If you’re trying to drive book sales — whether you just launched a new release, you’re promoting a discounted title, or you’re looking to hook new fans — running ad campaigns is a great way to reach both existing fans and new readers.
But how do you choose which readers to reach? One strategy is to cast a wide net and try to get as many eyes on your ads as possible. This approach is excellent for increasing awareness and exposure of a book, but it can be tricky to get a positive return on investment when you’re paying to reach readers who may not be interested in what you’re showing them. The best way to increase the chances of making your money back on an ads campaign is to maximize the click-through-rate and purchase rate of readers who see your ad — and the best way to do that is by reaching a narrow audience of relevant and engaged readers.
BookBub readers are already primed to purchase books, and BookBub Ads offers highly nuanced and flexible targeting options that let advertisers reach specific subsets of our audience of power readers. Advertisers can limit their audience to readers who live in a particular region, purchase ebooks on a specific retailer, or subscribe to certain categories. But the most powerful way to reach an engaged audience is to target readers interested in specific authors, who are likely to not only click on your ad, but actually purchase your book.
We interviewed 10 advertisers who consistently run BookBub Ads campaigns with high click-through-rates to learn more about how they use author targeting to run successful ads. They generously shared their strategies for choosing which authors to target, how to measure a campaign’s effectiveness, and other fantastic tips for reaching new readers using BookBub Ads.
How many authors do you target per ad campaign?
Targeting one author
There’s no limit to the number of authors you can target with a single BookBub Ads campaign, but targeting just one author per campaign delivers clear results that allow advertisers to learn which authors’ fans are most likely to click on and purchase their books.
I usually target one author per ad campaign so I can see who converts the best for my books.
—Leighann Dobbs, USA Today bestselling author of Ghostly Paws
I target one author per campaign. If you use multiple, you won’t know which author is giving you the best cost-per-click or cost-per-impression. One might be costing you $0.20 per click while another is $0.80, but all you’ll see is the average.
—Ernest Dempsey, USA Today bestselling author of The Secret of the Stones
I use one to three authors per ad. This not only gives me a better idea of where my ROI is coming from, but allows me to use a tighter targeting with higher budget in order to maximize the ROI.
—Sophie Davis, USA Today bestselling author of Talented
Targeting multiple authors
Once you know which authors’ audiences are most likely to engage with your books, you can combine multiple author targets to create larger audiences for broader reach and better exposure.
With authors who have smaller followings, I will typically group several together to make sure the “pool” is big enough for my spend.
—Cidney Swanson, author of Saving Mars
I usually direct my campaigns to targets that will deliver around 10k-50k impressions, which I think is my sweet spot between exposure and meaningful targeting.
—Melody Grace, New York Times bestselling author of Meant to Be
We typically target multiple authors unless we’re running a specific experiment to determine the effectiveness of specific authors. We will run “individual author + single ad creative” combinations to determine how well an ad is resonating with the given author’s audience. Then we bubble those results back up to our primary ad, removing any ineffective author targets to leave “the best of the bunch” on our primary, longer-term “set it and forget it” ad.
—Kristin Morin, Book Production & Marketing at Magical Scrivener Press
I use multiple author targets to build the right size audience, but it really depends on the book, the message in the ad, and the budget. For instance, if I am doing a campaign for Lexi Blake and she has two fabulous blurbs from Shayla Black and J. R. Ward — those are two very different authors. So I might use the Shayla Black blurb in one ad’s design and create a target audience including Shayla and a few similar authors, and do a second ad design with the other blurb and target that one to fans of J. R. Ward and a few other authors similar to her.
When doing a campaign for an author who is not yet a household name, I always target quite a few other authors. It can take time to figure out the right targets, but if you screw up the targeting not even the best ad will succeed.
—M. J. Rose, Founder of AuthorBuzz
Combining author and category targeting
If you’re targeting authors who write across multiple genres, combining author targeting with category targeting will narrow your audience to those authors’ most relevant fans for the book you’re promoting.
Generally, we’ll target several authors along with a specific genre or group of genres. We know that readers love to keep coming back to the authors they love — but we also know that they’re always on the lookout for a new author to read when they’ve finished the books from their favorites. By targeting comparative authors, readers can find a new author or book based on what they already enjoy.
—Alex Nicolajsen, Director of Social Media & Digital Sales at Kensington Publishing Corp.
How do you choose which authors to target?
Look at retailer “also boughts”
Many advertisers look at retailer “also boughts” and BookBub’s popular author lists to find new authors to target who write similar content.
We primarily choose targeting from the “also bought” portion of the Amazon page, which shows books that customers have bought alongside our book. This list helps us find popular authors that attract similar audiences to ours, as well as smaller names that we perhaps haven’t heard of until now. Both make for excellent, usually very profitable author targets
—Rebeka García, Marketing & Publishing Associate at Mozaika Publications
I look through Amazon’s “also boughts.” I check the left column on my Amazon author page to see other authors my readers buy. I will also click on those and go a couple layers deeper to see who some of their readers read, since those are often ones that will enjoy my work too. I also look through BookBub’s authors in my genre.
