Social Media - Is It Worth It?

[Paul Whybrow]

Various Colonists have mentioned their use of the social media sites. There's so much conflicting advice about building a presence online, gathering followers as a way of ensuring a decent launch of a book through self-publishing. It's also reckoned that literary agents assess a potential client's viability through the number of followers they have, who might become readers should the book be traditionally published.

I've also read that agents don't place that much importance of a writer's social media presence, relying instead on the quality of the writing and whether a story is marketable. Obviously there have been well-known successes for debut authors, that were based on having millions of blog followers or YouTube subscribers - such as Zoella and her Girl Online.

I have LinkedIn, Pinterest, FaceBook personal and business profiles, a Wordpress blog and a Twitter account. I haven't done a huge amount of work with any of them. Twitter confuses me more than the rest, though I've seen many writers recommend it above the other social media sites. I've followed about 400 people, and 70 have followed me, and I get about twenty notifications of new followers a week.

Many of them are for paid-for services, such as book reviews or editing services - which I ignore. I did find a couple of useful snippets of information about literary agents' preferences via tweets, but nothing that wasn't already on MS Wishlist. It's easier for them to say what they're after at the moment in this way, rather than do so on their literary agency's website.

As I begin work on my second novel, I'm wondering how much time to devote to these different sites. They're so time-consuming, and it's tricky not to duplicate content - which is said to be a bad thing by marketing experts.

What do the Colonists think of the different social media sites? Have you had any great successes, or at least formed useful relationships? Do you think that any of them are overrated?

 

[Jason Byrne]

All I have is Twitter. And LinkedIn, but I've had that for ever, and I make no mention of my books there, because they're not published. "Published author" will appear as a job when I'm published. Until then, Twitter is it. It's fun, and novel, but I'm not sure how useful I would say it is, in and of itself, save for as a gatekeeper tool to agents, as it may or may not be. I made one to participate in a pitch war, and steadily increase from 1k to 2k followers, on the off chance it helps.

 

[Karen Gray]

Twitter is great for building a following of mainly other writers and non readers, though conveniently I have horse and photography followers as well as screaming writers, so I do have a little reader following... though not enough that I'd shout about it.

Facebook I use for personal social stuff though I have an author page and that gets shared a bit but, nothing I'd shout about.

LinkedIn I'm not a huge fan of. I have an account... but, meh.

MySpace is only just back and I haven't done much on there yet.

Tumblr, um... lets just say I made an account to connect with others on my GISHWHES team and... um... lets just leave it at that shall we.

Wordpress, I got a good few follows on but moved my stuff to my personal website.

Generally I'd say that social media is over saturated with book spam, and that's just one problem with it. Better to use it as a tool to connect with folk.

 

[Nicole Wilson]

My opinion: social media is a great way to connect with your current readers and attract new followers. In this day and age, I highly recommend social media to any businessperson starting out, and authors do have to be business people. That said, I don't think you need to be on constantly, but enough to keep it active (once every couple days? weeks?). I've been told that agents don't really look at your social media unless you have a couple thousand followers (per site), and, apart from @Jason Byrne's ridiculousness getting thousands of followers in a few weeks, that takes time. I've been really active on both Facebook and Twitter for several months, but only have about 300-400 followers on each.

I find social media to be a great way to reach out and make friends and connect with readers, which should be the primary goal for this: not to book spam. Book spamming is bad. Only about 8% of your posts should be book promos, and even that's a little high. I almost never promote my short stories; once every few months, I'll remember and post a link to my website, but people want connections, not spam. I have made a few friends on each, some regulars that post on my Facebook and chat with on Twitter.

Facebook, I find useful for my longer posts (book excerpts, short rants )
Twitter, for short thoughts, random stuff, hashtag games (great way to find new people)
LinkedIn, I use occasionally for writing but only to post blog posts, maybe a link to my other social media sites (since I do use it pretty heavily for my "big boy" job)
Google+, not terribly popular. I have like 3 followers (woo!).

(Hint: often, I post the same things on FB, Twitter, and G+. Easier to keep the accounts active.) I don't have Pinterest, Tumblr, Reddit, or any others as they haven't jumped out at the author market as big places to get people. When they do, I might get one. Until then, I've got enough to worry about.

 

[David Steele]

No.

 

[Emurelda]

No.

I clicked on this thread cos i got excited to see David's name (cos his messages are witty and rare ) and really wanted to read his words. Then i took my time enjoying everyone's responses and opinions getting more and more excited to read the nugget that was awaiting me from Mr Steele.

What a tease! One word. You sure know how to get an encore! Still made me chuckle.

Thanks @David Steele. Encore!

