Replaced by simple marketing savvy, the era of the undiscovered novelist is over. Most self-published books go unnoticed, allowing room for the outward facing best-selling novel published by Random House, Houghton Mifflin, or other major publishing houses. Though, every once in a while, a book goes from self-publishing disaster to publishing marvel.
For most people, those stories won’t happen, but those who market themselves well have a better chance of getting their book noticed than those who don’t. This means authors want to find their target audience, but first they need to know who their target audience consists of and how to connect with them.
To connect with your target audience, you’ll want to identify what authors your audience reads. And the best way to do that is to determine what authors you write like, using iwl.me.
Just take an excerpt of your writing, paste it into the box, click analyze, and iwl.me will tell you what author your writing is most similar to. Then, find out how and where those people connect with those authors, similar authors, and one another.
It might be tempting to use or overuse Twitter, Facebook, or Google+; but consider that you might find your audience on a niche social networking site for writers or the author’s personal social networking site.
For more book marketing tips, check out these blogs:
Over the last couple of years, SEO Bridges has served a two-fold purpose. To generate income and to be a marketing engine for myself and my writing. When I started writing my novel, an author friend suggested I begin marketing. I had wanted to start a business, and I figured starting a business that allowed me to focus on the needs of readers and writers would help me market myself and my writing.
Over that time, I have treated myself as I would any other client. Or at least that has been my goal. For the first year, @SEOBridges maintained a larger following than @ErickWrites. Then, my personal Twitter feed began to outgrow my business Twitter feed. I had adopted a new strategy. I started to focus more on conversations, rather than just dissemination of information.
Once I started doing that, I found more Twitter followers who Tweeted well and just liked to chat. Now, as I continue to chat, I am changing my Twitter strategy once again. I will continue to use Twitter to find conversationalists and get into conversations, but I will also use it for market research.
If you feel your Twitter strategy has become mundane repetition, you might want to consider changing your Twitter strategy. If your Twitter strategy is all about you and not about your followers, you might want to change your Twitter strategy.
Have you considered changing your Twitter strategy? How has your Twitter strategy changed? Is your Twitter strategy working for you? Do you have a Twitter strategy and what is it?
Last night, I met with a writer friend, who is getting ready to publish the first part of his book about a zombie apocalypse on his website. He wants to create interest by allowing people to read it online without the hassle of buying an e-reader.
During our conversation, he asked how he should go about branding what he calls “Outbreak 0”. That’s the virus in Lazarus Walks that causes people to turn into zombies. Branding is all about buzz, and buzz is all about name recognition.
Twitter’s a great way to get a conversation going. I set up some literary lists on my account you might want to follow: Writers, SD Writers and Friends, and Writers & Literary People. You will also want to follow hashtags like #AmReading, #AmWriting, #AskEditor, #AskPublisher, #AskAgent, #PubTip, and #WriteChat.
You can find more popular literary hashtags on this blog. And if you’re writing a book about a zombie apocalypse, the most popular zombie related hashtags are #Zombie, #Zombies, #livingdead, #horror, and #undead.
Along with following conversations your audience follows, start a new conversation with hashtags to brand yourself and/or your product. For my friend, since he wants to brand “Outbreak 0,” he might use #Outbreak0. The more you create name recognition, the more you create buzz; and the more you create buzz, the more you brand yourself and/or your product.
Hashtags allow you to join a conversation and eventually start a conversation without interrupting the conversation in progress. Think of hashtags as road markers on the road from buzz to branding.
Recently, I read an article that purported that studies showed social media did not increase traffic to websites. Of course, that was a generalization and is not true of all websites. Though, for the average website, I am not going to argue with it. The purpose of social media is not to increase traffic to websites. If people go to your website because of your social media campaign great, but that should not be your primary focus for delving into social media.
Think of your website like a Starbucks and your website traffic as the foot traffic. Now, lets say because you had a sign spinner or a giant banner or some other means of advertising your store, 1,000 people come into your store on a particular day. 450 of those people buy coffee, 350 come and sit with friends or just read, and 200 just get water or use the restroom.
Of course, you have your overhead, you need to pay your employees, and there are other expenses. Only those 450 people on that particular day paid for all of your expenses for that day. That banner or the guy spinning the sign or whatever other method you used to drive traffic to your site may have driven that traffic to your location, but those 450 who paid for something that day also paid for the 550 who bought nothing or used something without a cost.
Now, think about why you do or do not go back to a particular coffee house. Perhaps its because of good prices, good product, good service, ambience, convenience, you’ve developed a relationship with the baristas, or other. The bottom line is SEO, like that sign spinner or the banner, is about driving traffic; social media is about building relationships and developing loyalty.
Last week, Avinash Kaushik tweeted that some people don’t think before they Tweet, and that can lead to adverse consequences. I Replied, “It makes one consider that the freedom of speech has given rise and justification to the freedom of criticism.” I thought I’d write out a Social Media Marketing Rights version of U.S. citizens’ Miranda Rights:
“You have the right not to post or tweet everything you’re thinking or doing all the time. Anything you post or tweet can be used against you by anyone, anytime, anywhere for any reason at all. You have the right to maintain a social media presence separate from your everyday social and personal life, now and during future interactions with your friends, followers, and fans. You have the right to hire or consult a social media marketing agency, before you engage in social media. If you cannot afford to hire or consult a social media marketing agency, you’re on your own. If you must let everyone on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, and other social media sites know what you’re doing and thinking all the time, all those free social media tools you use may cost you your job, privacy, and dignity.”
