A nonfiction lead magnet is the digital, downloadable incentive you offer your target readers in exchange for providing their address so they add themselves to your email list.

Whether you call it a lead magnet, reader magnet, freebie, or ethical bribe, it’s what people get when they “opt-in” – choose to add themselves – to your email list.

And you need one.

Nonfiction lead magnets and email list-building

Years ago, author email marketing was novel enough that all you needed was a newsletter sign-up form on your website to begin building your essential email list. Now that email marketing is the norm, things are more complicated.

Today, people expect a gift in exchange for their address, and why shouldn’t they? When they opt-in to your list, they’re giving you permission to contact them regularly. Thank them with a small, useful, and relevant gift.

“Useful” and “relevant” are key. Your nonfiction lead magnet has to be something your readers, fans, or audience need or want. (Do you write fiction? Read “3 fiction lead magnet ideas.”)

Make sure it solves a promise, is short and easily digestible, and offers high value.

Lead magnet examples

My primary lead magnet is a one-page PDF file with my “Top 5 Free Book Promotion Resources.” Authors receive it when they complete the form on the right side of this screen or on a page I’ve created specifically for that purpose — a “landing page.” (I use ThriveArchitect, a WordPress plug-in, or my email service provider, ConvertKit, to create most of my landing pages.)

I have several others, too. I offer each on its own landing page. They include:

• Virtual Book Tour Basics: How to Connect with Your Audience and Sell More Books Without Leaving Home
• Guest Blogging Cheat Sheet
• Book Marketing Plan Template
• Platform Building for Authors Cheat Sheet

What can you offer as a lead magnet? What does your target audience want that you can provide? Here are five ideas.

Nonfiction lead magnet idea #1: The Template

A template is a fill-in-the-blanks form.

What can you pull from your book that you can turn into a form? If your book teaches a system, you might have a worksheet that you can pull out of the manuscript and turn into a downloadable PDF file.

A fitness book author might offer an exercise tracking Excel file; the author of a book on small business website design can offer a form that lets people outline site content.

Example: Momentum Planners by Productive Flourishing

Nonfiction lead magnet idea #2: The Cheat Sheet

I’m a sucker for a cheat sheet, which is probably why I like to create them. A cheat sheet offers best practices or your best advice on a specific reader problem or challenge.

I created my author Guest Blogging Cheat Sheet after volunteering as the editor of an association blog with a monthly member column. Many member-written posts and headshots arrived in my inbox with issues I had to fix before the next step. I used them to create a short list of best practices for authors using guest blogging as a book marketing tool.

Any nonfiction author writing how-to or instructional content can easily pull a list of tips on a specific topic out of their book. Memoir writers can distill their lessons learned about the key problem or turning point in their lives into a cheat sheet, too.

Example: Guest Blogging Cheat Sheet

Nonfiction lead magnet idea #3: The Plan

A plan is a form of calendar where you’ve mapped out what someone needs to do on a schedule – it might be daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly.

Are you a cookbook author? Create a menu plan based on your book. Is yours a career book for new college graduates? Provide a simple “do this, then do that” plan for landing that first job.

Example: 100 Days of Real Food (when you move your mouse to leave the page, you’ll get a pop-up with a free meal plan offer)

Nonfiction lead magnet idea #4: The Resource List

People love resource lists because they save them time.

What are your favorite resources that are related to your topic? What tools, products, or sites do you use that will help others who are interested in what you write about? Drop them into a one-page resource list.

Are you a social media guru? List your favorite content creation and scheduling tools. Do you write travel books? Give us a list of what you won’t leave home without.

Example: The Content Hacker Educational Resource List for Today’s Marketers-in-Training

Nonfiction lead magnet idea #5: The Checklist

Who doesn’t love a checklist that will keep them on track and prevent mistakes?

Do you offer dating advice? List the elements of a dating app profile that gets results. Is your book about how to make soap? Give us an ingredients shopping list.

