Case Study: Inside the Metrics of James Swanwick’s Triple #1 Amazon Release
How Strategy, Data (and a Ton of Hard Work) Turned a Book Into an Eight-Figure Lead-Generation Engine
My company, New Wave Press, publishes expert nonfiction in health, wealth, and mindset. The intention of The Future of Publishing Substack is to show you both our philosophical approach to publishing and the actual strategies we employ when developing and launching bestsellers.
In today’s post, I’m going to open the kimono on the recent launch of our book CLEAR: The Only Neuroscience-Based Method for High Achievers to Quit Drinking Without Willpower, Rehab, or AA.
James Swanwick is a former ESPN Sports Center anchor and the founder of Alcohol-Free Lifestyle, an eight-figure coaching company that has helped thousands of high achievers quit drinking without willpower, rehab, or AA.
His program is so effective that a 2023 study conducted by University of Washington concluded it could help participants reduce their drinking by up to 98%. These stats blow other methods for quitting out if the water.
But when James set out publish a book that would share his secrets with the world, his journey began with a hard “no” from 16 major publishers.
“I pitched 16 publishers. They all said no. So I said, ‘F them—I’ll publish it myself and make millions. Even if a traditional publisher had said yes, it would’ve taken two years just to get it to print—and they’d take most of the profits. I’d rather bet on myself.”
-James Swanwick
Rather than give up, he partnered with New Wave Press—leading to results even big houses chase: a #1 New Release in three Amazon categories (Alcoholism Recovery, Alcoholism, Healing) and a first-year sales pace outstripping 95% of traditional book launches.
For James, the book wasn’t just a win—it’s fast becoming his company’s primary source of authority, daily leads, and impact.
From Messy Draft to Market-Ready in 9 Months
Most nonfiction books published through traditional houses take 18–24 months to go from manuscript to bookstore shelves. This long timeline includes waiting on industry gatekeepers, multi-stage approval processes, and crowded publishing calendars.
By contrast, James’ partnership with New Wave Press delivered a professionally written, edited, designed, and market-ready book—complete with a turnkey launch strategy—in just 9 months.
This accelerated timeline meant James could capitalize on market momentum, immediately begin generating leads, and outperform industry averages while competitors were still waiting in the queue.
What James started with: 50,000+ disorganized words—emails, blog posts, notes, and rough chapters.
What New Wave Press did: We structured, co-wrote, and refined the manuscript for speed and impact, partnering closely with James to make the book resonate for high achievers. Our structured process delivered a professional product in just nine months—less than half the traditional timeline.
In other words: Faster launch. Faster results. No compromises on quality.
How We Engineered CLEAR to Become the #1 New Release on Amazon in THREE Categories
First, let’s establish one core premise: rankings matter.
Why? The higher your book ranks, the more likely it is to get seen by your target audience and the more likely you are to turn those readers into revenue down the line.
But that begs the question: what type of rankings?
You have probably heard of bestseller lists from newspapers like The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal — but in today’s media landscape, it turns out that the polish of those “old guard” publications is wearing thin.
What matters in the digital (and, gulp, AI) era is data. And no retailer has more customer data than Amazon.
Amazon rankings are what matter most when it comes to book visibility and as an overall indicator of success. And this isn’t just our opinion.
Members of the “Big 5” publishing houses are quietly admitting this, too. Simon & Schuster CEO Jonathan Karp stated this very sentiment under oath during an anti-trust lawsuit brought by the Department of Justice in 2022:
“Amazon’s bestseller list, in my view, is more important than the New York Times bestseller list.”
-Jonathan Karp | Simon & Schuster CEO
Amazon rankings are what the biggest publishers in the world base their financial decisions on because unlike traditional outlets like NYT and WSJ who curate “weighted” lists that amount to little more than an “editor’s choice” column, the Amazon bestseller lists actually track what’s selling by volume — and what readers are actually buying.
So, we followed the data and optimized for Amazon directly by doing extensive keyword research that informed how we chose the subtitle of the book itself.
