FAQ

 Author E.M.S. is a public website and online community for authors, book reviewers and freelancers who provide author and/or publishing services. On our public pages we provide general information and potential solutions for common business dilemmas faced by authors.  Inside our Resource Library—accessible by Members only—the site provides in-depth how-to information, overviews, video tutorials and links on topics of interest—promotion, social networking, effective use of Amazon and other online book distributors, self-publishing and more. We strive to curate the most current, accurate and helpful resources for authors to study further.

In today’s rapidly changing publishing industry, opportunities for authors are bountiful. But what’s a good opportunity? What’s a smart career move? Many authors find balancing the creative work of writing fresh material and the stress of promoting current releases overwhelming. Instead of hundreds of authors retracing each other’s steps to figure out how to maximize their sales on Amazon, how to build a cool fan page on Facebook, or where to find a reputable book reviewer or freelancer, we’ve created Author E.M.S. to pull together—and keep up to date—this and other key information for all authors to use.

Basic Membership is available to authors, book reviewers and freelancers for FREE. Read our Membership Info for more information. Beginning September 1, 2012, we will reopen our Premium Memberships. Premium Members pay a quarterly or annual subscription to gain access to additional tools and services. Premium dues will be $30 per quarter or $95 per year (subject to change). Learn more about Author Benefits.

Basic Members gain access to a treasure-trove of content. Author E.M.S. is committed to building and maintaining a free Resource Library. These pages include growing sections with overviews, how-tos, embedded videos and links on Business Basics, Copyright, Money Matters, Promotion, Self-Publishing, Social Media and much, much more. In addition, Basic Members are eligible to join our Info Track email campaigns (coming in September). Members will also be the first to know about new content, online classes and webinars that we offer. You can stay abreast of our blog if you subscribe to our Daily Tips RSS feed or Like us on Facebook and even follow us on Twitter.  We’ve recently added our Book Reviewer Round-Up daily ezine that pulls content from our hundreds of reviewers’ Twitter feeds.

Yes! If you’re an unpublished writer building your business model and brand, you may join as an author. If you’re an industry professional—agent, editor, marketing professional, artist, graphic designer, IP attorney, accountant, or even a book reviewer who wants access to more of the site—we invite you to join as an Basic Member.

Yes! Getting listed in our Database of Online Reviewers is a great way to help authors and save yourself time. We’ve made it easy for our Premium Members to search through the database for reviewers who best match the criteria of their book. To get listed in our database, you need to complete an online survey that provides information about your website or blog and your review services. You can fill out the survey here. We pull survey data weekly and add it to the active database.

For reviewers who join as Basic Members, we offer a monthly Reviewer newsletter featuring new and upcoming book releases, full access to our Resource Library with useful content about FTC guidelines regarding blogging, advertising, newsletter campaigns and product endorsements, and we give you access to view our Database of Online Reviewers a few times each year so you can monitor and update your database entry. Call us crazy, but encouraging symbiosis between authors and reviewers just seems like good business to us!

 We’ve made the conscious choice not to place any ads at this time on Author E.M.S. We want to maintain a focused, professional environment, a haven where authors can study quietly and get their questions answered.

We are currently gathering names, websites and general services in a list form. These lists appear on pages inside our Resource Library. We’re preparing to expand the information in a searchable database, much like our Database of Online Reviewers. You can see how the search function works in this video tutorial. To verify whether you’re currently listed, simply join as a Basic Member. To submit information for the new database, please fill out our Freelancer Survey.

In a word, yes. We’ve looked at a couple of different models to support the web site and the time and work put into curating all this content. Sure, we could charge everyone for access, but the point of the library is to share the information as openly as possible to help authors. We could sell advertising and fill our sidebars up with flashy ads for books, review sites and service providers, but we’d rather keep the library quiet and simple. A place for authors to study and find answers. We hope you’ll see value in the material we present and offer a small donation to allow us to continue to offer our content free to all.

We’d love to discuss submissions.  We now offer a Resource Library Submission form. We’ll review all submissions carefully. If we choose to link to it, we’ll let you know. If we wish to add the material to our site, we’ll discuss that with you on a case by case basis.