I’m going to sound smug for a moment, because frankly, that’s how I’m feeling right about now.
From the beginning, I’ve done everything I can to make life easier on myself, and it’s paid off in several ways in the long run.
I make all my links in my books go back to my own author website, including the link for my newsletter sign up.
Link to one of my books? It goes to my website (a page just for that book).
Link to my newsletter sign up form? It goes to my website (a page just for the form for the newsletter sign up).
This is part laziness on my part and part forward thinking. I’m always imagining worst case scenarios, and the worst thing I can imagine happening with links is some service going under and me being stuck with the task of editing who knows how many books and having to upload new files to all the distributors.
So here’s my advice to you, especially if you have a lot of books or plan to write a lot of them!
Link to your own website pages, no matter what anyone else recommends you do, or how much they swear you’ll earn more or get more subscribers or whatever.
I mean, I guess if you don’t mind the work, and doing it in a hurry too when something happens that screws up three hundred links you’ve put all over the web or inside your books and promo materials, then do what you want, but I will never recommend anyone link to anything but pages under their own control.
The end.
:-)