Ideas for Promoting Christmas Reader Magnet WITHOUT Doing a Swap

TLDR: What strategies have worked for you for building your newsletter with your reader magnet? What ways do you “get the word out,” not counting Newsletter Swaps?

Full, Long Context:

I’m getting ready to release a Christmas short story collection in a couple weeks as a reader magnet through StoryOrigin. The last time I did a reader magnet, I did minimal promotion. I’m wondering if any of you have had success in spreading word about your reader magnets?

The main advice I’ve seen is to do newsletter swaps either with mutual friends or through StoryOrigin or BookFunnel. I’m not against this, and I am planning on a more strategic plan to involve swaps later on with my next (non-seasonal) reader magnet.

However, I don’t think my list is ready for a swap right now. I have 80 subscribers, so I don’t think that brings much value to the table for a swap, and I haven’t incorporated recommendations into my newsletter updates so far, so my subscribers have not been primed for a swap.

I’m wondering if there are strategies I’m missing or forgetting about.

I’m up for experimentation, and I want to use every opportunity as well as possible. Besides this Christmas collection, I plan to release a free story on my website and a non-seasonal reader magnet — plus I have a story confirmed for an anthology, release date still pending. I also have a Christmassy flash fiction story debuting on Havok towards the end of December.

That means I have five solid pieces of content releasing throughout next six months or so. I’m hoping to be strategic with each one so that I can have my list ready for a novel release sometime late 2025.

Any advice/perspective is welcome!