Like your Miranda Rights (If you’re a U.S. citizen), which are meant to remind you that you don’t have to incriminate yourself under police interrogation or in a court of law, your Social Media Marketing Rights should remind you that when engaging with your friends, fans, and followers on social media sites, there are just some things better left unsaid because not leaving those things unsaid could spell trouble.
No matter whether you’re a social media novice, aficionado, or expert, there is bound to be something in this book you can glean from. It’s a great resource for teachers and students, and it covers all of the basis from blogging to the importance of a social media plan.
If you’ve read this book, let me know your thoughts. I’d love to glean from you, and learn what has and has not worked. If you haven’t had a chance to read it yet, you can buy it below.
Over the last few years, social media sites like Facebook and Twitter had to answer the question as to how they would make money. One way for a publisher to make money is to sell advertising inventory. So, Facebook introduced Facebook Ads and Twitter introduced promoted Tweets.
Last night, I found a blog about a book I found interesting; though, I had no incentive to Tweet it because I had no advertising inventory on which an affiliate link would bring me revenue. Since Governor Jerry Brown of California signed the Affiliate Tax into law and Amazon discontinued the affiliate program, I, along with 25,000 other people, have no incentive to advertise for Amazon or its sellers.
Unlike selling Facebook ads and Twitter’s promoted tweets, tweeting out an affiliate link for a book does not a guarantee revenue, but the probability incentivized people enough to go those few extra steps. Now that the incentive’s gone, former affiliates must look for something else to incentivize them.
I don’t agree with California’s Affiliate Tax law, but I hope it encourages people to think like publishers instead of advertisers. I hope more people will become producers, creating and selling products, instead of passive promoters, waiting for products to sell.
Think of it like the sign spinner, standing on the corner, advertising a new housing development. If that house sells, the sign spinner receives little revenue, but the real estate agent receives a great deal more. The real estate agent is focusing on selling, rather than just telling. I know it’s not a perfect example.
The point is just like Facebook and Twitter, if you’re a social media marketer, you should think like an online publisher, offering your audience a product, rather than telling them about another person’s product.
In the restaurant industry, a good dining room manager will ensure the entire staff’s trained to take ownership. That means if a guest’s water glass is empty or nearing empty, whoever sees it and makes note of it should either fill that water glass or escalate it to the right person (the server). Social Media Monitoring works in much the same way, in that whichever person in a company sees a specific tweet or comment, should either respond or let the right person know so they can respond.
Now, on the social media initiative side, that is sending out Tweets, such as promotional Tweets or posting comments to blogs and Facebook, it should also be a collaborative effort. Companies that choose not to hire one or more people to handle their social media should consider setting up a social media task force that consists of one person from every department to head up the social media initiative for that department. Larger companies can assign one executive to act as liaison or Chief Social Media Officer to head up that task force and speak on behalf of the company.
If your company has a specific social media department, or a department assigned to handle social media, and that works for you, great. If you have one employee who handles all your social media, and that works for you, great. If you outsource your social media, and that works for you, great. Though, if your company’s large, and you are in social media limbo, consider a social media marketing committee.
I’d love to know your thoughts about what has or hasn’t worked for your company.
The other day, my nephew looked at my Twitter account and asked me how I got managed to get more than 1,000 followers. I told him there was no secret and that it took me over a year to acquire those followers.
Of course, there are services out there that allow Twitter users to buy Twitter followers. But buying Twitter followers is against Twitter’s TOS.
Along with that, buying Twitter followers is a bad idea. While those services add geo-targeted followers to your list, those followers will not have the value of a person who chooses to follow you.
My nephew’s tweeting for his band, so I told him he wants to find people in the area who are interested in music, preferably the style of music his band plays. As long as he tweets regularly, respectfully, and reciprocally, the ratio will be about 3 to 1 at first. That means that initially for every three people he follows, about one of them should follow him back.
The more you tweet the right way the more you’ll attract followers. And the more attractive you become the smaller that ratio will become. It’s tempting to not only close that gap, but to avoid that gap by buying Twitter followers. Just remember, it’s black hat social media that will lead to inflated, low quality Twitter followers.
Eventually you’ll close that gap and you’ll have more Twitter followers than people you follow. Social media is not a get rich quick scheme. The main thing to remember is to tweet respectfully, regularly, and reciprocally.
Hootsuite uses it, Scribd uses it, and several other sites use it to be more search bot friendly and interactive for users. Here’s a list of the most social link types, attributes, and elements in HTML5.
Article Element – This tells search bots when content is related to other content, such as with blog comments.
Cite Element – This cites sources and is a great way to give credit where credit is due.
KBD Element – Under certain circumstances, this can be used as a voice command.
Embed Element – This represents integration with non-HTML points, such as applications or other interactive content.
Link type “Author” – This can be used with link, a, or area elements and creates a hyperlink. When used with the a or area element, it indicates further information about the author of the article. When used with the link element, it indicates information about the author of a page.
Link type “Help” – This can be used with link, a, or area element and indicates that the referenced document provides help. When used with the a or area element, it indicates help for the article. Within the link element, it indicates help for the page.
Link Type “Pingback” – This may be used with the Link element and creates an external link resource to let authors of other blogs or articles know you referenced their information.
Accesskey Attribute – This generates keyboard shortcuts that activate elements.
If you’re an SEO, you should know the basics of HTML, and you should be aware of the upgrades in HTML5. If you don’t, W3 Schools is an excellent place to learn.
