How do you compile a list of email followers of people who like your work?
It seems like such an easy thing to do, but I haven’t figured it out yet. I would prefer to have a web page where people could add their address to a list, and then some way to send an email to everyone on the list, but I don’t want to pay for a service, if I can avoid it. Any free options that aren’t too difficult to set up?
I suppose I could just keep a distro list in Outlook, for that matter, and just get people to “send me an email” if they want to be on my list, but that seems a little casual. What are other people doing to compile such a list? Are most of you doing it?
I had lunch with a writing friend and we agreed this was one of the most valuable things a writer could do to monetize their writing (which, of course, I still haven’t done – hehe).
For the abortive Many Words newsletter, I used TinyLetter. Shows you a list of email addresses, allows you to send an email to all of them, completely free. Seems like what you’re looking for.
Yeah, there are tons of free contact form plug-ins, and some will create a rudimentary subscription service for your updates. Full featured, for-pay mailing list systems like Mailchimp provide better tools, alongside law-abiding features like proper opt out options, etc.
I looked at WordPress, but couldn’t get it to work as I’d like. It was a while back, but it was basically an RSS feed for sign ups and no email address for me. So I could only communicate with my list with a new page. If want a list of email addresses that I can use how I like and take with me to the next thing, if I lose interest in blogging.
I didn’t realize that’s what Mailchimp did. I’ve heard of Mailchimp. I may have to look into the price, even though I doubt I’d pay for it. Sometimes it’s just nice to know what the “top of the line” product does when evaluating other products. Thanks Armando!
I interacted a little bit with Mailchimp at work, and I’d recommend it. “If you have 2,000 or fewer subscribers, you can send up to 12,000 emails per month absolutely free. No expiring trial, contract, or credit card required.”
Wow, that’s great! I imagine it would take me a bit to get to 2k subscribers. I’m going to have to look into it. I mostly just want to make sure I get to maintain the list, including taking the list with me if I want to move to a new service.
Create the mailing list on Mailchimp. Create a landing page for potential readers. Put a link to said landing page in all of your work before it is uploaded. Make the link visible at the beginning and end of the book/story/novella. Bribes work as well. Setup a landing page that automatically sends subscribers a free book when they sign up. Mailing lists have become essential tools for successful authors. I jumped on the bandwagon late and really regret it. Some of my author friends have mailing lists numbering in the thousands.
I suggest looking up Mark Dawson videos on creating mailing lists. Just google him.
For example… my website is now just a landing page. Click ‘Free sample’, and the Mailchimp-executed signup process begins. You can edit the content and style of the messages and add graphics. Eventually you’ll get a link to a pdf sample of the novel, and that file is hosted by Mailchimp. For free.
Heck yeah! I know what I’m doing this weekend for my writing business. I’m excited because I’ve been doing this for a while and now I’m just starting to take it all to the next level, including re-building all my backlist with better tools. Some of the older stories are looking kind of decrepit, lol. Before I republish, I’m going to create a list and put a link into each one.
Thanks tylertoo and Crusis! This is an awesome thread.
For whatever value could be assigned to my endorsement, if any QT3ers are on the bubble, this is a very entertaining story. I’m just over halfway through and the story is really picking up, and the world-building is top notch.
Mr. Zero, I am reading The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro (author of Remains of the Day and Never Let Me Go), and I’m reminded of your book, The Chosen One, quite a bit. In a good way! Ishiguro won a Booker Prize, and I think you out-write him at this genre.
So launch day is here! I have officially (and finally) launched my four-years-in-the-making baseball steampunk novel “Lord Bart and the Leagues of SIP and ALE.” SF writer Ron Collins calls it, “your basic steampunky ‘baseball as political fodder’ thriller, complete with steam-powered dogs, power struggles, career concerns, conniving of the murderous ilk, fights between rookies and vets, and a life and death, summer-long quest for the pennant. If you like fantastical, plot twisty, baseball kind of stories, this is your gig. Simply a fun read.”
So watch the trailer, then head over to my site to get a free sample, or follow the Amazon link there to buy a copy in print or eBook. Also, friends, if you do read it, honest reviews on the Amazon would be a huge help. Thanks!
I’ve been slaving away on my ePub files and it looks great in the Calibre reader, but it looks (and runs) all fucked up looking in Adobe Digital Editions. I know I can tweak the stylesheets, but I’m not really sure which ePub readers are most popular. The ePub I made looks tight in the iBooks app on my Mac. I suppose I can check it out on my iPhone. I’m not even sure what to do with Android.
What are you guys doing along these lines?
As an aside, I just checked out the ePubs I’ve been using that were generated by Smashwords from a DOC file. Not bad, but not that great either. Smashwords puts a clunkly “MIDPOINT” into the middle of the TOC for some reason in every format.
