book promotion

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https://permies.com/t/15277/tnk/book-dvd-pie-promotion







I'm gonna try to get some more book and dvd promotions rolling.

Some important points to keep in mind in how it all works:

I start the promotion in a forum (usually monday night or tuesday morning). People post to that forum. At the end of the promotion (usually sometime on friday) I run a program that shows me 10 random posts from the forum. I pick the four best posts and verify that the email address for the post matches an email address for my daily-ish email.

I will then email the winners and the winners MUST reply with their snail mail stuff within 24 hours.

If the name on the permies account does not seem like a real name, I throw the post out. Disqualified.

The last time we did a promotion, we gave away four copies of the DVD "Urban Permaculture". I had to run the app twice to get 20 random posts and 16 of them didn't qualify. And two of the winners did not respond within 24 hours.

So! It helps to follow the rules.

The book and DVD promotions are awesome.

As part of the rules, how can we (continue to) educate folks on the difference between a forum thread and a forum? Seems to be a repeat issue.

Screen shots in a thread and link to that thread in the contest post? Is there something like this some where already?

Jocelyn Campbell wrote:The book and DVD promotions are awesome.

As part of the rules, how can we (continue to) educate folks on the difference between a forum thread and a forum? Seems to be a repeat issue.

Screen shots in a thread and link to that thread in the contest post? Is there something like this some where already?

Yes, that would be great. I am new to this forum stuff. I have done wiki collaboration before but this is different.

For instance, the post leading to this thread was in permies->forums->permaculture->permaculture under the thread name "Welcome Toby Hem..." This thread is in permies->forums->tinkering with this site and named "book promotion". I assume that the permaculture forum is where we post to qualify. Do we qualify by just posting in a forum thread, creating our own thread, or both? Posting in the thread "Toby Hemen..." doesn't count (as Paul detailed in that thread), so posting in which threads count? Anything but the "Toby Hemn..." thread?

Thanks,
Tim

I removed a post from this thread because it is a question about permaculture for Toby. That sort of thing needs to be posted in the permaculture forum.

Tim,

Any post in the permaculture forum counts.

Commenting on a thread that is three years old counts.

Starting a new thread counts.

Commenting on the "Welcome Toby" thread does not count.

Posts in other forums (such as the homesteading forum) does not count for this promotion. But if this promotion goes well for everybody, i think we will be doing a promotion there next week.

I would love a chance to get one of Toby Hemenway's books. I am working on stuff from where I am and not where I want to be as of yet, but I find that many of the skills that I needed can be done even in my small garden and home.
Thanks for the chance at the prize!

Jocelyn,

I think that there will be some bumps in the road early on. Soemthing I should have done yesterday, but did do today: I used the "split" function available to the stewards. I just split the one errant post into a new thread. Hopefully people will catch on quickly and we won't have to do much of that.

This might be a good time to point out:

A person that posts ten times during the promotion is ten times more likely to end up with a book than a person that posted once.

And, don't forget, when I see the ten random posts, I will pick the best four. Good questions, good answers, good stuff. Posts that are pretty empty will be ignored.

For each book promotion, I plan on emailing the folks on my daily-ish email at least 24 hours before any mention on twitter or facebook or anywhere else. Because I like the daily-ish email the best. I want to give these folks a head start.

You all are welcome to post it to facebook, twitter, send email or whatever you want to do. In fact, I encourage it. In fact, that's kinda what I'm hoping for by doing this. And, in fact, Toby is kinda hoping for that too.

If Toby sold and extra 200 copies of his book because of this, that would be really cool.

Maggie Hatfield wrote:I would love a chance to get one of Toby Hemenway's books. I am working on stuff from where I am and not where I want to be as of yet, but I find that many of the skills that I needed can be done even in my small garden and home.
Thanks for the chance at the prize!

Maggie,

To qualify, your display name needs to be a proper first and last name. "Hatfield" was a name assigned to folks when we moved to the new software. Click on "My Profile" and then "Name Change Request form" and submit a new name is either your real name, or sounds like a real name.

Thanks!

Paul, since you were so kind as to move my thread for me, does that count?

I found Toby on Facebook and once he accepts me as a friend I can start sharing his stuff

Thanks!

