​Best marketing platforms for books

   
I am a self-published author. Now, because I am retired, I have more time for marketing. I tried companies offering to help at a reasonable price (a few hundred), then ads on Facebook, X, and Amazon. For me, the best results were with Amazon Ads in the Sponsored Products program. It makes sense since they have all the necessary statistics.

   If your book is in Kindle Unlimited, then Amazon knows how many books are downloaded and how many pages are read. Amazon knows if there are many downloads for a book, but the reader only goes a few pages or a few chapters and then jumps to the end to find the conclusion - the book has a good presentation (cover design, an appealing summary or synopsis) but poor content. If there are few downloads for other books, but most readers go through it all, it is the other way around - a poor presentation but good content. I talked about Kindle Unlimited since those paying subscriptions are picky but the best barometer to judge a book’s quality. Besides, the author can find those statistics by watching the KENP frequently on his/her Amazon Author pages, not with Amazon’s precision, but still might have a clue.

    It is similar to eBooks, but those buying it read the book, and their potential reviews might indicate their assessment. Of course, reviews from friends and most paid “readers reviews” should not count for an honest evaluation if an author wants to be truthful to himself.

    What follows are my best guesses about how Amazon works.

    Amazon wants to make money from selling books. And if they advertise good books, the fan base increases. But they want to take advertising money from all authors paying for ads. I think it is different from how Amazon treats excellent and bad authors.

    But how does Amazon evaluate a book? I already explained the statistics they have on eBooks. Reviews always matter; Amazon tries to discern between honest and “friendly” reviews. I am not sure how successful it is with this, but those with tons of reviews stand forward. My take is that a few reviews (and all good) do not matter much.
    
    The beginning is hard for an author, but Amazon gives you a chance until it places your book on the right shelf, from outstanding books down to disastrous ones. The Amazon “New Releases” program might help authors start well. I will not make any recommendations here since many articles about the process exist. I would only mention that I had no clue how to do it, so I paid Reedsy to help me, and it was a good choice. 
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    Is it fair that Amazon became such a powerhouse that anybody else is dwarfed? Well, they have the chance to regulate a Wild West book market.

    I will explain more about my experience as an author in the next post.