Selling a Fiction Experience with Direct Mail

Can direct mail scare you?

Jokes about credit card statements and parking tickets aside, well-done mail and print can tap into emotions like fear, even when it’s just make-believe, to deliver chills and thrills. And especially when it compels you to keep reading, to find out what happens next.

What triggered this post was an ad I found while scrolling through one of my social feeds.

The text: “Old is new again. I’m telling a story through the mail. Introducing — Scaremail. It’s better than bills”. And the graphic with it showed some faded-looking envelopes with artwork and symbols drawn on them.

I was hooked. I had to know more.

Billed as “The Yearlong Horror Experience,” Scaremail is a direct mail subscription service that was created by horror author David Viergutz, a disabled Army and law enforcement veteran. It tells the story of a man who stumbles upon the mysterious Scare.me website, touching off strange supernatural events.

Details are revealed by the author in a narrative spread across letters mailed to the reader twice a month. Each installment includes links, cryptic symbols, postcards, and other materials that enrich the customer’s experience and build anticipation for the next letter.

Details on Scaremail

• Base Price: $107 for the year (24 letters); a collectable box and a pen & letter opener set are extra.
• Subscribers: Over 20,000
• Printing/Fulfillment: Materials and swag printed/produced by vendors; envelopes printed, stuffed, and mailed pre-sort by his team in-house.

Why Scaremail Works

I reached out to Veirgutz for more about how he’s “making snail mail fun again”.

He explained his “why” for starting Scaremail, and how that benefits fans of horror fiction: “I was looking for a new way to reach readers. I’ve written 23 novels and 50+ short stories. This isn’t a story told through letters, it’s a story that can ONLY be told through letters. It is both fun and challenging for me as a writer, and even more exciting to see how readers react to good news in the mail (even if it’s a horror story) every two weeks.”

Selling direct with this subscription program is a mindset shift that can drive interest in his brand and sales for his books. And he pointed out that a second Scaremail story and ARG (alternate reality game) are on the way. But, he says, “I don’t push it hard. I still sell more than when I was authoring before Scaremail, but it’s not my focus.”

Should other authors and writers extend their work into other channels, I asked. With a wide variety of print and multichannel options — some connected, some not — storytelling in both fiction and non-fiction doesn’t have to be a linear or 1-dimensional experience for the audience. And that additional engagement means there are also opportunities for other physical formats that can be supplied by printers.

His take? “You’re a storyteller. Your medium for telling stories that people want is your writing, not the books. As soon as you get out from the idea that you MUST sell books, you’ll find your ability to tell stories is what will drive your business forward. The world needs more storytellers. I’ve accepted the moniker of storyteller, and it’s done well for me.”

The tangible properties of mail and print provide a unique customer experience. “The mailbox is a bastion of bad news and cold, unrelenting advertisements. Amazon delivers what you need quickly. With Scaremail, you get what you want and in this digital world, an opportunity to check the mail. Some folks remember getting cards from grandma in the mail. Or maybe a penpal from grade school. That’s what we’re doing — we’re bringing back a bit of nostalgia.”

And that’s not scary.