Twitter – Publetariat

Quick Link: Using Twitter to Make Powerful Connections as a Creative Professional

February 5, 2017 by Publetariat

Quick links, bringing you great articles on writing from all over the web.

Today’s social media post is all about Twitter, a great way to connect to people 150 characters at a time. Posting at Jane Friedman, Daniel Parsons explains the best way for authors to use Twitter.

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Using Twitter to Make Powerful Connections as a Creative Professional

by Daniel Parsons

Today’s post is from Daniel Parsons (@DKParsonsWriter), author of The #ArtOfTwitter.

Finding an audience for your books can seem like an insurmountable task when you enter the publishing space with no prior experience. Thankfully, Twitter can help you become not only an engaged member of the community but—in time—an influencer with a loyal audience.

Four years ago, I joined Twitter because I was writing my first book, and every blog post on the internet seemed to be saying the same thing: authors need a social media presence. Starting out, I had one goal, and that was to get 3,000 engaged Twitter followers. Why 3,000? Well, I had heard that you only start to get interactions on every tweet when you hit that number, and publishers wanted authors with ready-made, interactive audiences.

A lot has changed in the last four years. For a start, I discovered self-publishing and decided that I preferred it to the traditional route. One thing that hasn’t changed, however, is my focus on Twitter. I now have 93,000+ followers, reach 500,000 people every month, and get over 200 interactions per day. My followers have helped me grab the attention of powerful influencers, got one of my stories 30,000 reads on the story-sharing site Wattpad, and landed me a job at a publishing house. Along the way, they’ve helped my tweets trend above those of A-list celebrities—beating the likes of Craig David and Ryan Seacrest in various hashtag games.

Read the full post on Jane Friedman

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Quick Links: Twitter For Writers – More Proof That It Works – Updated

July 12, 2016July 12, 2016 by Publetariat

Quick links, bringing you great articles on writing from all over the web.

With only being allowed 140 characters, many writers put their social energy into other areas than Twitter. But Twitter can be a great way to meet other writers, find out great resources, and yes – even sell books. At BooksGoSocial Book Marketing Blog, Laurence O’Bryan goes into great detail on how to use Twitter and what tools are available to help manage your Twitter accounts.

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Twitter For Writers – More Proof That It Works – Updated

May 23, 2016

Laurence O’Bryan

Twitter has hundreds of millions of daily users worldwide. It is both a way to engage one to one with people and a way to broadcast information. Writers use it every day for both. Search for #amwriting on Twitter and you will see some of the activity writers are engaging in on Twitter. Some of it is broadcasting. Some of it is looking for engagement.

If you use it consistently you will get noticed. It’s not a magic wand, but it does reach readers.

Twitter sells books too. On this page you will see actual Tweets from real people who have bought books because of Tweets, and a table showing thousands of people going to book pages on Amazon as a result of book promotion Tweets, all tracked by an independent hit tracking service. You can also see other comments at the bottom of this post from people whose books sold more because they were Tweeted about.

There’s a lot of misinformation around about the value of Twitter for writers. Much of it is written by writers who struggle with how to use Twitter effectively. Often it’s assumed that one or two Tweets to your followers is enough and that if that approach fails, it’s because Twitter isn’t effective at selling books. That adage about workmen blaming their tools comes to mind.

Read the full post on BooksGoSocial Book Marketing Blog

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The Telling Signs of Content Flops, and 6 Ways To Fix Content Marketer’s Worst Nightmare

January 3, 2016May 31, 2015 by Publetariat

This post by Olsy Sorokina originally appeared on the Hootsuite blog in 3/15.

Even the best-love brands have their haters—that’s unavoidable. So for marketers, it’s often better to focus on being memorable and stand out from the crowd. Think of all those commercial jingles that just won’t get out of your head, or anticipation of products associated with the coming of a new season (Pumpkin Spice Latte, I’m looking at you). Brands that achieve this do so by straying off the beaten path. Marketing guru Seth Godin calls this “finding your purple cow,” a term inspired by a short 19th century nonsense poem and used by Godin to describe being remarkable, and succeeding in advertising by thinking outside the box.

Should you be thinking about finding your own brand’s purple cow? Finding that truly unique way of telling your story means taking risks and surprising your audience. That means the first step down the path to a more memorable bovine brand is to figure out if you’ve been boring your followers.

