Want Raving Fans With An Author’s Email List?
Want Raving Fans With An Author’s Email List?
An email list would have to be one of the most important assets of an author’s tool kit. As well, it would have to be a focal point of any author platform.
You’ve heard the saying, I’m sure, that “The money is in the list”. An email list is a way of getting a group of raving fans.
The idea is to have an email list of followers with whom you can communicate. Communicating with these people on your list helps you to build your audience and you can establish relationships of mutual respect and trust.
Your followers want to hear from you, they want to learn from you, and they are happy to receive your emails.
Permission for communication was given when they gave you their email address and if they don’t want to communicate with you they will unsubscribe.
Why an email list?
With an email list, relationships are built and its members become your followers. As this author-audience relationship evolves it eventually becomes a relationship of trust.
The email list is about building your own audience – an audience that gets to like and trust you.
These are the people who become your raving fans. These are the ones who will buy your book.
When you release a new book you’ve already got a list of people excited to buy it.
Just imagine building a large audience, let’s say the list is 5,000 or 10,000. It’s a no-brainer – you’d just have to make sales, wouldn’t you think?
Reviews
With an email list, you can build a list of reviewers. They become your review team. Whenever you release a new book you can tell the review team about your latest book.
You can source people who would be interested in joining your ARC (Advance Review Copy) team. These are readers who would like to receive an advanced copy of your book prior to its publication.
Then when the book is published on Amazon they post a customer review.
Own your database
Even if you build large followings on social media you still need to build an email list that you own. The problem with having large lists on social media you don’t own those lists.
You can lose those followers. Social media accounts can be blocked or suspended and you can find that you have no access to your followers because you did not abide by their rules. You did not play their game and you’ve been relying on these platforms for your success.
As a priority, you need to direct your contacts to your email list, the list that you own.
Build an email list in 4 easy steps
To successfully build your email list you will need to invest in a few tools:
- Get a domain name
- Build an author’s website or landing page
- Select an autoresponder
- Put a Lead Magnet onto your website (that is, have something that will give people an incentive to give you their email address)
With your Lead Magnet, you collect email addresses and these go into your autoresponder. You then send out automated emails on a regular basis giving your audience real value.
This way you keep your audience up-to-date with your latest book, or that book you are currently working on, or you will share fresh ideas or anything else that is relevant or of value to your people.
You as the author are in control of your marketing. You are not dependent on a Publisher’s distribution system, social media, or anything else.
Lead Magnets
Brainstorm incentives that you could offer people so that they will give you their email:
- free chapter of your book
- free ebook
- a report
- an article
- checklist
- free online class
- webinar
- video
When should you start building your list? Start now. If possible start even before you’ve written your book.
Your takeaway?
- Find an autoresponder that is right for you. When starting out the most popular one is Mailchimp. It’s a good place to start. And it’s FREE.
- Aweber is a low-cost autoresponder, there’s Get Response, ConvertKit and Active Campaign. I use Keap which is part of Infusionsoft.
- Get a domain name and build a website or landing page
- Offer a great incentive with your Lead magnet
Remember, the idea is to build an email list and to communicate with these people on a regular basis.
Give them valuable content because if you don’t they will unsubscribe.
Don’t put off building your email list! It has proven to be one of the best assets authors can have when establishing a database of raving fans.
Coming soon is an online program of 52 weekly lessons on how to become a self-published author so watch this space. In the meantime learn more about self-publishing in my Free Online Class.
Marji Hill
Author and Coach
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