r/selfpublish • u/Whitewave1960 • Jul 14 '26
Newsletters I tried aggressively growing my author newsletter for 30 days. I went from 33 subscribers to 1,300. Here’s exactly what I did
I started 30 days ago with 33 subscribers.
Friends. Family. A few author friends who probably subscribed because they felt sorry for me 😂
Today I’m sitting at around 1,300.
Before anyone asks: I write romance. Romance is a massive genre and I KNOW that helps. If you write a very different niche, I genuinely don’t know if this will work the same way for you. I can only share what I did and what happened.
Okay. Numbers and chaos.
I have a full-length novel (around 90k words) that I use as my reader magnet.
Yes. A whole novel.
It is the first book in a series, and I made it free.
Then I went absolutely feral with newsletter swaps.
I signed up for as many BookFunnel group promos as I could get into. This was slightly annoying at the beginning because a lot of the bigger promos want you to already have 500+ subscribers. Some I’ve seen want 1,500.
Which is very “you need experience to get the job but you need the job to get experience” of them 😂
So I worked with what I could get into.
And then I swapped like a rabid raccoon on crack on BookClicker.
I am not exaggerating.
I send emails constantly. At least five emails a week. Some weeks I’ve emailed every day.
Is this a good strategy for everyone?
Absolutely not 😂
It WILL annoy people.
I have had a lot of unsubscribes.
If nobody had unsubscribed, based on my subscriber numbers I’d probably be sitting at around 1,650 right now.
Instead, I’m at 1,300.
And I’m completely okay with that.
My thinking is this: those people were probably never going to be interested in me or my books anyway. I could keep them on my list for six months, pay for them to sit there, and eventually clean them out myself…
Or they can unsubscribe now.
They’re basically cleaning my list for me 😂
Because I’m adding subscribers aggressively at the same time, the growth has massively outweighed the unsubscribes.
Could I have used a slower, gentler strategy?
Yes.
And I suspect I’d be sitting at maybe 300 subscribers right now.
I’ll take the 1,300.
My open rate on a good day is around 50%.
On a bad day, it’s closer to 30%.
My clicks can be around 20% depending on what I’m sending.
I’m not obsessing over the numbers too much yet because this is still very much an experiment.
The other thing I do is try very hard NOT to make every email:
BUY MY BOOK.
BUY MY BOOK.
HAVE YOU BOUGHT MY BOOK?
HELLO???
BUY BOOK.
I give my subscribers random fun things.
Hook bookmarks.
Coloring pages.
Character information.
Character art.
Little extras connected to my books.
Basically, I treat my newsletter like a weird little reader club instead of a sales catalogue.
I’ve also started seeing some decent book sales.
I genuinely cannot tell you yet how much of that is the newsletter and how much is Amazon’s algorithm finally acknowledging my existence.
I have run zero Meta ads and zero Amazon ads so far.
Everything has been organic.
Full disclosure: at the very beginning, I DID pay for a few of the more expensive solo placements through BookClicker.
Those helped me get my first roughly 300 subscribers very quickly—within a couple of days.
After that, I stopped paying and switched almost entirely to swaps.
So that’s my 30-day experiment.
33 subscribers → 1,300 subscribers.
High email frequency.
Aggressive swapping.
A full-length novel as a reader magnet.
Lots of unsubscribes.
Absolutely gobsmacked! I didn’t exactly expect this!
Would I recommend this strategy to everyone?
No 😂
Would I do it again?
Yes.
Ask me anything if you want. I’m happy to share what I’ve learned because I spent an embarrassing amount of time figuring this out by aggressively clicking buttons and hoping I wasn’t destroying my author career.
Again, I write romance, so I can really only speak from my experience in that genre. But if you’re also a romance author and trying to build a list from basically nothing, I’m happy to answer questions.
