As with anything, there are always tried-and-true best practices from those who have gone before. It’s important to listen to the experience of others to inform your own strategy. Guidelines are widely applicable, but when it comes to your specific social media platforms, that’s where you can and should add your own style and personality. This chapter covers the best overarching strategies for achieving a successful social media presence as an author.
Before you think too hard about what you’ll say, consider who you’ll say it to. You don’t start any social network with followers, after all, so where do you find your audience and more importantly, is your audience on social media? Start by following people you actually want to follow. Don’t follow 5,000 people just so they’ll maybe follow you back. Follow people you genuinely want to interact with regarding your book’s subject matter—and people who would actually interact with you. Follow leading experts on your book’s topic, other authors in the genre, and look at the people who follow them. Once you are following those relevant to your subject, show you have interest in what they’re saying by responding to their tweets and engaging in conversations. Never forget, social media marketing is a two-way street.
Knowing who your audience is and what they like to talk about helps you find the right message to communicate. When you know who your audience is and what they’re interested in, you can begin crafting a message that’s directed to them and that they actually respond to. You should always be yourself—but be yourself in a way your readers can connect to. If you notice that all your followers are 20-somethings, then maybe it’s time to stop live tweeting every time Murder She Wrote comes on the television; if they’re mostly on the East Coast, then they probably won’t understand all of your In-N-Out Burger references. If you get negative sentiments from a tweet you posted about loud children, then you can probably assume that many of your readers are parents and you should lay off the topic.
If no one is buying your book—or if you just want to sell more copies—then pause for a moment and ask yourself if you really know who your audience is and how to talk to them in a way that establishes a connection.
Writers do not compete with each other the same way businesses do, but no matter what genre you are writing in, there are people with books that are similar to yours and one of the beautiful things about social media is that it’s public. Part of your social media strategy should be researching the strategy of similar authors in your genre. What happened when their book came out? How did they talk about it on social media? Did people respond? How do they talk to their audience when they don’t have a new book coming out? What kinds of posts do they share that get the most engagement? What do their followers look like? There’s a lot in their strategy that you can implement in your own, but your voice, brand, personality, and writing style need to be uniquely yours on your social media.
You’re a writer, so you probably know all about your writing voice. That voice should carry over to social media as well. Don’t share uninspired posts—show that you really enjoy doing this and aren’t doing it just because you feel like you have to. If you don’t want to do it, then don’t, because your fans will be able to tell in your tone.
Don’t forget your author brand either. When you create your social media presence, you’ll want to create an author bio, photo, and a header image for each site. (Even before this, however, you may want to create a brand identity that defines colors, fonts, and graphic elements that you use throughout your social media.)
Before posting something on social media, ask yourself if someone would actually care. Everything you write should answer the why, how, and what:
One of the ways more people will discover you is if others share what you’ve posted. At least once a week, you should have a post or tweet that is unique and would get shared with others. Recommendations are one place to start, but there are plenty of others—a controversial or funny statement that speaks to people, a photo that tells a story, an infographic. Find out what speaks to your audience to ensure what you’re posting is shareable content
Sharing interesting articles is another popular thing you can post for engagement. But try and think of articles people may not actually have heard already. Don’t share an article about who won the presidential race . . . share an article about something a little smaller, but that needs to be read. You can also occasionally promote other, similar authors because helping other writers will help you in the long term.
As you grow and start to get followers, begin thinking about ways to encourage them to engage with your message. For example, instead of saying, “Here’s a great charity that helps kids read,” and providing a link, say, “Millions of kids can’t read. Here’s a charity that helps. Please retweet.” In the second example you’re asking your readers to actually respond to what you're saying.
Post at least one thing a week that makes your readers engage with you. You can do this by posting book recommendations or asking people what’s on their reading list. Maybe you ask them to share their favorite quote from your book. People love to offer their opinion. It’s human nature. You’ll be surprised how many of your fans have an opinion when you post a simple poll like: “What’s the best reading spot in Chicago?” Polls take less than a minute to make, but capture a lot of engagement.
Social media is also a great channel for giveaways and promotions which trigger engagement as well. Think of creative ways to sell your book: bundle them with other books, for example, and sell them as gift sets. If you’ve written a series, do a contest or giveaway to hook readers and make them buy more. Offering freebies is also a good way to gain new followers and new readers.
It’s easy to forget the most important word in social media: social! Talk to people. Every day you should spend at least 5 to 10 minutes reading and commenting on social media. Be personal and genuine. People can tell when you are commenting hoping to get a follow and when you are commenting because you actually like what they’re saying.
Hashtags (words or phrases that start with a # sign) are one of the easiest ways to gain followers quickly, if you use them right. When a person clicks on the word(s) after the #, they see other people talking about that topic. Here’s a few things to remember about hashtags:
When you are visible and participate on social media, you quickly reveal whether you’re worth paying attention to. Some people don’t bring anything to the community that’s worth a listen, or—to limit their time commitment—they automate everything that’s posted. People can tell when you’re an automaton, and that’s by far one of the easiest ways to get ignored on social media.
Your social media shouldn’t be random; it should be strategic. There will be times where you’ll add something in the moment, and there’s nothing wrong with that, but at the very least, you should be scheduling one post a day or a few posts a week based on the social media platforms you choose to join.
When you’re creating a schedule, it helps to be thematic. For example, Mondays are for posting quotes, Tuesdays are for posting reviews, etc. Knowing the type of post you will publish on any given day will help you avoid having social media writer's block.
A social media content strategy will look different for every author and every genre, but the most important piece of your content strategy is the goal. Don’t be vague here. Have a number that’s quantifiable—such as “drive x people to my author website, and convert y% of those people to buy my book.” The more specific, the better. Make your goal realistic, and give it a timeframe. Every other piece of information in your social media strategy should point back to this goal. If there’s something in your plan that isn’t helping you achieve this goal, take it out.
If you can’t commit to a social media site, then it’s best left alone. A social media shell provides no added value and can detract from your overall marketing campaign. Social media campaigns should be organic, time sensitive, and consistent. Without those qualities, a prospective audience may stagnate. You don’t grow your social network overnight; you don’t grow it over a few weeks. It’s a long process and something you should ideally be working on as you write your book—not only when you’re ready to release it. Be persistent, and don’t give up if your following isn’t growing as fast as you’d like. The point is to build your traffic and, by extension, build your audience over time. Social media can be an intimidating task at first, but once you implement goals, develop a strategy, and get started, it will become second nature.
This chapter was compiled from the following posts on the IngramSpark blog:
What Social Media Should Authors Use? by Sara Wigal, Senior Manager at JKS Communications
Social Media: Choose It and Use It, Self-Publishers by Carla King, Founder of Author Friendly
8 Social Media Goals for Authors by Scott La Counte, CEO of BuzzTrace
7 Social Media Tips for Authors by Scott La Counte
6 Ways to Make Sure Your Social Media is Holiday Ready by Scott La Counte
How to Develop a Content Strategy for Authors by Scott La Counte
Using Social Media to Drive Book Sales by IngramSpark
