By Michael Evans, January 12, 2024.
This weekend I was reading a book on management, and it shared some AMAZING advice on the importance of Early Access.
Here it is…
So often in our lives we have been in environments where we have to be “perfect”. Whether it’s a test for school, a presentation at work, or publishing our story on retailers.
It’s great to have polished stories and work to share with the world.
However, we are so used to ONLY sharing our work once it’s polished given how our society trains many of us.
Early Access is about breaking through that.
Yes, you can make extra money from early access, and that’s great. Many authors in Kindle Unlimited make 25% or more of their income just from offering early access to their stories that will later be published in KU.
But Early Access does even more than that.
The book I read this weekend (it’s called The Making of a Manager) framed sharing work early and often as an extremely positive thing.
Fixed Mindset: I’m not ready to share this with my readers cause I don’t want to receive negative feedback.
Growth mindset: I want to share my stories before they are “ready” with my stories so I can get feedback that helps shape the story at an early stage and makes me a better author.
Take this mindset even further… and you can start sharing your *ideas* with readers at early stages to see what is interesting to them… all to try and test before you roll something out to a broader audience outside of your subscription 
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This is the power of subscriptions.
Your subscribers are on YOUR team.
Just like you wouldn’t share a presentation that isn’t polished with a client external to your company’s team. You probably wouldn’t share an early unedited draft at a book signing that has a first draft cover.
But you would share that presentation with your team early on in its process so that you can get feedback and make the final version better.
Your superfans are on your team.
And they may just give you feedback that really helps you find even MORE readers.
Here’s three action items to take this concept of sharing WIPs to the next level:
- Poll your readers on story ideas you have to your Followers and Members of your Ream. See which one is the most popular, and use that to focus on that story!
- Ask your readers at the end of every chapter as you offer early access a question that prompts a response. Keep these short and simple. Some of the best ones are asking “what do you think will happen next?” Sometimes, you will learn your readers already figured out your plot twist… and you can then revise your draft to truly surprise them!
- Create a poll at the end of a story or during the writing process asking for input/feedback from your readers. Maybe you want them to help you name a character, maybe you are curious if they want an extra chapter that elaborates more on a relationship between two characters or a secondary plot.
This has the added benefit of sparking positive community engagement around your stories 
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Wohoo!