Sell 100+ Children's Books A Day!
Learn The Changes I Made To Take My Book Sales From Ten A Day To 100+ A Day
No, the answer is not Amazon Ads.
No the answer is not dancing on Tik Tok.
Yes, the answer is Facebooks Ads.
I know what you are thinking...
Everyone says you must advertise on Facebook.
So you've tried it, and you were better off just throwing your money in the shredder. At least you have been left with some fantastic green confetti this way, but...
hear me out.
I promise you; I've been there as well. This is probably my millionth time giving Facebook ads a try.
I've had tons of success selling books using Amazon Ads. I've sold thousands of books over the years. But I've transitioned from selling on Amazon to selling direct to customers on my website. Increased margins being the driving force behind this decision. Why make $2-$4 per book when you can make $8-$10?! 🤑
Because of this decision, I had to change the way I advertise. I needed a system to support my new sales channels. Facebook Ads was a perfect choice.
After A LOT of trial and error, I've found a Facebook ad strategy that works.
It worked so much I was able to sell hundreds of books a day within a span of a few short weeks on both my website and Amazon.
It worked so much I sold out completely and had to cut my ads off. 🔥
It worked so much I still get emails asking when will the books be back in stock on my website.
The screenshot above shows my Shopify revenue for the last 30 days. The peaks represent the killer sales period, and the valleys are the periods I had my old strategy in place (before the peak) and when I had to cut the ads off (after the peak). Also, don't worry; the following strategy can be used to generate sales on Amazon if you are a KDP customer.
So, I repeat, hear me out...😅
Context
This past month I decided to change how I market and sell my children's books online. I've always been able to capture a handful of sales on my site, but the sales could have been more consistent.
I quickly went from selling 25 books one day to 3-5 the next two. Hell, I've had a day where I've sold -2 books. That's right, zero sales and two refunds issued 😩.
I know most would say, "25 books a day? You should be grateful."
Trust me, I am. I've very grateful. But one should never feel guilty for wanting a little more financial freedom.
So, I canceled all of my ads and took some time to reevaluate my marketing from top to bottom. I analyzed various ads from other successful brands and industries and thought about ways to incorporate their strategies into my own.
In doing so, I realized that children's books are different. Like, different different.
There are a lot of successful self-published authors making tons of sales and money using Facebooks ads. But I noticed that many of those books–well, almost all– were not children's books. They mainly were coaching or self-help books. Books that promised people solutions to problems. Of course, they sold...those always sell. People have problems and will pay if you offer a solution.
But what about fun, imaginative storybooks for kids that may or may not teach a lesson?
Exactly!
In all of this research, I've realized that I needed to remember how different the children's book-buying experience is from the rest of the goods people purchase.
I'm a parent of two awesome kids, and I have purchased hundreds and hundreds of books for them over the years. Tapping into that experience, I realized I was doing things ALL WRONG.
I thought to myself:
What factors led me to buy books for my kids as a parent?
Then I had my 💡 moment.
Strategy
I remembered that as a parent, I shopped for children's books differently than books for myself.
I would go into Barnes and Nobles and Borders– remember that place?
Yes, I am showing my age 😅.
But I would go into those stores, pick up the books, and actually read them to my kids.
We purchased it if we enjoyed it or just thought of it as a cute enough addition. It didn't matter that we just read it cover to cover. If it weren't for that, we probably would not buy it. We found value in the book and made a connection.I would buy books friends and family with kids recommended. I also purchased books I knew many teachers had in the classrooms as well.
These two were the significant factors.
So the question then became...
How do I capture these experiences in my ads and website?
Ads Break Down
As children's book authors, we make the mistake of thinking people should buy our books simply because we wrote one and because it's cute. And our ads reflect that.
We put out ads saying "I Wrote a Book...Here Is The Description...Buy My Book!"
We actually have to give people real reasons to buy our books.
Below I provide a breakdown of my new ad format.
Let's Start With The Ad Copy
1. Long-form copy: I switched to long-form copy.
This is something I learned from successful e-commerce advertisers. It allows you to truly sell your book and draw on the emotional response needed for customers to make a purchasing decision.
With longer copy, your conversion rates increase because people have most of the information they need from your ad. When they go to the site, their intent is now to buy, not just learn more.
