Thursday, September 22, 2011

The Great Mystery Of Amazon Best Sellers' Rankings

I have no clue how amazon figures out their placement of ranks for book sales.  In fact, I can see no logical connection between the amount of sales and rank at all.
A few days ago, I was listed at 185,000-ish ranking in sales.  Then, a day later, with no new sales but two new book reviews, I jumped to the rank of 139,000.
Okaaaaay.
I stayed there for a few days, sold more books, and went back to 185, 000.  I was still there this morning.  Then, this afternoon, a co-worker at school bought a copy of my book -- and my rank immediately jumped to 69, 839.
For ONE book sale?
Really?
Seriously, if anyone can enlighten me as to how on earth this ranking system has any meaning or relevancy to actual sales, I'd love to hear what you have to say.

4 comments:

  1. I know it is a combination of sales, how many reviews you get and how long people stay on the site reading all about it. (and possibly other stuff I'm not even aware of). so even negative reviews can be good if it keeps people on the page.

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  2. Ah, words of wisdom from someone with more book sales than I have! That helps. It still seems crazy to me, but it helps.
    Thanks.

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  3. I sent chocolates to the secretary entering the data. Didn't help. Sigh, Roland

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  4. Dang. I never thought of that! Maybe next time.

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