Anna’s Comments (group member since Mar 21, 2017)

Anna’s comments from the Navigating Indieworld Discussing All Things Indie group.

Yes, same here. Can't read in a car, but can get totally lost in a book on a plane. Have missed meals like that!

Hope you feel better soon.

Get well very soon, Simi.

I've just bought your ebook - and it's a darned site cheaper than many similar books.

Thanks.

With regard to big companies chewing up new challengers, I remember watching the demise of two here in the UK.

One was a new broadband company and it attracted hundreds of thousands (that's big in the UK, Carole!) of customers in a short time. It got gobbled up by British Telecom, a company which is notoriously difficult to deal with (I speak from experience) and, of course, it is more expensive.

The second was a start-up which realized that liquids for washing clothes were much cheaper to produce than powders. Brilliant. I supported them and bought... One of the biggies bought them very quickly and carried on producing the liquids but the price is the same as the washing powder which is one of the most expensive things in my shopping basket.

My mini fight-back is to use considerably less washing powder than they recommend and I switched broadband company away from the biggie who gobbled up...

I always fight back, it just makes me feel I still have a little control over my life. Having lived in Africa surrounded by mud huts and that style of living, I can cut down like nobody else! (My little pride. Sigh).

But 'zon? We're up against many big corporations in league with it. Carole, you have done so much to fight back and I admire your ingenuity, courage and persistence and I bet there's a lot of others agreeing with that.

Ssh... we mustn't let them know we know...

What I also see is that whereas the mighty 'zon used to be champion of Indies, it isn't any more. Those with the money take precedence. Cannot complain, can we? It is, after all, a business.

Mutter, mutter.

Don't be surprised that it takes you time to absorb it all - it takes most people time! And then the mighty Zon changes things... er sorry, improves things.

I think if you get a download of a freebie via the ad site, it shows up as an order in the Orders column but, of course, there's nothing in the 'Sales' column.

I think!!!!

Ah, free, well then yes stick with 10p especially as your # 19 post states you have a 3.22 click through rate. That is very good for a non-free book but I wouldn't know whether it's good for a freebie.

You should be able to see the click-through rate in one of the columns. You look as though you have calculated it yourself. Go to a button that says 'columns', press and a box comes up. I've ticked all the boxes which gives me maximum info.

I've not had anything like that. I'm pleased with a 1. or 2. and most of my author ones are 0.5 or something like that.

I'm guessing the freebie is #1 in a series.

AMS US runs away with money. UK is better at the moment but you need to watch it all the time. At least I find that. There's a column called ACOS and it's wise to try to keep that column below 100% because, even though you will get some KU reads, you'll have more expenses than you imagined initially. Don't worry about the whys and wherefores of all this - just keep that column under 100% and you shouldn't be out of pocket. Some will tell you to keep it under 80%. That's difficult.

How do you keep it low? Well switch it off (left hand side button on the relevant line) and don't switch it on again until you get some money coming in.

Wanna know what happened to me? Well... US ads, I decided to go for it and really get some visibility so I upped my bids on 3 genres to something like 70c and my daily rate to $7. Within days I had racked up ACOS of 1,000% plus on all 3 of the genres. So I'll never do that again.

Keep your daily rate only to what you can afford each month if it goes to the limit.

I can understand how you feel about this Alex - gobbledegook. But once you press a few buttons you'll find that this begins to make sense and so I suggest you bookmark this page or copy some of the useful stuff.

I wish I could write it out in order for you, sorry to be so confusing. D.J. might be able to interpret!!

You've got started! Yay! You should find that when you choose an author, a suggested bid will show up and you can choose something within the range it shows. It's easiest if you just press 'apply'.

10p used to be the sort of bid that would get you clicks, but some are now as much as 60p.

Best thing to do now, I think, is to look at some authors who write in the same genre as you and go to 'add keywords' (it's there, but you have to look hard) and add their name. The suggested bid will come up automatically.

Some people suggest having 100+ names but you've got to have a pretty big budget to support the clicks!

Good luck, enjoy playing with it.

Link please :o)

Ouch... I feel for you, Alex. Nobody's replied! It's probably because we can't remember how to get started because, once we have, all we have to do is press a button that says something like 'new campaign' and then it tells us what to do next - I think.

The main thing is to choose the right keywords. I suggest you choose 'broad' rather than 'exact' and so long as you have one of the main genres as a keyword, Amazon do the rest by scattering your ads throughout that genre. From there, you can add a few authors and build it as you go along.

Maybe someone will read this not-very-helpful post and come riding to your rescue.

Oh wow! Congratulations.

My 'something good' is that I've taken my jersey off because the sunshine through the windows is doing its job, two days in a row.

And then choose the middle option.

I've had to bookmark that page because, as we know, it's very easy to lose.

I wish you well with this project, Sam. Writing can be very rewarding emotionally. I can't tell you the best way forward. I only know that I write all my stories as a Word document and then follow Amazon's advice on uploading for Kindle.

Others will, I hope, be better able to give you advice that suits where you are at with your writing.

Yay!

Thank you. I keep hoping not to be quite so busy.

Alex wrote: "Holy *bleeping* *bleep* I took a huge risk today, possibly the biggest of my writing career today, I submitted to Bookbub for a combined international and US featured deal.

Nervous is not the word..."

Wow! Congratulations! Big smiles here and best wishes for another 400+ % return.

Carmel wrote: "Hi all....I wanted to share some exciting news. Months ago I sent letters to a couple of universities about my book. I had one professor interested in reading it, so I sent her a copy. She liked it..."

Belatedly, I offer you my congratulations. That is fantastic

Sadly, I didn't give you anything for the Miami Book Fair. I was just swamped, far, far too busy. Sigh. But it is so good to be part of a group that works for each other.