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Case Study 9—Social Media Is Gateway to eBook Sales Success: Amazon Kindle eBooks Thomas S. Mueller, Appalachian State University The Amazon Kindle eBook brand is one of the most popular forms of digital publishing in today’s social community. As of early 2016, the direct-to-consumer online retailer was selling 1.06 million eBooks (paid downloads) per day. Consumers spent $5.75 million per day during a recent month, with $1.76 million of those sales directed to author royalties. Though it is somewhat undocumented regarding distribution, authors received an additional $140 million in funds from Kindle Unlimited, Amazon’s subscription reading service.32 The industry as a whole is generating over $2.1 billion in sales annually. It is interesting to note that as established publisher sales decreased, eBooks written by independent authors increased.33 During an assessment in 2016, 56 of Amazon’s 100 top-selling eBooks were self-published titles. Topically, the bestselling independent authors write about paranormal activities, romance, thrillers, urban fiction, suspense, and science fiction. With the ascent of digital titles on Amazon and other sources, industry experts posit that printed versions of books will become a niche market, similar to the effect noted in magazine and newsprint.34 Digital publishing strategist Ben Thompson applies aggregation theory to the process, suggesting that sales portals like Amazon eliminate intermediaries, which allows independent publishers to avoid publishers and go direct to consumers.35 With a substantial faction of the social publishing market operating independently, advertising and promotion become the responsibility of the author. One portion of an author’s time is allocated to writing the novel, while the other half of the time is invested in social commerce, which includes marketing to expand the author’s fan base. The challenge is to differentiate an eBook from millions of competitive titles, then convince readers to download the digital offering onto a Kindle reader or other digital device. Pre-selling is essential to assure return on investment for the self-published author. One viable and affordable option is to build a social media marketing plan. Social media platforms provide opportunities to develop leads, generate a follower list, leverage other prominent users, access large topical groups, and promote content “teasers” that showcase your upcoming eBook.36 Most eBook authors develop a social media plan through content generation. These are most often short, concise articles of 250 to 500 words. Most successful social media plans offer shorter posts, with frequent placement. Social media content is usually housed in a blog, such as Google’s Blogger platform, or the highly customizable WordPress.37 It’s important to claim a URL that is unique and specific to the author and her or his work. A strong URL, along with key search words included in blog post titles, can help the author’s social media content climb in ranking on search engines. Social media portals such as LinkedIn and Google+ offer each user a personal landing page, but much more is available through groups and communities, where individuals share common interests. For example, a fashion community in Google+ hosts 557,000 followers.38 A marketing communication group in LinkedIn has collected 621,000 members.39 And, the LinkedIn Book Marketing group has 28,000 members.40 It is essential to identify a topical group to understand the relevance of posts, how interaction and replies work, and who posts the top viewed submissions. Authors can integrate into these platforms by reading posts, replying to posts, and finally crafting content that resonates with potential readers. Some authors incorporate introductory promotional comments on their upcoming eBook. It is important for authors to remember that blatant selling is not admissible; posted content must provide value and prove interesting to other group members.41 Facebook has been the most influential platform for many eBook authors. It has grown to over 1.4 billion users worldwide, with 70% checking their feed multiple times each day. eBook authors create a “landing page” for their profile as an author, or sometimes for a specific title. The challenge is to direct friends from the page to a personal website, and to target specific Facebook users who are profiled as sharing an interest in the eBook topic. Some authors host events or make promotional offers to engage users and increase traffic, which can be measured through social media data management. Mark Dawson initially started writing for a traditional publishing firm. His sales were weak and he transitioned to self-publishing. After learning how to leverage Facebook, Mark invested time and energy and now earns over $450,000 per year.42 Video platforms such as Vimeo and YouTube have been integrated into the social media promotion of eBooks. YouTube, the predominant player, was purchased in 2006 for $1.65 billion by Google. YouTube currently reports that it generates over 1 billion views per month.43 Successful eBook authors have integrated YouTube segments into their social media plans, including interviews or “teasers” that offer special introductory offers at eBook launch time. It’s beneficial to cross-promote YouTube posts across Facebook pages and embedded content in visual sharing sites such as Pinterest and Instagram. Studies indicate that the human brain assimilates images 60,000 times more quickly than text. eBook authors are intentional about visual sharing; Instagram is predominantly 18 to 24 female (56%) and allows space to share images. Pinterest represents a female and male audience, with two thirds between the ages of 18 and 24. One half are located outside the United States. It allows users to aggregate content that appeals to their interests and sensibilities. The author’s challenge is to entice user engagement, create awareness for the latest published eBook, and generate reader feedback, which can channel into digital book reviews. Many authors use the visual advantage to promote their eBook through storytelling in multiple posts.44 A social media platform that serves as the “messenger” for all social media activity is Twitter. Each message is limited to 140 characters, which can in turn be reposted and shared. Twitter now has 320 million monthly users, with over 1 billion monthly visits.45 Savvy eBook authors use Twitter to include “@” user handles to attract other key authors, or hashtags to create topical searches. Twitter can also steer followers to other platforms, where blog or web content has been placed. Some have also leveraged Twitter’s new live video broadcast program Periscope to promote special programs and activities. Some of the most highly successful eBook authors are also prominent podcast hosts. Technology entrepreneur James Altucher has published 11 books, including the Wall Street Journal bestseller Choose Yourself! Altucher’s unique position in the marketplace is that he lost his fortune, earned it back, and then lost it again. He now publishes eBooks such as Reinvent Yourself and promotes his projects on the popular “James Altucher Show” podcast, which is accessible on podbay.fm and iTunes.46 One social media opportunity that is sometimes overlooked is within the Amazon portal itself. An Amazon author page can showcase the author, include a biography, feature a compilation of the author’s Amazon Kindle publications, and link to other social media content such as Twitter or personal blogs. Most anyone can become a digital author, but not everyone can sell books. The holistic author understands how to write, publish, network, create, associate, and entertain. Social media presents the gateway where authors and customers connect in the open and unregulated marketplace.