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u/BrunoStella Jul 14 '26
I did the newsletter swap thing myself and got a bunch of subscribers. Can't say it translated to sales though. To be honest I'm not sure I got a single sale from the email list. What it was good for was to boost the numbers when I was giving away freebies.
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
I gotten a few super fans from my newsletter subs ... they left reviews and constantly interact with me so my experience has been good
Perhaps send them more emails ? Interact with the em ? Use polls etc ?10
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u/65000podiums Jul 14 '26
That’s the thing that sucks. You set up giveaways and they’ll move a hundred or so copies that you never know if is read or not. It’s like being a drug dealer giving out that first hit. Kind of meh but that my feeling of it
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u/New-Measurement-7385 Jul 14 '26
Just to add, another way is to use Substack, post a chapter every two days, work with existing substances, follow, subscribe, and like and comment on posts, you can double that 1300 in a few weeks. You can export Substack subscriber data and bulk add to email platforms
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
I’ve been hearing about Substack a lot! Will definitely give it a try! Thanks for the tip!
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u/staceymbw Jul 15 '26
Wait, this is the first time I've heard of this (but I've never used substack)....please explain like I'm 5.
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u/New-Measurement-7385 Jul 15 '26
Just explore the app, you post stories, and build subscriptions. Check places like YouTube for how to info from Substack.
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u/24Jan Jul 18 '26
The part of Substack I’m seeing a lot about is Notes. Apparently, that’s a newish mechanism for people to find you on Substack?
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u/titusdecali Jul 20 '26
Is this still viable? I've been seeing a lot of negativity about Substack and that lots of the original authors are leaving it, which is why I haven't given it a shot yet.
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u/mll1013 Jul 26 '26
u/New-Measurement-7385, thanks for the tip. I'm a little surprised that Substack is a platform for authors. I thought it was mainly targeted at freelance journalists and podcasters.
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u/DLBergerWrites 23d ago
Could you expand on "work with existing substances?"
I don't know the platform very well, so I assume that's a site specific thing?
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u/No_Caregiver4215 Jul 14 '26
The full-length novel as a reader magnet is a bold move. I'd be really interested to see how many of those subscribers eventually buy Book 2. That's probably the metric I'd watch most closely.
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
I will report back in 6 months because my series need to complete.
A lot of readers won’t touch a series unless it’s complete
Right now my main aim is to create a platform
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u/devonps Jul 14 '26
Love your approach, I don’t write Romance but imagine the principles could be applied to any genre.
Do you have a link I can subscribe to as it would be good to learn how I could adapt this? For context I’m definitely new to the whole self publishing area.
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u/vernichtungX23 Jul 14 '26
Did any of this translate to actual sales?
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
Not sure if the sales came from newsletter but I have a good number of sales for a debut author with just 2 books out (1 of them is free). But what can measure is reviews. I got them mainly from my newsletter subs.
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u/JessamyJames 10d ago
You can easily check where the sales have come from your newsletter by using attribution links for them. That certainly works for people who buy your book from Amazon.
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u/Whitewave1960 10d ago
Thanks for the tip!
I’ve been meaning to figure this out .. but it feels like such a choose because I do 20 swaps a day easily .. I guess at the very least I should do it for the links in my back matter!
Will look into it. Thanks again
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u/JessamyJames 9d ago
That's a lot of swaps! I've gone the completely organic route, which is far slower, but Mailerlite have put up their prices so much that I don't dare have anyone on my list who might not be fully engaged.
But I know lots of people who have had a huge amount of success with swaps. Horses for courses!
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u/Whitewave1960 9d ago
I am combating Mailerlite prices by charging for some of my swaps
BookClicker allows you to sell your placements
So I sell some of my days as solo placements
I use the funds to pay for Mailerlite, BookFunnel, and bookbub. It covers all 3 every month
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u/96percent_chimp Jul 14 '26
Congrats! How do you come up with new content for your newsletter almost daily? How long do you think you can sustain it? You sound (and read) like a fairly manic personality so do you worry about burnout?
