This is the promised followup post to Barbara Hinske’s Facebook Really Can Help You Sell Books and my Can Facebook Really Help You Sell Books? posts, and the first of a 3-part special on Facebook ads. I spent some $350 on Facebook ads in December with the twin aim of getting more subscribers to my newsletter and promoting my new bundle.
So, how did I fare?
The Ultimate Bundle of Fantasy Novels and SF Short Stories Is Born
I designed the campaign with help from my author friend, John Logsdon. John is a brilliant, fun guy with a great head for marketing. He’s also the author of some brilliantly funny SF novels.
The very first thing he suggested was that I bundle all my work. As he pointed out, to run an ad, the first thing you need is a bargain.
So, Rule #1: don’t bother advertising a full-price book.
It turns out that, if someone bought all of my fantasy/SF books individually, they’d have to pay some $20. By bundling them up and selling them for $9.95, I offered people a 50% sale – which still leaves a healthy $7 profit for me. This dramatically increases the chances of recouping any money spent on ads.
So, Rule #2: because of the small percentage of people who will end up buying your product, don’t advertise anything that sells for under ~$10.
Preparing the Landing Pages
I also needed to prepare landing pages for my ads, complete with Facebook tracking pixels.
Without wanting to get too technical, I created a new blog, based on ideas from Mark Dawson’s Self Publishing Course. Specifically, I got the ad-layout idea from websites featured in his course.
I advertise my books there, but the main purpose of this blog is solely to act as a landing page for my ads.
With that complete, the next step was to prepare the free material that would encourage people to subscribe to my newsletter.
Preparing the Giveaway
As I mentioned, I had two aims for my ads: to gain new subscribers, and to promote bundle sales. This means I had to design two distinct ad sets.
The first ad set was designed with new subscribers in mind. Before I could even work on this, though, I had to prepare a giveaway. I prepared a special edition that contained Schism, the first half of Rise of the Prince and bonus material (the Robinson Companion).
The giveaway is there to offer an incentive to people to subscribe, but the trick is that they’re then led to a “tripwire” (or “upsell“) page on the new blog. This allows me to sell them the afore-mentioned bundle. The idea is that enough of them will do so, that I’ll recoup at least part of my ad costs. Using this technique, John has managed to actually turn a small profit in most cases.
Which leads to Rule #3: Whenever possible, make people pay to subscribe to your newsletter!
Designing the Subscriber Ad
Click to open in Facebook
The next step was the actual design of the ad. I used an eye-catching background courtesy of Alex Saskalidis, and pasted my giveaway books.
I then wrote a small blurb and went through the usual steps of creating an ad: choose an audience, select where the ad is to appear, upload the image etc.
I set up the ad to run, and waited for a few hours for it to be approved, which it did a few hours later. I gave it a daily budget of $10.
Then I sat and waited for the impressions to start.
And waited.
And waited.
Three days later, I started thinking there might be a problem with it, so I deleted the campaign and started from scratch. This time, it started performing right away.
The lesson here is simple: Facebook runs on code. And every code has bugs.
The Subscriber Ad Results
Between December 7th and 23rd, I had reached 17,779 people. 46 of them had clicked on my ad. And I had gained 28 subscribers, after spending $45.75.
This means that each subscriber cost me some $2. Therefore, 8 of them – or 17% of the people that visited the page – needed to have bought the bundle for me to break even.
The real rate, of course was much lower, which is why I stopped the ad on the 23rd.
Designing the Sales Ad
Click to open in Facebook
The second part was to design a sales ad. This would help me promote my bundle, even if it gave me no subscribers.
As before, I used Alex’s background, and created two ads – one with a single image, and one with a carousel. The latter allowed me to emphasize how many books were included in the bundle.
After going through the usual steps of creating an ad, I scheduled it to run on a $5 daily budget for 7 days. I then submitted, and the very next day it started performing.
An Early Success…
After the week ended, I was ecstatic. I had spent $57 and made a little over $80. This means that, for the very first time ever, I had actually made money off ads! Woo hoo!
My ad had reached 8,000 people, and 124 of them had clicked on it. This gave me a Cost Per Click (CPC) of only $0.46, which is fairly decent.
After screaming, “I’m rich! RICH!” and giving myself a thorough pat on the back, I decided to run the ad again. Only this time, I’d scale it, by increasing the budget to $10 daily, and running it continuously. It was December by now, so Christmas was near. Which can only be a good thing, right?
…Followed by Failure
Wrong. As expected, this ad performed much better. It reached 38,525 people, 686 of whom clicked on it. This meant a slightly lower CPC of $0.42. Still, because of the higher budget and many clicks, I found myself spending some $250 in record time.
Which would have been fine, had I not only made $40.
I felt, in the words of a Scottish friend, that I’d managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. I had spent over $300 and made $120.
