Sales and Marketing

This week I have experimented with duplicating my existing facebook advert. You would think that duplicating the ad would duplicate the performance. It didn’t and it’s very frustrating, partly because there seems to be no logic.

I also tried changing the targeting of one the ads from fiction book readers who have an interest in Zombies, to audiobook readers who have an interest in Zombies. I’ve since turned the duplicate ad off as it is just not performing and I hate seeing the profit for the month draining away.

The issue with targeting audiobook listeners is that people who read audiobooks may see the ad and be interested, then they put the book on their wish list for later purchase when their credit comes in. That might mean a wait of up to thirty days and I’m not willing to gamble £600 that it might work after 1 months.

For the moment I’m going to leave my spend at £20 a day with on ad and when I feel like taking another risk, or I come to renew the campaign, I will double the budget on a single ad and see how that works out. I’m not sure whether August would be a good month to do this in. Traditionally sales are weak in the summer holidays but a lot of people will be missing out this year on trips abroad because of the virus. I’ll have to wait and see.

The reduction in price of IN THE END to £0.99/$0.99 is having the desired effect and is certainly shifting more books, plus I am still getting sales of BEFORE THE END at the new higher price of £3.99/$3.99. At least that aspect seems to be working.

I keep having to remind myself as long as the ads are paying for themselves then this is okay as I’m still testing for the future, in particular being ready for when AFTER THE END is released and the series is completed.

So far this month I’ve given away around 800 free copies of OPERATION DAWN WOLF and sold an equivalent of five copies of LESSON LEARNED. It’s still early days to see if this is a wise method of marketing the series.

Events

Thinking forward, I’ve started looking into Christmas events. The one I attended last year was such a success I decided I would attend as many as I could this year. As long as there is no major lockdown then I think this will be the first time I’m back out selling directly to the public. Now I just need to find local events which are still planning to run and that have a low entry fee. Some of the costs our way out of my reach!

Work in Progress

I managed to get the beta edits completed on the first two thirds of AFTER THE END and late yesterday I received another update from Laura, my beta reader, come development editor. She has made some excellent points that I need to work on, rewrite big sections of the novel. It looks like I’m going to have to really dig deep if I’m going to make the edits before I go on holiday, whilst not rushing and doing a half-assed job I’ll regret after publication.

When I haven’t been working on AFTER THE END I’ve been able to complete the last major run through of BEGINNING OF THE END and now I’ve put that to one side, ready for a final read through before I see if Laura is sick of Zombie books, or my writing in general! It’s only 20,000 words, hey Laura :).

It had always been my plan to then work on the Carrie Harris novella, currently titled CAPITAL ACTIONS, which I have been doing and it’s great to be working on my favourite character again. However I remembered the book is set after the next full novel in the series, FROM THE DEAD, so I’ve switch over to get that complete first. It’s almost fully formed but there is a couple of plot issues, mainly technical, that need to be fixed. Once I’ve made the changes I should be able to have an idea of a release date.

Yesterday morning I received the first half an hour of the audiobook for OPERATION DAWN WOLF and the narrator has done a great job taking on my feedback. This means the production proper can now start in anger. I loved it!

I think that’s about it from me. Comments and suggestions are welcomed as always!