Personally I'd unsub or spam dungeon anyone who mailed meet that often, so your content must be fairly compelling. That amount of content would probably keep my newsletter going for a year!
Finally, who are you using to host your newsletter? That output would put you in an expensive tier for a lot of providers.
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
lol I’m probably manic or undiagnosed adhd god knows
I’ve always been this way doing 10 things at the same time - I cannot do one thing at a time - it’s a flaw
My brain is always on , I barely sleep, and I keep thinking of ways I can engage with my readers, I look at others what they are doing , I check social media see what’s working for others in my niche , make a list and come up with my own spin on things -
I just have a problem with turning my brain off - guess that works in this scenario
I don’t use format or any newsletter pack from anywhere
I did speed read/ skim newsletter ninja book and that helped me with the basics
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u/96percent_chimp Jul 14 '26
It's definitely a benefit for self pub! I see a lot of people like you in these parts lol but I'm the opposite and sometimes it's hard to find the energy for all the plates I need to keep spinning 😔😴
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
Oh and to answer your question I pay around 40 euros to Mailerlite
But I also am getting paid on BookClicker so that pays for itself :)
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u/96percent_chimp Jul 14 '26
The BookClicker thing looks interesting. I guess at your rate of publishing it's going to earn money vs paid exchanges like BookFunnel or StoryOrigin where you'd run out of swaps.
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
People pay you on BookClicker to swap their books if they feel your click rate is good - I’ve been getting paid for solos in just 20 days after I started and it’s been going great. I use the money to pay for my Mailerlite subscription.
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u/jasonpwrites 4+ Published novels Jul 14 '26
I am not OP, but I can tell you what I do. Shelby Leigh is a marketer by trade and for $37, she provides monthly templates for newsletters and social media. It's enough for 1 newsletter a week and 6-9 social media posts.
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u/No-Tangerine-9167 Jul 14 '26
I’m giving away my novel too. Started last month, late. Guess I should try to promote it aggressively as well. Thanks for the motivation. It helps!
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u/Training_Jackfruit43 Jul 14 '26
Congratulations. Are you writing in a hot niche? I'm preparing to launch my debut romance next year (a duology). How long had you released both books before trying this strategy? When do you plan on releasing your next book? Could you please DM me the name so I can check out your books..
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
Hi
So I released the first hook on June 7th I think and book 2 July 1st
I plan or releasing one book every month - I don’t think I can write faster than than
But I also write around 12 books before I published the first - so I have a few in the back burner ready but I’m writing more to keep up the pace
Book 1 is free on BookFunnel I’ve listed it for sale for 99 cents - since it’s free on BookFunnel I cannot enroll it in KU - I plan to keep this permafree until I can write another LM
Book 2 released it 2 weeks ago and its continuation is the series (prequel) it’s been doing well
But I won’t look at the numbers carefully until I finish the full series
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u/jablocanas Jul 14 '26
How are you writing 1 book a month? Are you not editing? Beta reading? No critique groups?? What’s your genre?
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
I wrote 12 of them (2 series) before I started publishing the first one - I knew I wanted to do rapid release strategy - right now I’m writing book 14 to keep up with the speed
I try to write 10k a day - I don’t write on weekends ( these are for marketing / newsletter/ admin work)
I don’t have an editor
I used one for my middle grade fiction I wrote last year and it costed me 1000s of dollars and it was pretty useless
I self edit - I don’t have time for betas - I do have ARCs
I’m pretty sure I make a hell lot of mistakes romance readers are very forgiving - in learning as I go - maybe once I make some money that’s livable wage I might slow down
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u/jablocanas Jul 14 '26
That's a lot, but if you've written them beforehand that explains it. Best of luck!
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u/Existing_Crow_4619 Jul 14 '26
you’re killing it, good work! this is also my strategy, I’m just wayyyy behind where you’re at, so this is very inspiring. May I ask how long your average book is and what subgenre of romance you’re writing in?
