Goodreads Authors/Readers discussion

Has anyone seen a major drop in downloads since Aug 1st? I have a perma-free book and those downloads have dropped by 1/3, also my sales for all my other books have dropped at least that same amount.

I'm still on all the same lists I've been on all of July. Is it possible August is just a slower month?

Jill wrote: "Has anyone seen a major drop in downloads since Aug 1st? I have a perma-free book and those downloads have dropped by 1/3, also my sales for all my other books have dropped at least that same amoun..."

July and August always seem to be slow for sales. People are on vacation and not looking for on-line purchases as much.

Actually, I have seen a bit of a bump in sales in Aug but my genre is children's books and it probably follows different trends. People may want to load up on kids' ebooks for the back seat of the car. That said, my free promo was a bit of a flop. In your case it could be a slower month, or someone may have tweaked an algorith at amazon which is affecting your ranking (It has been known to happen). Hope September is better.

Mine have bumped up also, but as it's aimed at teen/YA it could be that there's more folks out there that have a need for a quality read (even if I do say so myself!)

Mine are down (contemporary adult fiction). I think a lot of people are on vacation. At least, I hope so. :)

Whew! I was wondering what I was doing wrong, all of a sudden. I won't say that I'm glad everyone elses sales have dropped, but it is good to no longer feel alone in this.

Members of my critique group and I were aware of a "summer slump" last year. The same is true again for each of us this year. I think sales will pick up again once people start spending more time indoors again.

Marjorie wrote: "Members of my critique group and I were aware of a "summer slump" last year. The same is true again for each of us this year. I think sales will pick up again once people start spending more time i..."
That's encouraging. Thanks!

I was aware of a summer slump last year and I'm seeing the same trends this year. August was the worst month. It's summer vacations and getting ready for back to school. Kids clothes and school supplies versus books. So I'm trying different pricing strategies hoping to help sales a little.
Sylvia

Whew! Thanks everyone. I feel better. :) I know I've been trying a few different things as well.. Hope it gets better after school starts.

Mine went down too and I had a new release so I was starting to get worried. Well this thread is a relief. It seems I am not the only one

This is good to know. My book just came out July 1, and it's my debut, so I didn't know what to expect. From a baseline of zero, my sales have certainly gone UP in July and August (LOL), but I'm now encouraged that they might get better. Thanks for sharing :)

Mine have not changed whatsoever. I have 5 purchases in 5 months so almost a book a month.

I've been having a steady climb all summer, then a strong spike last week that took me to the top 100 of the sub genre of time travel on Amazon. Don't know where that came from but it was a nice surprise! Things have dropped off since then, but I'm getting ready to release a prequel short story to my series, so I'm hoping to get another spike.

Nope, in fact mine went the other way, July has been my best selling month yet, and it has spilled over into August :)

I've also had a few returns, which I've never had before. I wish there was a way of finding out what the reason for return was for (purchase mistake, hatred of book etc)

AGREED! I think Amazon should make it mandatory to state a reason. I know what it is.. it's people buying the book, reading it, and they have 7 days to get their money back. If they do this a few times, they won't get caught by Amazon. It's frustrating.



Andy wrote: "I've also had a few returns, which I've never had before. I wish there was a way of finding out what the reason for return was for (purchase mistake, hatred of book etc)"

My sales never go up so I can't tell.

June was a huge spike for me. July & August have leveled off, but still better than prior to June. I hear summer tends to have a slump, as the previous posters mentioned.

June was a big month for me and so was July, but August has dropped and I'm lucky if I get two copies sold a day. I'm hoping that changes soon!

Here is an interesting article on free promotions and how they affect sales.

http://noorosha.com/freepromotionswork/

Andy wrote: "I've also had a few returns, which I've never had before. I wish there was a way of finding out what the reason for return was for (purchase mistake, hatred of book etc)"

I have returns sometimes. I still don't know why.

I'm glad I came across this discussion. I've saw the same drop in sales in July. August is looking a little better ... so far.

Although sales this August are double those for the same time last year, they are down from June 2013, which was excellent, and July, which wasn't bad. I released my fourth full-length novel on July 31, which in hindsight wasn't a good choice. Next year, it'll be September or October. Since I live in Australia (but we use the US Amazon here) and we are in deepest winter now, I expected healthy sales but they are mediocre at best. I hope that when semester starts in the US things will get better. I have found that my paperback sales are okay... but that's because UK sales have not really slumped and the love-affair with the Kindle is not as pronounced in Britain.
So yes, there are a number of factors that contribute to the mid-winter doldrums. In addition to this, I think the same algorithm that guarantees optimum results to the Big Five publishers over the Christmas period is put into play around now. I suspect there is an agreement about trad visibility that favours publishers above all other comers. I could be horribly wrong, but the timing is too neat to be random.

Hi, Rosanne. I usually find that sales plummet in August and, unlike you, it is especially so for me here in the UK. Here it's the month when families clear off on holiday. I guess it may be the same in the States?

Yes, Frank - probably so. Let's all promote like mad so that when spring and summer come around in your hemisphere things will spike off the graph, eh?