"Roundheads and Ramblings"
Building a platform
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Posted on Tuesday, March 27, 2012 9:20 AM
There are dozens of social media
sites on the Internet, and I am certainly no expert on all of them. The big
three—the ones most often used—are Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. They serve
different purposes, and I’ve been surprised to see how different their
audiences are.
Let’s start with Facebook, which
now advertises that it has over 500 million users. . . . On my own Facebook account I have
discovered close to 400 “friends.” They include a few family members; a
neighbor or two (although that strikes me as silly); some long-lost high school
classmates; several former students, some dating back over twenty years; and a
fairly large contingent of academics, mostly medievalists. The rest are members
of Lions Clubs or members of the Military Writers Society of America, both
locally and around the world. What can they possibly have in common? I know
them. I’d recognize them on the street. I’d probably hug most of them. They are
all people with whom I have shared both common interests and common
experiences. We’ve worked together, struggled with the same problems, and
shared our ideals and goals. I care about them and how they are doing, and I
hope they care about me.
When it comes to posting my status
on Facebook, I try not to bore my friends or irritate them unduly with efforts
to sell my latest book. But if I have had a wonderful day—or a miserable
one—these are the people with whom I can share it. I post pictures here, both
of myself, so they can watch me age, and of my current activities. It is on
Facebook that I am most open about my personal activities and opinions. What
good does that do for business, you may wonder? Many of my friends will buy my
books; even more will be tickled for me when I win an award. I receive a benefit
when they talk about me or leave a congratulatory note on my wall. Facebook
friends can form a virtual cheering section in our lives, and that’s important. . . .
My second social media outlet is
LinkedIn. As I indicated earlier, this site is much more business-like than
Facebook. I have over 300 connections on LinkedIn, and almost none of them
are cross-overs to my list of Facebook friends. I know less than half of them
personally. My LinkedIn connections are the power-brokers in my world . . . Many of my connections are members of Lions Clubs
International, but they are the leaders in that organization—former
international officers, staff members, or CEOs of Lions-associated non-profit organizations.
They are people I can turn to when I need business-type advice. The rest are
business figures with whom I have had some contact, and media and public
relations people. How can they help build my
publishing platform? Well, my financial advisor, my lawyer, and my accountant
are on that list, along with public figures who can orchestrate newspaper or TV
coverage when I have an announcement of a new book or an award. They are the
people who can help set up book signings or public speaking engagements. They
are great contacts because they have their own contacts.
Another great advantage of
LinkedIn is that it lets people with common interests form discussion lists,
where they can connect with people who have similar interests or who are facing
similar problems. I currently participate in several writers’ groups, as well
as one that discusses fund-raising ideas for non-profits.
And then there is Twitter. What can
you possibly accomplish with 140 spaces? The easy answer, of course, it that it
teaches you to cram a lot of information into the smallest possible space.
Brevity is good. But beyond that, I see Twitter as a conduit—the vital link
between me and the huge world of the Internet.
At the moment I have around 800
followers on Twitter, and I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t know many of
them. We are strangers who have made a brief connection because of a third
party who knows us both, or because we have a common involvement. They are
simply people who have indicated an interest in what I might have to say. When
they follow me, anything I post will automatically appear on each of their
Twitter feeds. They may, or may not, ever see it. But when they do, they each
have the option of passing it on to their own followers, giving my message
access to untold numbers of readers. Twitter also has the ability to post
automatic messages for me, and to re-post my messages to my other social media
outlets.
Here’s how it works. Suppose I’ve
finished a blog post announcing the publication of a new book and including a
link to the book’s order page. I send it to my 800 followers, and Twitter also
posts it on my Facebook page (+400 readers) and my LinkedIn profile (+300
readers.) Then a dear fellow writer in England retweets it to her whole list
(+1000 readers), the president of a writers’ society to which I belong retweets
it to her list (+1250), and three faithful blog followers in Missouri,
California, and Colorado send it to all their followers (+1700 total). That one
personal message reaches over 5000 people within minutes. That’s the best, and
easiest, advertising I know.
