Morgan Clasper Author

Not too long ago, I came out of a writing hiatus and decided to write a spinoff novel for my biggest series. I’d heard plenty about ARC campaigns before, but I’d never really committed to testing one myself.

For that reason, I decided to create a simple, small-scale experiment to gather some first-hand experience.

While wild stories of breakout success (I.e., “I ran an ARC campaign and sold 11,000 books”) are certainly inspiring, they don’t often reflect the reality of publishing and the usual results that authors can hope for.

These big numbers can also feel dejecting when you run a campaign and it doesn’t even come close to these massive outliers.

In this article, I’ll share how I ran a $100 ARC campaign for my YA fantasy book. I’ll show you my exact strategy, the landing page I used, and—most importantly—my results.

The benefits of an ARC campaign

Imagine if you could launch your book with reviews already lined up. Instead of obsessively checking your book page and wondering when (or if) they’ll ever start trickling in, you could have them in place within the first few days of going live.

This is the power of an ARC team. By sharing a free copy of your book before publication to a dedicated group of readers, you can gather vital “social proof” for when your book launches. That means, when you run ads or book promotions, you’re more likely to sell books because people are more comfortable taking a chance on you.

My strategy (gathering readers)

There were five steps to my strategy for gathering ARC readers. The first was drawing on my existing fiction newsletter of several hundred subscribers. This would give me a core of readers who were already familiar with my books.

The second step was running a small $100 Facebook ads campaign. The third was listing my book on dedicated ARC reader websites. The sites I chose were BookSirens and BookSprout. I avoided NetGalley due to the high price.

The fourth and final step was to list my book in multiple subreddits and Facebook groups that are dedicated to ARC readers. I had around half a dozen FB groups, two subreddits, and a couple of Goodreads groups as well.

 I gave myself 6 weeks from starting the campaign to launch day, with 2 weeks to gather the bulk of my signups. I reasoned that there was enough time for readers to finish the book, but not so much time that they forgot about it and never got around to reviewing it.

Building an onboarding system

Finding readers alone wasn’t enough. I also needed a simple system to deliver the ARC, provide timely reminders, and push for reviews when the book went live.

For signups, I created a MailerLite landing page with the cover and essential details about the book. I’ve found that one simple trick for backgrounds is to take a text-free version of the cover and apply a dark overlay. I made sure to highlight:

• How the ARC process works
• Who the book is a good fit for
• And what readers can expect

I also provided the blurb and a link to the first chapter. My reasoning behind this was so that people could check out a preview and decide if the story was to their taste. That way, I wouldn’t end up with readers who signed up, started the book, but never finished because they didn’t enjoy the writing. This would also help mitigate the risk of low reviews.

The signup page was linked directly to a special ARC group inside MailerLite, with an accompanying email automation. I had 3 emails set to go out. The welcome email expanded on how ARC teams work and what to expect. Critically, I didn’t actually deliver the book in this email. That happened in a second email the next day, where I provided the BookFunnel link.

I had a third email a week later, which served as an “Are you enjoying the book?” check-in, as well as separate campaigns as I approached launch day. These worked as reminders to keep my book in the minds of readers and prepare them for launch.

For delivery, I used BookFunnel. It’s my go-to platform for sharing books.

The results

First, the signups. In total, I had 70 ARC readers. About 25 of these came from my existing list.

The paid ARC sites weren’t particularly effective in terms of numbers. BookSirens led to 3 signups, while I cancelled BookSprout after several weeks due to no signups and only a handful of impressions. I feel like it never really got shown to anyone, which explains the lack of movement.

The subreddits and Facebook groups may have led to a signup or two here and there, but as I expected, they’re heavily oversaturated and lean toward romance—especially Facebook. Because they’re free to post in, they get a constant stream of activity, and I’m not sure how many readers actually use those groups. I wouldn’t make posting here a primary strategy.

My Facebook ad campaign was by far the most effective. I optimized it for link clicks, and had ~450 based on approximately $100 USD in spend. Out of that, 50 readers signed up, leading to a $2 per signup cost, which is the same as what BookSirens was charging me.

I’ll share the ad graphic I used below. I no longer have the original image, so these are screenshots of how the ad appeared in Facebook.

But did people read?

This is where numbers get interesting. Inexpensive leads are great, but only if those people engage with your emails and actually read your book. These are the stats:

• Welcome email: 82% open rate
• ARC book delivery email: 92% open rate, 70% click-through rate
• “Are you enjoying” check-in: 64% open rate, 20% click-through rate

My main takeaway is that delaying the actual ARC delivery to the second email didn’t negatively impact engagement. In fact, it may have increased it because it created a sense of anticipation.

I also included a BookFunnel link in my third email to catch anyone who missed the others or procrastinated on downloading.

I no longer have the Dragonkindled ARC page, so I can’t remember my exact downloads, but the vast majority of readers who signed up did download the book.

The reviews:

Through launch week, I sent out three emails, encouraging readers to leave a review. In total, about 24 readers did, meaning a sign-up-to-review ratio of 34%.

Dragonkindled launched with a rating of 4.8, sold over 105 copies, had 9,000 KU pages read, and achieved a peak rank of around #12,000 on the overall paid store.

In total, I spent around $150 on this campaign. There were some additional costs—$16 on BookSirens and $9 on BookSprout. I did also have subscriptions to BookFunnel and MailerLite, but those weren’t exclusive to the campaign.

My biggest oversight:

Because ARC readers leave a review without purchasing, these aren’t counted as “verified purchases” by Amazon, and so they’re limited to the marketplace in which they’re made.

Because I set my Facebook ads to “worldwide”, I had readers from the US, Canada, Australia, and the UK. While not a big problem, it did mean that my reviews were split across multiple storefronts. Some reviews would show up on the Canadian store, others on the UK storefront, and so my reviews weren’t concentrated.

While BookSirens only resulted in three signups, two of those resulted in reviews, and so I consider it worthwhile.

Conclusion:

It’s absolutely possible to run a modest, budget-friendly ARC campaign that will ensure your book launches with some social proof.

Importantly, it doesn’t require you to have an existing audience. A targeted Facebook ad campaign can draw in engaged readers who will read your book and leave reviews.

Because reviews are so valuable—and often feel difficult to get—an ARC campaign can help your book generate forward momentum and make your entire marketing efforts easier.

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