Utility of book trailers - results of the experiment

Michael Davis · Aug 8, 2009

About a month ago I queried AWC and another forum to assess the usefulness of video trailers for novels. The responses were mixed: half considered them helpful while half did not. I decided to run a little experiment. Well, it started out as little, but ended up taking roughly eight days to create two trailers (you can see them at Davisstories.com by clicking the "video trailer" button). I posted them on about 16 sites (Utube, Revver, etc). The details of what I did and the statistical results are available on my website (click the "article" button).

I promised to report back with the results. Bottomline, neither my site hits or visits to my buy page (sources where my novels can be purchased) experienced any increase. My conclusion is that the ROI of trailers does not justify the cost in time. Your experience may be different.

Hope that's helpful.

geardrops · Aug 8, 2009

Thanks for posting your data

I'm curious to see if any other authors have done similarly, and what their results were.

Emily Winslow · Aug 9, 2009

I made a draft trailer several months ago. (No link because I don't yet have my final cover art etc. to polish a final version yet.) I don't expect it to get me any new readers, but more as kind of a "bonus gift" for people who are already interested. I have access to some special photographs that I wanted to share, which I think will enhance the experience of reading my book.

I'm not close enough to launch to comment on whether it also brings me new readers or not, but I have noticed an unexpected trend. I have a lot of friends who, though they wouldn't normally buy a book in my genre, are keen to buy mine because I wrote it. That's lovely, and no less than I expect of normal friendship. I've heard from several of them that they're using the trailer to entice their other friends to buy my book when it comes out. They enjoy showing it off and find it to be a helpful conversation starter. (Not with strangers, mind you, but their own friends.) I think for many people it does help to be able to show somebody something than try to describe it in their own words.

So, I don't expect random strangers on youtube to watch it and get excited about my book, but it seems that it's useful, in my case at least, for the friend-of-a-friend market. For people who are excited about your book already, it can be a helpful tool for spreading the word.

I also wouldn't be too quick to put a time-frame on the value of a trailer. We can't all be "United Breaks Guitars" and get a million+ viewings in our first week! The adding of your book trailer to youtube is not an event. But, it is there for the long haul. It's something you can use, but I wouldn't expect it to be something that people stumble upon.

Michael Davis · Aug 9, 2009

Actually, Emily, I used the photos I took to get my brain in the fiction world for BLIND CONSENT and based the trailer around those with a voice over. Ref the time frame, that was my original thought, to record for two months at least. Then the data had such a diminishing curve (hundreds first week, twenties second week, and now one or two per week) it was clear that any impact on sells would me negligible. But they are done and out there now, and I will leave 'em alive, just wouldn't do anymore.

Utility of book trailers - results of the experiment

Michael Davis

geardrops

Good thing I like my day job

Emily Winslow

Do Not Walk on the Grass

Michael Davis