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Posted on Wednesday, February 08, 2012 4:18 PM
 I've been working non-stop for the past couple of days on launching my new book on self-publishing. In that process I discovered a new application that allows its members to create small, specialized websites for free. I've designed one for "The Second Mouse" that looks like this. The panel on the right side changes when you push one of the five buttons on the left. This picture of the cover is the HOME page.
The WIX site provides a large selection of templates. You choose the one whose appearance you like. Then you can delete their pictures and add your own. You can erase their text and add yours. You can add music, videos, new backgrounds, and special effects, if you're the type who likes to see things moving around on your site.
To create The Mouse page, I started with a site designed for a bakery. Where they showed bread and piecrusts, I added mice. Where they had price lists, I inserted book descriptions and reviews. The whole thing took several hours but was relatively pain-free. Once you have your website finished, you can upload it to a Facebook Fan Page, for a really neat presentation. Mine is at www.facebook.com/TheSecondMouse .
To see my whole site in action, you can also go to its own website at: http://www.wix.com/schribercat4/second-mouse
The initial design account is free, but you can expect to be pressured to upgrade to a Premium account. So far, I don't see much of an advantage to doing the upgrade, especially since it costs $100 a year or more. I'm trying the premium settings for a month before I decide to commit to that kind of investment. Right now, I can't recommend anything but the free site. I suggest you try it out for yourself. Design a page and put it up on your Facebook page for a unique presentation
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Posted on Tuesday, January 24, 2012 10:15 AM
Once I started working seriously on
my Civil War novel, Beyond All Price,
I also began looking for ways to publish it. Waiting until you have a finished
product just does not work; you have to do your homework along the way. I
started with the standard approaches. I found books written in my genre (in
this case historical fiction set in 1860s) and checked on their publishers and
the authors’ agents. These were names I could at least be sure would be open to
the type of book I was writing. To that basic list, I added other publishing
houses and literary agents I found listed in such resources as Writer’s Market. I looked up each one on
the Internet to find out how they wanted submissions handled. Each one on the
list received a hand-tailored written or e-mailed query letter.
Responses were spotty. Almost half
never replied. Others sent canned messages: “Sorry. We are not accepting new
clients.” “Sorry. We no longer consider unsolicited manuscripts.” Only a
handful expressed any interest whatsoever, and they consistently asked for a
full description of my platform before they would consider the book. At that
stage, I had no idea what a “platform” looked like in the publishing world, so
I had more research ahead of me.
Here’s what I found. If you are a
household word—a politician, a celebrity, a sports figure, or a best-selling
author already—you have a built-in platform: a fan base of people who will buy
your book because of who you are. If you’re a hard-working writer, you have to
build your own platform. Publishers and agents suggested that I needed the
following: •
A personal website visited by hundreds of readers every day; •
A blog that had a similar reader base and gathered dozens of comments on
every posting; •
A personal Facebook page, with hundreds of followers and daily postings; •
A Facebook Fan Page, one dedicated to my writing; •
A Twitter account, with daily postings and thousands of followers; •
A LinkedIn account, with multiple recommendations and connections within
my professional community; •
A personal e-mail list of media outlets, bookstores, libraries, and
civic organizations, all of which would be eager to do personal interviews with
me, invite me as a guest speaker, or host a book-signing event.
Fortunately, I'm pretty adept at
finding my way around a computer, but I had never bothered to become involved
in social networking of this sort. I went to work, particularly at building my
Internet resources. These outlets are not hard to use, but they take an
enormous amount of time to develop their full potential. I've been working on
this platform for about eighteen months now, and my numbers surprise me. I have
almost 400 Facebook friends, some 800 Twitter followers, more than 290
connections on LinkedIn, and a website/blog that receives around 200 hits a
day. To me, that’s amazing, but the figures are still not up to the five
thousand guaranteed readers that most publishers want to see. At most, I have a
little soapbox that serves as my platform. But for a self-publisher, that's enough.
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Posted on Friday, October 14, 2011 11:45 AM
There are dozens of social media sites on the internet, and I am certainly no expert on all of them. The big three--the ones most often used-- are Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. They serve different purposes, and I've been surprised to see how different their audiences are. I'll try to show you how I use each one to promote my work, and you can apply the same lessons to another site if you like.
