How to Best Unleash Amazon Ads to Sell More Books - BM373

 Susan Friedmann                                                                           00:30

Welcome to Book Marketing Mentors, the weekly podcast where you learn proven strategies, tools, ideas, and tips from the masters.

Every week, introduce you to a marketing master who will share their expertise to help you market and sell more books.

Today, my special guest is Alex Strathdee.

At 21, Alex convinced 11 colleges to send his book to 40,000 plus students across the US.

Now he's the founder of advanced Amazonads.com.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           01:02

500 plus books and a $1,000,000 plus in ad spend, where he helps authors get their books read.

He works from various countries around the world.

And when he's not working, you can find him sitting out on a surfboard Waiting for that next big wave.

Well, Alex, it's good to have that wave come our way because It's a pleasure to welcome you to the show.

Thank you for being this week's guest expert and mentor.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               01:22

Susan, it's such a pleasure being here.

And for all the listeners here, this is a surreal moment for me because when I first got into books and book marketing, you know, I was an avid listener of your podcast, and it told me A lot of what I know today in book marketing.

So to be on your show now is unbelievable, and I'm just so excited to be here.

So thank you, Susan.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           01:28

Wow.

What a compliment.

Don't know that gave me goosebumps.

Thank you.

Alex, bookmarketing.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           01:52

This is a topic that, as you know, is near dear to my heart and obviously to yours too and moving copies.

I mean, those are magic words our listeners want to hear.

I love the idea of selling books in bulk, and you like to move copies.

I think we're talking very similar language here.

So talk to us.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           02:07

Where do we start?

I always love to start at the beginning with this because We never know what listeners know and what they don't know.

So let's start at the very basics.

If somebody comes to you, what happens then.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               02:52

Sure.

And so I actually learn everything I know from being a failed author to start out And I think that's you know, where a lot of people you know, a lot of us get into this as we're like, oh, I'm going to write a book.

And then you write the book and you expect the masses to run after you grabbing the last copy you have left, and that just doesn't happen.

Unless you spend as much time marketing your book as you do actually writing your book and, you know, that's One of my favorite quotes is by Bill Gladstone, who's the literary agent, people like Marie Kondo and Deepak Chopra and Jack Canfield is says if you're gonna spend a 1000 hours writing your book, you need to spend a 1000 hours marketing your book.

So that's where, you know, the day that you need to are oftentimes, I, you know, I get the question from authors is when should I start thinking about the marketing for my book?

Alex Strathdee                                                                               03:04

And it's the day that you decide that you're going to write a book.

That's the day you should start thinking about your marketing.

So when authors come to us, it's just really just figuring out, okay.

What were your goals for writing the book?

what have you done so far?

Alex Strathdee                                                                               03:11

What's your current makeup of, you know, your reviews, your pricing, all all those things?

So it's really just diving deep into where they're at as an author on their journey.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           03:50

What I really love, and I'm gonna use that quote, is the 1000 hours because it's so true.

What happens is so many times, authors come to me and they've used up all their money because they're funding themselves, writing the book, having a book coach, the cover the layout, the design, everything that's involved.

Then, of course, if they're going to do printing or if they print on demand, obviously, If they don't know how many they're going to sell, I always say, go print on demand.

Don't have a box that's full of books that are going to lie, you know, in your basement unsold.

I've been there, done that one.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           04:24

But, yes, the idea of so much time for marketing and, of course, having some money put aside that you can invest in that because there's only so much marketing you can do for free.

and there comes a point that you've gotta stop paying for it.

Now I know that advanced Amazon ads is your company.

I am so curious about this whole idea of advertising on Amazon.

It's not been my go to recommendation.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           04:41

I'd like to potentially change that, and maybe there are people listening who would make great clients for you.

So talk to us about the whole idea of using advertising or if it's even the right thing for us.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               05:14

Yeah.

That is the starting place.

