Email lists: What do you want from the author?

For most authors marketing their books is tougher than writing them.

Numerous blogs, webinars, and courses provide advice. The general consensus, at the moment, (I say this advisedly, because a month or two from now, the direction might be quite different) is to build an email list of subscribers.

I’ve subscribed to a number of author emails lists. Some email only to announce a new book, which means I hear from them once a year or so. One gentleman emails about his latest release and also writes about the state of publishing and marketing. This author is prolific. His emails come every few months. Yet another sends fascinating tidbits a couple of times a month related to ancient history—you won’t be surprised to learn that his genre is historical fiction. One woman writes weekly with sage advice and tips about writing.  Then there’s the guy who sends out short bits daily.

So, for an author trying to market his or her books, what is the magic “email” answer?

We’re told:

·       Offer them books, extra chapters, character profiles—al for free of course.

·       Email often—once a week at least.

·       Don’t email too often—once a month will do.

·       Keep your emails short.

·       Provide long, informative emails.

The thing is, with all these emails floating about, I don’t know that anyone has stopped to ask subscribers what they really want. So, here’s the question of the day:

Once you’ve decided to sign up to an author’s email list, what do you expect to receive from that author and how often do you want to hear from him or her?

Youth Sells

Every morning I lie in bed listening to the birds, my eyes on the palm tree, waiting for the morning when the dangling frond will have succumbed to gravity and released its fragile grip on the tree. The frond proves to be tenacious and day after day, it clings to life while the younger fronds, tall and erect, reach eagerly for the sky. Below them fronds begin to bend, then droop and finally sag with age.

Every morning my granddaughter bounds into my room. “Hi grandma. Let’s play.” She’s like the new fronds at the top, eagerly reaching for the joys of the new day. And me? I’m somewhere in between—a middle aged frond, not yet drooping, but certainly not possessing the energy I once had.

We live in a society that worships youth. Perfect wrinkle free bodies populate ads and television and movies. A Hollywood agent told me that no self-respecting star would agree to play a mother—not before she was in her fifties at least. The same rule doesn’t seem to apply to men, but that’s a whole other topic.

Those of us who are older bemoan the emphasis on youth, the obsession with youth, the lack of respect and regard for age and wisdom, but watching the palm, I wonder if we have it wrong. Are the young, with their energy and enthusiasm more important? Certainly they are essential to the future of our society. It is they who will take care of us as we age and, like the dangling palm frond, eventually succumb to our fate.

With the great desire to have some decent sales of my books before I die, I ask: “From the authors’ perspective, how does our age affect our promotion and sales?”

Brian Feinblum says it best. In his blog, “Are authors sexy enough for the books they write?” http://ow.ly/uDXrm He says, “‘They say not to “judge a book by its cover,’ but do consumers judge a book by the age (and looks) of its author?”

Good questions. Being a young attractive author should be an advantage for marketing books. We market through social media which lets readers into our lives, lets them see and hear us, and that may influence buying decisions. So, if we are older authors, do we hide away, or pretend to be younger, or do we flaunt our age?

Or do we ignore the question and get on with the job? Perhaps Mr. Feinblum has it right when he says, “what really counts is the seductive beauty of words.”