See those books were next to me on the many Free charts that I was on. I was only free for a day, many of these titles ARE JUST now coming off free. And why are they on my "team?"
Because if you look at their listings, my book is on the first few pages of their Also Boughts. So for the next few days, when someone clicks on the books above, my book will be right underneath with "Customers who Bought This Also Bought...."
And this is why I ran my "Test" Now that I know how the algorithm works (and I knew vaguely before this, but this is very specific) I can use it to my advantage. Next time I go free, every book next to me on that chart will be tweeted by me as much as I can to encourage readers to buy it for "Free" as well if they've bought my book. Why? Because where you rank on the Also Bought pages depends on how many readers who bough one book also bought your book. This time, I'm only on the first page of two books' Also Boughts. I was also only free for one day. Most of these books have been free for at least 2-3 days.
I did think, but didn't behave like this, when I was free and sharing a few links of other books that are free "Aren't I just helping my competition? After all, if readers get their book, I'll bump me down in the rankings." NO. I mean, yes, that can happen, but remember those free rankings DO NOT just shuffle over to paid. Your goals while you are free are:
- Get as many people as possible to download your book.
- Get as many people as possible to download other books in your genre so you are "connected" to them when you all go back to paid as an Also Bought.
- Try not to wear out your computer's refresh button.
A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby. CANCELLED is available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble WIP: STONE. Can Melanie Stone let her mother back into her life and kick out the creep trying to worm his way in? March 2012.
Definitely this is one piece of it. You hit on the key issue - "other books in your genre." I imagine that having my action thriller on the Also bought page of a romance will not help a lot, but if for instance it winds up getting associated with Konrath or Crouch or Nicholson who also had all those free thrillers yesterday. . .
ReplyDeleteBeyond that, though, my experience has been that the paid sales start coming in before the also boughts get recalculated. I think the Amazon is doing something behind the scenes that winds up showing the books to potential buyers once they come off free. Those free downloads carry some weight somewhere else in their algorithms, some place we don't know specifically about.