Why was that? I suspect that Christmas is to blame. As the holidays approached, people would click on the ad, but not buy the books. This might be because of some weird Christmas effect – they probably felt they’d rather spend the money on a Christmas-related book, or on Christmas tree ornaments or an elf or something. I honestly don’t know. I’d have to repeat the experiment at a different time, which I plan to do, only not just yet. When I do, I promise to share the results.
In the meantime, my next post will show you two alternative ways you can use Facebook ads to gain subscribers and to promote a giveaway.
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I’ve thinking about ads for a while and came to the realisation that I’d need to understand much more or get somebody who really knows about it to do it for me… I’m still interested but I’m not sure I’d get my head around it…
I know what you mean 🙂
I enrolled in the course but didn’t get much benefit — I wanted to get only new subscribers. However, one author, a very successful one gave me a good idea and strategy I was needing at that time. last time when I tried with FB ads I had a very god image, copy (poeple in the FB Self-Publishing group like it) but again over $2-3 for a subscriber. I haev found much cheaper ways to get email subscribers + their engagement is better. One, day when I have some money to throw off I’d try with ads for subscribers. Maybe, if I opt for impressions with over at least 2-3 million target audience, my results would be better. But I’ll definitely try with video views for a paid book– they are so much cheaper than website clicks.
And John is a lovely guy! He gave me some free FB ads consulting, too.
Thank you for sharing your experience! You’re right; video views are the hot new thing right now 🙂
At present I am running FB ads to gain subscribers using Mark’s methods. It has been a slow trickle, but nonetheless, I have new subscribers signing up almost daily. The cost, I haven’t as yet worked it out. Too scared to do it!
So glad the ads worked for you 😀
Ah, the dreaded cost – therein lies the rub… 🙂
Yep, the cost ;D
Thank you for posting this. I want to begin to sell some of my photography. This is helpful information.
So glad to hear that! Best of luck with sales 🙂
Thanks as always for sharing this personal and most helpful info Nicholas. 🙂
A pleasure! Hope it helps you when the time comes 🙂
Indeed it will! 🙂
By coincidence, I just read this https://selfpublishingadvice.org/facebook-ads-one-authors-experience/ It seems to confirm that you should advertise one book at a time and direct the customer straight to your amazon product page.
Ah, very interesting. Thank you for sharing!
Thanks for always being transparent about what you’ve tried and the results of each method. I suspect for December, many people prefer to give hard copies of books as opposed to e-books as gifts. My bookstore made record sales this year.
That’s an angle I hadn’t considered; thank you for that. And yay for your bookstore 😀
This was really useful! Thanks for sharing! Maybe next time I try and run an add on Facebook I’ll follow your outline!
Yay! Thanks; I’m so glad you found it useful 🙂
You know Nicholas? I’m still not sure whether spending money on ads makes any sense to me… Really don’t know.
Trial and error. It’s even better when you watch others do it, mind you 😀
Then I’ll watch you closely 😉
My cunning plan worked, then 😀
This is a fantastic rundown Nick which could serve as a blueprint for many. More numbers I say! More!
Lol – whenever I write one of these, I think of you… 🙂
Thanks for sharing all this valuable info. That is so much work, Nicholas. You FB ads looked great and I’m not surprised you generated interest. My much lamer attempts at Facebook advertising haven’t produced much. I know there are some people who work magic there, but they seem to be niche writers: witchcraft romance, for example. Thanks again for the analysis :-).
Thanks so much for sharing all the details! I’m bookmarking this for future reference (I need to get a couple more books out before I really try FB advertising), and I’ll look for future posts. Good luck with your next go-round and I hope it does better than Christmas did.
Thanks! Me too 😀
Your ads look stunning and so does the new blog you set up as a landing page. I got a headache reading about the FB ads though. I still haven’t plucked up the courage to do one. You’re an inspiration, just for trying it out. Wish you better luck next time and look forward to reading all about it.
Thank you so much, Fros. Sweet as always 🙂
Such detail is quite valuable. Thank you for sharing your experience. 🙂
A pleasure! I figured that I needed to include all the details for the experience to be helpful to others 🙂
Wow. I’m a little surprised by the advice you got. If it works for you, that’s great, but everything I’ve learned contradicts all three rules. And I sold 200 books on Christmas Day alone. That said, your ads look fantastic.
Thanks! 200 books – that’s awesome! Would you care to share what you did to achieve that?
Sure. I’ve done several things, but I’d be happy to write something up for you. Give me a week or so. Will that work?
Of course! And thanks 🙂
Hey guys.
I’ve done the same thing by buying into Mark Dawson’s course that teaches us how to use facebook ads. One of the benefits to this is a closed facebook group where you can collaborate with other authors, thus gaining their insight and learning from their experiences.
