While the database of contacts would seem quite useful, it's also harder to navigate than I would like. It's hard to know which categories to choose for my non-fiction book, and even when I do, it's full of irrelevant listings and categories, with no way to filter down more finely (like -Christian for example). And then when I find contacts that seem like they might be relevant, there's no suggestions on what to do with their information. One contact had a website link only, and when I went to their website, their was nothing that suggested they were interested in taking on board a new book in some form.

I didn't even know that the email templates existed until I stumbled onto them after starting a pretend email. And the fact that I have to use the Storiad system to send emails is not ideal. I think I'll be using the DB to find names and then sourcing my own contact methods outside of Storiad, so I'm in control. There's also no way of knowing how receptive any of these contacts are to me reaching out, so I lack the confidence that my efforts will get results.

And the Marketing Plan wizard is a very odd user experience - I tell the site about my book, can pick only ONE thing to learn about, and then have to sit there for 30 seconds or more while it generates a "customised" set of information. This is supposed to save me time, not waste it.

Sure, for some questions, like "the top influencers" maybe it needs to be tailored to the genre, but for things like "the difference between marketing and publicising" I really don't understand why I have to sit there for 30 seconds to get generic recommendations. This content would be better off as a static resource that I can access through a knowledge hub at my leisure. Honestly, I should only have to enter my book details once, and then have access to customised answers to EVERY question that I can go back to at any time.

And it's very hard to get back and choose a different topic. Half the time the "Ask again" option is missing, and I end up having to re-enter all my book criteria all over again, with no way to save what I've done. All I can see to do is copy and paste the text out of each answer into a word processing document so I have some way of coming back to it again later.

I have no need of a website or calculators, as that's my area of strength, so the only value for me is the contacts, the templates and maybe the marketing plan wizard (but I lack the patience to keep using it).

I really wanted to like this tool, but it's just not sufficiently useful from my perspective.

At this point, I MIGHT keep Storiad just so I can go back to the list of contacts and email templates in future if I want to, but I'm not sure that a well done Google search might not just get me as far.