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. Find more details in The Second Mouse Gets the Cheese: How to Avoid the Traps of Self-Publishing. |
 |
||||||||||||||||||||
 
CategoriesA new contestAbolition Amazon ancestors Announcement Applications and software awards basketball Battles Book Launch Building a platform Business plan Career choices cats cemetery research Census characterization Characters choosing a publisher Civil War Connections Cyber Monday daily events depression e-book pricing e-books editing elevator speech English class evidence Fear of Failure flood waters Fort Pulaski genealogy Getting organized guest blogs Gullah Historical Fiction historical thinking Inspiration internet Kindle rankings language Layouts Lessons learned Marketing medicine medieval-isms Monthly Musings NaNoWriMo New Research non-profits Pinterest and copyrights Pirates plot point of view polite society Principles publishing RBOC Recipes reviews Roundhead Reports Second Mouse self-publishing Shiloh Slavery snow, living in the south social media Substitutes Taxes the difficulties of blogging The Gideonites Theme Tongue-in-cheek Travelog using commas video Volunteering warnings weather website Words Writing as Career writing process |
|
 |
||||||||||||||||||
    |
||||||||||||||||||||