Example: The Ultimate Optin Form Checklist

Designing your lead magnet

Before you can create a compelling lead magnet, you need to know what goes into one and what it looks like. For that reason, I recommend downloading the examples listed above.

Add yourself to lots of other email lists, too, and study their lead magnets to see how others are doing it.

Once you’ve selected a format and written text to go with it, you’ll decide whether you’re going to design it yourself or outsource the work.

You can also create an attractive, effective lead magnet with low- or no-cost resources. I’ve used each of the following. The first is for out-sourcing; the second two are do-it-yourself options.

Fiverr 

Fiverr is an online marketplace for freelance services. For tasks like this, I think it’s an easier way to find a graphic artist than alternatives that include ask friends for recommendations or using a job site such as Upwork.

On the site, search for “lead magnet design” until you find one or two designers that you like.

When placing an order, attach to your order a lead magnet that represents what you’re looking for. It will help your designer better understand what you need in a finished product.

If you don’t have a lead magnet to offer as a sample, scroll through the design samples offered by Fiverr designers to find something that resonates with you and your book’s personality.

In general, I find that I get the best results on Fiverr when I can give the designer an example of the type of look I’d like to have.

Designrr 

Designrr is one of my favorite book marketing resources. It’s a web-based tool that lets me take content I’ve already created on my blog, in a Word file, or on a web page and turn it into a range of end products. I pay $27 for it annually and use it specifically for lead magnets.

Just last week, I used it to turn my 2021 Literary Calendar blog post into a downloadable PDF. Now, authors reading that article can also download and save the calendar when they provide their email address.

It was as simple as selecting the template I wanted to use (this one was my first time using a two-column design), pasting my URL into the form for the text import, and  playing around with the result.

Every time I use it, I get a little more brave . . . and a little more creative.

Canva 

Canva is an online design tool with both free and premium levels.

Creating a lead magnet is easier, of course, if you already know how to use Canva. If you aren’t taking advantage of it yet, it will probably take longer to create an end product than other options. Reviewing templates and learning how to customize or replace elements isn’t hard, but it takes time.

If you know what you want  – say, an e-book or a checklist   – simply type that term into the search box. You can also search for “lead magnet” to get some fun ideas and templates.

As an alternative, on the home page, review the options under the Canva header image. These categories are your best bets:

• Documents
• Education
• Marketing
• Events

Click around each collection to find something that speaks to you.

Set aside time to browse your options, as there are plenty of them. To get started, in the “documents” collection, try the “A4 document” options. Or, in the “events” group, select “announcement” in the “events” collection.

There are many more lead magnet options available to you, so spend some time Googling the topic to see what else you might discover. Once you’ve got your lead magnet (or magnets!) in place, remember that it won’t help if people don’t know about it.

Your goal with email list-building is to constantly send ideal readers to your landing page so your list — and your reach — grows steadily.

If you have a lead magnet, please tell us what it is in a comment and explain why you selected that format and topic. 

“Lead magnet” is a marketing term for the gift you give readers as an incentive to add themselves to your email list.

Think of it as an ethical bribe.

This isn’t optional. To get people to sign up to receive occasional author updates or a regular newsletter, you need to offer them a free, downloadable gift. It has to be something your readers, fans, or audience need or want.

My primary lead magnet is a one-page PDF file with my “Top 5 Free Book Promotion Resources.” Authors receive it when they complete the form on the right side of this screen or on a page I’ve created specifically for that purpose — a “landing page.”

The big question for you is: What should I offer as my incentive?

Not an easy question for novelists

That question is easier for nonfiction authors to answer than it is for novelists. Nonfiction authors can create quizzes, templates, infographics, cheat sheets, and samples, among other options.

More often than not, if they’re using any kind of lead magnet, fiction writers are using a novella or short story.

But is that your only option?
Nope.

Here are a few suggestions to get you thinking.