And I'd say that when you have a breakdown of our ulcers that we work with, I'd say About 60% of them actually use their book for lead generation for other businesses or for their business or, you know, for to get clients and and whatever have you.

and then about 30% actually make money on their ads and the book itself.

And so you can see a large portion of authors think that they can make money on their book and they can, but, you know, it really depends on what level of effort you're willing to put into your book to begin with.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               05:26

yeah, 30% of our authors actually make money on their book, but they, you know, they also have thousands of reviews.

They've written in in a niche that has you know, less supply than demand for that type of book.

So there's a lot going into it.

And then

Susan Friedmann                                                                           05:27

10%

Alex Strathdee                                                                               05:59

of our authors are really just you know, they just wanna get copies into the world.

And so those are the three different reasons why someone will run Amazon ads.

But when it comes back to you know, and you mentioned it is for a lot of authors, Amazon ads are not the right option.

There's 2 different kind of ways to go with it, and you can either kinda do some small test because we bring on, you know, I'd say about 1 and every hundred books that we bring on, we'll do this miraculous thing where the ads just take off, and they work really, really well.

the author is profitable in them, but that is not the case for most authors.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               06:29

And those authors are oftentimes the most outspoken about, oh, just run Amazon ads or make a ton of money, but For the 99 other authors, they will lose money on their ads.

Sometimes Amazon just you know, for whatever reason, a book works better with Amazon ads.

Well, there are some reasons, but, you know, a book just works better with Amazon ads.

So if you are serious about Amazon ads, it is a cash intensive endeavor.

unless you, you know, just run some basic ones and they work really well, if you really are serious about Amazon ads and we can talk about why, you know, you are talking about a couple $1000 investment.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               06:48

And so if you are the cash strapped author, there are much better ways for you to spend your money for a better ROI.

Right?

Like, working on, you know, building your email list or working on, you know, some other marketing efforts.

And Amazon ads probably aren't right for you if, you know, if you can't spare that cash and also you maybe don't have a bigger payoff at the end.

Right?

Alex Strathdee                                                                               07:04

because if there's an author who uses their book to drive their business and they sell 60 copies, but one of those becomes a you know, multi $1000 client of theirs, the numbers make sense for them.

So it really starts with what is the old author's goals for writing that book and then determine whether Amazon Ads are right for them or not.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           07:34

And that's actually the first question I ask authors when they come to me to publish their book is What do you want the book to do for you?

If they start saying, you know, well, I want to sell a million copies or I want to get rich and famous, a really, say, point blank that this is not what this is about.

Right.

I mean, very seldom do people get rich on selling books.

And I just read a statistic now that 3,000,000 books last year were printed, published.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           08:01

And yeah, the ocean is getting bigger with regard to the numbers of authors out there.

So it's harder and harder to get seen in your market.

So -- Absolutely.

But you said the word niche, which, you know, again, you know that I love that word because For me, it's all about niche marketing.

You can penetrate a niche, become a big fish in a small pond.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           08:14

I feel that that's a much easier approach than trying to put your book out there and, you know, throw as much spaghetti against the wall.

Hope ping some of it will stick.

Yeah.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               09:06

It reminds me of Mike McAowicz who a lot of people know for his most popular book, Profit First, but also the author of a a few other books well, pumpkin plan, fix this next.

And, you know, he started off without knowing it, Anish, he, you know, released profit first for business owners.

And what ended up happening is he started speaking at some universities to maybe get the book in the hands of some business students, and those business students were actually taking their books home on holiday, like, you know, during spring break or winter break.

And when they would take those home, they would leave them at home and moms who manage the you know, even the the family's finances or manage oftentimes the family business finances were picking up this book and realizing that it was the answer to all their problems and Mike did not write it for mothers who were at home.

And yet, that happened to be the niche that ended up carrying him to the masses.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               09:34

And a lot of authors, you know, starting off, they need to find that niche that carries them to the masses.