—Ernest Dempsey, USA Today bestselling author of The Secret of the Stones
Draw inspiration from your readers
In addition to the data collected from retailers and other platforms, your readers are another great source of ideas for author targets.
I’m always communicating with my readers — through newsletters, social media, even BookBub’s recommendation feature — so I pay attention to the other authors that they’re enjoying. I keep track of the charts, to see which newer authors are surfacing, and also make sure to follow my “also bought” data on the retailers to see connections that might not be obvious.
—Melody Grace, New York Times bestselling author of Meant to Be
I read A TON, and when I find a book with lots of similarities to the kind of thing I write, I note that author’s name. I might also check out their “also boughts” on Yasiv, if I’m not 100% sure the fit is a good one. Sometimes I’ll ask my readers what they’ve read lately and really enjoyed.
—Cidney Swanson, author of Saving Mars
Study what’s trending
It’s also important keep an eye on marketplace trends so you know what kinds of books readers in your genre are excited about. This can help you understand where your book fits in.
One of the biggest parts of creating an effective campaign is knowing the books you’re publishing and also what’s working in the marketplace as a whole.
—Alex Nicolajsen, Director of Social Media & Digital Sales at Kensington Publishing Corp.
We’re subscribed to our books’ genre categories on BookBub, and will add authors to our ads whose Featured Deals seem particularly well-aligned to each book.
—Kristin Morin, Book Production & Marketing at Magical Scrivener Press
On any advertising platform, not just BookBub, the readers don’t see an excerpt telling them about the core content of your novel when you advertise. They see a cover. Advertising is 100% about appearances. So I target authors who have a similar cover branding to mine.
Example: I write a lot of fantasy, and some George R. R. Martin fans might enjoy my books. But I will never use him as a target because my cover branding is very different to his.
Sometimes I target authors who don’t write fantasy at all; they write paranormal romance, or sci-fi romance, and their branding is similar to mine. I know that at first glance, the cover, the ad, the “packaging” of my books are going to catch their fans’ attention.
Of course, I also make sure that the book would interest the readers of that author, but that’s actually the secondary concern. If I target an author who has covers super different to mine, the click through rate is generally atrocious, even if the books themselves have a similar theme.
—May Sage, USA Today bestselling author of Shy Girls Write it Better
How do you decide whether or not your targeting is working for you?
Maximize CTR and minimize CPC
There are a few different ways to measure the effectiveness of your ad campaigns. Some advertisers are primarily focused on a high click-through-rate (CTR) and a profitable cost per click (CPC).
Anything under $0.50 CPC I will let run until BookBub stops serving it. Typically, I try to shoot for under $0.40 CPC. All of my books are $2.99 so I don’t have a lot of margin to play with. However, I have a deep catalog so even if they don’t buy the one I’m advertising at the time, I know they might buy one of the other 20+ books. If your catalog isn’t as deep, you might need to find a CPC closer to around $0.35 or lower depending on your product price. Obviously, if your books are $4 or more, you have more margin to play with.
—Ernest Dempsey, USA Today bestselling author of The Secret of the Stones
I decide if my targeting is working based on my CPC and CTR. I prefer my CPC to be as low as possible, and my CTR above 4%. In addition, I keep an eye on the ranking via Amazon to account for KU buyers as well as to account for ROI from KU reads.
—Sophie Davis, USA Today bestselling author of Talented
I’m very sales-driven (I’m the Director of Digital Sales…so I should be!), so I’m 100% about looking at the numbers to determine whether an advertising strategy is working. Of course, I’m also a marketer, so I know that not every impression or click will result in someone buying a book. It’s about getting in front of consumers and breaking through the noise — again and again — so that they eventually do buy their copies.
So, aside from just the sales numbers, the click through rate is very important to me. If people are clicking through, I know that my ad creative is effective… and that if nothing else, they’ve noticed the book — so if they didn’t buy it this time, they might buy it next time they see it — whether it’s on social media, an online ad, a print ad, or face-out in a store.
—Alex Nicolajsen, Director of Social Media & Digital Sales at Kensington Publishing Corp.
Track actual sales
While CTR is a great way to determine whether your ad is engaging the readers who see it, it’s important to remember that the CTR doesn’t always tell the whole story. The conversion rate will tell you how likely it is that readers who click on an ad actually buy a book.
I’m not just looking for clicks on the ad but sales. It’s easy to get people to visit a book page at Amazon or any other retailer. It’s not so easy to get them to buy a book. So I want to make sure I’m sending the right people to the book page. If I chose too broad a target I might get thousands of readers clicking but none buying. I want people predisposed to want to buy the book.
—M. J. Rose, Founder of AuthorBuzz
When a book first launches, or is in preorder, it’s a good sign that our ads are effectively targeted if we start seeing preorder “also-boughts” align with our ad targeting. Since BookBub ads are our preferred tool during preorders, this is the most “pure” way to find out the effectiveness of the ad.