Let's start with Facebook, which now advertises that it has 500 million users. You probably even know a few of those yourself! I have no intention of telling you how to use Facebook. As I write, the powers behind the scenes are still re-organizing and tweaking what materials you can see, and what others can see about you. If you're going to use Facebook, that's the first thing you'll have to get used to. it changes. Sometimes it changes several times a day.
On my own Facebook account I have discovered close to 400 "friends." They include a few family members; a neighbor or two (although that strikes me as silly); some long-lost high-school classmates; several former students, some dating back over twenty years; and a fairly large contingent of academics--mostly medievalists. The rest are members of Lions Clubs, both locally and around the world. What can they possibly have in common? I know them. I'd recognize them on the street. I'd probably hug most of them. They are all people with whom I have common interests and common experiences. We've worked together, struggled with the same problems, and shared our ideals and goals. I care about them and how they are doing, and I hope they care about me.
When it comes to posting my status on Facebook, I try not to be boring or irritate friends unduly with efforts to sell my latest book. But if I've t had a wonderful day -- or a miserable one -- these are the people with whom I can share it. I post pictures here, both of myself ( so they can watch me age) and of my current activities. So it is on Facebook that I am most open about my personal activities and opinions. What good does that do for business, you may wonder? Many of them will buy my books; even more will be tickled for me when I win an award. I benefit when they talk about me or leave a congratulatory note on my wall. Facebook friends can form a virtual cheering section in your life.
There's another side to Facebook, too, one that is still evolving too rapidly to lay down strict guidelines here. Anyone with a personal Facebook account ought also to be aware that it is possible to build extra Facebook pages that advertise your business, or your favorite non-profit, or your club. On those pages, you can reach beyond your personal circle of friends to tap into those mysterious 500 million users who are reportedly out there. If you're new at the game, develop your personal page first, and then think about expanding to these "fan pages."
My second social media outlet is Linked In. As I indicated earlier, this site is much more business-like than Facebook. I have close to 300 connections on Linked-In, and almost none of them are cross-overs to my list of Facebook Friends. I know less than half of them personally. My LinkedIn connections are the power-brokers in my world. There are a few former students, but they are not the ones who just want to reminisce about college life. There are graduate students, or lawyers, or business people who are making a difference in their world. They've sought connections to bolster their resumes. Many of my connections are members of Lions Clubs International, but, again, they are the leaders in that organization--former international officers, staff members, or CEOs of Lions-associated non-profit organizations. They are people I can turn to when I need business-type advice. The rest are business figures with whom I have had some contact, and media and public relations people.
How can they help build my publishing platform? Well, my financial advisor, my lawyer, and my accountant are on that list, along with public figures who can orchestrate newspaper or TV coverage when I have an announcement of a new book or an award. They are the people who can help set up book signings or public speaking engagements. They are great contacts because they have their own contacts. I try not to bury them beneath my sales pitches, and I don't overtly try to sell them anything, but I can trust them to help me make my name better known. Name recognition is a vitally important resource offered by LinkedIn. Another great advantage of LinkedIn is that it lets people with common interests form discussion lists, where they can connect with people who have similar interests or who are facing similar problems. I currently participate in several writers' groups, as well as one that discusses fund-raising ideas for non-profits.
And then there is Twitter. What can you possibly accomplish with 140 spaces? The easy answer, of course, it that it teaches you to cram a lot of information into the smallest possible space. Brevity is good. But beyond that, I see Twitter as a conduit -- the vital link between me and the huge world of the internet. At the moment I have around 800 followers on Twitter, and I'll be the first to admit that I don't know many of them. We are strangers who have made a brief connection because of a third party who knows us both, or a shared common involvement. They are simply people who have indicated an interest in what i might have to say. When they follow me, anything I post will automatically appear on each of their Twitter feeds. They may, or may not ever see it. But when they do, they each have the option of passing it on to their own followers, giving my message access to untold numbers of readers. Twitter also has the ability to post automatic messages for me, and to re-post my messages to my other social media outlets.