I can say, with a certainty, that prices went up for everyone in December because that’s when all the marketers with big bucks are pushing their stuff. And we have to remember that we’re not only competing with traditional publishers but everyone, from Nike, to big chain stores, or whatever. Prices have gone back down and people are back to their regular spending habits, so I say don’t be afraid to try again. Especially if you’re getting clicks! That’s great!
There is a possibility that you’re giving people too many choices on your landing page, so maybe you can test advertising one thing, and go straight to your Amazon page for that one thing, or create another web page that only has the one option.
A big thing Mark advocates is to test, test, test!
One more thing, is that it takes Facebook about 3 days (which you seem to know) to get all their servers going on your ad, and to get all the kinks in their algorithms worked out. So a budget has to have space in those 3 days to work itself out. So I wouldn’t recommend stopping an ad after only 3 days, but keep it going. If you have an ad that’s working, then I would scale down the budget or even pause it, if needed, for your budget.
If it’s not working after 3 days, then try something different.
I hope you don’t mind, but I would like to contradict something that you said. Mark himself suggested, as you said, to bundle your product and not to sell anything under $5 in order to recoup your spending. When the group started, many people contradicted this. Some are making money off .99 cent books and $2.99 books. In fact, one of the group’s biggest success stories is selling his book for $3. And he’s now making $20,000 a month on his ads. *insert jaw drop* It’s all about the testing.
How true! Thanks for adding that, Fleur. If only testing wasn’t so darn expensive 🙂
No kidding. I have a friend visiting from out of state and he’s taking a look at my stuff. And he happens to be well versed in marketing.
One thing he’s got me working on this week is writing up 10 questions to test different marketing ideas and sending them out to my newsletter group. What a great way to test your ideas! It doesn’t cost you anything, you are getting advice from your audience, you’re engaging your fans and most times people love to give their input.
Or they unsubscribe. I hate it when they do that 🙁
Hey, I’ve sent you an email, and a FB message. I’ve even installed Viber (shudder)! Still need help with those covers?
Sounds like a roller coaster and I can relate. Did an Amazon campaign for the new book recently. Spent $100 and got tons of clicks and views. Not a single sale even with all that traffic. The bundle had better luck when I did it, but not by much. Still trying to figure out the lesson here.
I’ve finally got some ads that are working and I’m having the same problem, that no one is buying. I think it can be either 2 things: the congruency of the ad and the landing page (meaning people see what they expect after clicking on the ad – an exaggerated version of this would be someone clicking on an ad for cupcakes and landing on a website that sells tennis shoes) or the landing page needs work. Now that I’ve got working ads, I’m tweaking my landing page.
Another thing to factor in that I just thought about is Ad Blocking Systems. I wonder if that negates these things too. Nearly everyone I know has something like that. That and accidental clicks.
Good point on the congruency. I’ve run into a few ads that seem to market one thing and lead you to another. Those stick out in the mind better than the ones that work.
I don’t think Ad Blockers make a difference to ads, when you only pay for clicks.
Best of luck with that, then. Let us know what works for you 🙂
Ah, that’s interesting. I’d been flirting with the idea of trying one of those now that I have a more expensive bundle.
The last one I did was category, which might have been an issue. I had more luck with ones that I pick specific products, which is weird. I’d think only doing products would reduce your exposure when compared to categories.
Actually, that mirrors my experience. Perhaps categories generate too broad an audience.
That or you can only have one or two ads, so it shows up on items that aren’t very popular. Easier to choose ‘Game of Thrones’ and ‘Harry Potter’ than fantasy and hope you end up on those.
Good to know.
A valuable lesson to all of those seeking to promote their work, Nicholas. Let’s hope it goes better for you next time.
Best wishes, Pete.
Thank you, Pete! I sure do hope so 🙂
Heavens all that with a new baby and sleepless nights! I admire your thoroughness, but just reading through it makes me feel exhausted. I wish ( for your sake) it had been more successful, but for my sake I am relieved I need not be tempted to emulate. All the best for your next arrow of fortune.
Lol – thanks. I’ll let you know how it goes, when I fire it 🙂
I’ve recently been following an author who appeared to use the opposite tactics to you. Doesn’t bother with ads on social media and gives a novel away for free to newsletter subscribers. He swears by this method, but there are two caveats.
He spends thirty thousand dollars a year on ads in other places (he wasn’t clear where), and he also provides ‘premium advice’ for £600, which suggests there’s more to it than a freebie and a newsletter.
The Holy Grail to effective self-publishing promotion remains hidden. Whoever finds it will retire to a life of untold riches!
That wouldn’t be Mark, would it? 🙂
It could be.
Stressful news. Your ads look awesome, and you put so much work behind them. While I’ve managed to become more committed to writing daily, and my output has increased,organizing a FB ad sounds daunting. I look forward to your next article though…
Thanks! That will be Friday, then 🙂