3 warning signs that you might be boring your followers:

1. Your Twitter engagement rate is low

Once Twitter has rolled out their analytics tools to all users, determining how well your messaging is performing on the microblogging network is easier than ever. Perhaps the most telling of all metrics available to users is the engagement rate, a number calculated based on the number of impressions (i.e. how many people saw the Tweet) and the number of engagements (link clicks, favorites, retweets, etc.) with your Tweets. Obviously, the higher the engagement rate, the better you’re doing. We experienced this ourselves when we doubled our Twitter engagement rate in two months.

Read the full post, which includes two more signs you may be boring your readers and six tips for fixing boring content, on the Hootsuite blog.

Socially Awkward: A Simple Guide to Social Media

January 3, 2016March 25, 2015 by Publetariat

This post by Jandra Sutton with Steph Rodriguez originally appeared on San Francisco Book Review on 3/20/15.

Chances are you’ve read countless articles about the best ways to use social media outlets, like Twitter, Facebook, Google Plus, or LinkedIn, and devoured list after list of quick-tips—even “for dummies”—at an attempt to implement a wealth of information with varying degrees of success. It’s great that you’re using social media, but that’s only one part of the equation. You’ve already mastered all the basics to be accepted by the social media in-crowd: “like,” “share,” “tweet.” Yet, what about the things you should avoid at the risk of becoming a social media outcast? By following these simple guidelines to online etiquette, even the most socially awkward computer user will roam the halls of social media with much success.

Tasteful Self-Promotion by Online Appeal

Facebook and Twitter are perfect outlets to express a variety of thoughts and experiences like: how great the bike ride to work was, photographs of a tasty dish from that new, swanky restaurant in town, an interesting article you read, or even as a means to self-promote your brand or new novel.

Still, as a general rule, only 1 out of 5 posts should be blatantly self-promotional, like those including a link to buy your book. The other four, leave open to share a new blog post, comment on a topic relevant to your book, ask followers a question that interests them, or retweet that insightful article you read over the weekend. Flesh out your social media pages with more than just attempts to sell. This will further engage your loyal followers.

Read the full post on San Francisco Book Review.

Catering To Your True Fans

January 3, 2016September 23, 2014 by Publetariat

This post by Ksenia Anske originally appeared on her blog on 9/15/14.

Hey, indie writers? This is what marketing your self-published books is about. It’s about catering to your true fans, even if that might upset some people. As you’re aware, I’m doing a cleaning spree on Twitter, unfollowing most accounts, so I’m left only with about 2K of those that I really want to follow and read. After being on Twitter for almost 5 years, it’s not easy. In fact, it’s ruffling some feathers, as you might have seen in the comments to this post about dealing with online trolls.

Why am I doing it?

I’m doing it to cater to my true fans. I used to be afraid to say this word, “fans.” It felt odd. Weird. Exhilarating, and yet still weird. Me, having fans? How could I? I’m a nobody. It felt somehow self-serving and egoistic by saying it. Slowly, I’ve gotten used to the idea that I do have fans. And they are true fans, fans who send me money when they themselves are struggling financially. Fans who support me in my darkest moments, dragging me out of my gloomy murderous moods and spanking my ass to get me back to writing. Fans who are patiently waiting for my next book to be published, who have already read every single draft of that book and have pre-ordered it and donated me more money on top of it. Fans who have sent me messages, saying they will travel to my first book reading this Friday, even though they don’t live in Seattle.

Click here to read the full post on Ksenia Anske’s blog.

Do You Make These Online Marketing Mistakes?

January 3, 2016June 12, 2014 by Publetariat

This post by Jason Kong originally appeared as a guest post on The Book Designer on 6/4/14.

Imagine you’re making an appearance at a bookstore to promote your latest novel.

Someone approaches you to chat. This person gushes that she’s read all your books and is excited to read the latest one. She holds the newly purchased book in her hands, hoping that you’ll sign it.

Immediately you launch into an elevator pitch, explaining the genre you write in and a quick summary of your storytelling style. You conclude with the various places your books can be purchased, and that you hope she’ll give your books a try.

Clearly, a longtime fan doesn’t need an introduction to how you write and the stories you’ve written. Having the right person pay attention does little good if the wrong message is shared.

Maybe you don’t make this kind of mistake when you’re face-to-face. Can you say that’s also true when you communicate over the internet?

The downside of using online media

We all know about the promise.