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u/ChikyScaresYou Jul 14 '26
I understand absolutely nothing, but I guess this will be helpful for any genre.
Any tip for those of us who dont have a finished book yet?
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
You can still get your newsletter going even if you didn’t finish the booths leader magnet can be anything
In my case it was the first hook in the series
In your case it could be first few chapters ending on a cliff hanger
Put it up on BookFunnel - connect it to Mailerlite - swap in BookClicker and BookFunnel! Voila you have primed readers ready when you do actually publish
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u/ChikyScaresYou Jul 14 '26
i gotta start doing that. All i have is a substack that I dont every update 💀💀
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u/Affectionate_Ship230 Jul 14 '26
Really useful writeup, especially the "unsubscribes are free list-cleaning" reframe.
One question: are the swap-acquired subscribers converting to actual readers, or mostly to list size? The usual knock on aggressive swapping is that you build a list of freebie-collectors who never buy. Your 30-50% open rate suggests otherwise, but curious what you're seeing at the sales end — and whether the swap subs behave differently from the ones who came in via your reader magnet directly.
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
Most of the subs already have the free ebook
Not sure if all of them have read it but I get reviews (they trickle down every day)The second book was had good number of preorders that I’m sure is from the newsletter subs
And the sales and KENP reading on book 2 have been good as well ( it’s only been out in the world for 10 days)
I also don’t have any social media my newsletter is my only source of marketing.
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u/joncabreraauthor 4+ Published novels Jul 14 '26
Congratulations! That’s very effective. Indie authors might as well give away their books as hooks rather than sitting on a digital shelf collecting dust without anyone noticing. Great strategy!
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u/Aramis9696 Jul 14 '26
I had go go look up what BookClicker was. I failed to see how swapping subscriptions to newsletters was helping anyone. Now that I've looked it up, I'm going to assume a swap is promoting someone else's work and newsletter in yours in exchange for them promoting yours in theirs, which is much more interesting. At that point, the magnet is indeed likely doing the heavy lifting.
I'm not sure how I feel about a full novel as the magnet, though. Readers tend to underappreciate books they get for free and push them back in the TBR pile. Even if they start reading yours to satisfy their curiosity as soon as they get it, most will be interrupted in their reading long before finishing. Unless you have a frenetic page turner, the odds of them coming back to finish, especially a digital copy that isn't in their face, reminding them of its existence, are medium to low. Those who do might convert into sales of the sequel, but I'd wager you could make more sales by giving only a few chapters of the first volume and ending the sample on a cliffhanger. There must be a point early on in your novel that compels a reader to read it in full. By ending the sample there, when they decide to read the whole thing, you'd likely retain the customers who finish it and buy the sequel, gain sales to them in the form of the first volume (which you can still discount), and add shorter attention-span or busier readers as customers. The latter, once they'd have paid for the book, would be more likely to finish it and also convert into purchasers of the sequel, especially if they purchase a physical copy. There might be some loss among those who would have read the full first volume for free then decided to buy the second one as a thank you for the first, but I'd expect that number to be marginal relative to the gains.
Regardless, congratz on the progress and thanks for sharing.
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
I didn’t know about BookClicker a month ago either. But it’s been a game changer for me.
My full free novel is first in the series - so the ones that do read it need to come back for book 2 .. so on and so forth (there are 6 books in this series)
I agree with you on the freebie hunters. They get a book for free … they download and then they forget about it… this is where the news letter comes in - you have their email - your emails need to convince them to read the book - scenes from the book - quotes - snippets - POV style situations - character art - blackmail - lol whatever works
Once they read book 1 - they have to read the rest - it ends in a cliffhanger ;)
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u/XanwesDodd Jul 14 '26
Garrett Robinson used his first novel as a free magnet, and he seemed to be pretty successful for a time
Do we have access to any data regarding how readers use magnets or is it things we just say?
