Vincent Price
So I’ve been . . . do I really have to explain the picture and bad joke? No? Good then let me continue here. I’ve been looking at sites to try and figure out more about the algorithm Amazon uses. This has proven to be a foolish endeavor because I’m one of the least mathematically-minded people in the world. All I can figure out is the following:
- Amazon factors in amount sold in a 24 hour period and price.
- Free downloads no longer factor in or only talk 10% of the consideration.
- .99 cent books have been obsoleted.
- .99 cent books are still viable.
- Once you get on the list, you’ll be able to stay there for a long time.
- Amazon changes the algorithms 2-3 times a year.
This does explain how a new book can race up the rankings and leave older books in the dust. If it didn’t work that way then new books would rarely reach the lists. So, you have to make the algorithm look more at current activity instead of the past sales. Still, this thing is an utter mystery to me.
It makes me wonder my old question about price, which I’ve discussed a few times. I hear people saying that .99 cents isn’t selling, but then I hear that $2.99 eBooks aren’t doing any better. I planned to boost Prodigy of Rainbow Tower to $2.99 after Labor Day, but now I have no idea. How do the successful $2.99 authors get up there? Is it the Summer Slump that I’m seeing? I’m nervous about the price jump even though I currently intend to go through with it.
Even stranger, I see to sell more when I’m asleep. The Facebook Groups helped out, so I might make a FB Group posting schedule. That way I post my books on each group once a week in a rotating schedule. Except I only have 4 sites right now, but I’ll just double it a few times. That reminds me: does anyone know the limit before Facebook bans you for promoting your stuff and not giving Zuckerberg a cut of the profits?
How are the other authors that debuted around this time doing? Have you noticed any trends or seasonal effects so far?
Legends of Windemere 
Good grief, this is too much math for me. Sounds like Amazon changes their algorithms around as frequently as a supermarket moves around its stock. Is it to help or hinder the self-published author?
LikeLike
I wish I knew. It’s probably to shake up the lists and get new titles up there.
LikeLike
I have no idea about sale of books, but sales at our clothes store are the worst so far this year, and to think sales are supposed to peak in summer.
LikeLike
Wonder if the economy is a factor there.
LikeLike
Not sure, but we think it’s the hot weather. The store is located in an open air shopping center, not in an air conditioned mall. And we have getting 3 digit temperatures. It’s not really pleasant to shop around in this heat.
LikeLike
Ick. I can see that being a problem. I remember those days in Florida. Never pretty and made me lazy.
LikeLike
Amazon seems to combine data from the past 24 hours, past week, and past 30 days. If a book is ranked in the millions and suddenly sells, the sales rank climbs rapidly. If a book regularly sells multiple copies every day and suddenly doesn’t sell for a while, the sales rank climbs much more slowly. There are seasonal effects. Things even seem to change month to month (perhaps some of their marketing associations change monthly).
The big problem with 99 cents is that you have to sell 6 times as many copies as at $2.99 just to break even (assuming you’d get nearly 70% at $2.99).
LikeLike
That’s the odd thing about the pricing as far as the rankings. It doesn’t seem to take profit into account unless I’m missing something. I’m going to see how the sales go this week and decide if I’m going to jump to $2.99 until a 99 cent Labor Day sale. If things are still running smoothly then I might just bill Labor Day as the last chance to get the book cheap. Still, my free weekend has seen maybe 250 downloads. That’s terrible compared to the 2,000 last time and I think the summer has something to do with it.
Even on my second book, it’s still a guessing game of trial and error.
LikeLike
Reblogged this on The Ranting Papizilla and commented:
Charles has a fascinating question that I have pondered for some time. Do any of you have an answer?
LikeLike
This is what I find valuable for other writers…someone in the thick of it, discussing, questioning…thanks, Charles.
LikeLike
You’re welcome. I should get back into questions like this. That’s why I’m thinking of doing a ‘What Do You Look for’ post the is geared toward readers and another later in the week that is geared toward writers.
LikeLike
I like it: I am both!
LikeLike
As all writers should be.
LikeLike
See my new post … I’m completely mystified at pricing again. I simply cannot believe, with the ratings and reviews I have, that increasing the price from .99 to 2.99 would mean a sudden and immediate end of sales. This is very frustrating. I’d like to know who the people are who have been buying Bridgeport for the last two and a half months at .99 and why 2.99 is suddenly too much. There’s a mystery here that it sure would be nice if Amazon, KDP, or whoever would divulge.
LikeLike
I just got the post in my e-mail. I’ve been wondering about it being summer and people seeing books as a luxury. I can’t figure it out and it worries me because I keep rethinking my boost to $2.99 in September.
LikeLike
The immediate dropoff to zero the day after I increased the price is incredibly telling.
LikeLike
It’s also Sunday, which is terrible for all. I would still give it a day or two. I’m seeing some sales now after posting on Facebook groups again. One of them is fantasy only, but the other three are for all genres.
LikeLike
I probably can’t really compare because my book has only debuted on lulu.com so far. I aim to get it on kindle over the next week or so. Beyond that, in about 6-8 weeks lulu will put it in global distribution to Apple, Barnes and Noble, Nook etc. Till then I’ve only really marketed via my blog, and the kind reblogs of others, and through friends. So I don’t have a high sales figure yet, and I have no idea if I ever will, LOL! I will be doing a marketing campaign via lulu when it goes global, but that isn’t a cheap option, so I will be seeing if it has a return rate that justifies the expenditure for any future books I might publish. So it’s all a mystery to me at this stage.
I do appreciate your posts as they are making me think about Facebook, even though I’m wary of that site for many reasons. I will probably think about that eventually, but part of the marketing campaign with lulu will be my own writer’s website for the novels, so perhaps that’s the time I’ll do Facebook and link to that. I really have no idea, and I’m rambling now, LOL…
On a related note – Charles I think you did a post a while ago explaining the difference between the Amazon 35% and 70% royalty rates – I tried searching your site but couldn’t find it – would really appreciate a re-direct so I can read it again as I have to ponder that issue when I do upload my novel to kindle… 🙂 🙂
LikeLike
Social media has become a necessity for self-published authors. I’m still trying to figure out most of them like Twitter and Tumblr. I find it easiest to connect everything to my blog, so I only have to work about this. Every blog post counts as a post on the others. I still go to do individual Twitter posts for marketing. As for Facebook, I just started with there and you can make an author page instead of a personal page. I’m not really sure of the difference to be honest.
Here is the article I think you mean: https://legendsofwindemere.com/2013/06/02/is-70-royalty-really-70/
LikeLike
Yep, that’s the one – thank you!!! really helpful! 🙂 🙂
LikeLike