This one comes from my online friend, Steve Scott. He is a top-selling Kindle author on Amazon. He first started in the Internet Marketing niche but he's branched out in a big way to productivity.
And he's crushing that niche.
This post is a summary of his very comprehensive guide to launching a #1 best-selling book. I encourage you to read this for an executive summary and then dive into his post for the deets.
Executive Summary of “How to Launch a #1 Best-Selling Book” by Steve Scott
Steve covers a lot in the post. Here are the highlights.
Production Costs
Know your production costs. Steve produces an eBook, physical book, and audiobook, all at once. You certainly don't have to do this; you could start with a Kindle and then branch out as you earn money to re-invest in your book publishing business.
Pre-Launch
Steve has a pre-launch strategy that he shares:
- Go to Facebook to get an initial assessment of the book, its cover, and its title.
- Use Amazon Marketing Services to make initial sales.
- Leverage your “Street Team” and Facebook followers.
The 5-Day Launch Plan
Note that Steve introduces his book in the Amazon Kindle marketplace at 99 cents and then raises the price to $2.99 or more after the promotional period.
Day 1: Send email to your list of subscribers. Respond to replies.
Day 2: Blog post and 2 Facebook ads about the book launch .
Day 3: Get your book on BuckBooks (could be hard to do, but Steve offers alternatives). Basically, get your book on paid ads sites.
Day 4: Send out a “last chance” email to your list that emphasizes the looming end of the promotion price.
Day 5: Last email out along with a few Facebook posts.
Takeaways
Seems pretty damned simple. I suspect Steve does so well because he has a BIG following already, has a good-size email list, and has a few partners that sell on his behalf.
But it's a simple plan that anybody can follow. The real key is building that email list. As Steve says, you only need a few hundred people on your list who are ardent fans of yours who already know, like, and trust you.
Once you have that groundswell and a loyal following (in your email list and in Amazon), you'll be able to follow this guide and get good results.
So, how do you build that initial following? I think you do it the same way that I've seen nearly every successful author follow:
Promote your books hard on Amazon.
- Use their Amazon's KDP Select program to run promotions for free books for a day or two at launch.
- Advertise on Facebook.
- Get a bunch of orders.
- In your book, make sure you have an incentive to get people to sign up to your list.
- Work on getting good reviews (ask people on your list and mention how much reviews help inside your book).
- Keep building that following until you reach critical mass.
- THEN scale by using this 5-day guide.