And so it was kind of this unsuspecting group that, you know, Mike ended up finding fanfare with where they were talking in their blogs about this book and it was just mostly blew up among this community to the point where, you know, then once you have that small niche that really supports you and appreciates your work, then they're the ones who carry that book the masses.

So just reminded me of how Mike McCallowitz did it with Profit First.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           09:58

Yeah.

And he's done an excellent job with that I didn't even realize that that was the niche that he's in because one of my coaches is a real fan of his and always talks about profit first.

And so I was like, okay.

But I didn't realize that stay at home moms or moms dealing with the family matters that this was good for them.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               10:09

And he didn't even know it.

That's the funniest thing is, yeah, he found it by accident.

And a lot of authors can't rely on you know, a niche finding them by accidents.

That's where a niche is really where you need to start.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           10:36

Yes.

And, you know, start with one niche and then branch out.

If it works in one niche, it might work well in another.

Absolutely.

So, yes, I love drilling down and finding out a niche if if people aren't sure, then I often find that their background is an area that they can often find well, they know that industry or they know that profession.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           11:13

They can relate to that.

They can relate to the people who they want to buy their book and, you know, their message for these people.

Let's keep on about this whole idea of advertising because I know that it's something that people think about and think that it's the magic formula.

What else would they need to do, or how does it go, I know in your book, you talk about book funnels and starting off with the ads and then having a funnel talk us through that model, please?

Alex Strathdee                                                                               11:25

Sure.

Absolutely.

So for example, one of our authors is Ed Rush, and he wrote a book called the 21 day miracle.

And it's on Amazon you can check it out.

So if you you can even just use the look inside feature for his book.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               11:39

You'll see that that first page is a bonus page.

Right?

And a lot of authors will put bonus pages throughout their book or useful links.

His bonus page converts at around 30%.

So you've actually been able to look at the back end and the subscribers coming in through that book.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               12:13

And for every 10 copy c cells, 3 of them actually becoming subscribers.

He has a complementary video course for his authors.

We found those to be really, really great at converting readers into subscribers and then also This is backed up by people like, you know, Chandler Bolt, obviously, he's the founder of the self publishing school.

And he says that the best to lead generation tools in a book are a free audio complementary audio book or a complimentary video course.

And, you know, Pat Flynn did this with Will It Fly, led to a very high conversion rate.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               12:36

So first of all, a lot of authors will think, oh, well and even, you know, my mom and whenever I think about writing another book, she says, oh, We was gonna give it all away in this book.

And, Susan, I'm sure you'll have a laugh because I'm sure you you know, you've had authors to ask this question as well, and it's, yeah, you wanna write a book that really teach people everything you know.

You know, leave it all on the table, give it all away for free.

And what you'll find is that the people who, you know, they'll see, oh, okay.

This person's the expert.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               12:58

They know what they're doing.

I'm gonna hire them anyway to do the work for them.

And so when it comes to a really good lead generation book, which is obviously, you know, the best part of that.

The book funnel is a book that really does solve someone's problem and then giving them the ability to get that information at a deeper level, whether it be a video course or Alan Dib with the one page marketing plan, did this in another phenomenal way.

He didn't use a video course.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               13:11

He did a his whole book is based around the actual lead generation itself.

Right?

So the title of the book, the one page marketing plan, you can guess, okay.

Well, by the end of this book, I'm gonna have a marketing plan that is one page long.

Right?

Alex Strathdee                                                                               13:23

And so you know what?

His lead generation is for that book.

It is a template, one page marketing plan template.

Right?

where it's kind of like the book can't go without the bonus material.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               14:05

You know, he gives away all the value in it, but, hey, you know, here's the template to to actually get it.

And so There's multiple ways that you can get people to subscribe or reach out from the book, but, you know, the number one thing is really just making sure that you're not just creating a like, a trailer for the rest of your information that you really are creating a piece.

because otherwise, people will say bad things about your book.

