Jessica Russell's Blog - Posts Tagged "ranking"
Naivety is Dangerous
Don’t be naïve with advertising! If you’ve recently published a book and you’re anxious to get it in people’s hands, rest assured there’s hundreds of thousands of authors who feel the exact same way. Nevertheless, it is extremely important to avoid falling for solicitations that promise you the moon and stars. Let’s just clear one thing up from the beginning: no one can rank you in the top 1000 on Amazon. The only entity who can do that for you is Amazon. An unknown author is not going to suddenly catapult to top ranking on a monster merchant site. Slow and steady wins the race.
However, as soon as your book is out, you will get solicitation after solicitation telling you how people used this service or that service and were suddenly catapulted to stardom. They’re not telling you the truth. Advertising is important, but it’s up to you to make sure you’re using legitimate services. You can buy Amazon ads, twitter ads, Facebook ads, or pay to have your book added to the “shelves” of legitimate services such as BookBub. You can also go on podcasts, hold local events, or go through any other legitimate avenue to get your book in front of the best eyes, but one thing all those methods have in common is that you are paying for a specific service.
Solicitations that show up from merchants with whom you’re unfamiliar should be regarded as suspicious and ignored. This is because legitimate advertising sources don’t have to spam new authors with personal messages through Twitter. Writers go looking for THEM because they have a reputation.
Facebook doesn’t send you a message from a personal account saying “Hey, I’m passionate about helping other writers succeed, for only XXX dollars we can rank you in the top 100 on Amazon, give us the money and we'll show you the “secret.” Can you imagine Amazon doing that?
No, you have to go looking for THEM. Unsolicited messages telling you about “wonderful opportunities” should always be ignored. You’re just going to lose money if you trust them, and even if there is one legitimate one in every 50, it’s not worth playing the guessing game to figure out who’s who. Stick with trusted advertising sources you know, even if they're more expensive. It’s better to pay more money and get something for it than to pay less and end up with nothing. Write on!
However, as soon as your book is out, you will get solicitation after solicitation telling you how people used this service or that service and were suddenly catapulted to stardom. They’re not telling you the truth. Advertising is important, but it’s up to you to make sure you’re using legitimate services. You can buy Amazon ads, twitter ads, Facebook ads, or pay to have your book added to the “shelves” of legitimate services such as BookBub. You can also go on podcasts, hold local events, or go through any other legitimate avenue to get your book in front of the best eyes, but one thing all those methods have in common is that you are paying for a specific service.
Solicitations that show up from merchants with whom you’re unfamiliar should be regarded as suspicious and ignored. This is because legitimate advertising sources don’t have to spam new authors with personal messages through Twitter. Writers go looking for THEM because they have a reputation.
Facebook doesn’t send you a message from a personal account saying “Hey, I’m passionate about helping other writers succeed, for only XXX dollars we can rank you in the top 100 on Amazon, give us the money and we'll show you the “secret.” Can you imagine Amazon doing that?
No, you have to go looking for THEM. Unsolicited messages telling you about “wonderful opportunities” should always be ignored. You’re just going to lose money if you trust them, and even if there is one legitimate one in every 50, it’s not worth playing the guessing game to figure out who’s who. Stick with trusted advertising sources you know, even if they're more expensive. It’s better to pay more money and get something for it than to pay less and end up with nothing. Write on!