Jennifer Whitaker wrote:Paul, since you were so kind as to move my thread for me, does that count?

Thanks!

Yes.

Noobs are gonna stumble a bit on their first posts. We'll all make the best of it.

Tim Eastham wrote:

Jocelyn Campbell wrote:
<snip>
Screen shots in a thread and link to that thread in the contest post? Is there something like this some where already?

Yes, that would be great.
<snip>
Thanks,
Tim

Tim, I'll look at this a little later (including the rest of the details in your reply) and will create a new thread or bump up a relevant one--just can't get to it right now.

To qualify, your display name needs to be a proper first and last name. "Hatfield" was a name assigned to folks when we moved to the new software. Click on "My Profile" and then "Name Change Request form" and submit a new name is either your real name, or sounds like a real name.

All done! Thanks for the heads up!

We did the book promotion with Carla Emery's book "The Encyclopedia of Country Living". I got a note from the pantryparatus folks saying that they had hundreds of visitors but zero sales. Bummer. I was thinking that we could turn this into a weekly thing - giving away books, DVDs, having authors and famous people answer questions in the forums .... But when I talk to the providers it goes a lot easier when I say "in the past when we did this, people bought stuff!"

And, I know that when we did this for Toby, we sold 30 books through amazon. I thought 30 was a bit low because most of the people here probably already have Toby's book.

So .... I dunno ... I like the idea of doing this to be a huge win for everybody - the people here and the authors/publishers/etc.

Did I miss a step this time? Is there something I should have done? Maybe we're not quite ready to do this. ??

I would like to get some feedback on this path.

I think that money is very tight for more people than you might have thought. Everyone's holding back on discretionary spending. Does that sound right?

another thing to keep in mind is that books is a very testy field right now, very few authors are making good sells, and there are only a very select few who have soldout in the last few years, so to start with books are gonna be hard to sell, add to that that the books we are looking at are educational books and not books for entertainment, i dont really know if these types of books sell better or worse but i would assume they sell less well than entertainment based material
so the hard part is getting people to fork out money for something they either feel they don't need to survive(people who have very tight budgets) or convincing them that they cannot find the same information for free without a huge investment in time
so getting people to buy books may be difficult to start, i wouldn't expect a huge turn out in the beginning of this giveaway idea of yours

Rick Freeman wrote:I think that money is very tight for more people than you might have thought. Everyone's holding back on discretionary spending. Does that sound right?

FOR SURE! I'm disabled and on a limited income, therefore I'm trying everything I can to spend less and be more efficient. Sounds shallow that it came to my income being the reason for the need for this way of life, but it was a blessing in disguise! I love this lifestyle and thanks to Paul Wheaton and Ernie and Erica and Sepp Holzer and Oehler and everybody in this forum, I LOVE this lifestyle and the people in it. Thanks for sharing everybody!! This spring I plan on building a greenhouse and it being heated in winter with a Rocket Mass Heater (RMH). I plan on going hunting and bringing a RMH style Stove and showing all my hunting and camping friends them as well. Peace & Wellness.

Jay Blaze

As an internet marketer, I really think the responsibility for not making a sale lies with the publisher of the site receiving the traffic.

Paul's promotion sent traffic. It was also the best kind of traffic you can get online: good, targeted, interested traffic. Permies folks are a lot closer to the target market than a lot of random traffic that might be generated on other forums or sites. These are great promo opportunities (and I wish more forum and blog owners in more fields of interest would try to monetize with this kind of thing).

But there is a catch: once that good, targeted traffic goes to the book promotion sites... they need to SELL to them. Did they post special offers and messages on their pages to say "Welcome, Permies folks! For this week only, get free shipping on your purchase" (or whatever they can manage to offer... free small items like stickers, buttons, magnets, and even the smallest discount coupon codes can motivate someone to buy TODAY, not just bookmark your site for later)? If you want immediate sales, you need to make urgent, irresistable offers. If they didn't really do that, then nothing Paul did or said here could change the outcome.

