Blog reader Ryan Atkins from Flat on My Back recently emailed this question about platform:

“In a recent post of yours, you mentioned having at least 1,000 email subscribers before moving forward with publishing. This was surprising to me as I had assumed differently after hearing much higher numbers from query rejections last year. After hearing 10,000+, I started to pursue self-publishing.”

Many writers understand book publishers want to work with writers who have a platform. A key metric for determining platform size is number of email subscribers.

So how many do you need?

If you asked fifty different publishing professionals how large an email list you need to secure a book contract, my guess is you’d receive quite a variety of answers, such as:

• “At least 1,000”
• “No fewer than 10,000”
• “100,000 or more”
• “We don’t make decisions based on number of email subscribers, so it’s a moot point.”

In other words, you’d get a grab bag of different responses.

Photo by Vladislav Vasnetsov from Pexels

The Exception That Proves the Rule

Part of why a universal list size does not exist is because other key factors influence a typical publishing decision.

Two of these are:

• how compelling the book’s concept is
• how good the writing is

Sometimes a writer with a very small platform can land a book deal on the basis of these other factors. That happens, but in my experience (20+ years in the nonfiction trade publishing industry), such book deals are the exception that proves the rule.

The rule is that anytime you submit a book proposal to agents and publishers, you are in competition with writers who have considerable platforms.

Put yourself in a publisher’s shoes. If all else was equal, would you rather publish Author A who has the ability to promote her book in a significant way or Author B who lacks that ability?

If I’m Going to Do the Marketing, Do I Need a Publisher?

Publishers want to partner with authors who can help them promote, but that doesn’t mean publishers don’t do any marketing.

Any traditional publisher worth its salt will have a budget for marketing the books it publishes. 

Examples of promotional activities publishers regularly do:

• listing your book in their catalog, which is distributed to accounts
• advertising
• lining up interviews for the author on podcasts, TV, and radio
• placing excerpts of the book in targeted publications

All of these activities can have a real impact on the reach of your book.

The other thing a publisher does is sell your book to a wider network of outlets and accounts than you would be able to reach on your own.

Amazon is obviously the big player in retail, but publishers have relationships with other accounts that sell books. Think spinner racks in airports, independent bookstores, and nonprofit organizations that buy books to give away to donors, to name just a few.

The most important marketing function a publisher can perform is likely collaborating with authors to think strategically and develop a winning marketing plan. 

Why 1,000?

So why do I say a 1,000 instead of 10,000 or 132 or 100,000?

To be honest, I’d rather not give a number at all. When you ask “How big does my list need to be?” I’d like to say “How big an impact do you want to have?” and leave it at that.

But writers are persistent! They want a number. And I get it, it’s helpful to have a measurable goal to shoot for.

I say to shoot for 1,000 because you can’t get to this many subscribers without some serious effort, not if you grow your list the right way (which is to say buying a list doesn’t count!). And I’m confident anyone who has grown a list the right way to 1,000 subscribers would back me up on this point.

What Writers Really Want

The reality is writers can get so fixated on hitting a number that they forget the point of it all. The purpose of growing a platform (read: growing an email list) should not be to hit a number or land a book deal.

The purpose of a platform is to serve an audience, to effect a change in people’s lives, a change they want and are willing to pay for.

In this way building a platform and getting your book published are best seen not as two distinctive objectives but as part of the same whole.

This whole project—writing your book, getting published, building your platform, blogging or podcasting or speaking, promoting your book—all of it is about one thing: serving your audience.

Sometimes list building feels (and in fact, is) very different from, say, writing a chapter of your manuscript. But don’t miss the connection. 

In both you are helping your reader get closer to the person she wants to become. And of course, in so doing you are becoming the person you want to become.

Question: How do you serve your readers? You can leave a comment by clicking here.