Comparison of StoryOrigin and BookFunnel

Here are my statistics since migrating to New MailerLite exactly a year ago in December.

What I like/prefer about StoryOrigin:

• the member-authors are much more likely to do a book swap.

• The group promos allow sample chapters by default.

• There are audiobook review swaps.

• There is a very good beta read feature.

• The readers are a bit more flex: better open rate and click rate.

What I like/prefer about BookFunnel:

• the book covers (and group promo banners) tend to be higher quality—**my own readers are better served with apparently better books.**

• Authors are given an accumulating score that is associated with their name, which motivates you to do what you can to improve stats.

• Within the group promo, hosts can give priority visibility as a reward to those who are contributing most.

In my experience:

• 0.005% higher likelihood of spam complaint from SO.

• 12% higher likelihood of unsubscribe in BF.

• The BF readers are 5% less engaged.

• Readers using both BF and SO are less likely to unsubscribe but more likely to mark you as spam… Hmm.

• The BF authors are unlikely to swap with those just starting out.

For both, for 2023, I was using the same reader magnet. But I can’t say I did an equal number of promos. I use SO for author swaps and some group promos, I use BF for group promos and 0 author swaps. This certainly factors in.

This year I am doing my first BookSweeps. We’ll see how that compares.