Fiction lead magnet idea #1: How to do something

Bear with me on this. It’s possible.

When I read Jane Green’s Saving Grace, which made frequent references to food that sounded delicious, I wanted the recipes. I wanted them so badly that I searched for them online. Unfortunately, she didn’t provide them.

If Green had offered a collection of recipes featured in that book as a lead magnet for her list, I would have “opted in” — marketing-speak for “added myself to her list” — without thinking twice.

The author of The Language of Flowers could create a one-page illustrated guide to flowers as symbols (daisy is innocence, calla lily is passion, aster is wisdom, etc.).

And how about a tongue-in-cheek sheet of instructions for “how to be a crazy rich Asian” to go along with the Crazy Rich Asians trilogy?

It’s not that hard after all, right?

Fiction lead magnet idea #2: A cheat sheet

Imagine a lead magnet for How to Make an American Quilt that offers the best quilting tips from top quilters — even though it isn’t a nonfiction how-to quilting book.

If you’ve read Dan Brown’s Angels & Demons, you can appreciate how a map of the Vatican or a guide to Bernini’s art might have enhanced your story enjoyment. You’d add yourself to his mailing list to get that, right?

If you write fantasy novels with many characters with unusual names, consider creating a one-page PDF character guide with names and descriptions. It will be a Godsend to fans who read in many small units of time rather than in long sittings.

Fiction lead magnet #3: Your book’s first chapter

This is the go-to option for most novelists. It’s what most recommend doing not because it’s the only idea they can think of, but because it’s the easiest to offer and implement.

Just save your first chapter as a PDF file and set it up in your system for downloading.

It’s a smart option because it lets readers sample your storytelling and writing skills. (Because of that, if you’re not a good writer, this could work against you.)

Because it will help readers who aren’t yet familiar with you take your book for a test drive, it’s a solid option for first-time novelists.

If you’re a seasoned writer with an established fan base, though, start getting creative with options one and two. You’ll have more fun with it, and so will your readers.

Creating your lead magnet

You can create an attractive, effective lead magnet with low-cost resources. I’ve used each of the following:

Fiverr

On the Fiverr site, search for “lead magnet design.”

To make sure you have a vision for what you want your designer to create, I recommend adding yourself to lots of email lists that offer lead magnets so you can see what other people are doing.

When you find one or two that you like, attach one to your order as an example of what you’re looking for.

Your other option is to scroll through the design samples offered by Fiverr designers to find something that resonates with you and your book’s personality.

In general, I find that I get the best results on Fiverr when I can give the designer an example of the type of look I’d like to have.

Designrr

Designrr is my new favorite toy. I paid $27 for this web-based software that lets me take content I’ve already created on my blog, in  a Word file, on Facebook, or on a web page — and turn it into a range of end products.

When I wanted to create a special free gift for a conference I spoke at recently, I used Designrr to turn a blog post into a short report. The nerd in me enjoyed exploring the templates and imagining the many design options for the audience handout.

You’ll get a PDF as well as a URL that houses the PDF. Give that URL to people who add themselves to your list.

Canva

While Canva is free, if you aren’t familiar with it already, it will be your most time-intensive option as you review templates and learn how to customize or replace elements.

Start by typing “lead magnet” into the search box to get a nice selection of options and templates. Or, if you know what you want — say, an e-book — simply type that term into the search box.

Alternatively, on the home page, select “browse all” in small type in the upper right, just under the large search box. Scroll down to see all options. Best bets are documents, education, marketing, and events categories. Click around each collection to find something that speaks to you.

“A4 document” in the “documents” collection and “announcement” in the “events” collection offer appropriate templates and inspiration.

Need a lead magnet idea for your book? Join the Build Book Buzz book marketing group on Facebook and start a discussion. Tell us you’re looking for help with a lead magnet idea, provide your book title, and give us a short book description. Let’s rally the troops to help you if you need it!

What are you using as an incentive to get people on your list? Tell us in a comment.