Historical documentarian Ken Burns created a 1990 television series on the Civil War for the Public Broadcasting Network (PBS). Find Mr. Burns’ Twitter user handle, then write a tweet that would include both user handle and hashtag to link his work with a new eBook on the Civil War.

Answer 1

When you self-publish on Amazon (or any other ebook publishing platform), you’re more than just the author. You’re also the publisher. And that means you get to do the work of any good publishing house team of book editors, graphic designers and marketers. This article is about the marketing side, so I’ll be sticking with methods on how to get your creation viewed, loved and downloaded into the right ereaders.

Aside from the book editing , the book title and the book cover , there’s a number of pre-marketing steps you need to take.

1) Create a Blog

Hopefully you already have a website and you write blog articles related to your subject matter regularly. A website gives you a ‘home’ online. These days, creating your own website is really very easy. There’s lots of places you can get free sites from (just Google it – my personal fave is the free wordpress.com), and most make it very basic to upload design templates and images, so you can create a site that’s reflective of your book and resonates with your audience. Make sure your site has a blog on it. A blog gives you a chance to showcase your writing, engage with future readers, and (once published) drive traffic to your ebook landing page. And besides, you’re a writer, and a blog gives you a pretty cool outlet to write and write often. Be sure to enable comments and include social share buttons on all your blog posts to encourage reader engagement.

2) Start to Market with Pre-launch Landing Pages

I know, I know, you’ve read all about the value of building up a great email list – even before you start to publish. Collecting emails is the smartest and most effective way to keep in touch with your future buyers. It’s also a really cool way to start generating interest in your book with pre-launch promotions. The best ways to do this is through email-gated landing pages

There are tons of pre-launch campaigns you can run on your website landing pages. For example, you can generate leads and excitement about your upcoming ebook by:

• Hosting an email-gated sweepstakes to give away a free copy of your book
• Getting people to choose a book cover (with an email-gated vote contest)
• Engaging your audience by asking for their input about your book characters if it’s fiction (such as a choice your main character must make)
• Engaging your audience by asking for subject matter advice if it’s non-fiction (you can motivate responses by including the best quotes in your book)

Pre-launch promotions can help to start generating that all-important buzz – before you even publish. The more excitement you can generate leading up to your launch, the better chance of success your product will have.

3) Hyper-target your Reach with Ads

I hope you’re already marketing your author profile on Facebook and Twitter too (and Good Reads – you definitely need to be networking on the site to connect with your niche readership). Now, you might be getting lots of engagement on your blog already through your website’s social functions (yes, some websites, like the wordpress.com sites, let you follow fellow bloggers), and you might be getting lots of engagement and click-throughs on your social sites too.

Now, I only recommend that you spend money on Facebook Ads if you’re really serious about selling your ebook. If writing that book was a hobby and you really just enjoyed the process and the people you met along the way, don’t spend lots of money trying to advertise it. Having said that, Facebook Ads can be a super effective method of promoting your pre-launch ebook campaigns, get more Likes for your Page and raise awareness about your ebook. The ability to hyper-target your advertising to reach your exact demographic also makes Facebook Ads an incredibly reasonable ad spend.

4) Send out Email Automation Campaigns

When you start to get lead information from people who are genuinely interested in your upcoming book, it’s the perfect opportunity to stay in touch. Send out regular emails to keep people posted on the progress of your book, more pre-launch campaigns you’re running, new blog posts and to ask people to connect with you on your social sites too. You can even send out pre-written emails to be triggered and delivered at timed intervals with email automation campaigns. That way you can pre-plan your emails and not have to worry if you got busy with the many other tasks you have going on in your life and happen to, uh, forget to send out your bi-weekly or weekly messages.

The more people get to know you and your work, the more likely they will want to buy your book to support your efforts. Additionally, from a marketing perspective, email automation campaigns keep building up the buzz about your book launch. If you can do it well, more people will be lining up to buy your book on that all-important first day. And, as mentioned above, the more sales you get in a short time, the better chance you have of getting noticed on a bestselling list.

5. Make an Ebook Landing Page

Create a landing page (now that you know what a landing page is) on your website where you give your ‘book blurb’ showing the benefits of your book and creating the hook. Include your book cover image and book trailer (if you’ve made one). If you have ecommerce or payment gateway abilities on your site, link the Call to Action button (your ‘buy now’ button) to it, so people can buy directly from you. Or link it to your Amazon KDP book page once it’s live.

Once your book has been vetted through KDP and is live, make your ebook landing page public. By having an ebook landing page on your website (whether you’re selling you book directly or through Amazon), you give yourself more marketing opportunities to promote your book and drive traffic to your site. You can make Google Adwords or Facebook Ads that link directly to your website .

6. Announce your Book Release

Just like a traditional publishing house would, you should promote your ebook with a press release or at least an article on your blog announcing the official launch of your KDP ebook. Pitch your book to publications that are read by your specific niche readership. This could include:

• Online publications in your niche
• Popular (or engaged) blogs related to your book subject matter
• Local newspapers and online publications

You could also syndicate your press release through PR sites (there are generally costs associated with these), or sign up for HARO (help a reporter out) to pitch your release when a journalist is looking for a story just like yours. Be sure to send out your announcement to your email contacts to share your great news and generate a buzz with people who are already interested in your work.