Here are screenshots of the sales copy from my two super-sales generating ads I created. One is for my title Daddy's Arms, and the other for my title Jackie Wins Them All.
2. Grab Attention: I start things off with a very attention-grabbing first two lines. These lines are the only two lines Facebook ads show in the timeline. If someone is interested, they have to expand it to read further. So you have to make sure they pack a punch and catch the reader's Attention.
3. Emotion: Next, We have to give people reasons to buy the book– reasons that highlight the value of having your book in their library.
When it comes to children's books, the best way to do that is by appealing to emotions. Getting an emotional response from a potential customer will increase your chances of them buying. If they were in a bookstore, they could pick up the book, read it, and feel the value it will have on their kid's shelf. In both examples, my goal was to draw an emotional response. I gave them a sense of how their children will feel when they "experience" each title. Notice how both ads are framed around experiencing the books and not about just "reading" them.
4. Call to Action: Finally, I make sure to tell people exactly what I want them to do when they click on the ad. It's like telling them, "If you click this ad, you intend to buy!"
Next, The Creative
Remember point #2 about recommendations? Well, this is how we address that.
1. Video Creative:
Throw away all the selfies of you or your kids with your book. Throw away the horrible stock images of fake people reading your book. Throw away any still images of your book cover. From this point forward, you are using video.
If there is one thing alone I know for sure made a difference in sales, it was switching to video ads. But not just any video ads, user-generated video ads.
People make buying decisions based on how others think and feel about the purchase. They need that confirmation from someone else. They are not going to buy because you told them the book is good, but they will buy if someone else does.
This is the reason why influencers get paid tons of money on Instagram and TikTok. Businesses understand the power of influence on sales, so they pay to have someone share their experience and sell the product for them.
Check out my two video ads below:
You can get videos like these as well. I got these two videos for about $70 each from Billo. Billo allows you to get awesome quality user-generated content for a fraction of the cost.
It's super simple too!
First, you order your video and provide them the details for your ad.
Next, you ship them your book.
Finally, in 1 week or so, you will have a high-quality video ad for you to post and promote.
When ordering your video, make sure the following requested of the creator:
Title of the book (Duh).
Mention the value your book. Remember the emotional response from the long-form copy? Same thing here, but now someone else is telling them. Make sure to communicate the features of the book. Anything that will create an emotional response from the buyer. Are there lessons to be learned? Experiences to be had?
Have the creator incorporate children in the ad. Either include a child in the video, or discuss their children's experience with the book.
Have the creator flip through, showing the pages of the book. Just like being in the bookstore, people need to see the book's contents.
Das it!
Once I paired up my long format copy , along with the videos created above, I...
Popped them into my Facebook Ads Manager...
Created a purchase conversion campaign...
Targeted women 24-55 with interests in children's toys (Logic: If they are buying kids toys, they have kids to buy books for)...
Set a budget starting at $20 a day to get a feel for traction...
Let it run for 48 hours...
Gained sales with 3x ROAS (Return On Ad Spend/ made $3 for every $1 spent)
Increased budget by 50%
ROAS still 3X so I released the gates and increased budget to $100+ a day
And the traffic and sales to my website took off. As shown by my Shopify screenshot above, you can see where my new strategy was implemented and where I had to cut off my ads due to selling out.
That is how I managed to sell hundreds of books just a day after selling only a handful.
Of course, results are not guaranteed, but there should be an improvement from where you once were. And once you have that improvement, you can build on that. Run some more tests, and try some new audiences and creative pieces. Once you have your winner, it is time to scale scale scale!
There are other factors involved as well. You would need some knowledge of Facebook Advertising to implement the strategy above. And, if you only sell your books on Amazon via KDP, there are some slight tweaks you would have to make to link the ads to your Amazon Marketing dashboard.
If you need assistance in these areas, I offer children's book advertising consultation, where I provide 1-on-1 walkthroughs and teach you how to set up and manage your own advertising–for a non-bank breaking fee, of course.
Nope, I do not own an ad agency; I believe in empowering other children's book authors and teaching them to achieve the same or even better results than myself.
Email me at fabian@ffergusonbooks.com to set up a free 15 minute consultation to discuss your book marketing.
