Optimal time between promos?

[idontknowyet]

I've been doing some promo stacking tests. Trying to figure out what is the most effective/best use of money for returns.

My first promo was at .99 cents, but I had so much extra marketing I don't really know what it produced and what was the other marketing.

Me second was a free promo in July. That resulted in 9k downloads, and a tail trickled for 2 months. This week I'm doing another promo so far it looks to be generating about 5-6k free downloads but less than 1/2 of the sales. Have you found it's better to wait a year or 2 years or is every six months still an optimal length of time and that 5-6k will just be the new normal after the first big burst?

[TimothyEllis]

On the same book, there is a diminishing return regardless of period between them. The closer together, the worse the drop each time.

[LilyBLily]

I agree. Although there are millions of potential readers, only a very small number of them ever learn about our books' existence through discount newsletters, which ironically are our simplest and most reliable method of advertising. Selling the same book to that small group over and over has diminishing returns.

Amazon's store literally has more books than any one person can even look at. We don't have to buy the books we've already passed over once, no matter what the theory is about the number of impressions before someone buys. Multiple impressions may waste my time by attracting me with beautiful cover art, but I do my research before buying. The cover may scream "Good fit!" but other elements tell me "Nope!"

I see the same books get advertised again and again in the discount newsletters, usually about a year apart. I pass them by.
When my AMS ads worked, my books were being shown to people who hadn't seen them before. Big difference compared to the discount newsletters.

[JRTomlin]

I've been doing some promo stacking tests. Trying to figure out what is the most effective/best use of money for returns.

My first promo was at .99 cents, but I had so much extra marketing I don't really know what it produced and what was the other marketing.

Me second was a free promo in July. That resulted in 9k downloads, and a tail trickled for 2 months. This week I'm doing another promo so far it looks to be generating about 5-6k free downloads but less than 1/2 of the sales. Have you found it's better to wait a year or 2 years or is every six months still an optimal length of time and that 5-6k will just be the new normal after the first big burst?

On the same novel, possibly six months. A year or two, no. On different novels, definitely not.

You are assuming that the same people stick with advertisers (mainly newsletters) forever. That is not my experience.