Book Promo Sites That Don't Work ~ A Running List

I want to say there's a reason why some promo sites are inexpensive, but that's not necessarily true. It's mostly true, but an author can also pay a pretty penny for an ad that also gets no results.

With my new novel I spread my meager advertising dollars around. I scoured lists of "best" promo sites, and if the price was right, I went for it. I also took into consideration audience size and whether a site had a women's fiction category. In sum, I did my research.

Rankings can be misleading, because they're dependent on genre. Some genres will do well, regardless. (I wish my marketing was that easy.) However, I think my overall results are pretty typical, and thus I'm starting a running list of the sites I've used and their outcomes. Because I scattered my marketing days, I've been able to get a true picture of how well or poorly those sites perform. 

Thus, my list of sites used, units sold, and purported ranking per "experts":

eReaderIQ ~ 0 (Weirdly, David Gaughran recommends this site, and I generally trust his advice. (B+ ranking)

It's Write Now ~ 0 (B- ranking)

BookRaid ~ 3 (not even ranked!)

Awesome Gang ~ 0 (A- ranking)

BookDoggy ~ 0 (C ranking, but it was cheap)

LitNuts ~ 0 (not ranked)

Discount Book Man ~ 0 (admittedly, not ranked high)

BookReader Magazine ~ 0 (not ranked)

AuthorsXP ~ 0 (B+ ranking)

LitRing ~ 0 (B- ranking)

 

No results yet: 

Fussy Librarian ~

The Kindle Book Review ~  (B+ ranking)

Book Goodies ~

Bargain Booksy ~

 

Other non-time-sensitive promos (which will be impossible to quantify results for):

onlinebookclub ~ (free, but simply a listing on its site)

Readers' Favorite ~ (free, but just a review "sometime")

Independent Book Review ~ (free; review only)

Book-Shelfie ~ (awesome reviews!)

AllAuthor ~ (featured for 6 months)

BookBuzzr ~ (lots of promises of results "per month")

I've used other recommendation lists besides the one I linked to, but I did lean heavily on that particular list.

As for social media, I haven't used it (either paid or simply "me". I did post my great review on Facebook and X, but I'm skeptical of social media's influence. Two of the paid sites I looked into seem to push the same three or four books continually, which tells me they don't get a lot of business. 

Truthfully, I wasn't expecting much in the way of results, which is the correct mindset for marketing. But perhaps future promos will prove me wrong.