They'll review you know, I've seen plenty of reviews on Amazon where some will say, oh, this author is just trying to sell their services or not actually, you know, it's not a useful book.

And so if you are, you know, intending to use your book as a lead generation tool, Amazon, you know, you do need to make sure that it stands on its own that people, you know, can actually implement, like, Profit First, like we're just talking about, people can actually implement the system themselves if they read the book now.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               14:11

Like I said, you'll find a lot of people don't wanna implement it themselves, but at the very least, they could implement it with the information in your book, if

Susan Friedmann                                                                           14:19

that makes sense.

Yes.

It does.

And that's always a place to start.

I mean, I know that I've often said, oh, let me see if I can do it.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           14:43

But I give it a try.

And then if I can't and I really, really want to be able to learn how to do it, that's when I say, hey.

It's time to hire this person or do a course with them or do something else with them that obviously is a paid service.

I love, and I saw on your book because I downloaded your book funnels book.

And I was like, okay.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           14:53

He's got a QR code that takes me to a course straight away on that first page.

I'm like, this is Savvy.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               15:05

Yeah.

And we actually converted about 20% for people who end up becoming subscribers from the book, which not as good as ads, but still, you know, obviously, for us, you know, it's a useful tool for our business.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           15:20

Yes.

And sometimes, you can access those without even buying the book.

Isn't it right at the beginning so that just looking at the table of contents and then you've got this page that says, hey.

you want to download this course?

Alex Strathdee                                                                               15:27

Exactly.

People can use the look inside feature and see, oh, wow.

Okay.

Let me get the free bonus material without even buying the book.

So

Susan Friedmann                                                                           15:34

-- Mhmm.

Yeah.

Excellent.

Talking about these ads.

You mentioned a figure.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           15:54

He's mentioned about $2.

Is that a figure that we should keep in mind that if we were going into this, that that's what we would look to be investing?

Or what's the starting point?

I mean, could we have a few dollars here and there?

How long do we need to be doing this?

Alex Strathdee                                                                               16:26

working with us, we are not the let's just try throw the spaghetti at the wall and see if a couple things work, right?

That's not how we work.

authors pay us 4 results.

And so the quicker we can get results for them, the longer they're gonna stay with us.

And we have a 96% retention rate among our authors, the last month that was actually 99% just because we are very, very serious about finding the authors who are actually right for us to work, again, going back to their goals and then, you know, making sure that we are actually able to improve their results month over month.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               16:41

And so we require all of our authors sign up with a $1500 a month budget.

That is because we really want to be able to a lot of different things.

Amazon is getting more and more competitive.

Right?

5 years ago, when you have a lot of people who yeah.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               17:09

I won't name name names, but you have a lot of people who ran Amazon ads 10 years ago, and they had a lot of success.

And so they've created all these courses, and they're like, well, look at me.

Just follow along with what I did.

Those methodologies just don't work anymore because it's no longer the blue ocean that it you'll see a lot of voltage that get burned by Amazon ads because they're learning from these people who ran ads when things were a lot less competitive.

We understood very early on that we couldn't take that approach where you can just run some ads, basic ads on Amazon, and that'll just work.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               17:15

We understood that, and our focus is really actually building up the relevance with other books.

And so with that

Susan Friedmann                                                                           17:16

$1500

Alex Strathdee                                                                               18:12

a month budget, we're able to more aggressively target competitors' books so that we're looking to get a return in a much shorter period of time where, you know, a thousand people who read your book also read this other book that's related to yours, you know, you can actually start to show up in, you know, the frequently built together section, which customers who viewed this also viewed, and the customers who bought this also bought sections on Amazon.

And so those are organic placements.

And then Amazon will also email out and market books as well that are related to other books that people have read.

And if Amazon sees that there's a high relevance between you and those other books, you'll get recommended organically.

