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Lots of people are talking these days about using email marketing, and I know exactly why, as I explained earlier this week.
Email is the best way I know of for authors to engage with their fans and truly get the most from their published books. And for many nonfiction authors, it represents the possibility to build a stable business or writing career independent of gatekeepers, bosses, and 9-to-5 jobs.
Email Newsletters
Probably the best vehicle for most authors to use for their email marketing is the email newsletter.
Email newsletters are very flexible and can work for all kinds of authors. They can be fancy or plain, long or short, chatty or journalistic, it’s really up to you.
What’s great about email newsletters is how people look forward to them when you get aligned with your readers.
I asked some very successful authors who use email newsletters how important they were. Here’s what they had to say, first from Hope Clark:
“A newsletter is a more universal tool that can reach across ages, experiences, and backgrounds of readers. It doesn’t take a reader, software, or audio. Everyone has email. Readers also can hit reply and feel they touch a person, not a program. It’s more personable, and if used consistently, I’ve learned that a newsletter can become habit to readers. FundsforWriters has gone out for every Friday for 16 years, short of two weeks I was out of country. Readers tell me all the time that they look forward to Friday nights when they can read their “delivery” whether they print it off or read it online. I’ve tried blogs and podcasts but have learned that a newsletter is more complete in its reach and simplest for both the deliverer and the recipient. It’s simple, and I’m not amazed that its popularity is coming back around.”—C. Hope Clark, Founder FundsforWriters.com. Chosen by Writer’s Digest for its 101 Best Websites for Writers for the past 15 years.
Hope has one of the most interesting and useful email newsletters I know, and it’s obviously working quite well for her.
I also asked Joan Stewart, author and publicity expert about her email newsletter:
“Major benefit: Ka-ching, ka-ching. Why: I email 3 publicity tips and a link to one funny dog video twice a week–every Tuesday and Saturday, to 5,000 subscribers. I’ve been emailing these tips consistently for more than 13 years. This newsletter is my most profitable marketing tool, by far. It, along with a separate list of 8,000 people in my shopping cart, has made me hundreds of thousands of dollars in product sales, consulting assignments, speaking engagements and affiliate commission. You can opt in from the box in the upper left corner of my Publicity Hound website. I’ve also compiled a handy cheat sheet for authors on “10 Profitable Ways to Use Email to Create SuperFans Who Help You Sell Books.”—Joan Stewart, PublicityHound.com
Learn How to Do Your Own
The results that authors like Hope and Joan are getting with their email newsletters is why I’m particularly excited to be offering this webinar on Monday with Dan Blank.
Dan mails his newsletter every week on Friday, and it’s one of the best I’ve ever seen.
But Dan is also someone who really knows how to help authors. He teaches, consults, motivates, and guides authors, both traditionally published and indie.
He’s been called on by publishers like Random House and Hachette to help get their authors up to speed with social media engagement.
Dan has a clear and engaging teaching style, and this webinar will be packed with stuff you can use right away. We’ll cover topic like:
- How to grow the audience for your books via email newsletters.
- How to turn casual readers into true fans who create word of mouth marketing.
- How to encourage more book sales.
- How to leverage story and voice to create a killer newsletter.
- How to ensure your newsletter becomes an always-on engine for your next book launch!
Webinar Info
Date: Monday, June 1, 2015
Time: 1:00 p.m. Pacific, 4:00 p.m. Eastern
Length: 1 hour
Registration: Click here to get your seat now: How to Grow Your Audience and Sell More Books with an Email Newsletter
Replay: Yes, there will be a replay available, so register even if you can’t make the live event
Q&A: Sure, bring your questions
If you’ve been wondering exactly how email can work for you, don’t miss this live event with Dan.
Here’s that link one more time: How to Grow Your Audience and Sell More Books with an Email Newsletter
On Monday, grab your favorite beverage, clear your calendar, and tune in. I’ll see you on the webinar!
Photo credit: Mailboxes in ivy via photopin (license)
I finally got the correct page and signup was easy. Be there Monday. Thanks
Joel, I just read your most recent posting and signed up for the discussion.
I’m about to use one of my BookBaby ebook distributor’s promotional partners, Story Cartel. Their twelve thousand plus members are allowed to download a free pdf of your book in exchange for the expectation that they will provide a review.
