Meet Matthew J. Holmes: Transforming Author Marketing with Innovative Facebook Strategies

• July 31, 2023
• no comments

After 10 years working as a video marketer, filming, editing and producing videos for businesses around the UK, I found myself marketing my wife’s fantasy novels, which I’ve taken from earning $100 per month to now over $15,000 per month.

At the beginning of 2020 though, COVID-19 hit and destroyed my video marketing business.

So, I regrouped, did some soul searching and discovered that I loved marketing my wife’s books so much and wanted to help other authors do the same.

Which is why I now spend my days marketing my wife’s books, but also helping self-published authors with their Facebook Ads through my online course, Jumpstart Facebook Ads For Authors.

When I’m not working, you can find me spending time with my family (3 children, 2 dogs and 1 wife – it’s a busy house), in the gym, cycling, walking the dogs, or exploring the great British countryside.

Hi Matthew. Thank you so much for joining us today at Reader Views. Tell us a bit about your Jumpstart Facebook Ads Course and your experiences that motivated you to create the course?

Thank you so much for the opportunity. Absolutely…

I created the Jumpstart Facebook Ads For Authors course because I had learned the hard way how to run Facebook Ads for my wife’s fantasy novels.

I was also receiving so many emails from authors asking for advice and help with their own Facebook Ads, and it’s very difficult and time-consuming to offer one-on-one help like this over email.

So, I thought a video course was the best way to help and impact as many authors as I possibly could avoid the pitfalls I’ve fallen into running Facebook Ads.

Who is the ideal candidate for your course and what unique insights does it offer compared to other courses in the market?

The ideal candidate for Jumpstart Facebook Ads are self-published authors who are either brand new to Facebook Ads and don’t know where to start, as I walk through the hierarchy of Facebook Ads, the fundamentals of how they work, as well as launching, optimizing and scaling them.

Or, self-published authors who have perhaps been running Facebook Ads for some time, so are well seasoned, but are lacking a proven strategy to follow, or are just seeing their results fall off a cliff.

The strategy I share inside the course is unique (as far as I have seen) in the author community and offers a completely fresh approach to running Facebook Ads that no one is talking about.

Yes, it’s different, yes, it’s a bit “scary” running Facebook Ads the way I teach them, but it works. Not just for my wife’s books, but also for the authors who have implemented my strategy with their own Facebook Ads.

My brain likes to simplify everything, so as to make things as straightforward and least complex as possible. And this goes for my Facebook Ads strategy too.

It’s a very simple strategy that can be implemented within 1-2 hours, and then just takes a 60-90 minutes per week to maintain and scale.

It leans heavily into Facebook’s machine learning and removes a lot of the complexities that traditional Facebook Ads strategies involve.

This also plays well into Facebook’s algorithm, as it loves Account Simplification and in fact, thrives on it, resulting in better performance and increased profitability.

I offer a community for members of the course where they can interact with my directly, as well as other authors, sharing experiences, insights, troubleshooting and really covering the nuances of Facebook Ads.

Being an author is lonely, and I’ve found that the community has been a great support system for authors going through the course, as it gives them a place to get their questions answered and not feel like they need to go it alone.

How does your course tackle the common challenges authors face with Facebook advertising and keeping up with ever-evolving trends?

Some of the biggest challenges authors face with running Facebook Ads is the targeting and ad creative. So, my strategy simplifies this massively, by harnessing the power of Facebook’s machine learning and AI (artificial intelligence).

So much so, that I actually do zero targeting with Facebook Ads, which results in more profitable Ads and less stress worrying about which audiences to test next.

Facebook Ads as a platform changes fairly frequently, so I am committed to updating the course at least twice per year to keep up with these changes.

Can you share a couple of success stories?

