Hello and welcome back to the Book Marketing Tips and Author Success Podcast . This is Penny Sandsbury and Amy Cornell , and this is yet another Amazon PSA . You know , amazon just keeps giving us reasons to do these shows . I am a little so I'm coming in hot people , just so you know , because I'm really mad at Amazon .
Just so you know , because I'm really mad at Amazon . So we have an author that we're working with who has a mystery thriller and he has a menacing book cover . Hello , it's a mystery thriller , right . Started to run ads for him . Amazon came back and they said yeah , we're not going to approve this because the cover is too menacing . The cover .
What they said , which I thought was so ridiculous the cover looks . So there's a picture of somebody holding a knife on the cover and the knife is bloody . Hello , mystery thriller , right . And Amazon said in their note it looks like the knife is pointing at the consumer .
No , I didn't hear that latest .
Oh , my God , and I'm like , well , that's weirdly specific Amazon , like I mean , it just feels like I mean , I realized that a lot of this stuff through when you , when you write , um , when write , when Amazon responds back with no , we can't do this , or whatever . It's usually like an AI , but I'm like , well , that's very specific for an AI .
Maybe there's really a person behind there who has clearly some issues with being chased .
Do you feel personally attacked by that cover ? My goodness .
Do you feel personally attacked by that cover ? So the point of this whole PSA is do not let Amazon give you the runaround . So I wrote support ticket after I think I wrote three or four different support tickets to Amazon because what Amazon did . So this is where this gets really dicey . So Amazon approved the print book with the same menacing cover .
Right , they approved the print book , but they would not approve the ebook . Now , when I wrote what that's just stupid , it's just stupid . So when I wrote them , I didn't say that well , but you approved the print book , so why can't you approve the ebook ?
Because I was worried that they were going to pull like oh , we didn't know that we approved the print book and then they were going to pull that one too . But I kept writing them and I said listen , this book meets , this cover meets all of your guidelines . Right , there's no like naked person on the cover , like it's not , it's and it fit .
And then I sent links . I said here are links to other similar books , all of which are being advertised on Amazon . So you really do have to sometimes make your case with them , but I just don't . I mean , I know , and , amy , we were talking about this in the green room . I mean with , like , romance books .
Sometimes they get really funny if you have too many , like if there's too much skin on the cover , right yeah .
It's , there's a weird gray area and it turns into a really awkward conversation . And being in high school and talking to your parents about something , you know what I mean , cause you're sitting there with the Amazon . Support people going like , well , I mean , his shirt's only unbuttoned , it's not all the way off .
Support people going like , well , I mean , his shirt's only unbuttoned , it's not all the way off . You know like , what do you want from me ? But they are . They're very oddly inconsistent about their romance covers too , and it's very , I find it so bizarre .
Yeah , it's very bizarre . I mean , we've kind of known like historically , if you have too much skin on the cover , it gets challenging to run ads .
But because Amazon is always changing and if you're listening to this and you're like , well , I've never been able to run ads because I have like the guys half naked on the cover or whatever , I would pitch them again for ads and see what they say . I would pitch them again for ads and see what they say .
The one thing that we know about Amazon , the one consistent thing about Amazon , is they are super inconsistent , absolutely . But you have to be your own best advocate . So you have to , you know , pull up a support ticket , write them and then write them again and then write them again .
And I know that sounds obnoxious , but sometimes you really do have to be obnoxious because Amazon again largely run a lot of what . A lot of the responses that you get are just AI responses , right , yep , and it can be really really frustrating .
But you really have to be your own best advocate , in particular for ads , because ads has just gotten Amazon ads for whatever reason . It's just gotten really weird with their rejections .
That is interesting too , because it's like Amazon has how many arms and they don't talk . Because I will say , not to drag this out , but for A plus content . If any of you listening have ever had issues with that , believe it or not . They are the exact opposite , penny .
When you have an issue with A-plus content , they are surprisingly forthcoming and specific about what their issues are with it . There's really no guessing , which just blows my mind still . It still shocks me that it's so easy to deal with fixes in A-plus content compared to ads .
It's so weird , yes , and very frustrating too , because we get it Like we work with a lot of first-time authors and we fully understand how mind-numbingly frustrating jumping through all these hoops can be with Amazon .
Yeah , yeah , and actually you know it's interesting not necessarily related to the ads but I had an author who we actually I've never consulted with him , I just follow him on Instagram and it was his first book and Amazon just randomly pulled it one day . Like he went in and changed the price and Amazon randomly pulled it and I felt really bad .
He's actually an influencer and he wrote this book . And Amazon randomly pulled it and I felt really bad . He's actually an influencer and he wrote this book . And so I messaged him and I said listen , you can't give up , you have to call them , you have to be your own best advocate .
And then , within like three days , they were like oh , that was just a mistake . Amazon is glitchy as hell , so you really have to be . And you know the book was . The book found its way back on Amazon . All the reviews were still intact . He lost three days , but you know he wrote this post . He's just like , oh , I'm just giving up and I understand .
That's really where you get to , because you're just like well , amazon , just like this big machine , I get it . The one consistent thing , as I said , about Amazon is they are wildly inconsistent , so you have to really get in there and just file those support tickets or call them and get until you get .
And you know , if you ask three people the same question , amazon , you will get three different answers . Yes , that is absolutely true . Yeah , it's just , it's the craziest thing . So , psa , if you're having trouble with your ads , if you're listening to this , you're like , oh , I keep getting rejected .
Write them , call them , be your own best advocate for this , because at some point now with this author's book , they're like okay , yeah , we're going to approve it .
Really , yep , yeah exactly Pull out your inner toddler and just keep asking until you get the answer you want . There you go .
That's a great analogy , oh , my God , I think for the image for this podcast . I'm going to do that , that's funny .
Yep , just a fall on meltdown tantrum .
Like the little kid just pulling on their mother's skirt , like , can I have it now ? Can I have it now ? That's exactly what you have to be with Amazon . Yep , all right , well , listen , thank you so much . I know this was a short episode , but just wanted to kind of drop this into your feed and let you know this is what we're seeing on Amazon .
We love show ideas . Actually , we just recorded a podcast . Amy came up with a brilliant idea . As opposed to a show idea , amy , you want to take it from here ?
with yes . What are you challenged with Any phase in this whole process of getting your book to market ? marketing it , figuring out your author brand , all the things . You don't have to come up with a full-blown show idea .
Just email us and say this is what I'm having a problem with right now , and Penny and I will brainstorm how to turn that into a show and try to get these back out to you . We really do for what it's worth . We prioritize suggestions that come from listeners for sure . Yeah , you know so .
If you send it in , we really do try to make those shows happen sooner rather than later , because a lot of times it is because somebody's in the middle of struggling with that particular issue . So if we can help you out by creating a show and getting it out there right away , we want to do that .
Yeah , exactly , and I think , finally , if you have had , if you listen to one of our shows and you did you know it inspired you to do something and you've had success with that . We want to know about that too . We will give you a shout out on the next show that we record . So all the things , all the news we love all you guys for listening .
Thank you so much , um , and we will see you next week . Bye-bye .