How to Start an Author Newsletter (2026 Setup Guide)

Decide what your newsletter is for

A newsletter does three jobs. It reaches readers on launch day without an algorithm in the way. It gives you a direct line that no platform can take away. And it gives your keenest readers extras they can’t get anywhere else. Decide which matters most to you now, because it shapes everything from the sign-up offer to how often you send.

Readers have told surveys what they want. In Written Word Media’s February 2026 survey of 3,589 readers, 49% said they subscribe to author newsletters, and the most wanted topics were future projects (67%), insights into characters and story (59%) and book recommendations (59%) (Written Word Media, Feb 2026). The respondents already subscribe to Written Word Media’s deal emails, so they lean towards email, but the topic ranking is a useful steer.

Fiction and nonfiction newsletters are different

Fiction newsletters sell the next book: story extras, release news, cover reveals and recommendations. Nonfiction newsletters earn their place by being useful each time, often as short essays, and they can grow into a paid product. Pick a sending rhythm you can keep. Monthly is a sustainable default for most novelists, plus an extra email in release weeks.

Choose your newsletter platform

The biggest choice in how to start an author newsletter is the platform, and it’s also the easiest to change later. Judge platforms on five things: how many subscribers the free plan allows, whether the free plan includes automations (you need them for a welcome sequence), whether you can send from your own domain, how they connect to book-delivery tools, and where you might go later, such as paid subscriptions. Here’s what each provider’s own page said on 3 November 2026.

MailerLite

Free plan

Up to 250 subscribers and 2,500 emails a month

Automations on the free plan

Yes

First paid step

Check the current price

Best for

A small list that wants a welcome sequence for free

Kit

Free plan

Up to 10,000 subscribers

Automations on the free plan

No: automated sequences need a paid plan

First paid step

Check the current price (it depends on list size and billing period)

Best for

Lists that will pass 250 quickly

beehiiv

Free plan

Up to 2,500 subscribers

Automations on the free plan

No: automations start on Lite

First paid step

Check the current price

Best for

Authors who may add sponsors or paid tiers later

Substack

Free plan

Free to publish; no platform fees

Automations on the free plan

Check Substack's current features

First paid step

Substack keeps 10% of paid subscriptions, plus card fees

Best for

Essayists and nonfiction authors who may charge

Which fits you New fiction author with no list: MailerLite free. Expecting a big burst of sign-ups: Kit free. Writing essays you might charge for: Substack.

• MailerLite: free for up to 250 subscribers, 2 user seats and 2,500 emails a month, and the free plan includes automations (MailerLite pricing). Paid plans: check the current price, as it depends on list size and billing period.
• Kit (formerly ConvertKit): free for up to 10,000 subscribers, but automated email sequences are not included on the free plan. Paid plans: check the current price, as the Creator plan’s price depends on list size and on monthly or yearly billing (Kit pricing).
• beehiiv: free for up to 2,500 subscribers, with no email automations on the free plan (beehiiv pricing). Paid plans: check the current price.
• Substack: no platform fees to publish free; if you charge, writers keep 90% of revenue minus card fees (Substack).
• Mailchimp: the free plan has a limit of 250 contacts and up to 500 sends a month (Mailchimp pricing). Its paid prices were shown to us with a local currency and an introductory offer, so check them yourself.

Older guides often say MailerLite is free up to 1,000 subscribers. Its own page says 250 today. The other trap is Kit: its free plan is generous on numbers but lacks sequences, so you’d send your welcome emails by hand or upgrade. If you expect a burst of sign-ups from a big promotion, Kit’s 10,000 limit buys room; if you want automation on a small list, MailerLite’s free plan fits.

Set up your domain and the legal basics

The step most guides on how to start an author newsletter skip is the technical one. Send from an address on your own domain, such as [email protected], not a free Gmail or Outlook address. Then follow your platform’s domain-authentication steps, which give you DNS records (SPF, DKIM and DMARC) to add at your domain registrar. It takes about half an hour, and it is what the big inboxes check.

• Gmail requires every sender to use SPF or DKIM and keep spam reports below 0.3%. Senders of around 5,000 or more messages a day to Gmail accounts must use SPF, DKIM and DMARC, align the From domain, and offer one-click unsubscribe (Google sender guidelines). Volume counts across your whole domain, bulk-sender status never expires, and Gmail stepped up rejections of non-compliant mail from November 2025 (Google sender FAQ).
• Yahoo sets the same shape for bulk senders, and requires unsubscribes to be honoured within 2 days (Yahoo Sender Hub).
• Microsoft treats domains sending 5,000 or more messages to its consumer services (Outlook.com, Hotmail, Live) as high-volume senders: SPF and DKIM must pass, a DMARC record must exist, and failing mail is rejected (Microsoft Support).
• US law (CAN-SPAM) needs a valid postal address in every email (a registered PO box or private mailbox is fine), honest subject lines, and opt-outs honoured within 10 business days (FTC).
• UK law (PECR) generally requires consent before you send marketing emails to individuals. The “soft opt-in” exception is narrow and is aimed at existing customers, so it rarely fits a free-story sign-up (ICO).

In plain English: the 5,000 threshold is about daily sending volume across your domain, not list size, and most new authors are nowhere near it. Authenticate anyway, because it costs nothing and helps everywhere. Your platform adds the unsubscribe link and footer for you. Your jobs are the domain records, a real postal address, double opt-in (strongly advised in the UK and EU), and never buying or importing a list of people who didn’t sign up.

