More on beating the Amazon System

[Suzanne]

Where Hearts Prosper

I got a tip for this contest from a blog by Randy Ingermanson, (not sure of that spelling), and I'm trying it out with my book. I thought you all would be interested in following the results. The author that Randy blogged about had huge success.

I'm asking my friends (through emails and my blog) that if they are going to purchase my book anyway, to get it from Amazon on a set date (Jan. 11) and time (12 noon to 1:00 pm mst).

The reason for this is that Amazon ranks their books hourly and daily. This means that a book that sells 50 in one day will rank ahead of a book that has sold at most 49 in one day, even if the first book has only sold a total of 50 books, and the second book has sold thousands. And it will stay there until the second book manages to sell 51 books in a single day.

I'm also offering to enter anyone who spreads the word into a drawing to win a $25 Amazon Gift Card. I'll be asking my friends to write reviews next month (for another $25 gift card drawing). And the overall best campaign will win a $100 Amazon gift card.

I've blogged about it. And there are more boring details on my website.

While I hate to self-promote a group I've just joined, since this is a self-promoting group I guess it's okay, as long as my main intent is to share the strategy. So feel free to enter the contest while you're investigating. And I'll keep you updated on how it goes.

[Suzanne]

I told you all I'd keep you posted on this campaign, since it's purely an experiment on my part.

(I've set a target date for purchasing my book, and asked my friends who are going to get it anyway to get it on that date and time, in order to boost rankings.) Today's the day, and I'm anxiously awaiting my cyber-party, hoping I'm not the only one there. =) But in the meantime, I've had a question come up, and I'm hoping maybe someone here can answer it.

Apparently when a small press releases a book, it takes some time for Amazon to stock it. I'm not sure what determines how and when that will happen. In my case, my publisher sent in a suggestion that they stock up on the book, because of my ad campaign, but the book still isn't there, so my Amazon page says the book will ship in two to three weeks.

Does anyone here have any other experiences with the process of getting their book into the Amazon warehouse? I wasn't even sure they had a warehouse until this week. I can't help but wonder what would have happened if I hadn't run the campaign? Can anyone shed on light on the process? Thanks!

[Carole]

Suzanne,
Yes, I have heard Amazon takes a couple of weeks to show new books. Who is your publisher's printer? I understand that there is bad blood between Amazon and the printer Lightning Source, and that when small press publishers send in books printed by LS Amazon tend not to look upon them favourably. I don't know how true this is, but it would be interesting to know if anyone else has been affected like this.

[Gina]

My last book took a week to get onto Amazon, but the book cover didn't arrive for a few days after that. My next book is being printed by LS and I've been told it will be on Amazon by the beginning of the New Year, so there doesn't seem to be any problem there.

I read somewhere (too early in the morning for me to remember where) that Amazon has no problem with small press books... it's the big companies who compete with its self-publishing wing that it doesn't like - Lulu's one of them but there are another couple I don't remember the names of.

[Suzanne]

My publisher is Cedar Fort. The book was released Dec. 1, but they still aren't in stock on Amazon. Were I to do it again, I would definitely wait until they were in stock. The campaign was effective, however, in getting the word out, and I did sell a lot of books.