And so, really, our whole thing is actually using and we've tracked this with a lot of our authors, oftentimes, you know, month over month, we'll actually see a larger increase over time in organic sales and making sure that we're understanding the old there's whole marketing mix know, because if they're doing podcast too, then you can't attribute those sales to to Amazon, obviously.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               18:28

They're to Amazon ads.

And so, you know, we keep an eye on all these things that we've seen and create studies where both their ads can only account for a fraction of their sales.

And over time, the organic sales just from getting higher and higher relevance on Amazon increases.

Now you're not gonna do that with just a couple $100 budget.

Right?

Alex Strathdee                                                                               18:45

If an author, you know, doesn't have a huge budget and they are really serious about running Amazon ads, they wanna run some ads to test themselves, then Sure.

Set up some auto campaigns or some product targeting campaigns targeting a couple 100 ASINs or ISBNs that are relevant to your book.

And sometimes, like I said, you know,

Susan Friedmann                                                                           18:45

1

Alex Strathdee                                                                               19:10

of 90 or, you know, one out of the hundred books, well, that's fine.

That'll suffice, and you'll see some results from that.

But if that doesn't work, don't keep trying to push it.

and you don't have the magic bullet, then you really do need a big investment in order to make Amazon ads work.

Now if you are an author, obviously, that has done a lot of other marketing for the book and you're already selling, you know, a few 100 copies per month, your ads are going to be a lot more successful just because Amazon already knows a lot about your book.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               19:28

going back to what you're really trying to do with Amazon ads is you are trying to teach Amazon about your reader.

You do that through creating this reader profile where people see, okay.

A hundred people who have read Gay Hendrix, the big leap have also read atomic habits, well, you know, then we're gonna recommend atomic habits, the readers of the big leap.

Right?

your ads, you really have to be strategic of, okay.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               19:53

What books am I trying to show up for long term?

And so, hopefully, this gives you some sort of ideas of, like I said, if you're a beginning author, you don't have the cash, but you wanna test Amazon ads, then, yeah, sure.

Set up some basic campaigns.

But if you're not seeing an ROI within a month or 2 or you're not really moving that many copies, then shut off your ads and focus on other forms of marketing.

And there are plenty of examples that you can see how authors were able to market their books without spending a fortune.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               20:19

when it comes to Amazon ads, that's what I would recommend.

If you do have cash, despair, and really invest in Amazon ads, then Amazon ads can be a wonderful way to aggressively get your book moving up the the rankings, and then we have authors who have been with us for 2 years.

And on their 24th month, that will hit a new record because of this flywheel effect.

Right?

Because of the fact that the more books you're selling, the more Amazon's gonna show your ads, you're gonna move up and out over time, the more and more you invest.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               20:44

But that is a long game strategy, and you do have to be willing to invest in that.

So hopefully, that clears up some of the, you know, what the current state is I think there is a lot of misinformation out there about people who are selling courses or people who are recommending that Amazon ads are for everyone when they are in fact not because in today's day and age of the competitive landscape of Amazon, things are just not what they used to be.

Does that make sense to them?

Susan Friedmann                                                                           20:58

It does.

And one thing that comes to mind and I want to clarify for our listeners that Amazon has got its own program for advertising.

Whereas what you're doing is separate from that.

It's an independent company.

Correct?

Alex Strathdee                                                                               21:19

Correct.

So running the Amazon ads themselves is done through it's a platform that Amazon puts out, but Amazon is a bookstore.

Right?

You know, where Facebook and a lot of these other pay per click platforms, they make their money from ad revenue.

As Amazon, yes, they make their money from ad revenue in a large a portion of it, but they also make their money from book sales.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               21:57

And so they're a lot more focused, and this is why they organically promote books themselves, is because of the fact that they make money when books sell.

And so it's in their best interest to know at all times, okay, if I show this book to this reader, are they going to buy it?

And if you don't have money, then there's a lot of other ways that you can build up this cross relevance on Amazon through ways that aren't just Amazon ads.