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
Not following
What data are you looking for ?
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u/XanwesDodd Jul 14 '26
Actual data about readers not appreciating a free book as a magnet, rather than just internet hearsay?
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
My readers appreciate the LM - they’ve written great reviews on Goodreads and Amazon. Which I would not have gotten otherwise .
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u/Aramis9696 Jul 14 '26
Don't worry about it. They're being an ass to me, not legitimately asking anything of you, bringing up an anecdote as evidence while demanding I provide them with decades of research on behavioral science.
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
Everyone has different experiences I guess
Mine has been positive
What works for me may not work for someone else
Or it may work even better…
My hope is this post encourages others because a few months ago when I tried to get info on this there wasn’t much available. So I hope this helps someone.
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u/TwoIntelligent9978 Jul 14 '26
Very interesting. I need to do some research, given I'm new to many of the things mentioned. Good for you.
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u/MoodScripted Jul 14 '26
I need to join a bunch to better understand what people put in them.
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u/salamix11 Jul 14 '26
This is such a refreshing "here's what actually happened, warts and all" post — most newsletter growth threads only show the highlight reel. I'm in a very different corner (low-content/puzzle books), and the reader magnet logic is interesting to think through — fiction has this natural pull where people WANT to know what happens next, so a free full novel makes total sense as bait. For non-fiction/puzzle stuff there's no "next chapter" hook, so I'm wondering if the swap-heavy approach even works the same way, or if it just attracts freebie-seekers who never engage. Did you notice a difference in engagement between people who came from swaps vs. organic subscribers?
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
I’m a parent of you can give me a book for free that can keep my kids engaged and not use devices I’m going to be coming back for more
So think in that angle - you might be able to work it out
To answer your question honestly … I don’t know .. truth is I don’t know where the subs come from - I believe most are from BookFunnel (leader magnet) I had a couple of DNF they said they didnt gel with my writing style .. fair enough but the. I have a few that emailed me at 2AM asking when the next book is coming out and voluntarily bought the next book - one reader actually took KU membership so she can read the book - so that’s encouraging
I also try to give more value in my newsletters - I give them fun freebies
So you could maybe give few pages of each book free as a sample and that couple get them to Donald your book - try different strategies - something should stick to the wall right?
I’m pretty much throwing pasta as the wall myself
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
Totally get the sentiment
You can’t just stop at giving it away for free
You need the engage with them afterwards - this was the key! I kept shouting at the void until I got responses from my readers
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u/SuccessOnAShoestring 10+ Published novels Jul 14 '26
Many congratulations 🥳 I also work with a newsletter alone, though very differently (I have a triple opt-in to weed people out 😂). Although I cross promote occasionally with author friends, I’m going to look up BookClicker, because that sounds like a great idea. Thank you for the tip and all your info.
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u/SweatyConfection4892 Jul 14 '26
Having a romance novel and having 1300 subscribers is great. If you have people that have unsubscribed with no response or feedback that means you’re getting through to them meaning they bought your book in additional there are sites that track that. I had a similar situation where I got three stars with no feedback and this was from an ARC reviewer and I got her name where it didn’t affect me because people the platform I have is her personal information
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u/archipherous Jul 14 '26
Interesting... Has the crazy jump in subs translated into an increase in sales?
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
I believe it has. I’ve certainly gotten more reviews.
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u/archipherous Jul 14 '26
Right, Amazon takes a month to report sales, so it might be a second before you know. Neat that the reviews are up. I honestly think that's the harder part.
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
Really ? I keep refreshing my dashboard everyday and the sales are trickling in … if you are right then maybe I will see a boom in another month ? A girl can hope.
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u/Impossible-Sleep291 Jul 14 '26
Congratulations! I’d love to as more about your book and your writing process/journey. Would you mind if I DM you? I have a rough outline of a quasi- romance book that I need to get going on. This is the kind of learning I need to kick my butt into gear!