—Kristin Morin, Book Production & Marketing at Magical Scrivener Press
If you write a series but just calculate how much you make from one book, the numbers aren’t going to look great and they also won’t be accurate. I calculate the actual read through for each series to know how much I make per person buying book #1. So over the last 30 days, look at how many people bought book #1, #2, #3, #4 (etc.). If ten people bought #1, six people bought book #2, five people bought book #3, and four people bought book #4, you got 25 total sales from the ten people who bought book #1. Let’s say each book makes you $2 — that means you made $50 on the series, not just the $20 from those ten sales of book #1; in other words, each buyer of book #1 is worth $5 to you, not $2.
—May Sage, USA Today bestselling author of Shy Girls Write it Better
Keep your goals in mind
Sometimes, how you measure an ad campaign’s success depends on your goals!
If I am advertising a new release and just want visibility, I make sure that I am getting 2% or more CTR. If it’s for ongoing sales of an older book, I calculate how much each sale is worth based on read-through of the series, then figure out how much to pay per click (based on how many clicks it takes to get a sale) and adjust the CPM so that I am making a profit.
—Leighann Dobbs, USA Today bestselling author of Ghostly Paws
By checking the CTR and CPC of a campaign, and comparing variations to my sales numbers, I can judge whether the campaign is being effective. But this all depends on your goals. I’m not just looking for more readers, I’m looking for the right kind of readers: ones who will enjoy the release I’m advertising right now, but also engage with me, preorder new books, and be a loyal reader down the line. So my own version of a successful campaign might look different for somebody who is aiming for, say, blanket exposure in release week, or volume of sales to hit the bestseller list on a special promotion.
—Melody Grace, New York Times bestselling author of Meant to Be
What’s something surprising or unexpected you’ve learned about your targeting on the BookBub Ads platform?
BookBub readers are worth a higher CPC
Some authors have noted that BookBub Ads can be more expensive than ads on other platforms, but BookBub readers are more likely to actually purchase a book.
I used to be very concerned about how much a click cost me. I can get clicks for as little as $0.04 on Facebook ads, for example, and my BookBub Ads tend to be more expensive. Then, I did some trials… and I was very surprised to see that the cost per click was actually a pretty bad indication of how an ad is performing. I like them to stay under a certain CPC of course (and it depends on the price of the book), but I’m very comfortable paying more per click on BookBub Ads because the click-to-buy conversion rate is much higher. On Facebook or Amazon, you’re targeting just about everyone out there. Readers who sign up to BookBub are generally voracious readers, so even if the CPC is higher, they tend to be better value for money.
—May Sage, USA Today bestselling author of Shy Girls Write it Better
Obvious targets don’t always deliver results
The audiences you expect to be a good fit might not always work, so it’s important to run tests and question your assumptions.
I thought targeting by category was really time efficient and the best way to go — but category targeting has never worked for me as well as doing the hard work and targeting by author.
—M. J. Rose, Founder of AuthorBuzz
“It’s always surprising when an author target that seems to have an audience very similar to us ends up not producing great results, and an author target that seems totally unrelated to our work actually brings us great results!”
—Rebeka García, Marketing & Publishing Associate at Mozaika Publications
I don’t usually target really big names, even when the match feels obvious. For instance, I have a series set on Mars, so Andy Weir (author of The Martian) might seem like a great match, but since Weir’s book was an NYT bestseller, he attracted buyers and followers who might not be that into sci-fi or Mars. Some read the book because it was popular, not necessarily because they want to read other books set on Mars. Pierce Brown is a better author for me to target, because he wrote a series set on Mars, so it’s a safer bet his followers are a bit Mars-crazed, like me!
—Cidney Swanson, author of Saving Mars
The authors you expect to have a large BookBub following aren’t always the ones that do. Just because an author is a known “big name” author, or because someone’s book constantly tops the bestseller charts, doesn’t mean they’ll have a large, targetable following on BookBub. You need to balance targeting smaller authors who have invested the effort to cultivate their BookBub following with big-name celebrity authors.
—Kristin Morin, Book Production & Marketing at Magical Scrivener Press
Targeting existing fans is really effective
BookBub Ads give advertisers an excellent way to get books in front of the fans of similar authors, but it’s also a great tool to target an author’s existing fans!
Targeting my own author name is more effective than I would have guessed! Recently I realized it had been months since I’d included my name in targeting, and I got a nice CTR by targeting my name all by itself.
—Cidney Swanson, author of Saving Mars
It can be useful to target your own name! Not everyone who is interested in your books may have gotten around to signing up as an official follower. Targets are built out of readers who have interacted with your previous BookBub deals, so you want to make sure to reach them again.
—Melody Grace, New York Times bestselling author of Meant to Be
What targeting strategies have worked best for your campaigns? Chime in with your own answers to these questions in the comments!
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