How To Use Amazon Ads To Sell Your Book ǀ Self-Publishing Relief

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How To Use Amazon Ads To Sell Your Book ǀ Self-Publishing Relief

You may have written the greatest book of all time—but if readers (aka buyers!) don’t know it exists, you won’t make any sales. Fortunately, there are ways to get the word out about your self-published book that won’t break the bank: Announcements on your social media platforms, mentions on your author blog, press releases, and book reading events are just a few. If you have some wiggle room in your budget, you might want to consider using paid ads to boost your book sales. The marketing experts at Self-Publishing Relief have some tips and advice on how to use Amazon Ads to sell your book.

   

Using Amazon Ads To Sell Your Self-Published Book

Amazon Advertising (previously known as Amazon Marketing Services, or AMS) can be a great tool for self-published authors. With Amazon Ads, you can promote your book right on Amazon’s website, which is responsible for the sale of over 300 million print books a year in the US alone.

How Amazon Advertising Works

Amazon Advertising works on a pay-per-click model, meaning you’ll pay each time someone clicks on your ad—not simply for the impressions it gets. The pay-per-click model means that you’re only paying when your ad actually does what it’s intended to: catches a consumer’s attention. Of course, keep in mind that every click does not automatically result in a sale.

Here’s a simplified breakdown of how Amazon Ads work: You, the advertiser, will place a bid for an ad spot. That means you decide how much you’re willing to pay per click. Amazon then takes all bids into account and places ads accordingly. Along with the bid amount, you’ll also be able to target specific keywords and other details that will help place the ad in the best possible positions.

From there, once the ad is displayed, Amazon Advertising uses a “second price auction” wherein the highest bidder will only be charged one cent more than the second-highest bidder. So, if you bid 75 cents and the next highest bid under yours was 50, you’ll only pay 51 cents per click.

There are also different types of ads available. In Amazon’s guide to advertising for your book, they list three variations: sponsored products, sponsored brands, and lockscreen ads. The guide explains what each one is and how it works, so it’s a great place to get an overview!

Another great benefit of using Amazon Ads: There’s no need to create or upload new graphics—Amazon will use your book’s cover and metadata from your sales page to create the ad for you! This means that you can set up ads with minimal effort. You can, however, customize your ad with your own text during the setup process.

   

How To Set Up An Amazon Ad For Your Book

Setting up an Amazon Ad is fairly straightforward, and Amazon guides you through every step of the process. To get started, you need to go into your KDP account. (You must be a Kindle Direct Publishing author with a book for sale through KDP in order to advertise your book on Amazon.)

Select the title you want to create an ad for and click the “promote and advertise” button. From there, Amazon will guide you through choosing the marketplace for your ad, the type of ad, the campaign length/dates, your bid, your budget, and any other relevant details.

NOTE: When creating the ad, Amazon will take you from KDP to the Amazon Advertising platform. You will sign in to that using your KDP login.

While your bid is an important factor in determining your ad’s potential success, another vital element is what Amazon calls your “relevance.” This is why you’ll want to be sure to choose extremely relevant keywords and other targeting factors when creating your ad. Amazon wants to show your ad to the audience most likely to be interested, so if your targeting factors aren’t well related to your book, the odds of your ad getting placed are lower.

You can also set a spending limit on your Amazon Ad. Since you won’t know how many clicks your ad will get, or how much those clicks might ultimately cost (see that second-price auction detail again), setting a budget is a good way to control how much you spend overall. Once your budget is hit, your ad won’t be displayed anymore unless you increase that budget.

Combined with low-cost and no-cost options, paid ads on Amazon are a great way to promote your book and boost potential sales. If you’re only at the very first step of self-publishing your book, the experts at Self-Publishing Relief can help! We’ll guide you through navigating every step of the process, from manuscript to a great-looking, finished book published and available for sale. Set up your free, no-obligation consultation call today!

 

Question: What have been your results with paid and unpaid advertising for your book?

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