Simply having a shop with goods available online is NOT going to make the most of ANY promotion or advertising campaign. So, my advice to Paul would be to make a tips sheet for his promotion buddies that helps them prepare their landing page and site to SELL that permies.com traffic. If their goal is just short-term sales blitz... I personally think that is a short-sighted way of looking at marketing. What you really want is a trust relationship and mindshare for later sales. Then when people do need something from a similar shop (like a gift book for a friend, etc.) they go back because they liked those people at that shop. They support and trust them and love what they are doing. Getting people from permies forums aligned with your site/shop is probably more valuable than scoring a quick sale with no chance to converse and get to know each other outside the shopping experience.

I can buy books online anywhere. I am an Amazon Prime member every year so I get free 2-day shipping on almost everything, and I order other stuff there at least monthly. So it's way easier for me to buy a book there. However I frequently (like monthly) buy books, handmade goods, etc. from smaller shops online because I simply like the people who run those sites. Today, I might not need anything in their shop but if I like them and bookmark them, I will probably check back later. If they talked to me on a forum and answered people's questions and I read a bio and liked them a lot, I will remember them. That's incredibly valuable in today's economy where every consumer has thousands of retailer choices. I think Paul can offer subject matter experts with shops/direct sales sites an unprecedented opportunity to come and chat with prospective customers and make a really good impression. A weird aside: I really find I like people more when I see their pets or families in their bio. Unprofessional, biased, sure, but I admit I have an easier time thinking of a seller as a human when I see some of the mouths they are feeding when I buy there. When I buy from Amazon.com I figure a chunk is just going to some shareholders who barely notice the income because it's a tiny piece of their investment portfolio. Meh. I like seeing cats, kids, and smiling people when I send them money. Post pics and bios and pretty much invite permies folks to befriend these sellers. That's marketing gold you just can't buy most places.

Maybe there just needs to be more help so these folks can prepare and make the most of the promotion period. Analytics for your site and sales funnel is SO much more than raw traffic. You need to watch what people clicked on, what interested them, and did they sign up for future communication (bookmarking is grat but capturing email subscriptions, twitter folllows, etc. is MUCH better). The goal should be making new friends and allies, not just making a quick sale. It will do your biz so much more good in the long run! Also, I think the bio part is the most important. I like to know (or be able to make a good guess) what type of ethical people are running a shop before I really become a big fan/supporter. I have seen and heard enough Paul stuff online to know I like his values and he's not full of crap. I can recommend permies with full confidence that this is a good, worthwhile site. Site owners should be open about their values and goals so like-minded people can bond and get on their side. It is easy and the foundation of success for most indie/small retailers today. You can't appeal to all the people all the time, but appealing to like-minded people is the life-blood of a small business. The big stores can do price, convenience, etc. due to their scale but little shops always will need to make that human connection in some way. So the more shop owners get to know people and put their best face/chat "out there" the more fans they will gain from these promotions. And fans will equal sales in the long run (provided the shop is well-run and offers stuff people want/need at a fair price, etc.).

Well said, Paul did do his part by getting people to the site.

Wow, Kelly - I think you hit the nail on the head, huge. Excellent post! That being said, it seems here in Montana, February has hit people hard here. While we have had a milder winter, it seems the power bills are about the same which makes no sense - except that I am also seeing inflation happen in necessities like food and that goes to nearly everything else, which is not helpful if the income is not increasing. I tried to have an extremely-reasonably priced herbal class recently, and while I had a lot of response, many people told me "not now" due to finances, and later my consultations for the next pay period didn't even pan out. So there is some truth to that as well. I do hope March will bring more blessings (and that being said, I will be doing a mini-version of the herbal class, condensing the main points into a free lecture on March 6th in Corvallis, MT, if you visit the "Classes" tab on the website, you will see the info).

Devon, as a non-fiction author, I can tell you that traditionally, non-fiction sells much more than fiction. The percentage of fiction that sells in hard times goes down, not up. However, I do realize the entire industry is changing now, due to eBooks and self-publishing choices and the traditional publishers obviously needing to tighten their belts due to the fallout - but opportunities still exist. The same thing happened with music first if you remember - people still buy music but the way it works is totally different than it did 15 years ago. So now we see books going through this, and it will be interesting to see how it will all happen. I just do not see a world without any paper at all, but I would say that a good majority of the paper could go away, and the paper versions will cost more but be worth it for those who wish to purchase that way. The question will be how much paper will go away But in eBook or print, I would rather have an herbal or permaculture book that will teach me a skill for saving money down the road, rather than reading an amazing fiction story but that I cannot apply to my life in a practical manner when times are tough. This is NOT to diminish the value of well-written fiction (and it is a writing style I cannot do and admire it in those who have that ability). I am attempting to be in the mindset of the average person who is experiencing financial stress and needs to make priorities.