But to me, a bigger benefit is that as a Story Cartel author, you get email addresses from everyone who downloads your book. A substantial email list coupled with having a successful blog and those many followers on social media seems like a good recipe.
I look forward to the information that will provided by you and Dan on the webinar.
For this site there is no website required. When I try to signup for the seminar I get a message that my email is not accepted, I need a website email which I don’t have yet.
For this site there is no website required. When I try to signup for the seminar I get a message that my email is not accepted, I need a website email.
I already understand that it will be a long slog but I have to start somewhere and email doesn’t require anymore than time. I have a start list of over 200 email addresses, all people I know personally. While warming them up for the book I can put in the time for a rewrite with some occasional professional help (when I can accumulate a few hundred from my SS).
Does this make sense to you people who are already established?
PS: Not new to writing. Successful tech writer for almost 20 yrs. Associate degree Industrial Engineering, earned with military financial assistance while working full time, married and raising two boys (both successful today). Took me seven years of night school. Deans list.
I’m a first time writer. Non-fiction. Retired, 78, SS doesn’t make it. Trying to gather all the info I can on how to go about it. I have a mostly written book but have to go it on my own, ie self publish. I don’t have a website yet, and have to forego a lot of good info because I can’t logon. How to get around this?
Russ, you can attend the free webinar without having your own website. Just click the register link in the article and you’ll get an email explaining how to attend.
Let’s be honest here – email newsletters aren’t going to magically sell more books for you. They may give some info to people that already know about you and know what you’re doing, but you’re not going to have tons of sales next week.
How are you going to grow your email list? How are you going to get people interested enough in you to sign-up? How are you going to make people realize you actually exist and have a sign-up?
I feel sorry for all of you that think you’ll catapult to some new level after starting an email list. It’s a long slog, and while I’m sure Mr. Blank’s webinar will have some tips, I also doubt those tips are going to change your life.
Notice the two quoted people say 13 years and 16 years for how long they’ve been doing this. About all I’d expect from Mr. Blank are some emails each month that I don’t really want. I certainly wouldn’t expect more book sales, and I don’t think you should either with this gimmick.
Greg, you’re points are well said. I do think that email newsletters have some success for nonfiction issues, especially about marketing and selling products, or pitched to a particular “subject” group like an author writing about adoption or schizophrenia or raising teenagers. Lots of readers want to keep up with the latest news and updates on an issue. But for fiction, I just don’t see how a weekly or monthly newsletter is going to spark sales and that’s why I’m wondering if Dan Blank is addressing just nonfiction. I’m very skeptical about asking people to sign up for a weekly newsletter so I can keep pitching my book. Maybe Dan has some other perspectives on it?
Paula, Dan will specifically address fiction authors, and how email newsletters work for them. In fact, as far as I know most of the authors he consults with are fiction authors.
How to grow your list is one of the topics we’ll cover on the webinar, and it’s certainly an important one.
Just because Joan and Hope have been doing this a long time doesn’t mean it takes a long time to get positive results. I’ve built a great list in about 2 years that supports my book publishing and other activities. Like anything else, you will get better over time.
That’s if you actually try. Of course, if you’re cynical about other people’s results and about people with experience who are actually trying to help authors stand out in the crowd, and therefore you never even try, I can guarantee you’ll get no results at all.
And if you think an email list that supports 2 6-figure businesses is a “gimmick” then I guess you’re one of those people who will never try, and that’s too bad.
Greg, the big mistake most authors make is they fail to understand that the won’t make much money from their book—or any money at all by the time all the bills are paid.
The power of an email newsletter is being in front of your audience consistently, week after week. You’re there when a meeting planner who subscribes needs a speaker, when a reader needs emergency consulting, when a podcaster needs a guest for his show, when a potential joint venture partner sees what you’re doing and calls with an irresistible invitation to join her on a project.
The book is the calling card. The real money comes from spin-off products, online courses, “Rend My Brain” sessions, group coaching, mentor programs, paid speaking engagements, affiliate programs where you sell other people’s products and services for a commission. And lots more.
Will Dan be addressing nonfiction or fiction? Or both? Most of the email/newsletter strategies seem to favor nonfiction. Would this webinar serve the fiction author?