Kobo sponsored ads

[alhawke]

What the heck? I hardly mind, but as I was taking a look at my books with a book search, I noticed a sponsored ad. I do not run sponsored ads on Kobo. I don't even know if it's possible. I then ran a few other searches and saw other sponsored ads. Anybody hear about this new development with Kobo? (the "sponsored" is seen with the second book below).

[Wonder]

Huh. That's a new one to me, but it seems Kobo is testing an advertising platform akin to AMS.

[alhawke]

Maybe it's in beta. There's no "AMS" ads available through Kobo... yet??

[notthatamanda]

I don't see sponsored ads. (Not doubting you, I just don't see it.) I'm seeing a related books carousel with 18 books in it. Hadn't noticed that before. Which country are you in? I'm on Kobo US.

Edit - Oh I found one. The third book in my trilogy is up twice, one with a sponsored above the title. Weird.

[Cobbah]

I'm not seeing anything, but if they're up to something like that it's not before time. Their promotions rank horrendously low on results and I've recently stopped Kobo Plus to see if it will move readers from subscription back to sales. I'm not a fan of subsidising Kobo to the detriment of my own income. So, watching events now with some interest.

[notthatamanda]

Do you have a series? Look on a series page. That's where I saw it.

[alhawke]

Do you have a series? Look on a series page. That's where I saw it.

Looking around again, it seems you're right. They seem to be running ads on my series books. Could they be rolling out an ad option??
They're Kobo Plus feature has worked pretty well for me. I get bonus sales monthly through Kobo Plus. So we'll see how this new feature goes.

[notthatamanda]

I don't know who or why anyone, even Kobo would be running a sponsored ad on my book. And the sponsored ad is right above the identical unsponsored book. Maybe they are trying to see how many people click on something like that? But you have to take away the option to click on the non sponsored same thing. It's very strange.

[writeway]

If they ever did start their own ads I won't be using them. I never sold anything with Kobo. Even after a Bookbub the sales were still mediocre and Kobo's promos never did a thing for me. Not shocked if they try this though since B&N tried this a few years back but ditched the idea within a month. Turns out their ads were way too expensive for the average author. B&N claimed they were gonna regroup but we never heard of the ads again. Just more retailers going pay-to-play and all the big pubs will be dominating it.

[LilyBLily]

Agree about Kobo. I do okay with a BookBub 99-cent deal, but the moment it's over there are no more sales for me on Kobo. No tail. Nada.

If Kobo wanted to do AMS-style ads, for which I would not have to create visuals, only a little bit of copy, I might experiment. It's a far smaller market than Amazon's and visibility might be easier to attain.

[alhawke]

Most of my Kobo sales come from their promos or my BB ads too. No disagreeing here.

So far, to report regarding "sponsored" ad results, I have seen an uptick from my older sci-fi title Candy Savant. Since this occurred around the same time as these mysterious ads, and hardly at all before, I believe I can attribute it to it (I also haven't been advertising this title at all recently). But I don't know. It's not much, but it's something.

The current sponsored ads are mainly duplicates with series. The true test, of course, is whether they'd be connected with authors or other keyword/books outside of our normal search. They might just be collecting clicks at this point. ??

[notthatamanda]

Agree about Kobo. I do okay with a BookBub 99-cent deal, but the moment it's over there are no more sales for me on Kobo. No tail. Nada.

If Kobo wanted to do AMS-style ads, for which I would not have to create visuals, only a little bit of copy, I might experiment. It's a far smaller market than Amazon's and visibility might be easier to attain.

I might play around with it if it is cheap. I've always felt Kobo's big shortcoming is not having an author page. If anyone likes my book, they go back to Kobo to find me at a later date, putting my name into Kobo is some sort of google generated search results. A lot of western audio books. Don't know why. You have to go to at least page 2 to find me.

[notthatamanda]

Most of my Kobo sales come from their promos or my BB ads too. No disagreeing here.

So far, to report regarding "sponsored" ad results, I have seen an uptick from my older sci-fi title Candy Savant. Since this occurred around the same time as these mysterious ads, and hardly at all before, I believe I can attribute it to it (I also haven't been advertising this title at all recently). But I don't know. It's not much, but it's something.

The current sponsored ads are mainly duplicates with series. The true test, of course, is whether they'd be connected with authors or other keyword/books outside of our normal search. They might just be collecting clicks at this point. ??

I have a book in a promo right now and I've sold three which is like <champagne emoji> for Kobo, and, and, someone bought book 2 already. Probably flame me when there isn't another one after that.

Edit - the book in the promo shows "Sponsored" right now.