Friday, January 6, 2017

My Newsletter and Adding Another Goal

Do you know I have a newsletter? I’d be surprised if you did, even though I have a sign up form over there on the side bar AND on my website AND on Facebook AND on Goodreads. Surprised, because I don’t mention it all that much. But hopefully that will all change soon.

Oh, I’d LOVE to say it’s because I have a new book coming out. And eventually I will (one way or another), but just not soon (at least soon in the publishing way of things). Instead I’ve decided that once I read one of those new-to-me books I got free from conventions, the ones I talked about on a previous post about reading once a month, I will give it away. That should equate to 12 books over the year, right? So 12 chances to win. But the only way you can have a chance to win one of those books is to be a subscriber to my newsletter, because that’s where I’ll tell you how to enter (provided you live in the USA—I have to do some investigating of shipping costs before I include international subscribers. Sucks, I know, but I don’t want to break my bank account!).

Will this get me more subscribers? Will this get them to open my newsletters? We shall see. I currently have 292 subscribers with an average 33% open rate. I’d like to get that number up. Heck, I’d like to get BOTH numbers up. But at any rate, it will help get my name out there more often so people won’t forget little ol’ me, and get me on the road to being consistent sending out my newsletter. Which means I should have added that to the goals I listed on Monday, so I will now:

6) SEND OUT A NEWSLETTER AT THE END OF EACH MONTH.

Guess that means the first one will go out January 31. If you would like to receive my newsletter, sign up HERE. And don’t be surprised if I post reminders from time to time. If I can’t use this blog to sell me, then what good is it, right?

Yesterday I took the Christmas decorations down and had one casualty. L My 1993 Hallmark ornament bit the dust. I only had 4 more ornaments to take down, too. Guess I was getting too careless seeing the end in sight. This isn’t the first time I damaged an ornament, but the first to be rendered unusable (I was able to fix the 2003 Steelers ornament I dropped a few years back). Oh well, not much I can do about it.

In the past this might have bothered me more. Now? **shrug** No one pays much attention to my tree anyway, so I doubt anyone (but me) will miss it.

So… Do you get author newsletters? If so, do you open them? I know that’s a crazy question, because you subscribe, so why wouldn’t you open it? But many people don’t. What causes you to open it? I subscribe to a few author newsletters (some are friends, some I’m a fan) and I do open them and read them. I don’t enter their contests, because I don’t want to compete with their readers. Besides, I don’t need their swag or any more free books. I’m sure I’ll get tons more at the Romantic Times Booklovers Convention and Rust City Book Con this year. More giveaway stuff!

Happy Friday! Go Steelers!

Stacy

9 comments:

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

Yes, go Steelers!
The IWSG newsletter has an open rate of almost fifty percent, which is crazy high. Yours is still above average, so that's good. And not sure if I signed up, but I will now.

JeffO said...

I agree with Alex, I think the 33% open rate is pretty good compared to the average. If you're not familiar with her, Jane Friedman has had several posts describing ways to boost subscriptions, etc. Here's a blog post of hers about "the call to action." https://janefriedman.com/call-to-action/

I don't subscribe to author newsletters. By and large, I'd rather read their books!

Stacy McKitrick said...

Alex - 50%? That's great! I reached 60% once, when I was giving away one of my own books. It's been going downhill ever since, though. Hopefully my giveaways will perk it up.

Jeff - I'd rather read my favorite author's books, too, but I don't always know when the next one comes out. And sometimes they share short stories on the newsletters. I love those. I'll check out the link you gave me. Thanks!

Jennette Marie Powell said...

I get author newsletters, and I always open them. Like you, I don't enter the contests because I don't need any more books and don't get into swag. Something to consider on the open rate is that a lot of people read email in their preview pane, and the mail service providers can't always track those (if at all). So our open rates are probably higher than reported!

Stacy McKitrick said...

Jennette - Preview pane only shows so much though, right? So they're not reading the whole thing. By the way, are you going to the OVRWA reunion tomorrow?

Maria Zannini said...

Maybe you can send ebooks to international winners.

My preview pane can read the whole newsletter. I rarely open them unless it has a picture I'd like to see better.

Stacy McKitrick said...

Maria - RE: newsletters, good to know. I keep my preview small so I can see all the emails (not what's in them), so I didn't know. As for e-books, I'm not reading those (all these freebie books are paperbacks).

Stephanie Faris said...

SO sorry about your ornament breaking. One thing I look forward to when decorating my tree each year is looking back at all the ornaments I've collected over the years. As for author newsletters, I must confess--nope, I don't read them. I've subscribed to a few, but I never open them. I'm more interested in reading their blogs or keeping up with their new releases when they announce them on Twitter.

Stacy McKitrick said...

Stephanie - I'm hoping I can find some kind of plastic bubble to put my broken ornament in. The top broke off. The ball is still intact. I just can't hang it as it is. :(