Mark Dawson Ads For Authors

[NathanBurrows]

Mark Dawson's 'Ads for Authors' course has just reopened. I bit the bullet last night and signed up for it - it was late though so I didn't get much of a chance to look round it. Has anyone else from the forum joined the latest one?

[LilyBLily]

I almost joined ten minutes ago, but I keep waffling. I know that nothing will happen unless I do the work, and so far I haven't been able to master FB ads on my own despite attending numerous seminars. Mark is generous about giving out information, so in theory I ought to be able to just do this without paying for the course. I think what I really want is a lot of hand-holding. Pitiful, but true. Viewed that way, even paying $75 a month is cheap if there's someone I can go wailing to who will help me.

I'm going to run the P/L numbers on my business and see if paying the whole thing up front would be a smart move in view of taxes this year as opposed to next.

[Rob Martin]

I've signed up for it and, truth be told, there's a lot of info there to digest. That being said, I found it pretty easy to understand and follow with. One thing I really like, as FB has made changes to their policies lately, Mark has made adjustments/additions to the course.

I'm going to run the P/L numbers on my business and see if paying the whole thing up front would be a smart move in view of taxes this year as opposed to next.

I ran the numbers when I signed up. Even discounting the possibility of an expense deduction, it's still less expensive to pay at once than over time.

[cloudstrife]

What if you don't want to take the course or spend all your time learning how to manage FB ads? What if you just want someone to set up profitable ads for you? Who can I pay to do it for me? I'd rather spend my time writing my book than spend my life advertising for it.

Who has a good service for this? If it doesn't exist, why hasn't someone started doing it?

[Rob Martin]

What if you don't want to take the course or spend all your time learning how to manage FB ads? What if you just want someone to set up profitable ads for you? Who can I pay to do it for me? I'd rather spend my time writing my book than spend my life advertising for it.

Who has a good service for this? If it doesn't exist, why hasn't someone started doing it?

In that case, Google is your friend. Do a search. And if you can't find someone (highly doubtful), then perhaps you've just found a niche market to fill. Bon Chance.

[Anarchist]

If it doesn't exist, why hasn't someone started doing it?

Because it ain't worth it.

The ad manager either needs several accounts, each with a 5-figure monthly spend, or hundreds of piddly accounts.

The former is tough to make happen because there aren't a ton of authors spending 5 figures a month on FB. The latter is tough to make work because the ad manager becomes overwhelmed.

We saw the latter happen last year with a service targeting AMS ads.

[Tom Wood]

... We saw the latter happen last year with a service targeting AMS ads.

Was that the guy who was charging $40/month to do this?

[Anarchist]

... We saw the latter happen last year with a service targeting AMS ads.

Was that the guy who was charging $40/month to do this?

Yep.

[angela]

If it doesn't exist, why hasn't someone started doing it?

Because it ain't worth it.

The ad manager either needs several accounts, each with a 5-figure monthly spend, or hundreds of piddly accounts.

The former is tough to make happen because there aren't a ton of authors spending 5 figures a month on FB. The latter is tough to make work because the ad manager becomes overwhelmed.

We saw the latter happen last year with a service targeting AMS ads.

I agree completely. If it were worth paying someone to do, that's what more of us would do. And when you discover it's not worth paying someone to do something for you, it kinda makes you wonder why you'd bother doing it.

That being said, there are some situations where having an ad agency working for you would be worthwhile. For example, if the agency is handling a few authors in similar genres and can run collaborative ads with a group of books.

This entity might take a book and keep it between 500 and 15 in the Amazon store for 12 months, occasionally dropping the price as needed for turbo boosts.

That same entity might also be running high-budget constant ads for similar books, thus giving a multiplier effect to the group of related books that are populating each other's alsobots. Advertising on one title might not convert to the target book, but could spillover to one of the agency's other titles in the alsobots.

THIS IS A THEORY, PRESENTED FOR ENTERTAINMENT PURPOSES ONLY.

ETA: Everyone's mileage with ads is going to differ by genre ad product. I had a terrific run with FB ads back in 2013. It was amazing. 5 to 7 cents a click, like shooting fish in a barrel, and I sold a ton of $7.99 bundles. My rank was between 300 and 800 for months, and I raked it in. This was before the KUpocalypse, mind you.

What's nice about FB ads is they do give you the sense that you have some control over your career. It's a big mood boost when you feel like something is within your control.

However, the costs keep getting higher, and I've found it's much harder now to sell boxed sets, and the first-in-series sales haven't converted well for me. YMMV. I was selling a lot of 99-cent books to impulse buyers, but it ended there. It's likely my series is too niche or the book was too long or too short or didn't have a compelling cliffhanger, but I'm probably done with FB ads unless there are 3 more apocalyptic events and I have to try something out of desperation.

[Crystal]

There are many people who will run FB ads for you. I had a good relationship with an advertiser for awhile, but eventually she stopped putting in the effort, and I had to take over. I haven't found anyone with a reasonable price who can get better results than I can.

