I am a relatively unknown author at a time when all the numbers are against me. Of all the millions of books on Amazon, with more than 300,000 new releases every year in the US alone, why would anyone pick up any of my books? Throw into that depressing mix these factors:
1. I self-published.
2. My book crosses genres and doesn’t fit neatly into one of the genres traditional publishers like to pigeonhole authors into.
3. Selling books rely on “brand marketing” which I find to be unnerving. and
4. To gain attention to your books, you may need to do something flashy, another unnerving prospect.
Why, indeed, would anyone buy Welcome Reluctant Stranger?
And, yet, a few people actually did, thanks to the Book of the Day (BOTD) feature on OnlineBookClub.org. Enough readers so that my ranking rose from about 500,000 to 40,000. And there was an added bonus: the other books I’ve published gained some eyes and even sold a couple or so. Arguably modest, these results. But like I said, I had gigantic odds to contend with.
I’m a realist. I didn’t expect glowing success going into this. My goal was to gain visibility (which I believe I got a lot of, from all the social media attention,) and to target a niche audience whom my kind of books would appeal to. I would say the BOTD campaign did that, much better than any other promos I’ve done in the past. In fairness, I did have a couple of promos that netted me needed reviews and those, along with the OnlineBookClub.org professional review probably helped me achieve my goal for the BOTD.
Andew Weber
Thanks. That’s really helpful. My book is up for review right now and I was thinking about doing the BOTD deal. This gives me something to chew on.
evyjourney
Certainly worth a try. You’ll probably get even better results if your book is in a popular genre, has a great cover, etc., etc. I wish you great luck!