 

[Emurelda]

As for social media. Forums are also part of it.

I remember the days before social media was called social media....it was called 'Web two point zero'

WEB 2.0

 

[Paul Whybrow]

Thank you for the replies. One of the things that troubles me about social media is how time consuming it is, as well as a great excuse for prevaricating about getting on with writing and editing.

Being a writer is such a lonely occupation that any interaction with others is tempting. It's a more rewarding experience on The Colony, as we share ideas and offer support, whereas posting on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter receives little reciprocation.

By chance, I came across this quote today, that rather suggests tweets are just a puff of wind :

‘The truth is, we spend so much of our time advocating internally for our books, making sure we have the right cover, the right subtitle, filling out forms and so forth, that we often don't have time to be entrepreneurial. But when a moment of clarity comes, it's fun to pursue it or to brainstorm with an agent about a client whose writing you really like...

I've learned that despite all the new bells and whistles, there's no substitute for giving the bookselling community time enough to read a book and get behind it... Despite all the things that we tell authors to do, there has to be a book that you want to recommend to five other people after you put it down. It starts with the book no matter what. Without that it doesn't matter how much you tweet. You'll get one wave of publicity and then it's over.'

Dawn Davis, founder of 37 Ink, an imprint of Simon & Schuster, in Poets and Writers magazine

 

[Robinne Weiss]

I'm with David. I'm as inept socially online as I am in person. I'm gonna have to get published on the basis of my writing, not on how many people pretend to read my blog posts.

 

[Jennifer Stone]

As an author my Twitter is more for supporting others in the quest for agents, on missions such as 1line Wednesday. My FB is for my own quest for agents and publishers, when I'm ready to submit, as well as spreading the word about other authors. I don't have a great following on either but then I'm not really fussed atm. When I get book published I'll have more to put on there.

 

[Carol Rose]

I'd have very few readers if it wasn't for Facebook. In the old school days we didn't need it but those days are gone. To interact with my fans and fellow authors, it's necessary. Word of mouth sells books, no matter the quality of writing. Everyone lives online. It's part of our lives. Yes, I was published on the basis of my writing, not my social media presence, but what good is having one or seventy books out there if no one knows they exist? It might be different for other genres, but romance readers WANT to talk to their favorite authors. They want to see us on Facebook and Twitter, interacting. I've met many of them in person, and I consider a handful of them very good friends. Their support and their word of mouth are what continue to sell books for me. Yes, I have to write them, but they're the ones who help me get the word out.

I don't use LinkedIn. I find it annoying as hell and it spams the crap out of me whenever someone it thinks I "know" has signed up. It's more for professional/business connections anyway, and that's not my platform or my audience.

My website has now been combined for all three of my pen names. I update it constantly because it's the landing page for potential readers.

I don't bother with YouTube. Trailers don't sell books and I can't make them anyway.

I admit I use Twitter far less than I use Facebook. I have my Facebook author page posts set to automatically tweet, but I'm not on Twitter all day long. I don't have time to be. I work full time and I'm trying to also write full time. It's all I can do to keep up with Facebook but I'm used to it now.

So yes, I have to write the books, but like I said, if no one knows they're out there, well, it's not magic. They won't simply sell. I spend the time I do fostering and nurturing relationships with other writers and with readers because it's the thing to do in this day and age, and because we're all human beings. The romance community is large but close-knit and vocal. This is what they want and expect. And we're also each others' readers, so it behooves me to support them and promote their work as well.

We don't exist in a vacuum, and the world is larger than that room in which we each write.

 

[Katie-Ellen]

If the book's' a dog, it's all a waste of time, except for your own interest, and if it's anything but an outright star, plus it helps if you're 'connected, you're up against it, no matter what social meeja stuff you do.

#CBpitch on twitter tomorrow.

 

[Nicole Wilson]

I'd have very few readers if it wasn't for Facebook. In the old school days we didn't need it but those days are gone. To interact with my fans and fellow authors, it's necessary. Word of mouth sells books, no matter the quality of writing. Everyone lives online. It's part of our lives. Yes, I was published on the basis of my writing, not my social media presence, but what good is having one or seventy books out there if no one knows they exist? It might be different for other genres, but romance readers WANT to talk to their favorite authors. They want to see us on Facebook and Twitter, interacting. I've met many of them in person, and I consider a handful of them very good friends. Their support and their word of mouth are what continue to sell books for me. Yes, I have to write them, but they're the ones who help me get the word out.

I don't use LinkedIn. I find it annoying as hell and it spams the crap out of me whenever someone it thinks I "know" has signed up. It's more for professional/business connections anyway, and that's not my platform or my audience.

