Trialling Amazon ads – Week Two

Trialling Amazon ads – Week Two

7th August – 14th August

This week of ads has been super confusing! My best day saw me spend just over £4 in clicks and I had 3 sales and 1,111 pages read (although I don’t think all the sales came from ads). However, the following day dropped to 0 clicks, 0 sales and just 235 pages read. I thought I’d cracked it and found what worked for my books, but clearly not!

If you haven’t read week one, or just want a refresher, you can find it here.

Here’s how this week’s ads have performed…

 

Sponsored Category Products Manual Targeting

This is where you choose similar category products to market your book.

Books:

A Merry Christmas at the Castle (ebook)

A Spring Fling at Hotel Mayfair (ebook)

Price: Both are priced at £2.99

Dates: 7th – 14th August

Budget: £2 daily

Total impressions for 1st August – 7th August: 16,904

Total clicks for 7th August – 14th August: 41

Total Sales on ads dashboard: 1 sale and 1,544 pages read

(Approximate total £6.36)

Total Spent: £8.50

Profit? Loss.

Amazon Ads Dashboard Vs KDP Dashboard:

I’ve had another sale and more KDP reads which could be related to the ad.

 

Sponsored Product Manual Targeting

This is where you enter your own keywords to select the audience your book is marketed to.

Book: The Cornish Vintage Dress Shop (ebook)

Price: £2.99

Dates: 7th – 14th August

Budget: £2 daily

Total impressions for 7th August – 14th August: 1,591

Total clicks for 7th August – 14th August: 10

Total Sales on ads dashboard: 0 sales 402 pages read (approx £1.13)

Total Spent: £2.17

Profit? Loss.

Amazon Ads Dashboard Vs KDP Dashboard:

On the KDP dashboard, I’ve sold a couple more copies of this book and have had more pages reads. It’s possible the ads contributed to this.

US Sponsored Product Manual Targeting

Book:

A Merry Christmas at the Castle (ebook)

A Spring Fling at Hotel Mayfair (ebook)

Price: $3.99

Dates: 7th – 14th August

Budget: $2 daily

Total impressions for 7th August – 14th August: 1,179

Total clicks for 7th August – 14th August: 1

Total Sales on ads dashboard: 0 sales 0 pages read

Total Spent: $0.34

Profit? Loss.

Amazon Ads Dashboard Vs KDP Dashboard:

I have had reads from America, but I don’t think this ad has had enough impressions to assume it’s from it.

Conclusion: I’m inclined to drop the US ad and focus on my UK ones.

 

 

Overall thoughts…

If you look at the performance breakdown, you might assume it’s all bad news. However, if you compare my total ad spend with my total KDP dashboard income, I am in profit (I’ll do a final comparison of numbers once the month is over).

I’m finding it really overwhelming if I’m honest. I wouldn’t say processing data is something that comes naturally to me, so this is a steep learning curve. What I’m finding is that ads are really boosting my Kindle Unlimited reads, which isn’t proving to be very profitable (especially long-term).

So far my thoughts on ads are mixed. I’m in profit, but equally, I don’t feel as though the ads are doing anything my own social media marketing can’t. However, maybe I am reaching a new audience which is exciting. Hopefully, by the end of the month, I’ll be less on the fence about it!

Next week…

For now, I’m keeping my UK Sponsored Category Products Manual Targeting and Sponsored Product Manual Targeting. I’m tempted to try some manual keyword targeting again, but I’m struggling with keywords. A few people have asked about keywords, but they’re so niche to your book it’s hard to comment. I feel as though my brain is on another wavelength to everyone else, so how am I ever to figure out what people are searching for books similar to mine?