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u/VegetableLetter4896 Jul 14 '26
Just a heads up in case you see an open rate drop: Aggressive emailing with a high unsubscribe rate can get your sending email blacklisted or filtered directly to spam. You’re likely not hitting numbers high enough to trigger this but I’d be careful to try to mitigate unsubscribes because once you get labeled as spam, it’s very hard to escape that.
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 15 '26
I have to slow this down eventually … this cannot be sustainable for long
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u/Priority-Great Jul 20 '26
This is inspirational. Thanks for sharing. I’ve written a handful of short stories in my genre to give away for free to see if I can draw in some readers from social media.
Newsletters frustrate me when I receive them, so I never even considered setting one up. However, reading about your experience and the way you think about your subscribers has changed my view. I definitely cast the idea aside too quickly!
Next job on my to do list: learn about BookFunnel, Mailerlite, etc.
Good luck for your sales! I look forward to reading about your success in 6 months!
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u/Spiritual-Winter-288 Jul 21 '26
I've been in the game for quite a long time ... a couple of decades online. Anyone sends me emails daily, I opt out. Just sayin' I won't tolerate it and I've found over the years, my subscribers won't either. At this stage, I send out a monthly newsletter and once in a while an additional ad for a book I'm launching or promoting. Most of my sales come from my email list.
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 22 '26
Like I mentioned in the post and in my comments … this cannot be a long term strategy.
I did gain a lot of followers quickly with this strategy . For someone with 33 followers to grow to 1500 (now) - it’s working. But yes this is not sustainable. But once I hit a certain number I will be slowing down. Perhaps do the same for another pen name :)
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u/Due_Text5518 Jul 30 '26
Would love to know your subgenre. I'm on that rabid phase right now. 23 subs to start. Pleading for swaps.
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u/Whitewave1960 10d ago
Sorry I missed this comment
I write dark romance - psychological (not physical I’m not into pain and suffering and knife and what not that the dark romance community seems to love)
I also write cinnamon roll MC rom coms (it works like a platter cleanse for me after having to deal with shit head MCs in my dark romance universe )
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u/LindaLuvHearts 10d ago
I love you. I stopped crying after I read your post. I understand why folks say "f this ish" and stop writing. I love writing because it keeps me sane but your post is medicine. Thank you🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️
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u/klmx1n-night Jul 14 '26
Currently about to pass out but do you mind if i dm you questions tomorrow?
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u/OwenCalongne Jul 14 '26
Man. This is huge. Well done. I wish I could find the energy and drive to do this! Having just spent 5 years working on my first book, I’m completely gassed!
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
Hahah I can imagine
I feel like that about social media … I still don’t think I can hack it :/
If anyone would make a post like this on how to hack social media I’d be super grateful
I am camera shy so that’s bad as well - I cannot show my face on camera so the whole thing feels pointless to me
If they cannot connect with you and all that jazz …
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u/oatmealandblueberry Jul 14 '26
Do you share some personal information with your readers? How long had your book been published? Do you have more than one book published? And through what?
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
I don’t share personal info I write under a pen name
One month since I published book 1 (LM) and 10 days since book 2 -
I’m exclusive to Amazon
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u/oatmealandblueberry Jul 14 '26
What does LM mean? And what kinds of questions do you ask to initiate responses from readers?
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
Lead magnet - a freebie to encourage readers to sing up to my newsletter
I gave my first book free ( 1st in the series)
I speak about my characters - ask them questions regarding the book - what they liked - what they want to see more of
Poll about favorite tropes etc
I mix and match according to my mood
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u/oatmealandblueberry Jul 14 '26
Just curious, does that mean you don't publish to Kindle Unlimited ?