My website has now been combined for all three of my pen names. I update it constantly because it's the landing page for potential readers.

I don't bother with YouTube. Trailers don't sell books and I can't make them anyway.

I admit I use Twitter far less than I use Facebook. I have my Facebook author page posts set to automatically tweet, but I'm not on Twitter all day long. I don't have time to be. I work full time and I'm trying to also write full time. It's all I can do to keep up with Facebook but I'm used to it now.

So yes, I have to write the books, but like I said, if no one knows they're out there, well, it's not magic. They won't simply sell. I spend the time I do fostering and nurturing relationships with other writers and with readers because it's the thing to do in this day and age, and because we're all human beings. The romance community is large but close-knit and vocal. This is what they want and expect. And we're also each others' readers, so it behooves me to support them and promote their work as well.

We don't exist in a vacuum, and the world is larger than that room in which we each write.

100% agree. This is the world we live in: everyone is on social media, and that's how they find out about new things. I used to pretend I was above that and that it wasn't how I lived, but I've realized that, without James Rollins recommending a book on Facebook, or a friend sharing a tweet by another author, I would be less likely to discover new authors. Two weeks ago, I had an interaction with another author on Twitter, so I checked out her bio, and I *literally*, within twenty minutes, had purchased her book online. It's a fantastic marketing tool.

 

[Carol Rose]

100% agree. This is the world we live in: everyone is on social media, and that's how they find out about new things. I used to pretend I was above that and that it wasn't how I lived, but I've realized that, without James Rollins recommending a book on Facebook, or a friend sharing a tweet by another author, I would be less likely to discover new authors. Two weeks ago, I had an interaction with another author on Twitter, so I checked out her bio, and I *literally*, within twenty minutes, had purchased her book online. It's a fantastic marketing tool.

Social media makes it even easier for people to not only find new books and authors they enjoy, but for authors old and new to connect with their fans and with other writers. Sure, we had news lists and yahoo groups twenty years ago, but hardly anything like this community or others similar to it existed. Even MySpace wasn't as useful as Facebook. We can access Amazon and other distributors from a tablet or a smart phone, and we're able to stay connected literally 24/7 if we want to. If I can embrace this, at almost 58 years old, authors in their 20s, 30s, 40s and beyond certainly can. I'm not a techie at all but this is so easy to use anyone can figure it out. I can't imagine trying to sell and promote books - and especially e-books which all mine are - without the use of social media.

And I know someone will come along and say well it's the publisher's job to promote. Not anymore. It used to be, but those days are long gone. Not unless you're a big name and even then they don't do what they used to. Not even close. Stephen King is out there promoting his new stuff even. Authors now have to wear many hats, including a marketing one. It's all part of the game.

 

[Paul Whybrow]

Do any Colonists use Goodreads? Again, I established an author's profile there some months ago, but have done little to engage with the community. Apparently there are twenty million readers registered on Goodreads.

 

[Jason Byrne]

Social media makes it even easier for people to not only find new books and authors they enjoy, but for authors old and new to connect with their fans and with other writers. Sure, we had news lists and yahoo groups twenty years ago, but hardly anything like this community or others similar to it existed. Even MySpace wasn't as useful as Facebook. We can access Amazon and other distributors from a tablet or a smart phone, and we're able to stay connected literally 24/7 if we want to. If I can embrace this, at almost 58 years old, authors in their 20s, 30s, 40s and beyond certainly can. I'm not a techie at all but this is so easy to use anyone can figure it out. I can't imagine trying to sell and promote books - and especially e-books which all mine are - without the use of social media.

And I know someone will come along and say well it's the publisher's job to promote. Not anymore. It used to be, but those days are long gone. Not unless you're a big name and even then they don't do what they used to. Not even close. Stephen King is out there promoting his new stuff even. Authors now have to wear many hats, including a marketing one. It's all part of the game.

I had a MySpace in college, and it was really just for alerting everyone that I was currently drinking, disseminating pictures of everyone present for the drinking, and then hours later writing drunken blogs.

For people who commiserate with Robinne and suffer from social anxiety (or just don't like people), Twitter makes it relatively easy to make it look like you like people. All you have to do is "re-tweet" interesting things that other people have said. You don't even have to say anything yourself — it's a community of millions or billions of people all saying "yeah I heard that too yeah I heard that too" over each other.

LinkedIn has been crucial for me, but purely in my professional career, not at all for writing.

 

[Jason Byrne]

I've been told that agents don't really look at your social media unless you have a couple thousand followers (per site), and, apart from @Jason Byrne's ridiculousness getting thousands of followers in a few weeks, that takes time.

