Advertising on Bookbub

[RahKnee]

Just wondering if any aspiring kindle bestsellers have used bookbub for advertising in the past. I've been considering it, but their criteria for deciding if they will accept you seems a bit ridiculous in some places. The pretentiousness of them having to decide if your work is worth taking your money in order to promote it does strike me as a little funny. Perhaps intentionally so by the site operators. The price seems a bit steep as well, but varies depending on the genre of your work. IIRC, they don't accept submissions for erotica so that might have turned a few fastlane writers away from them in the past.

So, anyone used it? How were your results in terms of sales? Any lasting impact?

Also, in terms of mass advertising for ebooks that aren't free/dirt-cheap, need identified!

Ronnie

 

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[AllenCrawley]

@MJ DeMarco just did an INSIDERS call regarding self publishing. He mentioned bookbub. Maybe he'll chime in here.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

Have not used it but heard good things. And yes, they have screening criteria. If you have 0 reviews and a book that doesn't present well, they will probably reject you.

Several clones / competitors have come on the scene you might want to check out. BookDip is actually a service founded by someone here, can't recall who.

Also, in terms of mass advertising for ebooks that aren't free/dirt-cheap, need identified!

Yup, the first thing I mentioned on the call was that the real Fastlane was not writing/publishing but serving the industry. Right now it is a gold rush mentality.

 

[COSenior]

Just wondering if any aspiring kindle bestsellers have used bookbub for advertising in the past.

I have. Two of my four books under the pen name in my avatar have been advertised on BookBub, however, I had the help of an 'indie' publisher to get it done. He has told me that he's never failed to see an increase in sales that doubles his money on the ad. As for effectiveness, I have no direct way to determine that as I don't have access to the KDP account under which these books are published.

FYI, I'd say that the policy against erotica is not well-enforced. Another author I know of who is published by this same publisher writes books that could only be described as BDSM erotica, though the categories he chooses to publish them under may not reflect that reality. Some of those books have been advertised on BookBub.

From observation, you may take some of their criteria literally, but some is highly subjective. You won't get a book in if it has too few pages, for example, or too few reviews. As far as content goes, I doubt that they read more than you'd find in Amazon's First Look, if that much, to determine whether the editing and writing quality are up to their standards. I've downloaded some of their free offers that turned out to be unreadable in my opinion.

Finally, it seems to me that you will have more luck getting them to accept a discounted (rather than free) book after you have already had some free ones accepted. In other words, a track record. My first book advertised there had 86,000 free downloads, and the second 56,000. They still haven't accepted a discounted offer for either of the later two.

Hope that helps.

 

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[COSenior]

Yup, the first thing I mentioned on the call was that the real Fastlane was not writing/publishing but serving the industry. Right now it is a gold rush mentality.

BTW, I wasn't able to make it to that call, may I ask if it was recorded or transcribed and available to INSIDERS?

 

[MJ DeMarco]

BTW, I wasn't able to make it to that call, may I ask if it was recorded or transcribed and available to INSIDERS?

No, but I posted an outline in the thread which is pretty detailed.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

BookDip is @3things

 

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[Gymjunkie]

Mostly, good things about BookBub from those who done it. If they can get in. It shouldn't become the only thing to do for promotions but it's a very important part to be done if possible.