A platform in cyberspace meant you had a stage to project your voice. Your digital words could travel far and wide, attracting and corralling those who care about what you do. With one click, you could reach just about everyone.

Click here to read the full post on The Book Designer.

Using SlideShare For Marketing Fiction And Non-Fiction Books

January 3, 2016May 22, 2014 by Publetariat

This post by Joanna Penn originally appeared on her The Creative Penn blog on 5/16/14.

I know you don’t want to think about any other sites for marketing!

But in this post, I outline why I think you should consider Slideshare and how I’m using it for both my brands, J.F.Penn thriller author, and Joanna Penn, professional speaker and non-fiction author.

Why care about Slideshare?

Slideshare is basically a presentation sharing network.

It’s a form of content marketing, but more visual, and if done well, it can be much more effective than writing a blog post on a topic, especially if you are unknown and your site has no ranking. Visual marketing is very much the big thing now. In an age of text overload, people are clicking more on visual content – whether that’s Instagram, pics on Twitter or Facebook, infographics or SlideShares.

It’s easily shareable and viewable on any social platform as well as on mobile devices. On the right, you can see a tweet that actually embeds the whole SlideShare so it can be read within Twitter. Awesome for twitterholics like me!

Slideshare is one of 120 most visited websites in the world, with 60 million monthly visitors. It ranks highly in Google for keywords, and you can use embedded hyperlinks to direct traffic to your site.

Click here to read the full post on The Creative Penn.

You’re Not Gonna Spend a Lot Marketing This Book

January 3, 2016May 14, 2014 by Publetariat

This post by Saundra Mitchell originally appeared on her Making Stuff Up For A Living blog on 1/13/14.

So, I’m reading this absurd article on all the things you need to spend money on to market your own book. Oh noz, you have to pay a zillion dollars for a website, for a mailing list, for copy and editing for your website, wtf? I’m not even going to link to article because, seriously, WTF?

Here’s the deal. If you’re willing to put the time in yourself, you can do almost all of your book marketing for free. It may be worth it to you to pay for someone else to do everything- and if you’re in a position to do that, awesome! Go for it! But if you’re not, or if you’d prefer to have strict control over everything, here’s a brief guide to doing it yourself.

Blog/Website: More and more people are using Blog software to host their entire websites. WordPress is fantastically flexible, free and your URL can be an easily memorable yourname.wordpress.com. WordPress has about a zillion free themes so you can customize like whoa, and because it’s an integrated service, it shares your links on other blogs like yours to drive traffic. FOR FREE.

Blogger is another free host and software package that’s easy to use and customize for your needs. And you know what drives even more traffic to websites? Twitter. ALSO FREE.

Graphics: Graphics for your website, your bookmarks, your postcards whatnot- you can create them yourself for free, from the bottom up. Download a copy of GIMP image manipulation software, and play with it.

Click here to read the full article on Making Stuff Up For A Living.

3 Myths About Social Media For Authors

January 3, 2016May 11, 2014 by Publetariat

This post by Tim Grahl originally appeared on Out:think on 12/13/13.

More advice about social media is swirling around out there than ever before. I read the posts. I watch the videos. I’m constantly looking for that secret that I’m missing and each time I’m reminded of the same thing.

When it comes to selling books, spending a huge amount of time building a social media following is a waste of time.

In this post, I’m going to debunk many of the myths about social media and how it can be used to sell books and then I’m going to share a couple of things you can do to actually take advantage of these platforms.
2 Ideas About Social Media

Tools and Tool Boxes
All of the things we use to build our online platform – blogs, email lists, social media, podcasts, guest posts, etc – are all just tools in a tool box. The focus should never be on the tool. The focus is on what we are trying to build – in this case an author platform.

However, with tools like Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, Google+, LinkedIn and others, we often lose site of that. We decide we need to use them to sell books then run around trying to figure out the best way to do it. This is the same thing as picking up a hammer from your toolbox and then running around trying to figure out what to build with it.

You should never start with the tools. You start with a plan, then reach in your toolbox and pull out the right tool for the job.

Click here to read the full post on Out:think.

Neil Gaiman on the Hugo Awards Controversy

January 3, 2016March 6, 2014 by Publetariat

When Jonathan Ross was invited to host the Hugo Awards this year it caused a huge rift in the British Science Fiction community. Many felt the choice of Ross was totally inappropriate, as Ross is not involved in the community of Science Fiction authors and publishers, and some concluded it must be a cynical grab for more American attention.

