I’m using MORGAN BAROD as the test bed for them; it’s self-contained, reasonably conventional, and I haven’t done a Kindle deal in a year for it. I’m not really convinced that I’ll end up making money on the original advertising, but I think that generally I can get people to keep reading me once they start reading me. Besides, I can claim advertising as a business expense on my taxes.
That sale is scheduled for July 1st. We’ll see how it goes.
#commissionearned
I’ve been fiddling with Amazon’s ads for the last month, committing to spend at least some money on the process. So far, the results have been… well, horrible. The ratio of clicks to impressions is awful, and the ratio of clicks to sales has been abyssmal. It’s been so bad, I’m wondering whether I’m doing something wrong – except that I went through their tutorials this time, and my impression rate did go up as compared to the last time I tried this. I dunno, though. It seems like pouring money out onto the ground.
Thoughts, suggestions? – Aside from (obviously) putting up links in this post. That seems thematically appropriate, somehow.
#commissionearned
Found here. I’m trying to create something that can be advertised; my luck with Amazon ads was… peculiar. I was clearly doing something wrong, because nobody was actually clicking on the ads. Which at least meant that I didn’t get charged, but it was still extremely weird.
Feedback welcome.
It’s a mild milestone for me: I have a tiny bit of give in the budget, so I thought I’d set up an advertising test run for MORGAN BAROD and see if it does anything. Perhaps it will, perhaps it will not, it never hurts to check. In the meantime: buy my books!
Got some good advice along these lines from my webdude Neil about how I should be looking for places like mine to do my advertising…
…and going from there. I also saw some good advice about how I should be asking my readers and whatnot: where do you go, when it’s not here? So, I’m asking: got any suggestions of streamers or creators who might be interested in doing advertising for my stuff? I budget for complimentary review copies, at the very least.
Based around this:
I don’t know if I’ll make the money back on advertising this way. On the other hand, I find the idea pretty freaking rad and I can spend my money any way that I like. And on the gripping hand, most of the racers donate their sponsorships to Child’s Play, which is a charity that I heartily approve of. So I figure I can honorably shell out a few bucks on this.
Moe Lane
PS: You can find my books here. Keep watching the skies!
When it comes to this article – We Got A Look Inside The 45-Day Planning Process That Goes Into Creating A Single Corporate Tweet – it’s hard to top Patrick Ruffini’s response.
Inside the 45 Day Planning Process for a Tweet That Got Zero Retweets and Two Favorites. http://t.co/5NeIjTQxzJ
— Patrick Ruffini (@PatrickRuffini) May 28, 2014
But I’ll note this: Twitter is not actually a good place to advertise your product, unless of course you’re paying Twitter to insert your ads into people’s feeds (at least, the ones who aren’t using a Twitter platform that kills said ads on sight). Come right down to it: companies should not have Twitter feeds at all unless they have something legitimately interesting to say – and if there’s one thing that a 45 day planning process can accomplish, it’s the careful leaching out of anything interesting to say.
If you’ve ever wondered just how powerful advertising is, here you go.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EfO-OB9Eh1g
That aired in 1975, and it’s been informing my hot dog purchasing decisions ever since. To wit, I only keep Hebrew National hot dogs in the house, and don’t feed my kids any other kind. Not won’t – kids gotta be fed – but if I have any choice in the matter then it’s HN.
And I’m not even Jewish. Admittedly, I’m from New York and New Jersey, but that doesn’t really count.
Moe Lane
…if you want to advertise on MoeLane.com, feel free to contact Google Adsense (or however Neil has it set up these days). Trying to glom free ads via my comments section only works if I let you get away with it, which is highly unlikely unless I’m in a particular mood.
And now, the Triumph of Penguins over Adversity.
Heeeeeeere’s the situation:
In an application filed last year and made public last month by the United States Patent and Trademark Office, Apple is seeking a patent for technology that displays advertising on almost anything that has a screen of some kind: computers, phones, televisions, media players, game devices and other consumer electronics.
[snip]
Its distinctive feature is a design that doesn’t simply invite a user to pay attention to an ad — it also compels attention. The technology can freeze the device until the user clicks a button or answers a test question to demonstrate that he or she has dutifully noticed the commercial message.
…and heeeeeeere’s the problem:
It’s amazing how many of these vendors fail to understand Chekhov’s first law of narrative: “A gun on the mantelpiece in act one is bound to go off by act three.” That is, if you design a device that is intended to attack its user — by shutting her out of her own files and processes against her wishes and without her consent — someone will figure out how to use that device to attack its user.
Well, one of the problems. The other major one is that forcing people to maintain constant awareness of what their computer is doing is a very stupid idea. Particularly if you’re producing for a niche customer base in the first place. You know how people hate pop-up ads? This is worse. Particularly if the company does something really dumb, like integrate this kind of technology into their new iPods. Fastest way to lose dominance of that particular market that I can think of.
Moe Lane