurus were giving out their advice) but as already mentioned, those times are long gone.
How do we get visibility now? If anyone knew that secret sauce, they'd be making millions. Anyone not writing fiction to write author-help books...perhaps they've already made their millions and want to help...or they're making more on the author-help books.
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Small restaurants are hard to make a profit from--just like indie writing careers!
I remember when a small restaurant opened in my area, a rep was going door to door with coupons. None of the large chains have ever done that, though I do occasionally get coupons in the mail from some of them. But of course, the small restaurant can't afford a national ad campaign, and local ad campaigns are hard to manage, particularly if there is no longer a local paper. In other words, yes, there's quite a difference between big businesses and small businesses in terms of visibility, budget, and ad strategy.
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How do we get visibility now? If anyone knew that secret sauce, they'd be making millions. Anyone not writing fiction to write author-help books...perhaps they've already made their millions and want to help...or they're making more on the author-help books.
Often the latter.
During the Gold Rush, there were two ways to get rich. One was to strike gold. The other was to sell tools to prospectors.
Not everyone looking for gold would find it. Of those that did find gold, only a small number found enough gold to make them rich. Meanwhile, everyone looking for gold needed tools for gold prospecting.
There were probably also people that told others the list of tools they needed and told them to take those tools to California to find gold and strike it rich, which was advice generic enough to be true but not specific enough to be practical.
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My point about Burger King was that we all follow the same business fundamentals: branding, marketing, production, accounting, microeconomics, distribution channels, supply channels, etc. All businesses use the same toolbox, no matter the industry, no matter how big or how small. Scale has advantages but so does being nimble.
We have to be careful of thinking that basic strategies don't work for us just because a larger or more prominent business also uses them. For example, what can we learn from Adele's European and Vegas residencies? Turns out, even though she's a gazillionaire and most of us are decidedly not, we can learn quite a lot - and I'm talking about actionable strategies here. But to dismiss her out of hand is an active choice to reduce your opportunities and potential for success.
There are always lessons to be learned from folks who do things well.