Tuesday Tidbits: Mailing Lists for Authors

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Tuesday Tidbits: Mailing Lists for Authors

No rant? Thou doth forsaken me again . . .

Love ’em or not, if you are an author, you probably have one or have been told you need one. If you are a reader, you may have signed up for one because:

You enjoy the author’s booksYou want to have advance notice of future publications

Or:

3. You want a free book (most popular)

Good subscribers are had to find and keep. As an author, you have to offer value to the readers on your list. If you are just going to send purchase links, then many will not stick around.

Most mailing lists are generated with a Reader Magnet, a free book or sample chapters for example. Readers will either:

Enjoy your writing and purchase your booksEnjoy your writing and hang around for more freebies (being a beta reader for your next book or receiving your book for free in return for a review)Take the freebie and unsubscribeNever open any emails again

Number fours are easy to spot. Most have a “junk” email address that is used for this purpose as to not clog up the personal one. You know I’m talking to you doodlepoodle57_hahaABC@yahoomail.crom (Dot crom? yahoomail? Haha? Very funny. You might as well use an AOL* address)

I send out a newsletter each week (some authors will say that’s too often), but This is what I give them:

Writing updates. Giving them insights on the workings of a writer.ARC/Beta reading opportunities. I think that in the beginning, all your subscribers should be rewarded for supporting you by becoming your A-list street team. They can have the bragging rights by saying, “I knew them when they were first starting out.”Links to my blog posts for that week. Many readers don’t subscribe to my blog so I give them the highlights if they want to read them. I like to think that I am an entertaining writer, so this is a way to offer more value between book releases.Advance Sales notices. Sometimes I’ll run a sale for my subscribers before making it public.More freebies. Here is where the cross-promotions come into play. With SO and BF, authors team up to advertise to each other’s mailing list, either in a group, or individual. If you are a mystery writer, what better audience than another mystery writer’s list. I always openly state that in my newsletter, saying that author’s are working together to help readers discover new works.

Onto the list.

I purge my list every two months, by sending out an Unsubscribe email to anyone that hasn’t opened the last 10 emails. That way I keep my open/click rates higher- but also eliminating the dead weight.

Do you need a mailing list? Not if you’re a reader, but if you are an author, the answer is maybe. Is it a lot of work? Yup. Is it worth it? Probably.

-Leon

*AOL: Service provider unknown by GenY/Z/Millennials

Leon Stevens is a blogger, composer, artist, and an author of four books (so far): Lines by Leon: Poems, Prose, and Pictures, Journeys: Eight Original Pieces for Classical Guitar, The Knot at the End of the Rope and Other Short Stories, and The View from Here, his first science fiction novella.