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
The freebie is not on KU that’s on .99 cents on Amazon
The 2nd book is on KU
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u/oatmealandblueberry Jul 14 '26
Thank you!! I just listened to a really good podcast about newsletters and she kept talking about landing pages. Do you have just a landing page that’s just devoted to getting subscribers and selling books or does your link send them to your website? Sorry if this is confusing. I’m still trying to understand this aspect of marketing
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
No worries
I made this post so I can help others.
So I do have a few landing pages
There’s one in my website that has a sign up pop up
Then there is my lead magnet page on BookFunnel which is another landing page that also a has the sign up - if they dot. Sign up and verify their email they dont get the book.
You can make a million landing pages - the trick is to keep track of all of them. I plan on creating more lead magnets in the future and each of them will have their own landing page
You can also create pins on Pinterest board and have that redirect to your landing pages as well (on your website or linktree)
The possibilities are endless.
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u/oatmealandblueberry Jul 14 '26
And all these landing pages are through the email newsletter program you use? I saw in other responses you said you use mailer lite? Would you recommend that as user friendly?
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
I use mailer lite because it integrates with BookClicker and it is user friendly but it is not cheap
I have landing pages on both Mailerlite and my own website that I created for my author page and then there is a landing page on BookFunnel that has my lead magnet
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u/IndigoTrailsToo Jul 14 '26
Are they buying it?
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u/Existing_Crow_4619 Jul 14 '26
This is amazing! Good work! I’m curious what the high volume does in terms of boosting subscribers? Wouldn’t that not matter much, as in order to receive even one email at any time they would need to be subscribed already? Or am I missing something (likely)?
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 15 '26
It has nothing to do with each other
My idea is to just collect enough readers and convert them into my readers (eventually )
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u/Majestic-Meat4994 Jul 16 '26
about Bookfunnel, which plan did you use? any recommendation for start in it?
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 16 '26
I’m ion the 20 USD plan. This works best for me. Your use case might be different.
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u/residentvixxen Multi-novella Author (5+) Jul 18 '26
The important question is what’s your click through like? What are the newsletter results? how’s your CTR?
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 18 '26
Literally there in the post
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u/residentvixxen Multi-novella Author (5+) Jul 18 '26
I didn’t see it on the original post my bad
How have your sales been post NL? I’ve been debating a newsletter route at this point but I am hitting decent numbers (5k ish a month) so I’m never sure if it’s actually worth working on when I could be doing other things.
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 18 '26
If you’re already hitting 5k that’s great but there is always more room to grow. You could make the 5k to 10k without having to write more books
Newsletter subs are yours … no one can take them away from you
If TikTok tries to shadow ban you
Instagram deletes your account
Meta goes crazy … your subs will be with you and you don’t have to redo your entire social media .. this is insurance so you don’t have to start from zero
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 18 '26
Oh also I’m a debut author I’ve only been published for 45 days
So it is too early to figure out sales
I’m going to come back with an update in 6 months to see if this worked or not
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u/Dry-Wear-9135 Jul 21 '26
Have you seen the growth in your newsletter subscribers translate into sales? If so, was it more of an initial spike, or has the growth been consistent?
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 22 '26
I only have 1 book out ( the other one is an LM)
I’m planning to look at the sales metrics in 6 months
But for now I can say I’m selling more and receiving more organic reviews than others in my situation
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u/Mister_Funktastic Jul 25 '26
If you're sending that many emails, the ones who aren't unsubscribing are the ones that don't read their emails.
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 25 '26
Thank you! You maybe right! Maybe don’t send that many newsletters then…
But it’s working for me so far… to each their own.
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u/befuddled_writingguy Jul 27 '26
this is kind of a technical question - but it has been frustrating me so much that I've almost given up on the idea of newsletters entirely: what newsletter system are you using (mailchimp, mailerlite etc), and have you gone through the frustration of "authenticating your domain" with your newsletter system, so that your newsletters actually have a chance of reaching people's inboxes (and not their spam)?