And so, for example, you know, there's a platform called listennotes.com free to use for a few searches.

and, you know, you can look up who is your author twin, what author is most similar to you, and then look up all of the podcasts that they've been on that's your list.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               22:35

And so if you can follow them around on a podcast tour and the blogs that they've appeared on, it's the same readers who sold their book and read their book ideally, will see your book and read your book.

And so Amazon will see being that most people do buy their books on Amazon, will see that cross readership and then say, oh, well, we should start showing our book.

And so for a lot of authors, you know, one of the initial things that they should do when starting out with building their bookmarketing plan is looking at, well, who are my author twins?

And then figuring out all of the media, all of the placements that those authors have gotten and then to appear in those same programs or those same placements.

And Amazon Ads is just another way to build up that cross relevance.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               22:44

It's getting your books to appear alongside their books on Amazon, and that's really the biggest play on Amazon and what you're really trying to accomplish over time, if that makes sense.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           23:30

Yes.

Without any shadow of a doubt, it does.

And I love that idea of finding your twin and mapping their marketing and what they're doing and the shows that they've been on and what they're doing because if they're successful, then there's no reason why you couldn't be as well.

What I like to is the fact that you're explaining how Amazon make that decision as to putting your book next to another book because people have said to me, well, how do I get Amazon to do that?

And it's really from the sales, do they have to have advertised on Amazon in order for that to happen, or does that happen merely by numbers of sales.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               23:48

Not at all.

My Amazon ads are not required.

You look at one of the most successful self help books of of our age, which is Tom McCallitz by James Clear, know, that he does not run Amazon ads.

But if you look at half of the I swear it's half of the self help books on Amazon, you look in the frequently bought together section.

You know what you see?

Alex Strathdee                                                                               24:38

atomic habits by James Cleared.

That is purely just because if he's appeared in all these places and build up enough cross readership where he has that they make money on book selling wants to show James Clear's books because they have the James Clear book because they have the data showing that that is the book that is most likely sell on these other books.

And so, you know, whether it's through Amazon Ads or however you do it, that is really your way into building into the Amazon algorithms is just figuring out, okay, which books do I wanna be showing up on and then finding all the placements that those books have on and off of Amazon and following them around.

But absolutely, you do not need you know, many authors are very successful without doing Amazon ads.

Amazon ads are you know, it's just another tool that you can use to get there.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           24:56

Yes.

I never say rely on one thing because yeah.

I'd say it's like a dripping faucet.

that the more oil drips, which are different activities that you're doing, then the bathtub is going to fill up.

You never want to rely on just one thing.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           25:10

especially in marketing because marketing is such an inexact science.

You never know where it's going to come from, and somebody who might Like you, you listened to my podcast years ago.

Did I know that?

No.

I didn't know that.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           25:18

Now I know it.

And now, you know, we're going to potentially be able to refer our business.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               25:26

I think I actually remember you making that false to the reference in another one of your episodes a long while back.

So it's definitely coming full circle.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           25:37

Yeah.

Good.

I like that.

So we've talked a lot about the ads.

Let's look at just a touch on a couple of really big mistakes.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           25:40

that you see authors make?

Alex Strathdee                                                                               26:20

Sure.

But I think a big one is not having an idea of where they're book marketing is headed.

And this is where you see authors who get burnt out, and quite frankly, you know, that the marketing community gets a bad name is because of there's many different ways for you to spend your money, some better than others.

But if you don't have an overall guiding strategy of what you're really trying to do, it's kind of just like throwing darts at a board or it's like a Dorian finding emo just keeps swimming, but you don't really know where you're swimming to.

And so it's Something I like to recommend and this is actually, you know, one of my favorite book marketing books is write useful books by Rob Fitzgerald.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               26:46

And he didn't even mean to create more of that book is focused on writing really good nonfiction than it is on the actual marketing, but, you know, he has, you know, a number.