So back to what Kelly was saying - while the news about the economy is abound, people are still spending money. They are just deciding better choices, i.e. they are thinking about VALUE. You must deliver value and service, or you may as well not be in business anymore. You cannot be completely disconnected from the needs of your customers and still make money anymore and companies need to figure that out, and as noted by Kelly, this requires more efforts than just sitting around. Streamlining is not the same as compromising, and people need to be more creative than in the past if they are to stay in business.

Now I have also noticed that many people are using the "I can't afford...." excuse to attempt to get free services out of people a lot too. As a company or an entrepreneur, we need to be able to perceive the difference between a real need with a person attempting to fairly exchange value but working in a smaller space than usual, and a person who wants to just take complete advantage of us. Fear can be rampant and it takes many expressions - we need to be prepared by operating from a place in our hearts as well as our heads, while at the same time demanding a FAIR exchange of time, energy and/or material for all parties.

I think February is traditionally a slow sales month. As the credit card bills come in, people gulp when they see how much they spent during the holiday season. Right now, they are trying to whittle down those bills rather than spending more.

I always check other sites for deals first before I buy books. I didn't see where the book was a"Paul Special" price and I would have bought a copy probably then. Even if it's a few dollars more than the New and Used section at Amazon, because I think it's in support of the author. Or if a small part of the proceeds goes to some non-profit. People like to think they are getting a bargain and/or contributing to some noble cause.

Im new to this site and homesteading in general, so I was told by other homesteaders to get this book. but after looking at their site just now, I can't be spending $30 on a book, even if I need it. If they had a kindle download I would consider buying it. but I just can't justify spending that much money on a paperback nowadays, as it surely will be soiled and destroyed with my current style of living.

Encyclopedia of Country Living (kindle edition) - and this link gives me a kickback from amazon.

paul wheaton wrote:Encyclopedia of Country Living (kindle edition) - and this link gives me a kickback from amazon.

Your "kickback" quite likely equals or is more than the authors commission from Amazon. I hope you thank them for that.

Why didn't I buy? I went to the site and looked, because I didn't have one specific thing I wanted to buy. In fact, i didn't even know where I was headed (I got the word "Pantry," but I had to look up what "Paratus" means) That doesn't mean I won't be back (their prices on Berkey water filters look OK) but, they won't know because they didn't ask for my name or address (unless they use spider-like ID/tracking cookies)

I think Kelly is spot-on, because he(she?) is involved in the internet game. He made a couple good points, but being an internet marketer, there is also LOTS he didn't say, because each of those points made would probably require some form of explanation. Number 1, the "Welcome Permies" landing page and "special" he mentioned is a KEY element to assured sales. That is in addition to the Home page, and is usually a make-or-break introduction to welcoming new visitors and converting them to paying customers.

A couple more thoughts .....
Discounts - If a merchant cannot offer a discount because of low margins, their margins are too slim to begin with.
Customer contact - a merchant MUST ask for my email address, so they can use it for future offers and introductions and specials. People LOVE to "save money," even if there is undoubtedly a better price elsewhere online.
Loyalty - I rarely buy new books, especially when I can buy an excellent quality used book for 1/8th the cost of new. Not just books, materials and equipment too. Give me a reason to buy new on your site (points for future purchase, quantity discount, etc) and that will go a long way towards swaying where and when my purchasing dollars are spent.

As to weekly book give-ways Paul ..... too much can have a negating effect, especially as is currently practiced. i think weekly is too often.
I love to receive as much as the next person, but it seems a lot of the "entries" are in the form of "Welcome this weeks Sponsor. Love your stuff!" I don't have a solution or suggestion right now, but I think the entry process could be enhanced a bit. the "two-birds-with-one-stone" theory might suggest some of your give-ways be qualified by a small or large purchase at the sponsors site.