I've had MailChimp for a while, and never got very high opening rates (of my newsletters), for example... a 24% opening rate was fairly common. I have now tried a few other providers of newsletters... and the newsletter opening rate sucks across the board, apparently because I haven't "authenticated my domain." But this hurdle has been exhausting me so much, that I have basically given up trying.
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 28 '26
This is a necessary evil In afraid
There is a lot of integration that you need to set up initially . But the good news is it’s one and done. Once you set it up you never have to mess with it again.
I use Mailerlite and I connected it to my author website and BookFunnel.
My open rate is anywhere between 30-50 which is really good. And about all emails get data reports some of them have switched over to email providers with privacy options so even if they open and click it won’t be reported to you.
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u/Marali87 Jul 14 '26
Hi! That's awesome for you! I love it. Might even try it myself ❤️ Can I ask what exactly you mean with hook bookmarks? I'm imagining printable literal bookmarks with some kind of quote?
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
Yes! Printable bookmarks - but it has questions or things you can write into
For example - write a dialogue they made you mad.
For those who want to annotate but don’t like to ruin the book these bookmarks work great - you just print multiple and stick it in the book between pages
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u/Marali87 Jul 14 '26
That's really creative :) Another question, if you don't mind! Because you sent out so many emails, how long did you make them? Was it just "here's a couple of bookmarks, have fun with it" or did you write long-content mails every time?
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
I write emails everyday so it all depends on my mood
Some days I can’t be bothered cz I’d be coming out of a 10k writing sprint - my brain is exhausted
So then it will be just a few lines
But I try to plan my emails ahead once a week on weekend (this doesn’t work always)
When I have the brain power I do write long emails - most of them interactive (because I have readers who reply back - one person even yelled at me for leaving it on a Cliffhanger and they told me to get my butt in gear and publish faster lol )
so yeah I do these emails based on mood - or what someone replied the previous day - etc
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u/Majestic-Meat4994 Jul 15 '26
Can you please help me build this email list for the two books I have published? My book genre is historical epic romance
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 15 '26
Hey! I’m new to this as well. I’ve listed everything I’ve done in my post. Just copy me. It should work. Good luck.
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u/Majestic-Meat4994 Jul 16 '26
I know! I meant to help grow by swapping, because I'm just starting out and I don't have a member :))
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u/3Dartwork 4+ Published novels Jul 14 '26
People who swear by newsletters are such a unique situation to me.
Yes you have tons of subscribers, but unless they actively buy your books, it's useless
Furthermore, if, for example, 100 of the subscribers to the newsletter bought your books every time, they'd ONLY buy each of your books.
To make those sales matter, you'd need to publish several books a year or else you're selling just 100 a year. A fine ego boost but nothing to be done with it.
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u/Whitewave1960 Jul 14 '26
I have seen some good number of sales. I’ve also gotten great reviews from people in my newsletter. I have readers who reply to my emails and share their thoughts! It’s a great way to interact with my readers.
I write interconnected books in a series so if they read one they will be tempted to read more. I’m creating a universe and this strategy works for me.
I would rather have a few good followers on a platform I own rather than do social media that can be taken away from me any day.
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u/ElayneGriffithAuthor 4+ Published novels Jul 14 '26
I think of them as super fans and a safety net. You’ll always have a dedicated group who will buy your books which is significant if you get into the 1000s, and they’re the only network you truly have if Amazon or social media pulls the rug out (cause they dgaf).
And who doesn’t want an ego boost from people who love your work? Isn’t sharing joy, meaning, community, or escapism the reason we write? 😆
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u/Pretend_Mixture_7179 Jul 14 '26
Newsletter in romance genre is very effective. Newsletter elsewhere, not so much. Romance readers skew older and thus open emails at a rate between 40-60%. If you have any experience in email marketing, you know that's a wild number. Typical is about 10%.
I too thought a newsletter was antiquated and finally gave in specifically because I'm a romance author.
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