I just got an email earlier today from an author talking about a huge jump in her Amazon ranking. This is a common scenario, and always a cause for celebration. However, I cautioned her that a major spike in Amazon sales rank (from, say, 1,000,000 to 100,000) does not necessarily indicate huge numbers of books sold. I understand this can be hard for an author to hear, and also hard to believe–such a big change in numbers must mean something! But the relative ranking system means that to go from #100 to #1, you need to sell a LOT of books, but to go from 1,000,000 to 100,000, the sales don’t have to be that extreme.
I love it when my authors are involved in the marketing and sales process. What sells books is not Beaufort putting them out there, but our fantastic authors tirelessly introducing their books to people at speaking engagements, on their blogs, on television, even on the subway. Having an enthusiastic and involved author makes my job easier and more rewarding. I’ve tried to provide feedback to authors about sales, but I have dozens of authors, and they don’t stop being interested in their books when I take on new books. It’s overwhelming to try to keep everyone posted about what their book is doing more frequently than they get royalty statements. So most authors turn to the most responsive real-time reflection of sales that they have access to–Amazon’s sales rankings. (I admit that I do it, too, when I’m trying to see immediately how effective an author’s appearance on a particular show was.)
Which is why I’m so thrilled that Amazon is going to start providing authors access to Nielsen sales figures through the Author Central program.
The LA Times goes into detail here.
I’d encourage every author to go sign up for Author Central. It enables you to fill in your author profile on Amazon, link your blog to your books, etc. And now, it’ll give you access (for free!) to the same tools publishers have to gauge sales. Every week, authors will be able to see their updated Nielsen sales figures. Those don’t represent all sales (special sales, library sales, the author’s own sales at events, and some other channels are not reflected in Nielsen’s numbers), but it’s a much more useful way to gauge success than Amazon’s sales ranking.
I think this is a great step forward, and will give authors more tools to help sell and promote their books. Kudos, Amazon.
Margot