Book publishing is more than just writing and producing books; it is also about selling them. Selling books requires a host of skills, including marketing, promotion, and public relations. Yes, public relations—PR for short. At its most basic level, public relations is managing the flow of information from an entity (a company, organization, or an […]
Do I need to make changes to how I collect emails on my website? I don’t think anyone fully understands the practical implications of the GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) for the European Union. And we may not for a few years. Here are my thoughts on it. (Reminder: I’m not a lawyer, and this […]
Write for your audience, and don’t try to impress others with your skill I recently read a nonfiction book. My assessment was that the author wrote to impress more than to educate. Though I did learn from her words, I’d have gained much more had she gotten out of the way and put me, the […]
I receive many email newsletters and would like to read them, but usually, I don’t. The reason is they aren’t user-friendly. Here’s how they frustrate me. But there are newsletters I will read—assuming they have relevant information that interests me. Good email newsletters are self-contained within the email. This might mean they can be read […]
A few years ago I came across some statistics in DM News that puzzled me. They shared some numbers on email bounce rates, courtesy of MailerMailer. But they did so without explanation. I jotted them down for future consideration. They noted that when delivering an email message to our listless than once a month, the […]
As part of my publishing business, I send email messages to magazine subscribers on behalf of our advertisers. This is one of the services we provide. It’s commonly called e-blasts, but it’s just a different twist on email marketing. I’ve done this for several years and have tracked vastly different response rates depending on the […]
A third important metric in email marketing is bounce rate. (The first two measurements are open rate and click-through rate.) The bounce rate is the percentage of email messages that bounce back, meaning that they’re not delivered. A message can bounce for a number of reasons, including it being blocked at some point along its […]
Earlier this year, I blogged about email open rates. Once an email message is opened, another important metric is the “click-through rate.” The click-through rate is the percent of opened messages where the reader clicks on a link in the email message. Depending on the type of email message, the click-through rate can be critically […]
One effective way to market our books is via email marketing, often in the form of a regular email newsletter. This, of course, assumes we have an email list, which is a different discussion for another time. When we do email marketing, the email software we use, such as MailChimp, Constant Contact, or AWeber, will […]
A key to using your website as a book-selling, platform-building tool is to capture email addresses. You will use these email addresses to regularly communicate with your followers, such as through a monthly newsletter. Keep them up-to-date on your writing and share interesting or helpful content. Then, when your book is ready, let them know. […]