My recent post about helping fellow authors by leaving Amazon (and B&N) reviews, prompted a great question from commenter Margo: Does the number of reviews on Amazon actually help an author’s sales or boost his/her rating?
Boosting sales and boosting ratings are related but not the same thing. First, a primer on how Amazon operates (much of this was a revelation to me):
- Amazon is an upward spiral model: the more your book sells, the higher it climbs on the Amazon search results, and in category lists and recommendations (like “also bought” lists)
- Amazon sales rank gives you some idea of how well a book is selling, in its category. Note: this can be wildly different for e-books vs. print, because of the different pools of books it is being compared to. Also, these vary day-to-day, depending on sales for that day (or even that hour). Here are some old (2008) data, to give you a rough idea of what those numbers* mean:
Rank Weekly Sales
1,000 90 copies
10,000 60 copies
100,000 16 copies
300,000 12 copies
500,000 1 copy
1,000,000 1 copy per month
Presumably, a book’s sales rank is related to how much it has sold, and drives the highly desired upward spiral in Amazon-land (i.e. you sell some books, your book rises in the search listings, your book gets more exposure, you sell more books, etc.).
Now, what is the effect of reviews on all of this? Some think even revered print reviews have less relevance today, but others think book reviews still matter. While print reviews (and blog reviews) may be helpful simply because they are free publicity for your book, getting your title in front of more eyeballs, I think it is impossible to know exactly how online reviews such as Amazon affect a book’s sales. Surely lots of positive reviews could help sales, and possibly a devastating negative review could hurt sales, but I think in the world of fiction, most people take the reviews not too seriously. After all, the adventure novel you hate might be just the story for me. However, reviews are there for a reason and a couple of bad ones could tarnish how well a product sells. If you’re about to buy a book and 5 people said they fell asleep reading it, you probably aren’t going to be as willing to spend that money. At websites such as https://www.sunkenstone.com/services/amazon-ppc-management/ and many similar, companies who sell on Amazon are assisted with their reviews in order to help them increase their sales. This would be a life saver to those who worry about their product reviews. I think people take personal recommendations, from friends or like-minded people much more seriously than online book reviews from strangers.
So you probably want good reviews, or at least it can’t hurt. Here’s a cautionary post from Steve Weber (his book Plug your Book! has lots of tips about online book marketing) about who should NOT review your book, namely you or your PR agent. My opinion: if you and your publisher are the only ones reviewing your book, then your book’s not going to do well anyway. However, having people who already know and love your book review early on seems a sensible approach to getting your book on its way.
Weber’s book was published in 2007, which was before the e-book tsunami hit the industry. However his blog has several up-to-date articles about book marketing, including how the Amazon Spotlight reviews are chosen, how to use giveaways at Goodreads to boost reviews, and how authors can add or edit their books catalog details on Amazon.
All of this doesn’t really answer Margo’s question (sorry!), but I stand by my earlier encouragement to review books for authors that you love, to support and encourage them, and maybe even bring them more sales.
What about you, lovely readers? Do you read the online reviews before you purchase? Or have you already decided to buy by the time you click through to Amazon or B&N?
p.s. Come back tomorrow for our very first Guest Post by Rebecca Carlson: Science Fiction for Breakfast !
Hi,
I seldom just browse Amazon's book section, I am usually there to make my purchase because I already know which books I am going to buy. Once I have made my main purchase(s), I check out other books.
I *always* read the reviews and will often buy the book even if the reviews are not what I expected. I also make it a habit to check out the the person who posted the review.
As a avid reader, reviews matter to me. There are certain words I look for in reviews that tell me the book is, or is not, what I am looking for.
Online book reviews matter more to me for NON fiction books. Isn't that funny?
Fiction books are subjective so I don't pay as close attention to them.
Interesting post. Perhaps a shout out on Facebook can do more than an amazon review, since as you said.. people tend to give more weight to recommendations from friends.
I review rarely, and only if I think my opinion might contain some useful tidbit others haven't mentioned.
@Vannie I wonder if avid readers are more likely to read the reviews? That seems likely to me, as you say, avid readers are discerning readers. Thanks for the comment!
@Jennifer Reviews for non-fiction make total sense to me – like looking at a review for a toaster! Not so much a subjective experience, as you say.
