Paul Whybrow
Full Member
- Jun 20, 2015
After writing five novels in the last four years, I'm currently casting around for ways to sell them.
I've made 500 queries since 2015, as well as uploading 44 titles of short stories, novellas, poetry and song lyrics to Smashwords and Amazon. Originally, I was going to self-publish my Cornish Detective series online, but realising that I needed to establish a social media presence to drive sales, I backed away from that idea.
I'd made my ebooks free of charge, as a way of raising my profile, and I left this offer in place to see what would happen. Since December 2015 almost 15,000 downloads have been made of my titles...earning me not a penny. I have no idea if readers will remember my name. I tend to think that it simply proves people like free stuff!
I subscribe to David Gaughran's excellent newsletter, and this morning's daily digest was titled Clever Ways Authors Are Using BookBub Ads
I'd heard of BookBub, but never really investigated it. Over the last couple of years, I've not had much to do with self-publishing, other than reading writing gurus' contradictory newsletters about Amazon's various publishing programmes.
BookBub: Get ebook deals, handpicked recommendations, and author updates
Looking at BookBub this morning, I'm impressed with the possibilities, but bothered by the fees. What I like, are the success stories of authors who'd been rejected by traditional publishers as "unsellable".
David Gaughran claims:
"BookBub Ads is the platform where I’ve seen most growth in the last year, to the point where it is rivaling Facebook, especially when factoring in conversion. The amount of money I can spend effectively on BookBub — and by that I mean get an immediate return on investment — has quadrupled in the last twelve months."
They've been operating in the UK since 2014, so I thought it was time to check them out. I found a couple of newspaper reports on them, though I take what they say with a pinch of salt, as journalists always focus on the positives with stories about writing:
It Isn't Amazon Publishers Should Fear. It's Bookbub. | HuffPost
BookBub – it’s Groupon for ebooks
It's no free for all, as not every author has their work accepted: it's said that 80-90% of submissions are rejected...which helps to keep the quality high. The biggest problem with Smashwords and Amazon is that anyone and everyone can self-publish on the sites...and, they do!
I recall that @Carol Rose had not such a good experience with BookBub, but has anybody else used BookBub—as a buyer or seller?
What do you think of them?
I've made 500 queries since 2015, as well as uploading 44 titles of short stories, novellas, poetry and song lyrics to Smashwords and Amazon. Originally, I was going to self-publish my Cornish Detective series online, but realising that I needed to establish a social media presence to drive sales, I backed away from that idea.
I'd made my ebooks free of charge, as a way of raising my profile, and I left this offer in place to see what would happen. Since December 2015 almost 15,000 downloads have been made of my titles...earning me not a penny. I have no idea if readers will remember my name. I tend to think that it simply proves people like free stuff!
I subscribe to David Gaughran's excellent newsletter, and this morning's daily digest was titled Clever Ways Authors Are Using BookBub Ads
I'd heard of BookBub, but never really investigated it. Over the last couple of years, I've not had much to do with self-publishing, other than reading writing gurus' contradictory newsletters about Amazon's various publishing programmes.
BookBub: Get ebook deals, handpicked recommendations, and author updates
Looking at BookBub this morning, I'm impressed with the possibilities, but bothered by the fees. What I like, are the success stories of authors who'd been rejected by traditional publishers as "unsellable".
David Gaughran claims:
"BookBub Ads is the platform where I’ve seen most growth in the last year, to the point where it is rivaling Facebook, especially when factoring in conversion. The amount of money I can spend effectively on BookBub — and by that I mean get an immediate return on investment — has quadrupled in the last twelve months."
They've been operating in the UK since 2014, so I thought it was time to check them out. I found a couple of newspaper reports on them, though I take what they say with a pinch of salt, as journalists always focus on the positives with stories about writing:
It Isn't Amazon Publishers Should Fear. It's Bookbub. | HuffPost
BookBub – it’s Groupon for ebooks
It's no free for all, as not every author has their work accepted: it's said that 80-90% of submissions are rejected...which helps to keep the quality high. The biggest problem with Smashwords and Amazon is that anyone and everyone can self-publish on the sites...and, they do!
I recall that @Carol Rose had not such a good experience with BookBub, but has anybody else used BookBub—as a buyer or seller?
What do you think of them?
