How I Sold 1 Million eBooks in 5 Months! [Kindle Edition]

First thing to remember is this is not how to sell 1 million copies of a book. This is about selling a suite of complementary books, using branding and targeted marketing.

This information exists for free in the ether and some of it is kind of obvious especially to more commercially aware types. In fact I read a blog of an author who has done exactly what John has done but hasn't had the same success. The useful thing about this book is that it puts it altogether in a coherent approach.

The most useful part of this book is the advice on what not to spend your money on. Parts of the book drag but as John will profess he isn't pretentious with his writing so you'll fly through it no time. I found the book reasonably interesting as it pretty much confirmed the approach that was in my head. However, having it written down and confirmed helps your mind focus and stops you digressing from your goals.

This is more for someone who wants to produce a commercial product but it's still useful if you want to get your labour of love out to a wider audience.

This is an honest review as you can tell I've read the book and I don't have a book to plug off the back of John's success! Some reviews you'll notice have been written to plug their own book and actually don't offer any critical content of this book at all.

In the last two months I've been devouring non-fiction as research to support my new project - a how-to book on novel writing, social media and independent epublishing. It's been an interesting journey and my final port of call was the much talked about million selling method book by Mr Locke.
The first thing I do when considering a popular book is to browse the negative reviews. Locke's knockers were scathing, claiming he didn't really reveal his secrets, that his method wouldn't work for most people and he was on an ego-trip. Then I took a look at the three star reviews (the ones that Locke himself discounts when he calculates the positive / negative review score of books). I sensed from those middling reviews that he was connecting with his readers. Not everyone felt they could emulate his approach but they began to give it credence. A sample of the higher scoring reviews showed genuine praise. So I One-clicked and slipped my few bucks into Mr Locke's bulging pocketbook.
First impression? An avalanche of advertising, branding and hammering out credentials. Close to sales pitch overload. I'm a bit of a straight-laced Brit and pushy product placement presses the wrong buttons for me. However, in between the lines of Locke's opening gambit, I sensed warmth and something akin to humility. So I read on.
It didn't take long before I realised that I was in the hands of a master of rhetoric. That's a positive super-power, when used for good. Locke's entrepreneurial understanding of sales and marketing, coupled with that gift for rhetoric, are a powerful combination. He's a rich man who has unsuccessfully tried to herd his ebook camels into sales heaven through the eye of a needle (or some more suitable metaphor). That was the first major learning. Money thrown at traditional product promotion won't propel an indie author onto the best seller list.
Locke went on to describe how his writing polarises readers and that demarcation defines his market niche. I read that on the day that Peril received its first ever one-star review. The reader had found my anti-hero thriller unpalatable, where others had lauded it. There, I had polarisation.
Donovan Creed, Locke's MC in his main series, isn't a regular guy and the quirky story lines aren't mainstream. Bells began to ring in my head as I compared the appeal of Creed with my Peril MC Ger Mayes. Locke has a series of Creed novels and that was where my hopeful comparison faltered (note to self - produce more!)
Then Locke went on to describe his GBL (Guaranteed Buyer List) and how these people have become personal friends who not only buy his new releases but are evangelical in spreading the word. I call them the Locked In. He explained his approach to social media and how he engages in a supportive social network where spam is anathema and everyone benefits, how he communicates personally and builds relationships. I thought of people I have met on Twitter, facebook, this blog and in chat forums. How they might have bought my book but I don't know. How I don't know if the 17,000 people holding ecopies of Peril even know that I've written and released The Baptist! I'm adept at the how-to aspects of social networking and epublishing, and I think I write a decent novel but, compared to Locke's sleek, tight and smooth machine, my marketing is a pair of old lady's wrinkled stockings.
All the way through the book Locke promotes his sound marketing plan but the major catalyst for his success, the trigger that set Locke's snowball rolling down the hill, is his incredible rhetoric. He attributes the initial rush of sales to a series of blog posts that hit the sweet spot with potential readers and went viral. The resulting sales success fed into his business plan with all its carefully designed components and he leveraged the momentum to great effect as the Creed series rolled out.
If you are an indie author who understands product marketing, customer relationship management and the principles of persuasion, then you have to read Locke's book. If you don't understand some or any of those things then you have to read Locke's book.
At the end I wanted to hug John Locke. And I'm not the kind of guy who does man hugs. I don't think that many people will be able to fully replicate his method. Few have the skill set, determination and work rate that he displays, but there are nuggets in there for everyone and I'm thankful to the man for sharing. And I just bought my first Donovan Creed ebook.

I bought this book based on the reviews and wanted to know John's the secrets of selling fiction on Amazon Kindle. John had no big secrets in this book in my opinion. In a nutshell, throughout the entire book, John simply tells you to put a website together with a blog section and open a Twitter account. He then explains - repeatedly - that you should write a blog that appeals to the hearts of people and their families, then twitter it all over twitter. John claims that everybody who comes to your site and reads your blog and enjoys it, will buy your book on your site at the same time.

This doesn't work. Not unless you have a million twitter followers and a decent amount of them buy your book of course.

I've given this book two stars. Even at the end of the book, John tries to get the reader to sign up to his blogs and buy his books. This book is simply another marketing tool for John, in the hope of increasing sales of his own books. YOU, won't get very much out of it, at least I didn't. It falls into the same camp as all those other 'get rich scheme' books claiming to have big secrets.

I only learned a little from John's book. If this book was free, I'd be seriously disappointed.

Sorry, John, but I don't buy your system. It is feeble at best. You were a millionaire before you started writing fiction, it was not your novels that made you a millionaire.

Save your money and simply post on Facebook and Twitter your novel and hope people buy it. That is basically all John is telling you to do.