Easiest Marketing Tactics to Sell More Books this Black Friday

End the year with more success than ever with these tactics

If you're a season author you know Black Friday and Christmas are the most profitable holidays for selling your novels.

In the world of marketing for authors we hear about how your next novel is you greatest marketing tool; as the more books you have published the more opportunity of readers buying your books.

Using the tactics of "loss leaders", bundling and discounting is a guaranteed way to increase profits if done correctly.

As an author you're selling a product, your book, and if you have multiple books (a series or a couple of standalone) it's easier than ever to use these tactics.

Sell one of you books at a discount (or give it away for free to draw attention) and let your other books make up the discounted cost. This is called "loss leaders" - selling a book in your genre at a price lower than what people expect and it draw attention to the fact they get more value of your books over others.

The "leader" part of the tactic is bringing readers into the door. It's saying "I'm giving away this book at a discount" while also gently pointing them to your other books they would want to purchase.

Typical readers want to read book 1 before they read book 2 or 3. This means they need to purchase book 1 before book 2 or book 2 before book 3.

[T]he first book becomes more enticing to purchase as most readers want to read books in proper order. 

Book 1 either gets people in the door or book 1 is sold at the normal price while book 2 (or 3) are sold at a discount. By giving away a book deeper in a series the first book becomes more enticing to purchase as most readers want to read books in proper order.

Here's an example tactic that worked for my Sci-fi series. I sold books two and three for 90% while book one sold at a mark up. Let's say normally my sci-fi books are sold at $9.99 each. I change the price of book two and book three to $7.99 and then change the price of book one to $13.99,

If you bundle the other books as a package, you can promote the sale as a discounted bundle. This is up front cash from an immediate purchase. Most readers may not buy an entire available series in one purchase but by bundling your novels, even if they never read the other books, you are immediately able to bring in more readers.

Some authors might not need to profit nearly as much as if the books are sold individually. Instead by applying a discount of 50% off to multiple books, this might actually end up creating higher total sales instead. Which in the long run equal more sales than ever before.

"I'm getting two books for the price of one"

With book one's price increase and a $6 dollar discount the author is actually only dropping $2 in sales. To a reader this feels like "I'm getting two books for the price of one".

With a larger catalogue of books and multiple ways of bundling or changing the price, an author can generate more sales this Black Friday than ever before.

The idea is giving more value to the reader. More values equals more books to read in our industry. We want people to read our books and the more opportunity we have to give readers deals (while still trying to maintain some kind of profitability) the better.

Once someone has one book in your series, you have a higher chance to keeping them as a reader (and making them a life long customer). You may also want to turn this bundling or discounting into a way to also build your email newsletter list.

There's multiple ways to use these tactics as ways to continue your writing career. Good luck and we hope your Black Friday this year is more rewarding than ever.