When to send your ARCs: a launch timeline by genre
Almost every ARC campaign that underperforms was scheduled wrong before it was executed badly. Too short and your readers are still on chapter nine when the book goes live. Too long and the deadline feels theoretical, so nobody starts. Here's how to build the schedule backwards from release day.
Lead time by genre
Reading speed and reading culture differ enormously between categories, and the lead time should follow the reader, not your nerves.
| Category | Lead time | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Romance, thriller, commercial fiction | 4–6 weeks | Fast readers, high completion, and an audience that reads to a deadline comfortably |
| Science fiction and fantasy | 8–12 weeks | Longer books, slower and more critical readers; you want detailed reviews landing by launch day, not months after |
| Nonfiction and business | 6–10 weeks | Fewer readers matter more; leave room for blurbs and considered responses rather than volume |
| Children's and middle grade | 60–90 days | You're reaching the adult gatekeeper — parent, teacher, librarian — on their schedule, not the child's |
Working ranges drawn from how campaigns in each category are typically run, not from a published dataset. Treat as craft guidance and adjust for your book's length.
One caution on the long end: a twelve-week window is not twelve weeks of reading. It's eleven weeks of nothing followed by a scramble, unless you structure it. Which brings us to the part that actually moves the number.
The deadline does more than the lead time
A fixed review date tied to release day is the difference between a campaign and a giveaway. Without one, "I'll get to it" is a perfectly rational position for a reader to hold indefinitely — and given that only about 22% of even highly engaged readers leave reviews oftenWritten Word, the default outcome of an open-ended ask is silence.
Two reminders carry most of the load:
- Mid-window. A light nudge at the halfway mark, framed as helpful rather than nagging — here's your link again, here's the date.
- Three to five days before the deadline. This is the one that converts the reader who genuinely meant to and forgot, which is a large share of everyone who hasn't posted yet.
A reminder sequence is the cheapest lever you have — cheaper than another platform listing, and far cheaper than rewriting the book. Nobody has published a controlled measurement of what reminders are worth on their own, so treat the causal claim as craft knowledge. What is measured is suggestive: the platforms that chase the reader for you are the ones landing in the 38–75% range in the documented numbers, and they send those reminders whether or not the author remembers to.
Where your readers come from changes the schedule
Every campaign draws from two pools, and they don't behave the same way. In a documented romantasy launch, roughly two-thirds of ARC readers came from the author's own list and one-third from organic platform browsing — and on the same platform, in the same window, invited list-readers reviewed at 93% against 72% for readers who found the book cold.Illene
Invite your own list first, always. Even 200 subscribers will out-convert a larger pool of strangers, and they'll do it faster.
Practically, that means staging the sends: your list goes out on day one of the window, and platform listings open a week or two later. Your most reliable readers get the longest runway, and you learn early whether your deadline is realistic before the cold traffic arrives.
A worked six-week schedule
- Week −6. Campaign opens. Email your own list and street team first. State the review deadline in the first line, not the last.
- Week −5. Open platform listings. Approve requests as they arrive rather than in a batch — approval delays cost you downloads.
- Week −3. Mid-window reminder to everyone who has downloaded but not reviewed. Separate the message to people who never downloaded; they need a different one.
- Week −1. Final reminder, three to five days out. Include direct links to exactly where you want the review posted.
- Launch day. Reviews go live. This is the window the Spiegel research says matters most — the first five reviews carry most of the conversion benefit.Spiegel
- Launch +12 days. Take your first real reading. Do not treat it as final.
- Launch +6 months. Count again. In that documented campaign, reviews climbed from 263 to 311 over this period — an 18% increase arriving well after most authors stop looking.Illene
Two scheduling mistakes worth naming
Setting the deadline on release day. Reviews posted on launch day are already slightly late — you want them live when the page goes live. Set the review deadline three to seven days before release.
Treating the twelve-day number as the verdict. Platforms differ enormously in how their readers pace themselves, and a channel that looks weak at launch may be your best long-tail performer. Judge them at six months, especially if you write series.
More on that in what an ARC campaign is actually worth, and on the errors that undo a well-scheduled campaign in six mistakes that quietly kill an ARC campaign.
Keeping the schedule is the unglamorous half. ArcRoster runs the window for you — deadlines, staged sends, and reminder sequences to the right segment — with a campaign dashboard that shows who downloaded, who reviewed, and who's about to miss the date.
Sources
- Brutally Honest ARC Campaign Results — Susan Illene, September 2025.Field report
One romantasy launch (Oaths & Vengeance), six-week window, 622 requests across five platforms plus a direct list. A single campaign, not an industry average.
- 2026 Reader Survey: What Readers Want, Buy, and Expect — Written Word Media, February 2026.Survey
3,589 respondents, drawn from Written Word Media's own promo list — active digital readers, so likely more review-inclined than the general book-buying public.
- How Online Reviews Influence Sales — Medill Spiegel Research Center, Northwestern University, 2017.Research
Analysis of purchase and review data from PowerReviews and the Air Miles Reward Program.