Is it possible to get more book sales on, say, Amazon without advertising? Can it be done and if so how?

Let’s be honest, what most authors want is to sell more books. It would be nice if there was a set of secret magical words that could just keep those sells ringing up. Those words, if they exist, are being kept very secret.

The formula for sales is this – get and keep attention of people long enough to make them want your product. In our case a book. How do you do this?

We have to talk about email lists

By all accounts, the most effective method of selling books is an active email list. Those of you that have followed this blog for a while might remember I have something of a love/hate relationships with lists. Insofar as I really don’t like email. I cannot deny that lists do work. I might not like it but the universe does not care what we like.

An email list is something you can grow over time. It is not a magic wand for instant sales of millions of books. List building means taking time (not writing your next book) to get people to sign up. Once you have done that, the investment in time and effort should pay off (when you announce your next book).

There is a lot to consider when starting a list. Where will you host it? How will you email it? What will you email? Will people read it?

I can’t answer all those questions in the space I have here. If you are interested in learning more about lists, we have dedicated a whole section of our Author Platforms Project to email lists. It is far from complete but it should give you something of an overview.

Forget lists, start a cult

Second only to list building for selling more books, is starting a cult. That is, build a following by being funny, controversial, clever, or entertaining. In fact, any way you can stand out from the crowd is good for the end goal of getting more book sales. “All” you have to do is get and keep the attention of as many people as possible. Maybe you could start and lead a movement (but probably not).

That takes time, effort, and an outgoing personality (at least in public) to even get started. Depending on how remarkable your persona is, the faster your cult can grow. If you started three to five years ago, it might be ready for you to begin selling.

In an ideal world, maybe we could all do what Amanda Palmer does and build a relationship with thousands of fans. From that, you could get more book sales just by talking to your huge army of friends. It is certainly worth fostering a semblance of a relationship with as many fans as you can but not all of us are built to live our lives quite as publicly as Amanda Palmer does. Frankly, some of us writers are very shy.

Going from unhead of to minor celebrity is a bit of an ask. Having a good blog helps. I heartily recommend starting one. There is a huge part of the Author Platforms Project dedicated to blogs and blogging. It is never to early to start a blog. However, starting a blog is no promise of stardom. Like lists, they take work and regular non-book writing.

If you need a free blog, you can make one with a free Author Buzz account. Just make a new group and say yes to the blog option. Easy.

I don’t like those answers, what else can I do to get more book sales?

I hear you. Both of those answers – a loyal following or a list – take time to grow. You should probably look into getting started with one or both at some point. Or, at the very least, a website of your own. But, yes, there are other things you can do.

Another approach to getting more book sales is to leverage your existing readers. Our default is often to try and sell a few books to a lot of people but you can get the same result by selling a lot of books to a few people.

By releasing a sequel, then another, and another, and so forth, you can soon turn a tiny cult following into a decent number of sales. With enough books, you might even do better this way.

More-over you can then go on to offer your first volume for free if people sign up to your email list. Which allows you to (1) get them hooked on your writing and (2) advertise for free all the other books you have released. Not to mention that you can send them updates each time you publish something on your blog. Thus you would be working on your cult following too.

The fact is selling books is hard

The ugly truth is that selling books is hard. Getting more books sales may be harder still. Hard but not impossible. You just need to be willing to put the time. If you work smarter, you might not need to work harder but that requires learning a whole bunch of new skills. You may need to become something of an expert in marketing. Well, if you want to sell things, anyway.

You could use social media. Pick one or two social media types and commit to learning them. Naturally, our Author Platforms Project has a social media section. We take a look at demographics of users; useful if you know who your potential reader is.

If you are serious about getting more book sales, sooner or later you are going to have to consider cost vs sale value. Find out what advertising cost per resulting sale still nets you a profit. This is called Return on Investment (ROI). ROI is the bottom line for selling. As long as your ROI is bigger than your investment, you can take the profits to buy more ads and sell more books. Rinse and repeat. If you know what your ROI will be, you can confidently spend money to make money.

You might start out by writing a book sales business plan. As you learn the numbers behind your business, add them to the plan. That way you will compile your personal blueprint for success.

Conclusions

There are no hard and fast rules for getting more book sales. There are some well-tested methods that you can choose to use. They all require either money, time, or effort. All magic comes with a price.

Perhaps the best advice for a very shy author is this. Just write another book. And then another one. Keep doing that because each book will be discovered by a few people who will look at what else you have written. Eventually, you will have the sales levels you want just by writing and releasing consistently and well.

What methods for selling more books have worked for you? Do you struggle to shift a handful or are yours flying off the shelf? Do you have a business plan for your books? What advice would you add? Use the comments section to let us know your thoughts on selling books.