Yeah, but that was a full time job, for that week or two. I did almost nothing but feverishly Twitter for nine hours a day, every day. Now, I leave it open all day, and pop in a few times and throw out a dozen or so interesting writer-y things. In the month or so since, I've steadily increased maybe another 600.

I laughed at people who identified themselves in their blurb as "social media gurus." I mean, I still laugh at them. But I did before I realized how much effort it was, too.

 

[Carol Rose]

Do any Colonists use Goodreads? Again, I established an author's profile there some months ago, but have done little to engage with the community. Apparently there are twenty million readers registered on Goodreads.

I don't use it other than to make sure there are no mistakes with my books since anyone can add books from other distributor sites, etc. It's a hotbed for trolls and people who love to one-star books simply to be assholes. I don't go near the discussion boards or groups. It's as cliquish as high school - worse even.

 

[Carol Rose]

I had a MySpace in college, and it was really just for alerting everyone that I was currently drinking, disseminating pictures of everyone present for the drinking, and then hours later writing drunken blogs.

For people who commiserate with Robinne and suffer from social anxiety (or just don't like people), Twitter makes it relatively easy to make it look like you like people. All you have to do is "re-tweet" interesting things that other people have said. You don't even have to say anything yourself — it's a community of millions or billions of people all saying "yeah I heard that too yeah I heard that too" over each other.

LinkedIn has been crucial for me, but purely in my professional career, not at all for writing.

Makes sense to me.

 

[Carol Rose]

Yeah, but that was a full time job, for that week or two. I did almost nothing but feverishly Twitter-ed for nine hours a day, every day. Now, I leave it open all day, and pop in a few times and throw out a dozen or so interesting writer-y things. In the month or so since, I've steadily increased maybe another 600.

I laughed at people who identified themselves in their blurb as "social media gurus." I mean, I still laugh at them. But I did before I realized how much effort it was, too.

My hope is that soon agents will realize having 50,000 Twitter followers means absolutely nothing with respect to a writer's ability to market. I really think that was the reason for the initial push - because someone told one of them that to "market" authors needed a following on social media, and then they all jumped on the bandwagon. Now, even my cat can have a following on social media. The concept has lost any initial impact it had in terms of reaching potential customers, because it's all a big jumble of people tweeting, each one trying to catch your attention. It's like cyber white noise.

My favorite are the Twitter accounts that follow me and claim if I follow them back, they will tweet my promotion for free! Um… okay… DUH. We're all tweeting for free. It's so silly.

 

[Paul Whybrow]

How about services like Hootsuite and Mailchimp, which are meant to help coordinate social media management and email sending? Have any of the Colonists used these?

I get the feeling with a lot of such websites, that they're akin to the merchants who outfitted the goldrush prospectors, making more money than the miners.

This is me, this is - lost and with a sulky mule!

 

[Nicole Wilson]

Do any Colonists use Goodreads? Again, I established an author's profile there some months ago, but have done little to engage with the community. Apparently there are twenty million readers registered on Goodreads.

I do use Goodreads very heavily, but I don't think it's been very instrumental in helping me get readers. Me personally, I like to see what my favorite authors are reading, so I'm sure to keep mine up to date (in hopes that eventually, I might be someone's favorite author ). Plus, I just love Goodreads. I find all sorts of cool books on there

 

[Nicole Wilson]

How about services like Hootsuite and Mailchimp, which are meant to help coordinate social media management and email sending? Have any of the Colonists used these?

I get the feeling with a lot of such websites, that they're akin to the merchants who outfitted the goldrush prospectors, making more money than the miners.

This is me, this is - lost and with a sulky mule!

I use Buffer which is similar to Hootsuite, but it's completely free. I don't have time to be on facebook finding things to post twice a day, so whenever I run into them on various social media accounts, I push them to Buffer and they let me post at times I specify.

 

[Jason Byrne]

My hope is that soon agents will realize having 50,000 Twitter followers means absolutely nothing with respect to a writer's ability to market. I really think that was the reason for the initial push - because someone told one of them that to "market" authors needed a following on social media, and then they all jumped on the bandwagon. Now, even my cat can have a following on social media. The concept has lost any initial impact it had in terms of reaching potential customers, because it's all a big jumble of people tweeting, each one trying to catch your attention. It's like cyber white noise.

My favorite are the Twitter accounts that follow me and claim if I follow them back, they will tweet my promotion for free! Um… okay… DUH. We're all tweeting for free. It's so silly.

Thank you. I think you're right — the market has been saturated nay flooded to Katrina-like proportions (see what I did there happy 10th anniversary y'all) — it will probably become one of those things you're expected to do, like book signings, but which do nothing to get you in the door.

