So the smoke has finally cleared from my latest marketing efforts for THE GATEKEEPER, and I thought I’d share a bit of what I learned.
First of all, Google Analytics is vastly superior to other stat counters. With my older one, ninety percent of the traffic sources were listed as undetermined. Not so with Google Analytics-finally I have clear information as to which links brought visitors to my site, and which didn’t.
And here’s the funny thing: I spent a significant chunk of money on blog ads, Facebook ads, and Goodreads ads this time around. Each of these generated a fair amount of clicks- but nothing even came close to what I received from random sweepstakes sites. Because I was offering a big ticket item as a prize (a MacBook Laptop computer), a lot of contest sites picked up the link. And I received hundred of hits a day from those sites, significantly more than from any other source.
The question is, are the newsletter subscribers elicited by those sites actually interested in reading the book? Although I received fewer hits from the other sites, they were geared toward a more targeted readership. So it’s tough to say which worked better. But in terms of getting the word out there about a new book, offering a major prize definitely didn’t hurt. Next time around I’ll probably stick to a shorter time frame for the ads I’m paying for, and will count on the sweepstakes sites to balance things out.
I’ve also decided to more or less avoid touring next November when RACING THE DEVIL is released. Mind you, I love meeting booksellers, and had a wonderful time visiting Seattle, Phoenix, San Diego, and LA, among other cities.
However with a mass market paperback, the reality is that most of my sales occur in big box stores, supermarkets, drugstores, airports, and newsstands. The touring is always grueling, expensive (since most of it is on my own dime), and it doesn’t have much of an impact on my overall sales. I’ll still visit a few local stores, but after seeing the results of marketing three books this way, I simply can’t justify the cost in both money and time anymore. I won’t be attending as many conferences, either, for the same reason.
Social networking: I primarily logged on to FaceBook and Twitter this time around. That investment definitely produced some sales, and based on my experience the fans those efforts yielded tended to be much more enthusiastic about me and my books. I also did an exchange with some other authors, promoting THE GATEKEEPER on their pages the days of its release. That generated a few sales, but not a significant number as far as I could determine. However it was fantastic for prompting people to attend events.
I find it frustrating that there’s no way to get ebook sales totals yet (at least according to my publisher). I suspect that those have jumped considerably now that there are more eReaders out there, especially after Amazon’s report that for the first time on Christmas Day eBook sales trumped physical books. Once again, I’ll have to wait months for my royalty statements to arrive before I have a completely accurate picture of my sales this time around. It seems a little silly to me that in a computerized age this information isn’t more widely available.
So to recap:
Google Analytics: great
Touring: not so great
Social networking: moderately helpful
Big ticket prize: definitely worth it
I’m curious to hear if other authors have a similar rundown. Or if you have any marketing questions, feel free to fire away…