Do you struggle to find new readers and connect well with the ones you already have?
What if you knew how readers think, what makes them act, and what they want from you?
All these insights are revealed in the results of The Reader Behavior Survey. Last month, I polled 229 readers to try to learn what leads them to buy books and how they like to connect with authors. With this data, I've been able to unearth the principles authors need to implement to connect effectively with readers.
Plunge into the slides below to discover the psychology of the reader!
This is a /really/ valuable resource, Daeus. Thanks so much for conducting the survey and sharing their results with your analysis! Talking about more than just promotionals in your email list is more important, and I’ll be sure to keep your advice on treating subscribers as friends and not just fans in mind whenever I get to that point in my writing career!
I feel like that was the biggest lesson for me too. I mean, that’s how I want to be treated, so… 🙂
This. Is. Incredibly. Useful. THANK YOU SO MUCH. Especially as I’m just getting to the stage where I’m starting to think about (i.e. freak out about) marketing and such. Definitely referring back to this.
Daeus, this is so incredibly thorough and friendly and funny. Three of my favorite things, and it won’t even really benefit me ’cause I’m not a writer. But it says something that I had a good time reading it even if it wouldn’t help me. (All the stats were pretty interesting though.)
You’re good at compiling helpful information, making it readable and not just that but ENJOYABLY readable, and then making people want to do what you say. So… *many thumbs up* You will do well when you rise to world power. Good luck, and keep helping all the people.
*ice cream* *blended milk and maple syrup with raspberries* *scones with chocolate in them*
*salivates* Emma! Don’t do this to me. *eats everything* 🙂
It’s okay, you can skip dinner.
Thank you for putting this together! I learned a few things. 😉
Excellent. 🙂
Wow! You have no idea how incredibly helpful this was to me! Both from a writers point of view and from a business point of few. Awesome job on putting the results together!
Wonderful, Holly! I can assure you that it’s equally wonderful for me to hear it helped you. I need to go get my energy out. 😛
Thank you so much for sharing this!!! This is from a writers point of view that has never tried doing a email list for my books. I really thought about it once or twice, but I ended up not doing it. If I do it, do you have any pointers?
Sure, Katharine. It sounds like you already have books published? Whether you do or don’t, and email list is a great way to make sure people who read one of your books come back and buy more. It’s also a way for you to be social with your readers and build a tighter bond with them. If you plan to write more than one book, I highly recommend you start and email list. All you need is one free offer you can give your subscribers to entice them to sign up. I use a free novella, which is a really good option, but you could do something different. I’m not the best one to tell you how to grow your list, but basically you post your offer wherever you can. This can be inside your books, on your blog, in your article or bio for another person’s blog (I have my offer in my bio here), in Facebook ads — anywhere you interact with potential readers.
You’ll have to decide on which email service you want to use. If you’re ambitious and want grow your email list fast, I think GetResponse is a fantastic service. MailChimp, however, is free up to 2,000 subscribers, so if you don’t plan to get much larger than that, it’s an amazingly good option.
Once you have subscribers, like I said, treat them like friends. You want them to look forward to opening your emails, so send them exciting stuff like hilarious (and pertinent) youtube videos, poems you’ve written, witty quotes, and things like that.
If you have any further questions on email lists, you can contact me any time through the comments section here.
Oh, I was so excited to find out the results! They’re really interesting to think about, and you did a great job with putting this all together! Thanks for this. 🙂
Ah, helpful statistics couched in humor…👌
Seriously though, this was super fun to read through, and even though I am a gazillion miles away from the marketing stage it was very informative seeing these results. Thanks for putting this together, Daeus!
Sweet. I wasn’t even really trying to be funny. Glad it was though.
Oh yes yes this was really cool to see the results of actually. Thanks a heap for doing this. And yes. BE OUR FRIENDS AUTHORS. That’s a huge huge factor.
My biggest question is who were the 39 people who said they /didn’t/ want humor and jokes… *goes hunting for them to bash a couple of jokes over their heads until they start laughing*
Haha. 🙂 Wasn’t me.
Thank you so much for putting this together! It was very informative and also humorous to read. 😀 (I’m ignoring the people who say they don’t want to listen to humor and am assuming they misunderstood the question. XD)
And I love theme myself, but I didn’t realize it was such a big aspect for so many readers. I’ll have to keep that in mind.
Glad it was helpful. 🙂
Oh hey, I did this survey! Apparently a friend of yours shared it to a writing Facebook group I’m on. I didn’t even realize you were connected with the website I randomly found on Pinterest, but it makes sense.
Good info there. I don’t have any novels written yet either, but I shall remember the interesting-email-list thing when I do. It would probably be a good outlet for my weirdness. If people actually liked that stuff, all the better.
By the way, I read your free book.
Oh, trust me, people do love weirdness. 😛 At least as long as it’s not way overdone.
Hey! A reader of mine! Nice to meet you. 🙂
Finally got around to reading this, and I am so glad I did. I already knew word-of-mouth was a big deal in marketing, but it was fascinating to see it confirmed in the literary arena. Thanks so much for putting this together and sharing, Daeus!
@daeus –
I thought I commented earlier, but I guess it didn’t work, so…
Just wanted to let you know that even though I am not a KP Forum member, I saw your request for authors to share your new (and, by the way, awesome!) survey with. I would suggest Andrew Peterson (and his Rabbit Room community), S.D. Smith (plus all the Story Warren people), Sarah Clarkson (and the Storyformed/Wholeheart groups), and also maybe Sarah Mackenzie of the Read-Aloud Revival, a community full of young authors. I’ve met some of these personally and I recommend their work and their websites. I think they would love to see the survey.
Thanks,
Maya
This is really helpful! I’ve not worked up the courage yet (or found the time) to built a platform, etc. for when I start publishing, but this is still very helpful.
Also, I can’t the link to work for a free ebook. *sadness*