The results we uncovered were quite interesting, to say the least.
Our original subtitle for the book was “The Only Neuroscience-Based Method For High Achievers to Finally Break Free From The Grip of Alcohol.”
Everybody on the team liked it, but our research pointed us in a different direction. We utilized proprietary software to analyze relevant keywords across all titles in the space and chose a specific phrase that had relatively high search volume with comparatively low competition score.
Based on these results, we came up with the following subtitle that inserted a full keyword phrase: “The Only Neuroscience-Based Method For High Achievers To Quit Drinking Without Willpower, Rehab or AA.”
This straightforward and strategic approach led to CLEAR skyrocketing up the Amazon charts to #1 three categories: Alcoholism Recovery, Alcoholism, Healing.
Observing the Ripple Effect of Five-Star Reviews
The ripple effect of all the momentum we created was 50+ reviews (average of 4.9 stars) in just 2 months after publication (as of this writing).
This is significant because earning 50 or more Amazon reviews is a milestone that sets books apart in a crowded market. Industry research shows that fewer than 5% of books ever reach 50 reviews on Amazon.
This milestone is not only a strong indicator of real reader engagement and social proof, but also a key trigger for Amazon’s algorithm to boost a book’s visibility and credibility.
These aren’t just random AI reviews, either. The book has received heartfelt, genuine feedback from people whose lives have been changed by the material. After all, drinking is a problem that affects not only the user, but everybody in their life.
You can scan through some of the reviews below:
By surpassing milestone of 50 genuine reviews in just 60 days, James’ book joined the top percentile of independently published titles—reflecting both outstanding reader impact and market traction.
This is why we follow the data.
PS: I just checked. We got another one as I was writing this.
Diving Into Sales and Engagement Benchmarks
In its first 60 days after publication, CLEAR has sold 1,718 copies across print, audiobook and ebook formats (as of June 9, 2025 at 4:52pm EST, to be precise).
Here’s the breakdown across different formats:
So, are these numbers good or not? If this is your first time digging into the numbers of a book launch, allow me to lend some perspective for context.
The average self-published non-fiction book sells fewer than 250 copies total in its lifetime. The average traditionally published non-fiction book sells between 500 and 2,000 total copies in its lifetime.
According to a study by Publisher’s Weekly:
“950,000 titles out of the 1.2 million tracked by Nielsen BookScan sold fewer than 99 copies. Another 200,000 sold fewer than 1,000 copies. Only 25,000 sold more than 5,000 copies. The average book in America sells about 500 copies.“
It’s also important to note that James, like the majority of our authors, is most concerned with targeting a specific avatar who is a perfect fit for his high value, high ticket programming.
In this instance, that means CEOs, professionals and top performers in various fields who want to get control of alcohol as a way of upgrading their health, supercharging their already successful careers — and most importantly, improving their relationships with loved ones.
These clients tend to be in their 40’s, 50’s and 60’s. They have most likely struggled for years with the fact that while they are not alcoholics, they know alcohol is dulling their edge. They have likely already tried things like Alcoholics Anonymous, rehab or “white knuckling” it to various degrees of success.
This avatar is very specific and although the book can be utilized by anyone, it’s designed to help a targeted audience. Given those parameters, going as broad as possible to the general population was never the goal. We were shooting for a subset of people with the time, money and motivation to take the next step after reading.
We factored the makeup of that ideal audience into our launch targets.
“I care more about how many books we sell to our dream avatar of prospect…I’d much rather sell less and have a great influx of leads to my coaching program.”
-James Swanwick
More than raw sales data, we were fascinated by what the engagement metrics revealed about how people in James’ target market are consuming the book.
10,000+ Pages Read
In just the first 60 days post-launch, Swanwick’s book generated over 10,200 Kindle pages read across 250+ readers—that’s the equivalent of nearly 48 entire read-throughs of the 213-page book.
