Do you have a Newsletter?
It’s one of the must-have items in any authors marketing
platform. A way to reach out to your dedicated readers/fans. But how do you
create one and does it cost anything?
In the effort to keep that marketing budget in check, free
is always preferred when it comes to outside help. And when you want the most
bang for no buck, you can’t go wrong with Mail
Chimp.
Simple to use. Point and click. Full of templates. It makes
creating a nice newsletter a snap. And with list features, signup forms, and
tracking reports, it really does give you quite a bang. For the startup author
with a small list and maybe only one to two newsletters a month, you can’t beat
FREE! That’s right, free.
From their website:
Up to 2,000 subscribers
Send 12,000 emails to 2,000 subscribers for free. No contracts,
and no credit card required. It’s free forever.
I’ve used MailChimp now for about an year and find it to be
super user friendly. The list managing has some great automatic features. For
example: If you are a
new subscriber to my newsletter you will automatically be emailed a code to
download a free copy of my book, Dissension.
It’s fully automated. I don’t have to do a thing. Set it and
forget it. That is truly a blessing as it helps me keep readers happy (by offering
a good value) and also takes one more task off my to-do list so I can keep up
with writing and have more books to publish.
There is a lot more you can do with auto-features (like send
birthday wishes to subscribers, and thank you emails for being a loyal
follower, etc…) but I’ll let you play with those.
Having a newsletter does not have to be a huge time consuming
task, but it is a necessary evil in the arsenal that all indie authors must
have. So, consider this a good option and start yours today.