@Corey I know I would be more likely to try out a book (if it looked interesting) if I know the recommending person. For some (close) people, I would read the book even if it didn't look interesting, as long as they thought it was cool. 🙂
@Bane You have lots of useful tidbits! 🙂
I usually read some reviews before buying.
@Ted With the Spotlight reviews, I think it makes perusing the reviews easier to manage – do you usually just look at those?
I had no idea about ranking and sales. Thanks.
At a conference, I heard someone say they assume the first few reviews are written by family members, the next few are written by people with an axe to grind, and after that are the real reviews. So I guess writers need a bunch of reviews!
@Theresa Where do I sign up to skip over the "axe to grind" reviewers?? 🙂 Seriously, that ordering makes sense to me, and I would think it would take some time before the "real reviewers" come out of the wood work. 🙂
Yes, I look at the spotlight reviews at the least, and sometimes further if need be.
fascinating! I've learned something today!
If I'm undecided on a book, I'll look at the Amazon reviews. Mostly I look at the overall rating, one or more useful 4- or 5-star reviews, and one or more useful 1-star reviews (though it's rare to find a useful negative review; most of them are like, "This book sucks. The author sucks. The publisher ran over my dog and I'm never reading Author's books again. Including this one. Which sucks."
@Adam Why people leave negative reviews like that is beyond me. Fortunately, I think you are right – most people don't find them useful. (Kudos to Amazon for coming up with that system)
@Vicki And my work here is done (well for today)! 🙂
I actually do read the reviews on Amazon. Sometimes. Usually when it's a book I'm not familiar with. I tend to know what I want, but then I'll click on some of the recommended titles and that's when I start reading the reviews. Those books often end up on my wish list and as I hear more about them, usually from bloggers, they migrate into my cart. Blog reviews hold a lot of weight for me.
@Sherrie Blog reviews are important to me too – most of the items on my TBR list come from there. I've heard that most people hear about a book three times before they decide to buy it – sort of the threshold for "buzz." 🙂
I rarely buy anything from Amazon or B&N. If I do it is because of a gift card. I listen to what friends are saying about books or from what I read from my favorite bloggers. Walking into my local indie bookstore is still magical. I will not give that up for a 30% discount!
psssst. blackjack contest is underway. i think you want me to hit you. hoping for one more 21 before i have to go to work!
When I read the reviews on Amazon it is to see if other people thought the same thing about the book that I did.
I think you're right, Sue. I look for books that my like-minded friends recommend. I pay much more attention to book reviews on my friends' blogs than on Amazon.com.
@Kyle Good for you for supporting the Indies! I wish mine was closer …
@Vicki I think you should get some kind of award for uniqueness – I've never seen that kind of contest before. It's cool!
@Rebecca I never thought of looking post-facto on purpose. Goodreads has lots of book-specific discussions, too, but usually their more fan-based than analytical.
It depends on who's doing the reviewing. For example, when LiLa Roecker email me to tell of the lastest YA find I should read, it's guarantee I'll rush out to buy the book. They haven't steered me wrong yet. If the review is on a blog, and I've agreed with most of the reviews posted to date, then I'll trust the individual's opinion. Beyond that, I accept the reviews with a great degree of caution.
@Stina Even my best friends have very different tastes in books than I do (sometimes). But I'm much more likely to give it a look if someone I respect recs it. 🙂
Susan thanks for going into such detail to try to answer my question… even if it sounds like reviews for fiction books are taken with a grain of salt, your information on how Amazon works was very interesting.
Thinking about Stina's comment… I have found there are certain blog reviewers I really like, and these are all the ones who list their favorite books so I can tell right away if we have common tastes. Just started dabbling with Good Reads for that reason too… the problem with Amazon is you have no idea who is doing the reviews or what their background/tastes are – or do you??? Maybe I haven't looked closely enough. But the bottom line is – very few fiction books have a universal appeal. its so subjective. And… I'm babbling now sorry!
@Margo Subjective, yes, but inscrutable, I don't think so. I DO like Goodreads because you can see what your friends are reading without having to ask them all the time. Very cool!
I believe book reviews matter. Firstly, they are accessible – forever, when they are online. Secondly, bad and good reviews have helped me decide on what to purchase online. However, when I'm in a bookstore, it's the cover with the blurb on the back that sells me.
@LM That's an advantage that e-books have as well as the e-reviews: they're around as long as people are still buying them. I passed a "Remainder" table at the bookstore a few days ago – very sad.