 

[Dudley]

Been said by all the question is this: is it expected of authors? Be interested in what people think of that. Maybe need a new thread?

As for myself social media didn't work and it's my fault not perhaps the media...

LinkedIn is the life blood for business/consulting. I've made a lot of money from contacts on that site, but total agree its not for novelists/writers. Too many people post daily articles to it for the express purpose of selling their non-fiction business type books.
Facebook - was on years back but didn't pay much attention or learn how to use it right so it didn't work for me. Need to get back in the fray.
Twitter - be interested in advice on "how" to use Twitter effectively because that was once a time-pit. I spent hours on that and those were wasted hours.
Novelist/book website - had one years ago, but again didn't know how to use it.
Blogging, as in on Wordpress - thoughts on effectiveness?

Some of these other ones I've not heard about.

 

[Carol Rose]

How about services like Hootsuite and Mailchimp, which are meant to help coordinate social media management and email sending? Have any of the Colonists used these?

I get the feeling with a lot of such websites, that they're akin to the merchants who outfitted the goldrush prospectors, making more money than the miners.

This is me, this is - lost and with a sulky mule!

Hootsuite is supposed to manage your tweets between Facebook and Twitter. As far as I know, that's all it does. Mailchimp is what people use for newsletters from what I understand.

 

[Carol Rose]

I do use Goodreads very heavily, but I don't think it's been very instrumental in helping me get readers. Me personally, I like to see what my favorite authors are reading, so I'm sure to keep mine up to date (in hopes that eventually, I might be someone's favorite author ). Plus, I just love Goodreads. I find all sorts of cool books on there

I would imagine it's a very different experience for a reader than an author. I hope you never have the horrible experiences I hear about from authors. Again, that might be a genre thing.

 

[Nicole Wilson]

LinkedIn is the life blood for business/consulting. I've made a lot of money from contacts on that site, but total agree its not for novelists/writers. Too many people post daily articles to it for the express purpose of selling their non-fiction business type books.

I've been told that, for writers, the only thing you could really ever get from LinkedIn is speaking opportunities and even that's more aimed at non fiction.

Facebook - was on years back but didn't pay much attention or learn how to use it right so it didn't work for me. Need to get back in the fray.

This and Twitter are the two I use the most. I find fun pictures, updates on my book progress, writing life schtuff, all that on both. Facebook is more used for longer text that doesn't fit in Twitter's 140 character count.

Twitter - be interested in advice on "how" to use Twitter effectively because that was once a time-pit. I spent hours on that and those were wasted hours.

Took me a couple years of exposure and about a month or two of *really* trying to figure out how to use Twitter to get it. It's for short, random thoughts you have throughout the day. I've also found it both useful and fun to do hashtag games. Things like #1linewed, where you post one line from your WIP based on a theme. Also, I have the HashtagRoundup app on my phone and they host games a couple times a day on Twitter. Things like #BatmanDatingRules and you add your own rule to it. I regularly check to see what's trending and see if I can post something about it (provided it's not about politics or religion). It's super fun and a good way to connect with others.

Novelist/book website - had one years ago, but again didn't know how to use it.

I have one and use it to keep myself, readers, and agents updated on my various book projects. I have progress bars that show how far along I am in each book, what stage I'm at, etc.

Blogging, as in on Wordpress - thoughts on effectiveness?

My blog is on my website. I've been told this is effective, but I don't have the time or the topics to post more than once a month. When I do post, it's about writerly things. Maybe someone down the road might benefit from it. Right now, it's just to show agents I'm willing to do the work.

 

[Meerkat]

I honestly don't like social media, but the first writer whose book I edited convinced me I had to get it. I use it, but with reservations. I also haven't used it for my own writing, just for my editing work.

I do need to get a separate blog for my writing work, though.

 

[Katie-Ellen]

Been said by all the question is this: is it expected of authors? Be interested in what people think of that. Maybe need a new thread?

Expected, I don't know. Not all literary agents or publishers have a Twitter account, but many do, and tweet about book 'happenings,' their own, and each others. They also hold open submission events from time to time, or 'pitch parties,' where you are invited to tweet an elevator pitch of 140 characters and less. Curtis Brown did this for the first time in July and say it's too soon to know if they will sign up any writers in consequence of their pitch event, but they are looking at a few from July, and will run another of these pitch events tomorrow Read More Here

Major novelist Steven Pressfield writes a blog every Wednesday, Writing Wednesdays, despite the fact he has 'Bagger Vance', the movie to his credit besides the novel, and others novels: Gates of Fire, etc.

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