A huge firestorm of criticism erupted on Twitter, with personal attacks being hurled not only at event organizers, but at Ross and his wife as well. In a post made to his Neil Gaiman’s Journal yesterday, Gaiman reveals that he had acted as the go-between for Hugo Awards organizers in reaching out to Ross in the first place, and goes on to comment on the whole mess. From Gaiman’s Journal:

Twitterstorms are no fun when people are making up things about you or insulting you for things you didn’t do or think or say. When scores of people from a group that you consider yourself a part of are shouting at you, it’s incredibly upsetting, no matter who you are. And these things spill over and get bigger — I was saddened to learn that Jane Goldman, Jonathan’s wife, one of the gentlest, kindest people I know (and the person who, with Jonathan, got me onto Twitter, back in December 2009) had deleted her Twitter account because of all this.

I was seriously disappointed in the people, some of whom I know and respect, who stirred other people up to send invective, obscenities and hatred Jonathan’s way over Twitter (and the moment you put someone’s @name into a tweet, you are sending it directly to that person), much of it the kind of stuff that they seemed to be worried that he might possibly say at the Hugos, unaware of the ironies involved.

Click here to read the full post on Neil Gaiman’s Journal.

13 Great Tools to Analyze and Measure Your Social Media Results

January 3, 2016March 6, 2014 by Publetariat

This post by Frances Caballo originally appeared on The Book Designer on 3/5/14.

Many writers make the mistake of thinking that by being on Facebook and Twitter and other social media channels they’ve already accomplished the goal of using social media to market their books. They haven’t.

Furthermore, just being on social media and occasionally posting information isn’t a genuine outcome of your marketing efforts.

First, you need to define the purpose of your online activity, become clear on your purpose, and determine whether the outcomes you achieve will enable you to reach your overall goal of selling books, becoming better known as a writer, and receiving the recognition that you and your books deserve.

How to Find Your Online Groove

Let’s assume that you’ve been curating great content to post on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and perhaps even Google+. We’ll also assume that you’re scheduling your posts throughout the day and allocating time in the late afternoon to be social. In other words, you are perusing your news feeds, liking and possibly sharing some posts, leaving comments, and thanking your Twitter followers for retweeting your tweets.

There’s something else you need to start doing: analyzing your metrics. It’s important to spend few minutes every week analyzing your efforts to make sure that you are on your way to achieving your established goals.

Why Are Social Media Analytics Important?

Here are some examples of why you need to pay attention to analyses of your social media activity.

◾ What if you started to use an application that helped you discover that your Facebook posts were appealing to more women than men? Would that information prompt you to adjust your messaging?

◾ What if you discovered that your tweets were most often retweeted at five a.m. Eastern Standard Time? Would that information cause you to start scheduling your posts when East Coast residents are more likely to be online and using social media?

◾ What if you were to discover that a significant number of your Facebook fans were from Great Britain? Wouldn’t you want to schedule some of your status updates to the United Kingdom’s time zone?

The obvious answer to the above questions is yes.

Click here to read the full post on The Book Designer.

100 Tips to Be a Smarter, Better Twitterer

January 3, 2016February 3, 2014 by Publetariat

This post originally appeared on the Computer Colleges site on 5/12/09.

1. Set up your profile: Give people a glimpse beyond what your tweets reveal.

2. Include a picture: Make sure you add a photo of yourself so that your tweets will be more personal.

3. Create a simple and short Twitter name: The longer your Twitter ID, the more space it takes up, and having a complicated name can make it hard for people to respond to or mention you.

4. Just do it: Don’t just lurk-jump into the conversation.

5. Make your profile link something that tells more about you: Share your blog, an about me page, or any other page that offers more information about the person behind the tweets.

6. Share photos: Post your photos on Twitter to shake things up a bit and add some interest to your stream.

7. Use proper grammar: Occasional abbreviations are passable, but make sure that your tweets are readable.

8. Use your real name: Build your personal brand by choosing your real name as your Twitter ID.

9. List your location: Many people use Twitter for local networking, so they’ll be more likely to follow you if they know where you are.

10. Learn the lingo: If you don’t know what DM, @, RT, and other Twitter symbols and words are, look them up or ask.

Click here to read the full post, which includes 90 more Twitter tips, on the Computer Colleges site.

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Twitter For Writers – More Proof That It Works – Updated

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