He says you need to seed a 1000 copies into the wild.

And that should be when you write a book, as you're writing the book, you need to be thinking about how am I going to seed a 1000 copies into the wild.

And Bill Livest1, who's the literary agent who I mentioned before, he says the same thing.

Now his number is a lot higher.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               26:47

His number is

Susan Friedmann                                                                           26:47

20,000.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               27:13

He says, if you're really trying to write that book that changes the world, you know, you need to seed 20,000 copies into the wild.

Right now, obviously, there's a big difference between a book that's aimed at trade shows than, you know, a book about self help.

Right?

You know, obviously, a book about self help is gonna have a lot bigger reach and as the trade show book is really focused more on on niche marketing, you gotta take that into consideration.

But really, when you run a nonfiction book, your marketing should all be focused around this number.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               27:45

This number that you commit to selling And then if you've written a really good book, then, you know, that should carry weight on its own, and then your book should start to get recommended.

Jon Strellecki did this with cafe on the edge of the world.

He went to a bunch of chamber of commerce meetings around the country just, you know, taking a backpack of his books and handed them out to people at those meetings until he had personally handed out over 10,000 copies of his books.

Now that same old, there has now sold over 8,000,000 copies of that book.

And he really did no paid advertising in the beginning.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               28:18

He just literally slugged around a backpack and hated out books until he hit that number, and he was also able to build personal connection with people, which I think really goes a long way to when someone's actually met the author of their book.

And so for him, he committed 10,000 copies, and that's how he got them out.

I also think you can have a lower number if you market to communities.

Let's say you speak at a conference, and there's 250 people in the audience who get a copy of your book Those are people who can then talk to each other about that book as if you're doing one off marketing, which, quite frankly, Amazon Ads kind of is is where you'll have someone in Nebraska buy a book.

You'll have someone in Virginia buy a book.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               28:56

people aren't gonna know each other most likely.

And so they're not going to be, you know, necessarily have the opportunity to talk together about that book, which is what really creates that buzz.

if you can also find a way to market to small communities kind of like what you did, Susan, with the 500,000 copies that you got out, with your book where the company knows handing those out was probably all handing them out within the same community.

You know, you create that buzz about your book.

And so I think you can have a lower number if you focus on getting your books in the hands of communities, but really where your marketing should start out and the mistake, you know, this goes back to the this has been a very long winded answer to your question, which is what mistake do authors make, it's not knowing why they're marketing their book.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               29:31

And so every author should start off with a number that they commit to marketing.

And once you hit that number, the best part about it is you can give yourself permission to stop marketing your book.

because you know, okay.

I've hit my number, that number, you know, I and the book has grown its own legs and it's now working itself or it's not.

know, obviously, you can still market your book if you like, but that should be the litmus test where if you get 5000 copies of your books in the wild and you're not selling any additional copies organically, then it's probably time to go back to the drawing board and fix things like your cover or, you know, the message itself because otherwise authors will just spend an absolute fortune marketing their book.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               29:38

and there's other issues at play here.

Really, book marketing is about giving yourself permission to stop marketing your book.

Does that make sense, Susan?

Susan Friedmann                                                                           29:44

Oh, it does.

I'm like, Writing furiously.

I like all these messages.

Yes.

Yes.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           29:53

Yes.

Alex, how can our listeners find out more about you and what your company does tell us.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               30:05

Yeah.

Absolutely.

So I have a free course for authors who want to test the waters with their Amazon ads.

I really created the course for those authors that we couldn't work with.

I don't have any sells.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               30:39

There's no paid course that I'm trying to get you to buy, and I think it's honestly better than most of the paid Amazon ads courses out there.

I will send Susan over a link for that, which she can include in the show notes.

And then if you just go to our website, www.advancedamazon ads.com, I listen to over 15 plus hours of book marketing podcasts a week, including Susan's here.

