E-Book Experiment - Part 2

In my last post, I outlined my plans for an ambitious e-book promotional campaign, so this week I want to talk about how it’s going and what I’ve learned.

First off – The Mummies of Blogspace9 is DONE!!!  It’s finished, edited, Kindle-ized, and published.   Here’s my marketing prose:

The Mummies of Blogspace9 is a taut, high-stakes thriller about a team of archaeologists who inadvertently dig up more than they bargained for. Demons of antiquity are not easily amused, nor are those who’ve sold their souls to protect them. The Mummies of Blogspace9 will fill your heart with terror and with glee (but not at the same time, because that would be very strange, and also pointless).

You’ll laugh out loud, cringe in fear, and shake your head with delight. Here are some plot elements you might enjoy:

1) undead mummies;


2) archaeology;


3) very attractive protagonists who you will develop crushes on;

4) carefully-chosen fonts;


5) delightful full-color, high-resolution illustrations.


Here’s a blurb from one of Leon’s posts (Leon being a protagonist)

“None of us knew what was at stake. And that’s the thing about archaeology - you never know what you’ll find when you start digging into an ancient pyramid. Maybe some burials, mummies even. But surely not a five hundred year-old secret worth killing for.

Had I known at the onset that seven weeks later most of my friends would be dead, I would have left Peru in a heartbeat. But of course I didn’t know that.

I didn’t know that a demonically-possessed Spanish Grand Inquisitor would haunt the crap out of us, or that a pair of undead conquistador knights would help us find the secret to putting down walking mummies.

And surely, I wouldn’t have just sat around had I known that something was watching from inside that pyramid, some malevolent force that could animate the dead.

But it’s all true, as you’ll come to realize.”

The Mummies of Blogspace9: Horror has a new URL

 Support the arts, why don't you!  Only 99¢, so pick up a copy today at Amazon.com

For the bargain price of 99¢, I’m a little surprised that anyone can resist it.  Yes resist it they apparently can.  So that’s why it’s now time to execute the rest of the plan.

A caveat – I don’t think the book is worth 99¢.  I think it’s worth a hell of a lot more than that.  I worked hard on it, and I think it’s really good.  And judging by the lack of negative reviews, I’m thinking that most people agree.  Now, the fact that there are no reviews at all might suggest that nobody has actually read it yet, but I try to look at the positive.

I think the book is worth about $99, and I think it would be a good idea if people paid $99 to download a copy.  But they’re not going to.  The world of books and e-books is changing so fast that nobody knows how much a book is worth.  So I figured I’d try something affordable in hopes of dramatic results.

I put links on all my networks: on Facebook, Twitter, webpage, blog, LinkedIn, Independent Author Network, etc.  I even produced a dynamic book trailer for YouTube, which is rapidly going viral (if 5 views can be counted as viral).  You can have a look by clicking this handy word.

So I’m going to give this a week or so to judge the efficacy of my plan.  The next step is to implement a paid promotional campaign.  I tried to pay BookBub $230 to promote a free version to their readers, but they wouldn’t let me.  Seriously.  And I’m not sure exactly why. I got a nice rejection letter and it made me feel better. 

I think partly it has to do with the fact that I was trying to promote my book as a thriller, and most thriller titles don’t include the word “mummy.”  This could be a problem for cross-genre titles, and it’s making me rethink my new line of pirate erotica novels.  Maybe PIROTICA is not the way to go.

But I was able to convince some other kind folks to take my money.  

From April 15 to April 19^th, you can download a copy for free.  

Just go to the page on Amazon.  Not that there’s any reason you should wait, because it’s still only 99¢, but if you have frugal loved ones, please let them know. 

And to help get the word out, I did the following: I paid $35 to ebook boosters to blast out notices to fifty free ebook sites; $45 to whizbuzz to promote my promotion; and $50 to Books & Authors to promote my promotion to their readership.

So here’s what I will be reporting on in my next post – the results of my free promotional campaign.   That being said, I can always use help, so if any of you readers would be so kind as to share this on your websites and family newsletters, I’ll be happy to get you a free copy (between April 15 and April 19).  Any help and ideas would be most welcome.

www.williamdoonan.com

www.williamdoonan.wordpress.com

@doonan1