Views & Descriptions

I had been running Amazon ads for several years now, and I have gotten a steady stream of one or two "sales" a day.  However, when the books are in Kindle Select, the profit is very complicated.  Recently, I decided to put the Amazon ads on hold and try to promote my book videos to see if they could lead to a little better showing.

I wasn't ready for what happened!  The response to a promoting a few videos with a few dollars each, took me from  406 subscribers to over 6,000 in less than three weeks.  The view numbers went through the roof as well.  So it's goodbye Amazon Ads and Hello YouTube Ads -- at least for now.

LET ME SET THE TABLE FOR YOU:

I wanted to start making short videos in PowerPoint for my books.  I was told over and over that in social media, you need to be on camera, but I'm camera shy, introverted, and the thought of jumping around on social media like I see some of these younger authors do, was out of the question.  This advice kept me from venturing out into the short videos on YouTube and Tiktok for a long time.

I went ahead with my faceless book promotional shorts and I'm happy to report that I received a response I wasn't even ready for.  However, this huge response happened because I also promoted one or two of these videos.  I promoted the first one for views and put maybe $10 on it.  The third or fourth video I did, I changed the purpose of the promotion to subscribers.  Again, I was very impressed with how much interaction I received.

In order to monetize on YouTube, you need at least 3,000 subscribers and I believe 3 hours of content -- I'm going by memory here, so don't quote me on this.  Monetizing on YouTube was really never a specific goal as I'm retired and I don't think it's going to change my life at all.  However, it is nice to at least get the feedback of the views, the new subscribers, and likes.

So the first change I made was in creating these short videos, each one targeting a specific book, and mentioning the series name at the end of the video.  I'll post two of the short videos below so you can see what I'm talking about.

THREE KINDS OF PROMOTIONS:

After you upload a video to YouTube, and click on the "content" tab on the menu on the left side, a list of your videos will pop up.

On the right side, there are three or four dots indicating a drop-down menu.  When you click on that, a few choices will come up, one of which is Promote.  This is where I started with my first promotion, right on the dashboard at YouTube.

THREE PROMOTION TYPE CHOICES:

Once you get inside the choices, you need to first choose what type of promotion you would like to run, which is another way of asking you what your goal is or what you want to accomplish.  Your goal will fit under one of three choices as I explain below.

 You can promote to get more views on your video.  I tried this one and it exceeded my expectations.  Bear in mind that this is all based on how many views I would get organically.  So there was a huge difference.The second type of promotion is for subscribers.  I also promoted videos to get more subscribers.  I had the same experience.  My subscriptions grew from 406 to over 6500 within two or three weeks.  Again, I was astounded -- mainly because I'm only talking about $50.00 a month or thereabouts combined on all of these promotions.  And these changes occurred before the ad campaign ate up the money.  There is still money on a few of the videos.The third choice of selection is for "Website Visits" sometimes known as leads.  This is the choice for someone who wants to sell something on a website.  I set off to try this one, but noticed that you could only drive the traffic to your website.  This is where it got a little tricky for me because I wanted to send the clickers to one specific book on Amazon -- not to my website.RESEARCH - RESEARCH - AND MORE RESEARCH!

I searched for a YouTube Video that would explain how to set up a book marketing ad, but only got generic book marketing ads that had nothing to do with promoting an Amazon book on YouTube.  I tried different keywords:  Promoting a book link on Youtube, YouTube Lead Promotions, and on and on.  I found nothing helpful.

Somewhere between researching on YouTube and on Google Ads, I came upon a small link that said something like "get more control" and I chose that one.  This is where I found the next right pathway in setting up the type of ads I had in mind.

I'm posting the link here for you -- and for me, if any time lapses and I can't remember my exact route through the maze of choices at YouTube.  https://business.google.com/us/ad-solutions/youtube-ads/

HOW I SAVED $40 AT YOUTUBE THE FIRST DAY

The last link takes you to a place where you will be invited to log into your google account.  Once inside, there are hundreds of choices. Earlier in my research, I found a link where for $39.99, you could set up a consultation call with a Google Ads expert and they would help you.  I fully intended to pay for this service because I knew ,based on how complicated the Google Ads Dashboard was and how many choices there were -- may of which are hidden in the drop-down lists, I thought it would be well worth it to get advice from an expert.   The $40 conferences are for 30 minutes.

Before I set up the paid-conference I decided to first gather my thoughts and make a list of questions so I was prepared for the conference.  I went to Google Ads and clicked on New Campaign to see what type of information I would need to post an ad, like the book cover, links, headlines, etc.  To my astonishment, I saw a link to consult with a Google Ads manager FOR FREE!

I clicked the link and set up a conference.  He walked me through my first ad campaign, which at the time of this writing is called Demand Gen.  This allows you to sell something and target another link besides a website.   At the end of the zoom call and screen sharing, I had one ad featuring 5 different short videos on my books.

MY FIRST AD TWEAK:

This google consultant has been assigned to me now and we have scheduled a follow-up zoom call and screen share in two weeks.  They usually set the follow-up for one month, but when I told the consultant I wanted to specifically target the headlines to one specific book, that's when he said, let's go broad, see what happens for two weeks and then we can take it from there.  I agreed because I knew I wasn't ready to go forward with focusing on one book.  I needed to make additional short videos, beef up my long and short headlines that I will explain below.  So I just went for it.

For the next two weeks when this ad runs, I will make sure I have the following elements for my book entitled Beware - Things Are Not Always as They Seem:

Five different shorts targeting the Beware book.Five different short Headlines that are 40 characters or lessFive different longer Headlines that are 90 characters or less.Five different book descriptions that are 90 characters or less.

This way, I will be ready to either tweak the first ad or cancel the first ad and do a more specific ad campaign targeting the second book in this series.  Either way, I feel hopeful and am excited to see what happens.

WHY THE SECOND BOOK?

Some of you may wonder why I would target a second book in a book series.  My first book, Groomed for Marriage, is permafree on Amazon, which was done through a program they call price-matching.  By giving away Book 1, I get new readers who have nothing to lose to try my book and often, they read through the series.

In all honesty, I think of giving Book 1 away for free as a marketing approach.  This free book is casting a broad net to hopefully capture new readers.  If they like my first book, they will read through the others too.

By offering Book 2, people will have to purchase the book or they will download it as a Kindle Unlimited selection.  Either way, this book will be more profitable than a permafree book that is outside of Kindle Select.

PHASE ONE IS NOW COMPLETED:

My ad is up.  I had to work with the consultant and go with this broad campaign, but it's okay.  From this broad campaign, I will learn more about the ads themselves and see what kind of response I get with this type of ad.

I also have enough to do over the next two weeks to prepare for my second ad that I want to try, which I went over earlier.

I hope this helps any newbies who are interested in advertising their books on YouTube.  I'll do a follow-up blog post on this and I'm sure I will have more to report.

Check out the two short videos I made in PowerPoint below.  I chose music from the Youtube Audio Library.

 

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