Most ad agencies will charge 10% of budget (or more) to run your campaigns. That might be worth it for you, or it might not.

Mark's class is a great way to learn FB ads, but only if you are willing to put in the work and you have the funds to test.

[LilyBLily]

I think Nick Erik's post last year about being able to afford both the course cost and the cost of advertising and not putting the course on a credit card was spot on. Because of the Amazon (and others) payment lag, if $749 in one lump sum leaves you unable to pay off the card in full, or leaves you with no money to spend on ads, it doesn't make sense to do the one-time payment. Paying $75 a month is like paying 17% interest. Not an obscene amount, but possibly not the best use of your future money. Only you can decide.

(And I'm still waffling, not because of Mark or his course, but because of what I know about my own exhaustion rate with learning fiddly new things that are supposed to earn me a fortune.)

[Crystal]

I think Nick Erik's post last year about being able to afford both the course cost and the cost of advertising and not putting the course on a credit card was spot on. Because of the Amazon (and others) payment lag, if $749 in one lump sum leaves you unable to pay off the card in full, or leaves you with no money to spend on ads, it doesn't make sense to do the one-time payment. Paying $75 a month is like paying 17% interest. Not an obscene amount, but possibly not the best use of your future money. Only you can decide.

(And I'm still waffling, not because of Mark or his course, but because of what I know about my own exhaustion rate with learning fiddly new things that are supposed to earn me a fortune.)

Yes, I would wait to take the course until you have at least a few hundred dollars a month to devote to Facebook ads. You won't be able to do much with less than $10/day.

[bookworm]

I bought it last night. I used Nick Stephenson's affiliate link because Nick was offering two bonus courses if you bought through him.

The first bonus you'll get when you enroll in Ads for Authors via my link is The Author Marketing Machine, which will show you the exact system I (and 3,000+ of my other students) use to automate their email list building.

A perfect way to turn all that lovely Facebook traffic into subscribers and sales.

The second bonus is Your First Six Figure Launch, which takes you behind the scenes of a $2m+ business that was built entirely via email marketing.

Meaning, once you have your audience built up, you can use this system to launch ANYTHING, and not come off like a sleazy salesperson that everybody hates.

These 2 bonuses are an ideal accompaniment to Mark's training - and will help give you that edge to really scale your business and move the needle this year.

I'm offering these bonuses because if you enroll via my links, Mark will send me a commission (you don't pay extra). So, it's only fair I offer these free gifts in return.

And that also means you need to use the links in this email, otherwise you won't be able to get your hands on these bonuses (no exceptions).

[LilyBLily]

BookSends is offering a deal, too, a discount on one's next ad. Mark clearly has partnered with lots of people to draw in large numbers. And why not?

[cloudstrife]

Can anyone give an idea for how much time investment the course requires, and then how much time it requires to set up ads, and then how much time it requires to maintain ads and keep them going? So how much time for the course, how much time to set everything up, then how much time to maintain the ads and keep them running with tweaks?

I am aware this will vary for everyone, but I am trying to get a general idea.

[LilyBLily]

Can anyone give an idea for how much time investment the course requires, and then how much time it requires to set up ads, and then how much time it requires to maintain ads and keep them going? So how much time for the course, how much time to set everything up, then how much time to maintain the ads and keep them running with tweaks?

I am aware this will vary for everyone, but I am trying to get a general idea.

Run through this discussion from "another board." It may help clarify:

https://www.kboards.com/index.php/topic,248857.25.html

[Crystal]

Can anyone give an idea for how much time investment the course requires, and then how much time it requires to set up ads, and then how much time it requires to maintain ads and keep them going? So how much time for the course, how much time to set everything up, then how much time to maintain the ads and keep them running with tweaks?

I am aware this will vary for everyone, but I am trying to get a general idea.

I wouldn't take the class unless you have five hours a week to devote to marketing (both the course and ads), though ten would be better (five for the course, five for the ads). With that, you could probably do the course in a month.

You can run FB ads on less than five hours a week. Between releases, I often spend less than 1-2 hours/week on ads. But when you're learning, you'll want to do a lot of testing, and everything will take longer.

[mrduffles]

I actually found an agency that runs FB ads for authors - Zohhi - I couldn't afford it though so I signed up for the course they offer instead. I know the basics of how to set up Facebook ads etc but I needed someone else with more experience to make them work better - or learn how to do it better - and this course seems far more advcanced than Mark Dawsons - which I also looked at, for a fraction of the price.

I'll report back!

it has a facebook group too if anyone fancies a look - it's called The Author Ad Lab

[mrduffles]

but if anyone knows of a course for AMS or an agency for AMS I'd be interested in hearing about that too!

[AnneRTan]

but if anyone knows of a course for AMS or an agency for AMS I'd be interested in hearing about that too!

Bonnie Paulson has a class starting in January on Teachable. I’m not sure if it’s filled yet.

[Kathy Dee]

… if $749 in one lump sum leaves you ...

Yikes!!!