Having listened to the promotional strategy advice of a wide variety of people, I'm planning to accomplish two things this weekend. One will be to set up Hootsuite (or some equivalent social media manager, but that's the one people seem to prefer) to handle automated promotional reminders that I rarely have the emotional energy to do manually. The other will be to set up an opt-in (of course!) newsletter for fans and readers to provide both a direct way to communicate announcements and other information, and to provide special content in exchange for access to attention. I figure to aim for absolutely not more often than once a month except for things like unexpected special sales (which I never know about in advance). Maybe less often than once a month, we'll see. I have a hard time planning these things because I'm not a newsletter reader myself, so I have to figure out what works for people who are.
So what sort of content will the newsletter provide? A lot of it will be just basic information:
- Upcoming/New publication information
- Upcoming appearances
- Current projects
But I'll also be offering some special content not available to people who don't subscribe to the newsletter. And that's where you come in. Here are some ideas of my own, plus suggestions people have made online. Which of these would entice you to sign up for and read a newsletter? What other content would entice you?
- Worldbuilding information (Alpennian language, geography, history, etc.)
- Snippets of work in progress (no spoilers!)
- Exclusive previews of Alpennian short fiction (stories that will eventually be released either free or as a collection, but that I'm not trying to sell individually)
- Discussions of my writing process (for example, I kept a diary of how the plot of Daughter of Mystery developed as I was drafting it)
- Alpennia fan art (with the artists' permissions, of course!)
- Access to Alpennia swag (there is none yet, but I have some ideas percolating -- what would you be interested in?)
Let me know what you think. I'm still trying to get my mind around the psychological aspects of doing a newsletter and how it would differ from my blog, other than providing me with a list of people who have expressed a particular level of commitment and interest to following my writing.
Comments5
Language! Writing process.
Language! Writing process. And recipes so I can make my own swag.
Oooh, recipes! There's an
Oooh, recipes! There's an idea. Because almost every dish that I've mentioned in any of the books is taken from a historic cookbook. (Except for potenez, which I came up with a recipe for myself.)
Worldbuilding and Social Classes
I love your Alpennia series, I am at the fourth or fifth re-reading. Concerning history, we have few elements except for the XVIII-XIX century, I don't remember references to past rulers (for example Erkembrand the Great or Aukustin the Bloody).
On the geography part, my mental image is Alpennia superposed on Switzerland, with perhaps an access to sea.
I am interested by the social organization of Alpennia, notably the relations between the various social classes. Your triple division Mefroi/Maistir/Mesner is well-conceived. Modern people frequently don't understand that the use of Monsieur/Madame (I am french) for all persons is posterior to the Revolution.
I'm delighted that you enjoy
I'm delighted that you enjoy it so much! Yes, I can definitely include bits of Alpennian history and geography. I may recycle some past essays. For example, I've written a few things on the social structure, and especially how it gets expressed in how people talk to and about each other.
world-building
World-building is my favorite. Yes, more geography, and sociology, and recipes. It is a compliment to your writing, not an insult to your world building, that I never think, as I do with many people's books, "Never mind the plot! Just tell me more about [thing]"