Hi all, While my WIP is only 25% or so complete, getting these lists and marketing sorted prior sounds like a good idea. I have read some advice on here, and have done painfully tiresome research into this via the magic of google. My issue is, well - what email list? All the advice says to get your nearly finished work publicity by emailing all the bloggers, people who have signed up to your blog etc and anyone who is "in the business" of publishing or just works in literature overall. It makes complete sense, but I am at a loss as to how to get that list in the first place. Don't get me wrong I am aware of how to initiate all of the above but the chances of catching people in that net is negligable. Social Media is kind of out as I want to remain anonymous with a pen name/pseudonym. Facebook does have a lot of reading clubs etc. Has anyone attempted giving them free ebook copies or certainly a near finished sample in exchange for their email or to ask them to recommend it on their timelines to get sales going? I can imagine unsolicited advertising of your book would go down terribly but a free copy/sample is very benign and inviting right? It reminds me of the usual job hunt "Needs minimum 2 years in industry" - but how do you get the first 2 years if everyone expects 2 years! I know the answer is "that's the struggle/gatekeeper issue" but the articles never reflect this. None of them really give advice on how they grew that list. The majority just advise you to make use of this elusive list they all seem to expect you to have with a few professionals in the business too!
you can twitter with a pseudonym if you want That aside lots of self published authors explain how to build a list - nick Stephenson and Joanna penn spring to mind In essence your list is going to grow organically book to book (mines on about 20 so far 5 months in) as one of the best ways is to put the sign up in the back of your work so anyone who reads is and enjoys it can sign up for more. Also you need to offer an incentive for sign up (I use a free 25k word novella written for the purpose). You could also used paid facebook/amazon adds to push the sign up , although I didn't. Some people also use a free book with a sign up in the back and push the book via freebooksy or similar. End of the day we have to look at this as an author career thing,, not marketing for book 1
Also post your email sign up on the front page of your author website, don't bury it under a sub heading (I actually did both), and then aim to attract people to your website by content provision whether that's blogs, podcasts, downloads or whatever - linked to your social media accounts
