Growing an author email list is hard, but it’s also one of the most important things any indie author can do to impact success. So many methods require major investments and months of time to see results. But there’s one tool I recommend to my friends and clients that can make that tough job easier: BookFunnel. It’s a multi-purpose indie author tool that can move your email list forward without breaking the bank or demanding massive amounts of time.

Because I recommend it so often, I’m really excited to announce that BookFunnel will again be joining the 2023 Women in Publishing Summit as a Bronze Sponsor! Damon and his team add so much value to our Summit content – his sponsor session last year was a knockout! – and they have continued to turn out great results for our clients and friends over time.

Here’s why…

What does BookFunnel do?

BookFunnel does a few different things that, when taken together, can help transform your author email list AND your sales:

BookFunnel gives you a place to send readers to check out an Advance Review Copy (ARC) of your book.
BookFunnel lets you create an all-in one sales landing page that you can customize with links to buy on Amazon, Apple Books, Barnes & Noble, Google Play and Kobo – AND with the ability to also link directly to your direct-sales website, to maximize your book profits.
BookFunnel allows you to store and create landing pages for your audiobook sales and giveaways as well.
BookFunnel connects you with other authors to share links to free copies of your book or even to the sales pages for your book through their special “group promotions.” (More on that in a minute!)

All you need to do is upload your interior files (for giveaways/newsletter promos) and cover, add some promotional text, set the links up and go. It’s an easy-to-use, straightforward site, no matter what your tech experience is.

While the landing pages are great, it’s the group promotions that make BookFunnel special. By bringing you together with other indie authors looking to expand their audiences, you create themed promotions giving away a copy of your ARC or finished book in exchange for each reader’s email. When every participating author shares the link with their own already-established newsletter list and social media audience, the promotion of ALL the books reaches hundreds – even thousands – or new potential readers every time. If you’ve done your job by getting a great book cover and writing a compelling hook for your promotional text, you’ll be growing your email list before you know it.

Promotions are usually themed around genre or subject matter, and you can create your own promotions, too! It could be for romance books, kids’ nonfiction books or books set in the South. Whatever you think will energize a community of readers to check out your promotion.

BookFunnel also offers sales promotions that work much the same way, but they direct anyone who clicks on your book to a sales page. These promotions can really have a big impact combined with a special sale price.

Of course, this isn’t the only way you can use BookFunnel to grow your email list. Damon blew our minds this summer with his suggestion to use it to host bonus material for your book. That short story about your characters celebrating the holidays? A prequel chapter you cut for length? An additional chapter to your nonfiction book reflecting on recent news development? You can send readers of your published work to BookFunnel to collect this cool, free bonus material and capture their email addresses for your list. It’s a genius workaround to the problem of not knowing how to get in touch with all those folks who read your book on Kindle Unlimited or buy it through other booksellers.

What kind of author is right for BookFunnel?

At the end of the day, I think BookFunnel is right for any indie author who’s ready to grow an email list! It is particularly good for authors in genre fiction (romance, mystery, scifi & fantasy), but every genre has active promotions happening at any given time!