After a few lackluster weeks, a paid promotion finally got things rolling.
Sunday, Oct. 2 — 0
Monday, Oct. 3 — 1
Tuesday, Oct. 4 — 1
Wednesday, Oct. 5 — 10 *
Thursday, Oct. 6 — 6
Friday, Oct. 7 — 3 *
Saturday, Oct. 8 — 5 *
Sunday, Oct. 9 — 18 *
* Kindle Nation Daily promotion
Total sales to date: 195
Month to date: 44
Giveaways: 5
Sales to date: 39
Sales from Kindle Daily Nation promo: 37 (maximum)
The Kindle Nation Daily promotion was a sponsored post on their Facebook page that’s supposed to run three consecutive days. It started Wednesday, then didn’t run Thursday because of technical problems on their end. So they gave me a bonus day and ran it Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Thank goodness for that one extra day — Sunday was fantastic. I even cracked the Religious Fiction Top 100, climbing as high as 50. I think my overall rank in the Kindle store peaked at 3900, to give you an idea of what 18 sales equals.
So is sponsorship at Kindle Nation Daily worth it? The sponsorship I did cost $149 at the time I purchased it and has jumped to $179 since then. Even at the price I paid, that’s four bucks a sale. I’m grateful for the sales it generated, but I can’t justify spending that much again on a 99 cent book. Maybe for the sequel, which will be priced at $2.99.
alexadena 
Delighted to hear things are picking up. You were right to try the KIndle Nation Daily sponsorship. You’ve got some sales from it and got your name known. In our early days of running our gite, we spent a LOT on advertising before we sussed out what worked and what didn’t. It’s trial and error and having the nerve to go for it!
I’m going to focus the rest of the month on enlisting the folks who got a free copy back in July through Library Thing to help spread the word. I’m sending each of them an email with links that they can forward to their friends as well as something they can send to their local library. It’s a bit of work to personalize them but I think it might be effective in the long run, not to mention cost-free 🙂
Thanks for sharing. It’s always good to know how effective paid advertising is. Others who have not bought it will have noticed the promo, and may be a step closer to buying it in the future 🙂