The purpose of this blog post is to debrief the relaunch of the FreeForm science fiction thriller series. Let me start with a little background. This project began several months ago during which time I did a lot of prep work including:

  • All new covers for all six books, (Designed by Victor Habbick. Thanks Victor.)
  • New blurbs/book descriptions (written by Maxwell, aka dogpillow. Awesome job Max)
  • A new prequel story entitled Freeform: Crash,
  • Additional editing, and
  • Adjusted tiles.

I did all this prep work so readers could clearly see that each book was part of a science fiction thriller series.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

By the way, you can pick up the full set on Amazon for less than $22. (hint, hint)

There were several intentions behind this relaunch:

  1. To sell as many books as possible. After all, I’m working to make a living at this.
  2. At the same time, I wanted to learn as much as I could about how to not just write books but also sell them,
  3. Last but not least, I wanted to sell enough books that Amazon’s algorithm (A.I.) would take notice and start sharing the book with their network of SF readers. One of the ways I’ve thought of this was to launch this series into orbit so the sales would continue beyond the initial relaunch period.

The Pre-relaunch and Relaunch

I wanted the readers of my newsletter to have advance notice of the relaunch so I created a pre-launch which ran for three days. During that time, I used a method I learned from one of my mentors, Chris Fox, to send out notices to different segments of my newsletter. The official launch began on Monday, May 6 and ran through Saturday, May 12, so all in all the time of the promotion ran ten days. During these ten days, all the books were at special discounted prices. The first three were priced at 99 cents (regular price $2.99 to $3.99), and the last three were priced at $2.99 (regular price $3.99 to $4.99).

During the launch period, I implemented four ways to get the word out about the series:

• Cross promotion with other SF authors who shared the series with their readers (Thanks, guys and gals. So much appreciated.) and,
• Ads run through 5 promotional websites who shared the series on their websites and through their own promotional emails.
• Limited Facebook ads, and
• Limited Amazon ads.

Now For the Results

So, over the ten days of the promotion, 362 copies were sold. Also, there were approximately 6,000 pages read via Kindle Unlimited (KU) and Kindle Owner’s Lending Library (KOLL). As of this morning, May 15, the pages read has climbed to 7,568.

What I Learned

I learned so much from this relaunch, both what worked and what didn’t work so here goes:

1. It worked to send out notices to my readers by using the segmented email list approach. (I’m so appreciative many of my readers purchased one or more of the books in those first days of the pre-launch as well as on the last day before the special prices ended. Thanks, guys and gals. You are Amazing Awesome Readers.)

2. Working with other authors worked well also, and I look forward to sharing their books with my readers in the near future.

3. Some of the ad sites worked well and delivered what they promised.

 

What Didn’t Work or Could have Worked Better

  1. While some of the ad sites worked, others did not including the one that I had anticipated would be the most effective (and which cost the most). I’m currently in touch with them to see what happened that on the day they were to promote the book there was almost no purchases.
  2. I think Facebook ads and Amazon ads have a lot of potential for reaching new people who can become Amazingly Awesome Readers in the future, and I need to learn how much more on how to create powerful and effective ads that won’t break the bank in the process.
  3. I now see the value of an active and growing number of readers that I can reach directly so I’ll be focusing much more attention on attracting such readers to my Amazingly Awesome Readers community.
  4. Same is true with collaborating with other SF indie authors. I see this as the ideal win-win-win in that, not only do the two authors win, so do our readers who get to learn about new authors and when they are offering special deals on their books. (NOTE: If you happen to be an author who writes science fiction and/or fantasy and would like to create such collaboration with me, let me know with by sending me an email.

 

The Bottom Line and What’s Next

So, let’s see how I did with the original three intentions which were:

  1. To sell as many books as possible. After all, I’m working to make a living at this.

By the end of the relaunch date, I sold 362 books. While that’s not a tremendous number and is far below my target of at least 1,000, at the same time it’s the most I’ve sold in any other ten-day period. There were also those who are reading the book through KU and KOLL which I don’t quite know how to account for.

2. At the same time, I wanted to learn as much as I could about how to not just write books but also sell them,

I learned a ton and plan to apply all of it to when I launch or relaunch my next book or series. I am clear this intention was met in spades.

3. Last but not least, I wanted to sell enough books that Amazon’s algorithm (A.I.) would take notice and start sharing the book with their network of SF readers. One of the ways I’ve thought of this was to launch this series into orbit so the sales would continue beyond the initial relaunch period.

This did not happen. The premise I was operating on (and still believe can work) is that a slow steady curve in book sales over a 7-10 day period will result in Amazon taking notice and starting to sending other readers with similar reading interests to the book page. As far as I can tell, this didn’t happen. I will be working to get to the source of why my efforts went unnoticed by Amazon.

And that brings me to what’s next. I plan to apply all this to my next book campaign which will be to share two of my all-time favorite books with the world:

Fantastic fables of foaster flat

 

 

 

 

Fantastic Fables of Foster Flat: Suspenseful Tales with a Twist, and

 

 

 

 

Fantastic Fables of Foster Flat (Volume 3): More Suspenseful Tales with a Twist

 

By the way, both books are available as ebooks, quality paperbacks, and audiobooks. They are my homage to Ray Bradbury and the old Twilight Zone television show, so if you like either of these, I think you’ll really enjoy visiting Foster Flat through these books.

Now It’s Your Turn

I’d love to hear what you got out of this blog post, whether you’re a writer or reader. Sharing all this, what worked and what didn’t, is new for me, and a bit scary. That being said, I do want to hear from you.