For context, industry data shows most self-published nonfiction books never reach even 10,000 pages read in their entire lifespan. This level of Kindle engagement signals true reader interest and positions the book for continued visibility and profitability on Amazon.
1,200+ Hours Listened
In the book’s first two months, listeners logged over 1,200 hours—averaging 3 hours per person (50% of the audiobook’s total length).
This puts the book at the very top of averages for nonfiction, where most books are completed only 35–50% of the way. This means listeners are deeply engaging with James’s message, which maximizes the impact of every coaching and program invitation he makes.
We love to see it.
Not All Book Sales Are Created Equally
Let me tell you a dirty little secret that many “bestselling” authors don’t want you to know: you can buy your way onto any list with enough bulk orders and logistical management — even coveted bestseller lists like those of the New York Times. That’s is another conversation for another day.
However, this is the reason why as an author you shouldn’t just be impressed by total sales volume. While it’s great to sell a lot of books — you should be more impressed by sales over time.
Many books that are marketed aggressively sell well the first week or so…then fall off shortly after. They’ve achieved a bestseller badge, but not much more. Consistent sales over time, even in smaller amounts, are a better indicator that people actually care about your work.
In other words: It’s better to have a book that sells 5-10 copies every day for 5 years consistently than it is to have a book that sells 5,000 copies in a 7-day blitz, then immediately drops off when the hype fades. The former shows continued engagement and word of mouth from a real fan base. The latter is a party trick that can be bought.
As of today, CLEAR is averaging 25+ copies sold per day across formats organically. Obviously we are only two months post-launch as of this article, so we will continue to track and update you with our findings. That being said, we’ve barely scratched the surface.
We haven’t turned on any paid traffic yet.
We haven’t engaged any influencers to push it.
We haven’t gotten any corporate bulk sales.
We are in the middle of a podcast tour, with several big shows in the works.
We’re still in the early stages of tracking conversions from reader to high-ticket client.
This is all being driven via word of mouth because the book itself is a stellar product.
Based on how early we are in the game and the momentum it already has, I don’t see any reason why we won’t sell 7,500-10,000 copies across all formats in the first year. That puts it in the top 2-3% of books who sell that many copies in their lifetime.
What’s Next For CLEAR?
They say a book is never truly finished, it’s just abandoned by the author—and I think it’s the same with this case study. The work for CLEAR (and all our titles) never truly stops. As of the writing of this post, the machine has barely warmed up for this book.
There’s a lot more work to be done. We’ll make sure to continuously update this post with the latest performance metrics as the book unlocks new levels of revenue and success for James and his team.
“If you’re thinking about working with New Wave, I would say do it — because it’s not just getting help writing and publishing the book. It’s outstanding support, strategizing the marketing and ensuring that all T’s are crossed and all I’s are dotted.
If you’re serious about impact, work with New Wave. You’re not just getting a book—you’re building a lead engine.”
-James Swanwick
Update: July 2025
CLEAR was recently featured on a three-story billboard in the iconic TIMES SQUARE. This is a lifetime achievement for James after years of working to get this book into the world. Such a monumental accomplishment proves our thesis at New Wave Press that you do not need the blessing of traditional publishing to make a big impact with your book and get the attention of the world.
I must humbly brag that 99.99% of authors will never achieve what James was able to do by working with New Wave Press—and the proof is big enough for the world to see.
In the meantime, what about you?
If you’re an entrepreneur, coach or professional who’s already creating 7 or 8-figures of revenue in your business, but you don’t have a book…you’re missing a tremendously powerful asset that can drive leads, grow sales and build brand authority.
Ready to get started writing your book? Click here to book a call with our team today to learn more about our process and see if it’s a fit.
If you found that information useful, this post dives deep into a few of the “dirty secrets” of the publishing industry that stop authors from making the biggest ROI on their life’s work—and how we’ve developed strategies at New Wave Press to flip the model on its head in favor of entrepreneurs.
We’re baring it all….
Open the kimono? Lol. ;)