Create a reader magnet and deliver it

A reader magnet is the free thing you offer in return for an email address. It should be something only your readers would want, so it attracts readers, not freebie hunters. Reader magnet ideas that work:

• A prequel novella or short story set in your series world
• A bonus epilogue or a deleted scene
• A character guide, map or timeline
• For nonfiction: a checklist, a workbook or a sample chapter

You can deliver it two ways. Your email platform can send the file in a welcome email; Kit’s pricing page, for example, lists opt-in incentive delivery on its free plan. Or a delivery service can handle the download and the reading-device headaches. On their own pages on 3 November 2026, BookFunnel‘s First-Time Author plan was $30 a year with 500 downloads a month, but email collection and mailing-list integrations start on the Mid-List Author plan ($200 a year, or $20 monthly). StoryOrigin‘s Basic plan is free, and its Standard plan ($10 a month or $100 a year) adds reader email collection, group promotions and newsletter swaps.

The path a new reader takes looks like this:

1. They find you: the back of your book, your website, a social bio or a group promotion.
2. They land on a page on your own site that explains the free story.
3. They sign up through your platform’s form, which says what they’ll get and how often you’ll write.
4. They confirm by clicking a double opt-in email.
5. They get the gift, from your platform or a delivery service.
6. Your welcome sequence starts.

Sign-up form wording that sets honest expectations: “Get the free prequel, plus one email a month about new books. Unsubscribe any time.”

Put your sign-up link everywhere readers already are

Your best sign-ups come from people who have just finished one of your books. So the most important link is in your back matter, and it comes with one Amazon rule. KDP’s Hyperlink Guidelines prohibit links in Kindle books to web forms that request customer information such as an email address, and links to ebook stores other than Amazon. Amazon can remove links at its sole discretion (KDP Hyperlink Guidelines). The safe pattern is to link to a page on your own website about the free story, and put the form on that page.

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Amazon's link rule for Kindle books

KDP's Hyperlink Guidelines prohibit links in Kindle books to web forms that ask for an email address, and to ebook stores other than Amazon. Link to a page about your free story on your own website instead. Amazon can remove links at its discretion. Source: KDP Hyperlink Guidelines, read 3 Nov 2026.

Then add the link everywhere else readers meet you: your website’s home page and every book page, your social bios, your email signature, your Amazon and Goodreads profiles where they allow it, and a QR code on bookmarks for events. Our guide to creating an engaging author website shows where sign-up forms sit best on the page.

Group promotions and newsletter swaps can add hundreds of readers at once. Written Word Media’s 2025 survey of 1,346 authors found that effective list-builders use reader magnets, back-matter links and multi-author promotions, but also that authors rated swaps less effective than in earlier years (Written Word Media, Dec 2025). Choose partners whose readers match yours. A disclosure: The Bookish Elf sells book marketing services to authors, including promotion to our 200K+ social followers, which some authors use to send readers to a sign-up page. The free routes above come first.

Your newsletter is the owned centre of a wider platform. Our guide on how to build an author platform shows how the list, your website and your social channels fit together.

Write your welcome sequence

A welcome sequence turns someone who wanted a free story into a reader who wants your next book. A common pattern is four or five emails over about ten days:

Subject line, fantasy

BeforeAfter

Your free prequel is inside (and a map)

Why it works Says what's in the email and keeps the promise from the sign-up page.

Opening line, romance

BeforeAfter

Here's the chapter where Mia almost said yes, the one my editor made me cut.

Why it works Starts with the story, not with admin.

The ask, thriller

BeforeAfter

Hit reply and tell me the last thriller that kept you up. I read every answer.

Why it works One ask, and replies tell inboxes that people want your mail.

Book links, any genre

BeforeAfter

Start with Book 1: Amazon | Kobo | Apple Books | your library app

Why it works Readers buy where they already read. Kindle books can't link to other stores, but emails can.

1. Deliver the gift. The download link, and two lines on who you are.
2. The story behind the book. Where the idea came from, or a scene you cut.
3. Ask a question. “What’s the last book that kept you up?” Replies build a relationship, and they tell inboxes people want your mail.
4. Your books. Where to start, with links to every store and library app you’re on. Emails, unlike Kindle books, can link to any store.
5. What happens next. How often you’ll write and what you’ll send.

Engagement matters more each year. Gmail can sort the Promotions tab by the senders each person engages with most (Google, Sep 2025), and its “Manage subscriptions” view lets people unsubscribe from a sender in one click (Google, Jul 2025). Emails that get replies and clicks are the ones that keep landing where readers look. If your platform’s free plan has no automations, send these emails by hand to each week’s new sign-ups until you upgrade.

Send your first issues and track the right numbers

Send your first regular issue within a month of your first sign-up, even to ten people, so the habit starts before the list is big. For what to write in issue two and beyond, read how to create a compelling author newsletter, and for using the list in a release, our week-by-week launch plan.

New sign-ups per weekUnsubscribes per month%Starting list

After 6 months634

After 12 months1,231

After 24 months2,322

A simple model: weekly sign-ups added, a flat monthly unsubscribe rate taken off. Real lists grow in bursts around launches. Example inputs only.

Don’t judge yourself by open rates. Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection hides the reader’s IP address and stops senders seeing whether an email was opened (Apple Support). In September 2026, Apple accounted for 76.56% of the 1.5 billion-plus opens Litmus tracked, and Litmus says privacy-protected opens are not reliable (Litmus). Watch clicks, replies, unsubscribes and launch-week sales instead.

Every few months, send a re-engagement email to people who haven’t clicked in a long time, and remove those who still don’t respond. A smaller list that clicks reaches more inboxes than a big list that ignores you. To see what steady growth looks like, try the calculator below: a worked example of 20 sign-ups a week with a 1% monthly unsubscribe rate gives you a list of roughly a thousand in a year.