Meet Liz Gavin: International best-selling romance writer

At EmailOctopus we have the privilege of working with a wide and colourful customer base, offering a variety of services from insurance to erotica. Whatever their line of work, we love hearing our customers’ stories of how they built their businesses and how email has helped them grow.

Recently, we caught up with Liz Gavin from Elessar Books: her series of female-focussed erotic stories span everything from ancient history to magic and paranormal. Whatever your romantic fantasy, it’s likely Liz has written about it. Writing prolifically since 2013, she’s the international bestselling author you just may not have heard of yet.

Hi Liz, tell us a little bit about yourself and your work

I write romances in contemporary, paranormal and historical genres. In my sexy stories you’ll meet smart, independent women who don’t need rescuing by knights in shining armour. Instead, they’ll be indulging in steamy action with swoony Alpha males with big hearts. I also write about women discovering their sexuality and finding happiness in unconventional setups.

They sound really interesting, and so varied. I know you’ve had a lot of success around the world; how many people read your books?

Well, I’m an international bestselling author and my books have made it to number one in countries as diverse as Japan, the UK, Canada, and Australia, as well as my home country, Brazil.

I’ve been publishing my writing since September 2013 and since then I’ve sold 15,000 books and given away 400,000. As of today, I’ve got around 35,000 subscribers to my mailing list as well as a growing fan base across social media. I’m actually the second most followed author on GoodReads in Brazil – making me second to Paulo Coelho!

With that many subscribers, email must be a big part of keeping your readers engaged. How did you find the right service to do that?

Yes, it is and I’ve used a few different services in the past to try to find the best fit. I’ve used both MailChimp and Mailerlite and I did really like MailChimp. Its automation tools are really flexible and it integrates with lots of other services. But ultimately, cost is a factor, too. I moved over to EmailOctopus in April 2017 when I saw a fellow author posting about you guys and I saw how much cheaper it was. Although really the deciding factor was learning that you’re an Amazon Web Services partner; it gave me reassurance that it was a safe move for me to make.

“I’m actually the second most followed author on GoodReads in Brazil – making me second to Paulo Coelho!”
Liz GavinAuthor

We’re glad you made the move. How have you found the service?

The biggest advantage has been the cost-benefit ratio: EmailOctopus has improved my deliverability and I’m paying less than I used to. Right now I’d be paying around $60 more each month if I’d stayed with my previous provider.

Without EmailOctopus, I would have had to cut my lists substantially which I’d hate to do as an independent writer. This would have impacted my discoverability and I’d even have lost out on some promotional opportunities – lots of these in the independent publishing world are offered based on your mailing list size. I regularly recommend EmailOctopus to follow authors and I’m really satisfied with the service and the savings.

“Without EmailOctopus, I would have had to cut my lists substantially”
Liz GavinAuthor

That’s great to hear as we’re always happy to help small businesses and independent writers build their customer bases. Do you think you’ll stay with EmailOctopus in the future?

Yes, for sure. I know your service is relatively new and I hope you guys will continue to grow and improve. I’m looking forward to you building in new features – and here’s hoping you can upgrade while keeping the service affordable!

Absolutely. We’ve got lots of new features and improvements in the pipeline and we’ll always be committed to keeping prices low. Thanks Liz, and best of luck with the books to come.

You can find Liz’s writing on her website. If you’d like to be featured on the EmailOctopus blog then send us an email – we’d love to hear from you.