I really am obsessed with books and book marketing.

I love the stories of how different authors have made their books work, and so I send out a weekly newsletter every Wednesday basically just with my three favorite tips that I learned in those marketing podcasts for that week.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               31:15

two links that are really useful, the 2 authors, and then one quote by an author because who doesn't love a good quote.

That's my newsletter I saw that can say you can go to our website, get on that newsletter.

And then by signing up for that newsletter, you'll also automatically get a link to our Amazon ads course as well.

that's how you can get into our circle and learn more about the work we do, or at the very least here about all the weird, wacky book marketing tactics that people have used and makes me feel good because I have this whole head full of random book marketing knowledge, and so it makes me feel like it's actually being used.

So those are a couple of the different ways that people can engage with us.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           31:29

That's fabulous.

And I love the format of your newsletter.

Reminds me of a James Clears format of how he got so I'm wondering Maybe you were just maybe borrowed, imitated what he was doing with them.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               31:43

Stolen Stolen can be another word for that.

It works.

I mean, our open rates are as much as 60%.

You know, always above 50, always between 50 60%.

I think people just love to know that, you know, they can expect something each week that is really gonna be a value of them.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               31:49

So that's also something I'd highly recommend for authors is to find your 3-2-1 newsletter because, you know, people just love that format.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           31:55

Yeah.

It's simple to read.

It's like, boom.

I don't have to spend any time.

I've got this information.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           32:05

It's useful.

And there we go.

Fabulous.

And as you rightly said, Alex, I will put that link into the show notes and listeners.

Yeah.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           32:22

grab ahold of that course and learn whatever you can.

The more knowledge you have, the better off you're going to be with all of your marketing.

So fabulous.

Alex, as you know, we always end off with a golden nugget.

So what's your golden nugget you'd like to leave our listeners with?

Alex Strathdee                                                                               32:52

The golden nugget is to come up with your golden number.

commit to selling x amount of copies of your book when you're writing your book.

Rob Fitzpatrick and write useful books, talks about some of the top ways for him has been following around his author twin on podcasts or speaking at conferences.

And people that should not be included in that 1000 copies should be relatives.

it's great that your mom and dad support your work or your cousins or, you know, your siblings, you know, buy a copy of your book, but you really need to get your book in the hands of people whose problem you're actually solving.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               33:15

If you get your book in the hands of people whose problem you're not solving, then your book's not gonna mean anything to them and frankly won't get recommended.

And so when it comes to your number, focus on what are the communities, what are the groups of people that I can get in front of that are actually going to be benefited specifically by my book that I'm solving their problem, you know, and come up with your number between 1020,000.

So that's the golden nugget that I will leave you with.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           33:22

That's a perfect yes.

I mean, a 1000 sort of sounds as if it's doable.

20,000.

Woah.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               33:22

Woah.

Woah.

Woah.

Woah.

Woah.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               33:25

Woah.

Woah.

It's a bit of a bigger number.

Yeah.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           33:43

Yes.

In fact, in this statistic that we had 3,000,000 books that were published last year they said the average author only sells 300 copies in the lifetime of that book.

that's really sad when you think about that.

Alex Strathdee                                                                               33:45

I think I saw that too.

Yeah.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           34:01

Yes.

Yes.

So thank you, Alex, has been amazing listeners.

I know that you're gonna have to listen to this again because Alex has shared some amazing information that you can use and some great tips.

So thank you so much.

Susan Friedmann                                                                           34:40

And listeners, you know what I'm going to say if your book isn't selling the way wanted or expected to lets you and I jump on a quick call together to brainstorm ways to ramp up those sales.

because you've invested a whole lot of time, money, and energy, and it's time you got the return you were hoping for.

So go to brainstorm with susan.com to schedule your free call.

And in the meantime, I hope this powerful interview spot some ideas you can use to sell more books.

until next week, he's wishing you much book and author marketing success.

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