Hey everyone, and welcome to the fifth part of our little series called How to Stand Out. It’s about book marketing, and this time around, about email subscribers, and I hope you will find it helpful. You can find part one here, part two here, part three here, and part four here.

Today, I am chatting about building an email list. There has been a lot said about it on other blogs and in some webinars of late, so I am just agreeing with what all has been said, and giving the info out again. This is one area that I have NOT mastered yet, so remember that I am not an expert in this, but maybe using this info together we can both succeed.

The most often asked question authors have about email lists are first of all how do I build one, and second of all, why do I need one. I hope to answer both of these questions here today.

If you build an email list, traffic will come

 

 

• HOW do I build an email list?

 

Well, that’s the easy part.

First of all, you place these email subscribe offers in some pretty specific places. I have tried several. On my sidebar, and at the bottom and top of my site. I cannot say as to which one was most effective. I will say that these things can be the most ANNOYING pop up boxes of any site you surf these days. SO, be careful with placement and don’t be obnoxious with it.

Second, you collect emails from site visitors, through one or two different ways. I offered a short story for free for subscribers, and I have offered a semi-regular newsletter. I would say the short story was the most effective. I am a terrible newsletter writer.

But this is what you and I must master. WE must be better writers! We do this by either an interesting newsletter, or informative email to welcome new subscribers. We also give them a chance to get a free “something”, as that seems to be the way most email marketing is done.

 

• What will an email list do for me?

 

This is a bit trickier to answer.

First of all, we need an email list with interested subscribers in order to make sales. It’s pretty obvious that selling on social media is just not going to work the way most writers do it. We cannot spend all our time touting our wares on Facebook and Twitter. Our fans and followers will stop liking us quickly.

But by emailing readers who have signed up to be notified, and keeping them informed, well, that seems to work very nicely. I have had success with offering videos, and podcasts for free as well as notifying about a new work being released.

Just as long as you make sure that all of your emails are kept to a reasonable amount, and don’t become spammy,you should be just fine. There are autoresponders who do most of the heavy lifting at sending out at regular intervals for you. You can set them up to send out at one day, one week, one month or one year, and even more!

Bottom line: get subscribers. Send them notices but keep it real. Let them know what to expect from the get-go. They will be happy to be on the front line of information about your work, and they will be thanking you for the thoughtful way in which you send them info.

PS- don’t worry too much about site traffic anymore…with email subscribers, who needs traffic??