Authors-Readers Connect discussion

I wanted to know if anyone knew about how to market and find your readership for the wip novel before getting ready to publish it.

I'm currently working on a werewolf fantasy scifi novel 2nd draft , been working on it for over ten years, started to talk about it on social media a little bit over two years now but still cant find readers for it.
I can only find other writers but not werewolf fantasy writers .

I've researched what other authors do and im trying to do the same.

Over the past year or so I been creating visual audio trailers, short films for chapter snippets and my characters. Also I have a blog where i talk about my wip chapter by chapter , and a writing advice podcast , but im not getting any real views , no feedback or suggestions and I need help with this because I've worked really hard on my story's worldbulding and characters and took means to make it orginal. My beta readers say its a good read so far.

But how do I find actual readers that would be interested in my book? I'm not a new writer i'm just a new novelist. I'm getting discouraged and feel like im in some sort of echo chamber I just want to share my book with others but i dont know if I want to publish it if there is no readership . idk


your meaningful suggestions would be helpful on this matter. Have you came across this problem with your WIP ?

It's definitely an uphill battle, especially when you're just starting out (in your case as a novelist). One thing I can recommend is building a "writing platform," which basically is just a set of communication tools. It can't be done overnight, but if you can create a website, an email list, and a "reader magnet" (something you can give away in exchange for email signups), you can start building an audience. Then, join in some newsletter swaps to increase your reach. Yeah, it's a lot of work, but unless you're a wizard at advertising--and have the money to do it--there aren't too many other good approaches, from what I've seen. Social media works for some people, but that, too, can be dicey.

Dale wrote: "It's definitely an uphill battle, especially when you're just starting out (in your case as a novelist). One thing I can recommend is building a "writing platform," which basically is just a set of..."

Thank you this is helpful. Yeah social media is kind of trickey.

I have a website blog where alot of viewers view my post about general werewolf topics and I was thinking of giving away free copies of like maybe the first short stories in my series(I have 12 werewolf shortstories within the same universe and series) Only 3 are almost ready to publish. But, idk. Is it a good idea to give those 3 away for free? I was thinking of putting them on kindle vella but i dont know about that either because i already have a story for a different series on kindle vella and nobody is reading it so far since I published it during the summer.

Do I put that email signup that you talked about on the front of the website or do I put it on the blog post article that I wrote about the werewolf topics? And what email list signup services is best for authors? Right now I have wordpress and mail poet app but I don't think I set it up right.

How do you do newsletter swaps? I never heard of that before? Do I do it with other writers who write about werewolves?
once again thank youso much.

I give away short stories that I've already published on Medium via my newsletter. Usually I send a link to one of my stories once a month. However, some writers publish short stories or novellas as ebooks and given them away as part of their reader magnets (the freebies used to entice people to sign up for your newsletter).

I guess there are two ways to look at it. One is, you can exchange freebies for something, usually a newsletter signup. The other is, you can use them to acquaint people with your work and entice them to buy something related (e.g., your short stories might relate to a novel).

Kindle Vella is tough. I published a science fiction series there and have basically no readers for it. The only good thing is, you get the monthly bonus if you keep publishing episodes, so from that standpoint it might be worth using it.

The email signup should be in your readers' faces. Have a look at my website (https://www.DaleELehman.com) to see how I did it. The home page has a big section for signups, and each other page has a sidebar with the signup.

As for email lists, there are several you could check out. I use MailChimp, but a lot of people prefer MailerLite. I think the latter is supposed to be cheaper, but I got confused when I tried to compare the plans, and so I stuck with what I already had. Maybe other people here can tell us what they use. Wordpress has plugins that work with both for email signups. (At least, I know it has plugins for MailChimp. It expect it would have them for MailerLite, but I haven't looked.)

For newsletter swaps, I use StoryOrigin. There are also swap groups on Facebook and possibly elsewhere, but I haven't done anything with them. With StoryOrigin, you can set up a free account, but most of the good stuff requires a paid account.

Yeah, it's one of those "it takes money to make money" things. Unfortunately, it's hard to make enough in writing to pay for the good tools.