Here's how it works. Suppose I've just finished a blog post announcing the publication of a new book and including a link to the book's order page. I send a tweet giving its URL to my 800 followers, and Twitter also posts it on my Facebook page (+400 readers) and my LinkedIn profile (+300 readers.) Then a dear fellow writer in England retweets it to her whole list (+1000 readers), the president of a writers' society to which I belong retweets it to her list (+1500), and three faithful blog followers in Missouri, Califormia, and Colorado send it to all their followers (+1700 total). That one personal message reaches over 5000 people within minutes. That's the best, and easiest, advertising I know.
So there's an easy breakdown for you. Use Facebook to maintain your real friendships. Let LinkedIn represent you in your most professional roles. And use Twitter to make pithy comments to the world at large. Each part of your social Media network plays a vital role in building your publishing platform.
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Posted on Tuesday, June 07, 2011 8:32 AM
On Monday, I posted a diagram of the process of self-publishing. Now it's time to break it down. This week's diagram started out with this group of chores at the top:
 I am dissatisfied with it for several reasons. First, I would move "Start Online Platform" to the very top of the list. It takes months, even years, to build a presence online. Waiting until you have book written is much too late. Yes, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn accounts can be used to tell readers about your book. But the truth is, people are not going to be interested in your book unless they are also interested in you. If you build up a list of followers because you have witty or interesting things to say, if you blog about your travels, your reading, your causes, you will attract others who care about the same things. Then when you write your book, your readers will be waiting, money clutched in their hot little hands. That's what you want from an online platform. So start TODAY!
Now let's look at "Format Book Template." Do you even know what that means? Do you have the computer skills to create a template that will produce the kind of book a publisher or a reader expects? Unless you are very skilled or very experienced, I recommend letting the professionals do this for you. There are all kinds of book-writing programs out there. I am most familiar with Scrivener, a writing program for Apple users. It is roomy, intuitive, and easy to use. When you open the application, it presents you with a series of formats -- short story, poetry, script, novel, non-fiction. You make your choice and it gives you a bundle of pre-set pages for title page, chapter, etc. All you have to do is start typing; it handles spacing, indents, font size, and a bunch of other things you didn't know you were supposed to worry about. And when you are finished, it gives you more options. It can compile all your chapters and assign numbers to them. It can produce the ugly plain double-spaced page that an agent or publisher expects. Or it can allow you to transfer the basic manuscript to your own word processor to tweak the appearance until it's exactly what you want. If you don't own a MAC, you can hope that eventually the Scrivener folks produce an application that runs on Windows. But there must be similar programs for other computers. Anyone have recommendations? I would be happy to pass them along.
Next comes "Finish First Draft." My objection here is that word finish. It sounds like you're done, and nothing could be more misleading. A first draft is great, but there better be other drafts -- lots of them. I know there are "seat-of-the-pants" writers out there, just letting words fly onto the page. The results are seldom pretty. Writing is hard work, and I don't see that kind of warning here. You will probably need to start with some sort of research, unless you are setting your entire book in your own back yard, which you can see from your desk. If you are setting your book anywhere else, you'd better go there and take a look before you write. And unless you are very talented, you need another kind of road map to follow -- an idea of what your book is about, a plot outline, a theme, a plan for story development, and an idea of where you want to start and where you want to end up. Otherwise both you and your reader are likely to get lost. I've just been working on my book-planning, but what I've learned will have to wait for a different post. For now, just note that instead of "finish" this step should read "think, plan, write, and then rewrite. Rinse and repeat."
What about editing? I've expounded on that before. I've worked with editors and I've done my own editing. Because of the expense involved, this is a decision that will depend on your own circumstances. But for now, let's just be clear that one round of "editing" is not enough. You need to read and re-read -- backwards and out loud to catch your own errors. I went through the manuscript for Beyond All Price fourteen times, and caught different errors on each go-round. Then you need readers -- lots of them. And you don't want your best friend or your spouse, who is just going to say, "That's great, honey." Find some critics and listen to what they say. Then, when you think the book is perfect, consider professional editing. I'll guarantee you it will improve your product. |
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