Interesting Experiment for Freepers

self | 4/11/05 | LS

[LS]

Freepers, my agent told me he had come across reports that suggested that the Amazon rankings of books are partly (even mostly) driven by "hits" on that book's site as opposed to "scans" of actual sales. I'd appreciate some help testing this: I will list three Freeper books, and ask you each to go to their Amazon site. Let's see if there is a sudden change in the numbers. (PS, if you think I'm going this to bump up my own Amazon ratings, then please ignore my book and JUST do the other two.)

Matthew Bracken, "Enemies, Foreign and Domestic." http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0972831010/qid=1113248489/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/104-8532284-7986326,

#71,420

Mark Goldblatt, "Africa Speaks," http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/157962037X/qid=1113248675/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/104-8532284-7986326

#811,994

Larry Schweikart and Michael Allen, "A Patriot's History of the United States," http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1595230017/qid=1105121728/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/104-8532284-7986326?v=glance&s=books

#391

[LS]

The review thing is interesting. Two days ago, I had 26 reviews; today, 24. I can't really figure out which ones were removed.

[maine-iac7]

ah ha. You'll have to copy paste each day and then review...this would make for a good research work. We know Barnes and Noble are totally liberal - hoping Amazon isn't.

Maybe they remove really bad ones for the sake of sales.

Be interesting to know which reason - sales or politics?

[LS]

Matt's book is up to #60,000 now. That's a pretty good leap. Mark's is up 2000. I think there is something to this. Obviously, the further up the rankings you are, the more "hits" it takes to move it further up, so I don't expect to see as much movement with my book.

[Toskrin]

All three hit.

[Living Free in NH]

I hit 'em all. Good luck with your experiment.

[LS]

Thanks. Well, here's what I found out: my book moved a little (10 spots), and Matt's book moved quite a bit (10,000 spots) but Mark's book actually dropped.

After I passed this info along to my agent, he said it didn't make sense---Marks' book (the lowest one) should have moved the most with just a couple of hits.

He also said once he had a guy try to "jimmy" his Amazon rating by having 1700 people on his newsletter list buy the book, and he reimbursed them. He got #2, but it cost him more than he made :)

[trussell]

clicked on all three. Hope it helps.

[LS]

See post 46.