I’m taking part in a forced experiment:
My debit card was set to expire in January ’26.
My bank shipped me a new one, but due to some snafu with the address, it didn’t arrive.
I asked the bank to resend the new card. Which they did.
In the meantime, they also helpfully cancelled my current, still-valid card.
For one thing, this means I have been living for the past few days on the 200 or so euro I had in cash when my debit card got cancelled.
For another, a bunch of online accounts started notifying me that my card is no longer valid.
Among these is the Amazon ads platform.
As you might know, I have a couple books on Amazon, both conveniently titled the 10 Commandments of SOMETHING.
I’ve been running ads to promote the newer of those 10 Commandments books since I published it in May.
The book has been steadily selling ~15 copies a day thanks to its cool black cover, its provocative 23-word title, and of course the ads I’ve been running for it.
But how much is each of those elements responsible for the steady sales of the book?
That’s the forced experiment I am now involved in. Let’s look at the data.
My Amazon ads stopped running on December 12. Here are the sales of my book on Amazon for each day from December 11th (when ads were still running) until yesterday:
Dec 11: 19
Dec 12: 8
Dec 13: 8
Dec 14: 6
Dec 15: 2
… and as for today, December 16, there have been zero sales as of the time I’m writing this.
Maybe Amazon is punishing me for no longer running ads by throttling even organic sales of my book.
But I rather think it’s the opposite. My theory is that, if you pay Amazon to advertise your book, and particularly if you make a few sales via advertising, Amazon goes above and beyond in promoting your book to readers organically.
The point I’d like to suggest to you:
If you have a book on Amazon, then advertise. And be liberal.
My current ad spend philosophy on Amazon is that I just want to break even across all sales — the money I spend on ads should be roughly equivalent to the royalties I make on both paid AND organic book sales.
My future ad spend philosophy on Amazon — as soon as I get my new debit card, or soon after — will be to spend even more liberally.
My plan is to (finally) put an offer on the thank-you page of the optin that I link to at the end of the book. I’m thinking to make that offer something unique, only available on that page, and available for ~$100. Whatever money I make from these thank-you-page sales will also go towards Amazon ads. I figure even one or two sales of that a month could be a big deal for helping me sell way more books.
If you’ve already read my new 10 Commandments book, maybe you have a suggestion for an offer I could make to readers of that book, immediately after they finish the book and opt into my list? Something that would tie into the theme and topic of the book?
If you have an idea, write in and let me know. If I end up creating that offer, I will give you a free copy of whatever it is that you helped me create, along with an acknowledgment in the same.
And if you haven’t read my new 10 Commandments book yet, why not?
The book talks about SOMETHING, specifically the common strategies and techniques used by con men, pickup artists, magicians, door-to-door salesmen, hypnotists, copywriters, negotiators, political propagandists, stand up comedians, and Oscar-winning screenwriters.
If that sounds intriguing to you, or if you simply want to help me goose sales of my book while it’s not being advertised, here’s where to go: