What is a reader magnet?
A reader magnet is a free piece of content that authors give away in order to entice readers to sign up for their email list. Learn more about different types of reader magnets.
How to offer a reader magnet on a landing page
Whether your main website is hosted by Author Websites or another platform, you can use our tools to create standalone landing pages to collect emails and offer reader magnets. These pages can be linked to from your main website, social media pages, or the backmatter of your ebooks.
- Create an Email Collection Landing Page. You can create a new landing page or edit an existing one in the landing page section of your dashboard.
- Add a reader magnet offer. In the next steps, you'll be asked to choose the type of content you want to offer and whether your content is associated with one of your books. If you choose a book, we'll automatically fill in the book title and cover image for you.
- Decide how to host your file. You can upload your reader magnet file to Author Websites directly and we will provide the link where new subscribers can download it, or you can link to another platform like Dropbox or Bookfunnel where readers can access your file. If you choose to upload your file to Author Websites, we accept PDF, ePUB, or image files (recommended file size is under 10MB).
- Customize the email to new subscribers (optional). Author Websites will automatically email new subscribers a link to access your reader magnet. Or, if you've integrated your account with an email platform, you can set up that email yourself through your own email service.
- Edit the landing page design. Customize the colors, text, and images on your landing page.
How to offer a reader magnet on your website
If your main website is hosted by Author Websites, you can also add a reader magnet offer to the standard email collection form on your website to encourage site visitors to sign up for your email list.
- Visit your website's Email Collection settings. You can access these settings by opening your website dashboard and clicking Email Collection in the left-hand sidebar.
- Select "Add Reader Magnet". In the next steps, you'll be asked to choose the type of content you want to offer and whether your content is associated with one of your books. If you choose a book, we'll automatically fill in the book title and cover image for you.
- Decide how to host your file. You can upload your reader magnet file to Author Websites directly and we will provide the link where new subscribers can download it, or you can link to another platform like Dropbox or Bookfunnel where readers can access your file.
- Customize the email to new subscribers (optional). Author Websites will automatically email new subscribers a link to access your reader magnet. Or, if you've integrated your account with an email platform, you can set up an email for new subscribers yourself through your own email service.
- Edit the Email Collection section of your website. You can edit the text of your email collection form to let readers know about your reader magnet offer and change the section order of your homepage to update where your offer appears.