Ready to storm the internet like the beaches of Normandy.
Why Amazon’s New Pre-order Option is a Game Changer
It’s 5:30 a.m on a Thursday and I watch the sun crawl above the tops of mountains for the twelfth time this month. It’s launch day, and I sip on a cup of tea and take deep breaths in and out to ready myself for the activities ahead. This was in May 22nd of this year, when I released my third book, Berlin Vanilla through the Amazon online bookstore. I knew what lay ahead of me today; the task of making dozens of calls, shooting out e-mail after e-mail and trolling Facebook and twitter to make sure if people would snatch up the book on day one.
Day one is super important in the Amazon world, because day one helps you establish rankings for your books and also gives you an idea of the state of your readership. Are people hungry for the new release? Are they too busy to snap it up? Have I campaigned hard enough? These questions and more constantly float through my head as I type a message to a friend in Japan (the first people on my list to contact because they are actually awake), telling him my book is out. He sends me back an enthusiastic reply with a screenshot of his Amazon purchase. I don’t smile, because I will have to repeat this process dozens, perhaps hundreds of times for the day and more often than not, people will forget to buy the book or not buy it at all as my “book launch day!” banner slips lower and lower in their relative newsfeeds. So I ease back, stare at the sun hiding behind a few clouds and wonder to myself, “Why isn’t there a way for people to simply pre-commit to buying my book?” It would save me a lot of wasted time on launch day and it would creat a much more efficient marketing tool.
Now, it is here.
WHY THE GAME HAS CHANGED
There are, in my opinion, four kinds of authors that do very well on Amazon. The first kind are celebrities who have a built in audience or fan base and sell well for that reason. The second kind are established authors with a large readership (and in their own way relative celebrity). The third kind are the “lucky” authors, who have a breakout ebook and build rapidly on its success to cement themselves as a leader in the Amazon marketplace. Then there is the fourth kind, who gains success through brutal work ethic, using marketing tactics and strategies and using the system to move forward. This new Amazon feature will obvious make life easier for the aforementioned three kinds of authors, but will completely change the way the fourth kind operates.
Let’s call the fourth kind of author the “Hustler”. Hustlers must orchestrate all aspects of their book production and equally the methods of its marketing and distribution. They must understand how to use keywords and social media to get their name out there, while working to get folks (friendly or otherwise) to watch their book trailer, read their book, or read a free chapter. They must organize structured campaigns for their book releases, attempting to get on “bestseller lists” to rise upward in Amazon rankings, hold “book buy parties” and call Grandma, Uncle Dave and every friend or associate that has ever held a conversation with them in a bar or airport lounge. They must do this to ensure they can hit a certain number of sales and in doing so, hope to gain an audience that will like their book and the purchase any future product they release. The Hustler might have a good first release, meaning he or she got fifty to one hundred people to commit to buy the book and then on launch day after following up with everyone sold a percentage of those commitments.
But this is draining work.
As a ‘Hustler’ myself, I recall my first launch day in June 2013. I was up at 4 a.m and went to sleep at 2 a.m the next day. I spoke to no less than five hundred people via phone, e-mail and Facebook and afterwards, on the edge of being completely burnt out, ended up selling only forty-eight copies of my novel. When I looked at the stats the next day I felt relatively dissapointed. Why? Out of the five hundred people I had spoken to, I had no less than three hundred solid commitments, so I expected to sell anywhere in the ballpark of one hundred to two hundred books. Now the law of averages will tell you that for every ten person you offer something to, one person will take it from you. But the word to focus on here is commitment. When people want something in that moment, you need to get it sold to them then. In a day or two, they might forget about you, your book and your silly ideas of dominating the literary world. So when they committ, you want to be able to give them something immediatley.
COMMITMENT EQUALS SALES EQUALS RANKINGS
See, if I was able to say to each of those people “Awesome. I’m glad you want to get a copy of my book, in fact you can actually get it right now and you’ll have it automatically delivered to you on launch day.”
Even sweeter I can give an incentive.
“Awesome! I’m glad you want to get a copy of my book, and in fact you can get it right now for the pre-order price of X.99 and it will be delivered to you automatically on launch day.”
This right here would have been a perfect tool in my arsenal. It means that the energy I expend relative to the committments I get equates to both sales and positive Amazon rankings. If a person does not want my book, I simply say thanks and go on my way. If a person wants my book, they can get it immediately when they want it, even if the release date is down the road. For me this means no additional followup to check if they’ve bought it.
We are in an age of distraction. People have siginificantly shorter attention spans, and Hustlers know this. People are sensitive to one person filling up their newsfeed with promotional information. If someone recieves an e-mail, facebook message and text from you about your book they might get annoyed. Pre-ordering is a way to sweep away much of that excessive energy the Hustler needs to put out just to get a foot in the door. This feature does not completely reduce a Hustler’s workload, but it does change the way an individual can now balance their strategies.
For a 30, 60 or 90 day plan, using this new system a person can get far more commitments than they did previously, with certain guarantees for launch day. Using a simple example, say a Hustler spends 25 days getting 10 commitments per day for a book launching at the end of the month.
25 days at 10 people per day = 250 book pre-orders.
250 pre-orders at 2.99 a book = 750 dollars before taxes and Amazon’s 30%.
after taking that out you are left with 525 dollars.
Why does this matter?
It matters greatly because if this was my book i’d know that on day one of it’s release i’d have earned 525.00. There would be no guessing games, no crossing fingers and watching the Amazon numbers to “hope” I did well. I would already know that i’d sell 250 books on day one (probably hit #1 in my category) and have a set earnings amount heading towards me.
This is incredible for a Hustler, because he or she is used to spending ridiculous amounts of time and energy talking to people, showing book trailers and doing their best with the hope that someone can buy a book down the line, or get a name or e-mail to follow up at a later date (which i’ve said before can be quite hit or miss).
So if I want to sell 1000 books on my launch day, with would earn me $2700US after Amazon’s 30%, now instead of wondering how I can do it, I can aim for one thousand pre-orders. Naturally getting a thousand people to buy anything isn’t easy, but if i’m going to talk to a thousand people anyways, why not have a way for them to buy what i’m selling immediatley?
This is why i’m excited for the near future because energy that i’ve put in and other authors put in won’t go to waste in the same way it has before. I’m sure people will still have book buy parties and use tricks and marketing tactics to push their book (after it launches) but i’m sure all first run strategies from now on will involve something new: The Pre-Order Party!
Much success to all new and existing authors out there! (if you liked the article, please watch my book trailer below. Hey, i’m a ‘Hustler’ remember?)