So I emailed an author last week, and I never got a response. I think this is the second time. I don’t suspect any malice here; I simply think it is another unattended author email account.
I got a solution for that.
Believe me, I understand. It can be depressing to check an email account day after day, and nothing’s ever there except spam. Daily becomes every few days, then weekly, then you barely remember to check once a month. When I was running Fantasy Debut and Debuts & Reviews, I often had to turn into a detective in order to discover an active email account for an author. I’m going to have to do that now.
But here’s how I ensured I’m always responsive on my own author account.
When I set it up, I gave this problem some thought. I suspected that fan mail would be as rare as a personal letter in my snail mailbox. (However–funny thing–I do check my snail mailbox every day.) At about the time I was setting the account up, my personal email account was getting inundated with author loop emails. Emails from RWA, our Carina Press author group, another author group I was invited to, and another … emails every day, even with them all set on Digest mode.
Then, the solution hit me. Have all those loop emails sent to my author account. That way, I could keep them from cluttering up my personal account, and I could be responsive to the occasional email from something that is not from an author loop. Like … maybe … a fan.
Hey. It’s happened.
It works great. I have them all going to my author account, where I have some filters set up in Outlook. Anything from Yahoo goes straight into a folder. Everything else (except automagically handled spam) goes into my inbox. I even check that spam folder because important mails have ended up there from time to time. Any account I that set up as an author now uses that email account. And there are a few accounts–such as Goodreads and my author Facebook–that I really should switch over.
I highly recommend this approach for all writers, published or not. It doesn’t have to be a domain; it could simply be yourauthorname@gmail.com. Or Yahoo. Use it for queries and submissions to keep it active.
Because that’s the important thing. It needs to be active for that very occasional, very important email.
I do this, unfortunately everything funnels into my Microsoft Outlook, so it all gets dumped together anyway.
But in a perfect world, yes. This works.
I originally replied from work, but I clearly need to install a new mobile theme, because I clicked one button and my reply was gone. Annoying!
Anyway. I use filters to send my loop email directly to a folder. That way, everything else ends up in my inbox. Once I get through the stuff sent directly to me, I get to play with the loop emails. It works rather well.
I also only subscribe to individual emails on one loop. Everything else is a daily digest.
I don’t understand what you mean by filters….I use Internet Explorer and Yahoo mail for my professional (i.e.–I will give this addy out to anyone) email, and then I have a personal one that I use for friends, my agent, and such.
I’ll just have to write a how-to post on email filters. Thanks for the blog idea! 😉
Great idea, Tia! I have all my author email forwarded to my personal email account. That way I never miss a fan email. They’re the best part of being an author for me!
I tend to get fan tweets, but I’ll take ’em!
I try to get back to everyone who sends me an email..Even if it is a day or two late…I Keep mailing lists on one account and more personal on the other and I have it going to my smartphone so that helps a ton…
Savannah, I try to get back quickly as well, and I have all my email addresses on my smartphone as well. I know it seems cumbersome to others, but it really is like automatic sorting!