Sure, one of the authors who has been through my course is Nina, and since implementing my Facebook Ads strategy is on track to hit her first 5 figure month in royalties:

“Since I started using your Facebook system I am on my third record-breaking month in a row and I am on track to break $10,000 for the first time by the end of this month! Thank you for the awesome info :))”

And Stephen, who has only been using my Facebook Ads strategy for around one month, at the time of writing, is also on track to hit his target of £10,000 per month in royalties:

“I started Matt Holmes’ course toward the end of June and already things are ticking up again to reach my goal of £10,000 in sales per month.  I think my highest is £4,600 gross sales with net profit of £3,340 in a month.”

Give us a glimpse into one particular hurdle you help authors overcome when tackling Facebook advertising.

The biggest lever you can pull with Facebook Ads is your Ad Creative – the Ads people see on their Facebook Feed, Instagram Feed, etc.

Many authors though believe it’s the targeting that is the be all and end all, and so they spend hours looking for audiences to test (yes, this was me less than a year ago!).

So, with my strategy, I use an in-built feature of Facebook Ads that allows you to test a bunch of different ideas for your Facebook Ads very quickly, and use Facebook’s knowledge and data to identify who, within their user base, they should show your Ads to.

This method of testing Ad Creative has a huge reduction in wasted Ad Spend, because you’re not forcing Facebook to show Ads to people who don’t want to see them.

You’re allowing the Facebook algorithm to work at its optimum, reach more of your ideal readers and do the job it was built to do, without placing restrictions on it.

Tell us about your book, The Six-Figure Author’s Guide To Facebook Ads and what motivated you to write this book?

Of course, thank you…

My book, The Six-Figure Author’s Guide To Facebook Ads, outlines my Facebook Ads strategy in much more detail than I can cover in this interview. It walks you through:

• How Facebook Ads actually work (it’s not what you think)
• My process for testing Ad Creative
• The simplified Account Structure I use with Facebook Ads
• How to launch, optimize and scale Facebook Ads in 60-90 minutes per week
• The key metrics I pay attention to – and why all the others aren’t worth your time
• And a lot more besides

It’s a full blown strategy in a book that you can implement immediately. And, to help you with the implementation of it, I’ve also included details of a free 3-part video course, where you’ll be able to look over my shoulder as I launch a new Facebook Ads campaign.

And the book is free, so it’s only going to cost a few hours of your time to read.

In today’s competitive literary market, what’s the one piece of advice you would give to new authors about advertising and marketing their books?

The biggest piece of advice I could give is to never look at your Facebook Ads (or any form of marketing for that matter) in isolation.

Always look at the big picture of how all your marketing and adverting is impacting your entire author business.

Also, don’t feel the need to “be everywhere” and “do all the things”.

It’s tempting to jump onto the latest fad or shiny object when we hear about them in Facebook Groups, forums, emails, etc.

But even today, where my wife’s books are earning six figures per year, we have 1 main traffic source, which is Facebook Ads, and that is supported by a little spend on Amazon Ads. That’s it.

Sure, we have a small newsletter audience, but we do no social media (aside from a couple of posts around a book launch), but that’s essentially it.

Without the clear focus and commitment we’ve placed on Facebook Ads, we wouldn’t be where we are today.

In the beginning, I was terrible at this! I was always looking for the next shiny object that would transform our results. I was trying to be everywhere and do all the things.

When, in hindsight, I should have been doubling down on one platform and leveraging it for all it was worth.

And that’s what I do today.

Ultimately, you don’t need to do more. You need to do less, but do it better.

Thank you so much for your time, Matthew. Your insights into the world of book advertising on Facebook are incredibly valuable and we appreciate your dedication to supporting authors in their marketing efforts.

Thank you so much again for this opportunity, I greatly appreciate it.

Matthew J. Holmes is the sponsor of The Matthew J. Holmes Award for Best Fantasy Novel. Learn more about this award and all our prizes here: https://www.readerviews.com/awards-and-prizes/ and visit https://www.readerviews.com/literaryawards/ to learn more about our awards program.

You can connect with Matthew J. Holmes and learn more about him and his work at: https://www.matthewjholmes.com/

Matthew’s book, The Six-Figure Author’s Guide To Facebook Ads: A Facebook Ads Blueprint For Self-Published Authors is available for free on Amazon.