 | Yes, it's that time of the month again, and for a change I actually have some concrete good news to share. ;) Last April, I was lucky enough to be a part of Melody Anne's Kindle Worlds launch for her eponymous Billionaire Universe (thank you, Liliana, for getting me in!). The rules for writing a KW book were pretty simple, namely:
|
There were other rules (and perks!) as well, but I'm not sure if they were specifically for Melody Anne's KW books or KW in general, like---
- They encourage you to write between X and Y number of words, in order to have your book priced at $1.99. It's supposedly the sweet spot for KW books, but if you write beyond Y number of words, Amazon would have to adjust your pricing.
- Another thing I'm not sure about is that we (the first batch of authors writing for a new Kindle World) also received a cash bonus and it was a nice sum of money!!!
ヽ(ﾟ〇ﾟ)ﾉ
I didn't expect that at all. So imagine how thrilled I was, especially once I saw the amount converted to PHP (more zeroes, you know, haha!). But anyway, back to KW. I know some of you are thinking this is just basically a pat-on-the-back post, but it's not I promise. It's good news for both YOU and ME---
Off topic: Me Before You was a recent blockbuster, and then AlDub (yes, I’m still a fan, I just don’t have that much time to gush over them) has an upcoming movie, Imagine You and Me…mm…I wonder if I include the words ‘you’ and ‘me’ in my next book, I can get some of their good luck to rub off on me and I get to sell lots of copies. Mmmmm...
Well, anyway (sorry for getting off track >.<). Back to KW. Our April books launched on the 28th if I'm not mistaken (but we uploaded on the 26th), and the thing with KW is that you don't actually get to see the number of books you sold until the month after (e.g. I only found out about my May sales on the first day of July), and it will show up on your AuthorCentral account rather than your KDP dashboard.
I didn't expect much from my April sales since we only had a few days, but I was also secretly and quietly hoping it won't be small change since Devoured has been my best-ranking book for 2016 so far. And well, the bottom line: April sales were much, much better than I expected, with Devoured selling as many copies as my best-selling books on their first days of release. This is rare IME because Devoured's characters obviously have nothing to do with my Greek billionaires, and I also didn't do that much promotion for it prior to its release.
As for Devoured's May sales, well, let's just say it BLEW MY MIND, and is basically equivalent to 20% of my total income for the month. ONE BOOK, and it represents 1/5 of my monthly income, with no marketing from me. I have, like, thirty or so books and yet one book makes up for 20% of my sales for May! Imagine!
But wait.
There's more. ;)
Yesterday, I was randomly checking my Amazon rankings on my phone, and I was totally surprised when I saw this---
I didn't expect much from my April sales since we only had a few days, but I was also secretly and quietly hoping it won't be small change since Devoured has been my best-ranking book for 2016 so far. And well, the bottom line: April sales were much, much better than I expected, with Devoured selling as many copies as my best-selling books on their first days of release. This is rare IME because Devoured's characters obviously have nothing to do with my Greek billionaires, and I also didn't do that much promotion for it prior to its release.
As for Devoured's May sales, well, let's just say it BLEW MY MIND, and is basically equivalent to 20% of my total income for the month. ONE BOOK, and it represents 1/5 of my monthly income, with no marketing from me. I have, like, thirty or so books and yet one book makes up for 20% of my sales for May! Imagine!
But wait.
There's more. ;)
Yesterday, I was randomly checking my Amazon rankings on my phone, and I was totally surprised when I saw this---
This was at three in the morning and at first I was thinking, maybe my phone was loading an old page, probably because I didn't clear my browser's cache or whatever. You see, I also checked Devoured's ranking the other day and it was ranking somewhere between 4k to 6k if I remember correctly and down to #12 or #13 on KW's bestseller list. So you can understand my surprise. Anyway, just to make sure I'm not imagining things, I switched to my laptop and checked Devoured's ranking again.
And hey, it really IS #1.
And hey, it really IS #1.
Devoured on the also-boughts, with the orange bestseller flag
That was 3AM and at that time, Devoured ranked #1781. Now at 1430h, it's #2 on KW's bestseller list, BUT the book's overall rank actually improved.
It's now #1140! On its THIRD month. This is AMAZING. Compare it to Prince of Darkness 1, for instance, which was released end of May and now ranks around 13k. When I Love, also released end of May and the last book of my stepbrother trilogy, ranks around...lemme check...10k (yesterday it was 8k), but keep in mind that Book 1 is currently free from Friday to Sunday, hence Book 3's improved rankings for the weekend (previous to Book 1 being free, it was down to 21k or so if I remember correctly).
AND THIS, MY FRIENDS, IS THE MOST IMPORTANT REASON WHY I THINK (imho!!!) KINDLE WORLDS IS WORTH GIVING A SHOT.
Amazon is a for-profit business and as such there's nothing wrong about Amazon looking after its own interests. That said, KW books are one of those interests and that's why I believe Devoured gets to enjoy nice boosts once in a while. Don't get me wrong. Amazon is NOT manipulating sales or rankings. But what it CAN LEGALLY DO is make the book more visible using its own ad spaces on its own website to promote Devoured and other books Amazon published, which they also technically own.
Now...one of the major reasons why I wanted to give KW a try was because I believed Melody Anne's fans could also like my books since we write the same stuff. I was hoping that if they liked Devoured enough, they'd give my other books a try.
Two months after, I'm not sure if I did actually end up getting new readers (my post-Devoured sales for other books, new and backlist, remained pretty much the same) BUT it's still a win-win situation since what I did get instead was nice sales from Devoured and, as evinced by July 1's rankings, I can also be assured of the fact that once in a while the Amazon gods would remember Devoured and give it a nice boost. Considering how much I'm still struggling with increasing visibility for my backlist, having one book less to worry about is more than good enough for me! :D
AND THIS, MY FRIENDS, IS THE MOST IMPORTANT REASON WHY I THINK (imho!!!) KINDLE WORLDS IS WORTH GIVING A SHOT.
Amazon is a for-profit business and as such there's nothing wrong about Amazon looking after its own interests. That said, KW books are one of those interests and that's why I believe Devoured gets to enjoy nice boosts once in a while. Don't get me wrong. Amazon is NOT manipulating sales or rankings. But what it CAN LEGALLY DO is make the book more visible using its own ad spaces on its own website to promote Devoured and other books Amazon published, which they also technically own.
Now...one of the major reasons why I wanted to give KW a try was because I believed Melody Anne's fans could also like my books since we write the same stuff. I was hoping that if they liked Devoured enough, they'd give my other books a try.
Two months after, I'm not sure if I did actually end up getting new readers (my post-Devoured sales for other books, new and backlist, remained pretty much the same) BUT it's still a win-win situation since what I did get instead was nice sales from Devoured and, as evinced by July 1's rankings, I can also be assured of the fact that once in a while the Amazon gods would remember Devoured and give it a nice boost. Considering how much I'm still struggling with increasing visibility for my backlist, having one book less to worry about is more than good enough for me! :D