Good Luck!

think Rick hit it on the head..90 % of the time I'd be grabbing up an opportunity to buy more input ..I am a book a holic..esp when it comes to permie ...but unfortunately this last month hit us terribly hard...I actually had to apply for social services to keep heat going as we ran out of firewood and propane at the same time..

fortunately even though we didn't get any social services help ..yet anyway..my son sent us over 8 cord of firewood ..so we have heat..but it will be a while before we have any spare money again.

so..yeah..I think financially a lot of people are hurting, specially when they have to spend so much more for everything they do ...and it doesn't seem to be getting less right now...but most of US on HERE will be eating fresh things out of our gardens in a few weeks...and that makes a huge difference.

Neil, totally on board that the best thing for the sellers in these promotions is more help preparing their site so they can make the most of Paul's traffic. I understand people want sales to show the promotion was a success but there is so much value in getting contact information that I think an email opt-in/newsletter/special offer subscription is actually a bigger win in the long run.

Since Paul is also a coder, he might be able to offer a more polished turn-key solution to semi-automate the promotion setup. Set up a simple form that generates the landing page with the special permies greeting/offers (and embed the tracking codes automatically, from Google Analytics... can easily set up a profile just for each promotion so Paul and the seller can have access to the stats) and then the seller just needs to enter the links/info on a form to generate the html/css files they can dump into their web directory. The main thing Paul needs to track and be accountable for is "lead" generation (as that's really all he can offer, can't promise sales), and then the special landing page could spell out clearly what the seller wants from permies folks in exchange for their freebie promotion... for example, they could ask you to buy something in their shop (with a coupon code! the special bonus thing is what creates urgency to buy now) OR to at least sign up for email, like on Facebook, follow on twitter, etc. for future communications. Make friends, not just sales.

Embedding tracking that both parties (Paul and the sponsor of the promotion) can see is good so people can tweak and see what works. If you all can manage an a/b split test to see what type of offer or copy performs best it can help optimize the promotions over time. If the goal is to do one every month or 2 weeks, etc. then you have opportunities to test and build on previous promotions with some regularity and a keen eye toward making the most of the social connections and the monetization of valuable resources. But in the end, the important thing is for the seller to see their free book give-away as a VERY cheap way to buy qualified leads. Not a way to buy sales. Getting leads through pay-per-click and other means online is generally kind of pricey. Paul could easily use PPC tools to estimate the value of his traffic (what $ is a click-through from a permies forum member worth?) to help promotion partners see that the $50-100 in free books/shipping is a good value for getting targeted leads. And if it is too expensive, they maybe should NOT give away books or items with physical shipping/handling. Try writing a useful PDF guide or min-book to give away. Or a special video. Prizes don't have to be physical objects. What about a 30-minute personal phone call with an expert to go over your homestead plans or problems? Think value exchange not necessarily free (as in beer) stuff.

Also, I'm a she. I guess I should fill out my profile thingy on here.

have their been any new promotions recently?

I had something in my head that said that once we get to a million people per month I would be able to use that information for authors and publishers to do more promotions. And then when the pantryparatus folks put up the books for the last promotion but didn't have any sales, that slowed me down a little. Kinda hard to get authors and publishers involved if there are no sales.

I'm behind on dozens of things I wanna do. Yesterday I got a few more videos in the hopper (although my current microphone is lame - new microphone is on order).

Is there a particular book or DVD folks would like?

paul wheaton wrote:I had something in my head that said that once we get to a million people per month I would be able to use that information for authors and publishers to do more promotions. And then when the pantryparatus folks put up the books for the last promotion but didn't have any sales, that slowed me down a little. Kinda hard to get authors and publishers involved if there are no sales.

I'm behind on dozens of things I wanna do. Yesterday I got a few more videos in the hopper (although my current microphone is lame - new microphone is on order).

Is there a particular book or DVD folks would like?

there are plenty i would like lol but i was just curious, and now that you've posted it i seem to remember you metnioning that in a podcast or video somewhere, and yes it does seem rather difficult to convince someone to do a promotion if they aren't looking at an improvement in sales from it...