Easy Ways to Attract Meaningful Customer Loyalty

Being a new author can be difficult. For one, there are millions of other titles available to readers, and readers are always on the lookout for fresh new content. To gain their loyalty you will need to offer them something your competition doesn’t. Brands that invest time and effort into connecting with customers are more likely to earn their buyers’ trust in the long run.  
Readers, like any consumer, are more likely to spend money on your books if they find you meaningful. Ultimately, this comes down to unique branding, developing emotive connections and cultivating authentic communication. In a saturated author market, this can be difficult, so we’ve established five easy steps to help you attract customer loyalty to your books.  

• Personalise Your Communication 
  

First, you’ll want to set up your own email newsletter before launching your book. This helps with keeping your readers up to date on your work and promotion towards any up-coming content (free or otherwise).  


To increase your chances of success, send personalised newsletters (as opposed to a one-size-fits-all approach). You should ideally ensure your newsletter marketing is suited to your readers’ age and interests. This is something that can be achieved by using the email marketing software MailChimp. You’ll learn to fine-tune your mailer and adapt it on a month-to-month basis. Once you’ve got a good email following going, it’ll be worth interacting with some followers/readers from time-to-time, so take time out to ask for feedback on pieces or content they might like to see and read. This way, you can home in on developing material which you know your readership will love.   
Additionally, Rowanvale offers a mailer service with lots of marketing information to push sales for your book, so head over here and take full advantage of it!  

• Become a Meaningful Brand 
  

Your author brand represents your true value. When customers know that your brand identity has value, they’ll always come back to buy from you. You can achieve value in three ways: marketplace benefits (i.e. the value of your books), personalised benefits (the things you do for your customers), and collective benefits, (i.e. how you contribute your author-knowledge into the community).  
A pro tip to consider before you develop your brand is to identify your goals as an author and write a list of what makes you unique! One of the things that make Rowanvale unique is our commitment to ethical publishing. Unlike a lot of publishing companies who want to extort money from their authors, our mission is to fundamentally change and improve the self-publishing world, to take it from its ‘vanity publishing’ roots and transform it into something more ethical and caring. 
Certainly, if you want more guidance about branding, our marketing advisor can help you out on a variety of topics, such as how to brand your website and promote your book to the right audience.
  

• Use the Social Listening Technique 
  

Social listening is a content strategy used to understand your audience and improve promotions by analysing conversation and any topics relevant to your brand. This requires a third-party social media tool which’ll analyse your readers’ activities, book trends, authors, other author channels and more. You’ll better understand what people are saying about your brand, books and book launches. If you’re new to social media listening, it’ll be worth learning these tools, then ultimately you will be able to create customised posts, conversations and insight for readers all the time. We have loads of inspiration on our Instagram, Facebook and Twitter pages--be sure to check them out!  


Want help developing your social media presence? Head over to our blog post ‘Running a Successful Bookstagram’ here for a ton of great social media tips. 

• Build and Engage with a Community 
  

Reaching a community of book lovers is a great way to build followings, so get yourself on author group platforms. Essentially, these groups are made up of people who love what you’re writing about. To get on these platforms, join online Facebook groups or book clubs designed to discuss books like yours. There will certainly be groups that allow an element of self-promotion too, if you like, though it’s always worth checking the group rules before doing this. To get you started, consider joining these two online author groups: Writers and Readers and Writers Helping Writers. If you follow us on Facebook (link), you’ll see we’re part of a number of these communities. 
If you don’t have Facebook, another way to build connections with readers and authors is through book social networking such as Goodreads. You might find this profile helpful if you want to start something similar here. 

• Consistency is Truly Key! 
  

At the end, consistency in your approach is key to developing meaningful reader connections and building up a purposeful brand to keep on top with your readers. By staying consistent and following through with these tips, you’ll be attracting customer loyalty in no time at all. 
While you’re here, why not check out a few more of our blog posts here? Alternatively, if you’re interested in the services we offer, a variety of our packages can be found here and our Frequently Asked Questions can be found here. Can’t find an answer? Not to worry! Feel free to contact us at info@rowanvalebooks.com where we are more than happy to answer any other questions.