Hey Space Cadets, today I want to again look at marketing – trying to see through the weeds.  This will be the last blog I have on this series for a while.  However, I make no promises that I won’t come back to it.  This week we are going to look at Amazon.  While I am no expert – this is where I am selling my books.  So on to today’s adventure.

As an author, I have chosen to sell my books on Amazon, and further I have my books in Kindle Unlimited.  While this might not be for everyone, it has been working for me.  Through the Boss Man I learned that categories and subcategories are very important.  For The Legion Awakes, the sub-categories used allowed us to stand out in the Hot New Releases.  I was very fortunate to have Tim C. Taylor aka Boss Man to teach me about this.

The million-dollar prize in anyone’s marketing plan would have to be having Amazon’s market for you. This can be done in several ways, many of them are hard to control.  If your book takes off initially, Amazon is encouraged to pimp your book for you.  They do this by sending out emails to people who might be interested in your genre. Another way Amazon advertises for you is by linking your book to other similar books via the ‘Also Bought’ lists.  Unfortunately, I don’t really understand how Amazon decides who they add to the Also Bought list or their emails.

Amazon also sells advertising to market your books.  This being said, if you have a gun on the cover they will not do ads for your book.  Or at least that is what was run into with my books.  Evidently guns are not politically correct or something.  Who knows?

Since at the moment I’m exclusively Amazon with my books I cannot tell you about other sales platforms.  When Amazon shrinks or fails, I’ll jump off like a rat from a sinking ship with all the other authors.  I’m not worried about the risks of not selling broad early, because when I have this problem everyone else will too. It’ll be a pain, but a manageable one. As part of this aspect of marketing, I’ll be blunt in admit I’m a noob.  There is much I don’t know, but as I learn it, I’ll share with you and hope you’ll do the same!

If you are interested in more marketing information check out my fellow blogger, Joynell Schultz, who wrote a post on Marketing.  I met her through my blogging, and I’m glad we became blogger friends.  Heck, my wife was one of her beta readers!

Until next time, stay frosty and don’t forget to keep your powder dry.

JR

–>As usual, all images came from the Google’s “labeled for reuse” section or are videos used by JR Handley for use under fair doctrine.