How to use this Page

Guest Expert: Christina Inge

You’ve set up your Facebook fan page, and aside from your college roommate and your fishing buddies, you’re pretty much talking to an empty room. You need fans to help spread the word about your books, appearances, and movie deal, but how are you going to get people to know you’re on Facebook at all, let alone “Like” you? Well, it can be easier with some basic steps. You don’t have to do them all, or in sequence. Working on building your fan base on Facebook is like any other marketing success: it’s more about regular effort than anything else:

1. Make It Easy to Be a Fan: Have a Like button on your website. Have a link to your fan page in all your emails. One thing too few authors are doing is publishing their fan page URL on any print materials they hand out, such as bookmarks and postcards—you should; it’s as vital as getting people to your website. And keep all your web properties well-connected by posting new blog posts to Facebook, tweeting about new content on your webpage, and adding YouTube videos to your page. You’d be surprised at how much traffic this can generate.

2. Ask: This may be the simplest, but also the most effective of tactics for growing your Facebook fan base. Now that you have a link to your fan page on every other channel through which you communicate with your readers, let them know you’d like to connect with them. Explicitly ask people to connect in your next email, on your personal profile, on Twitter.

3. Keep Fans Engaged: Have something interesting going on as often as you can: ask questions, post pictures, share the work of other authors you admire. When your readers engage with your fan page, their friends see it. And when people see their friends’ actions, they’re much more likely to take action themselves. Your existing fans will also be much more likely to recommend you to their friends if they find your page accessible, interesting, and fun.

4. Encourage Promotion Beyond Likes: Make sure that readers can share your blog posts on social media—every blogging platform has an easy way to incorporate social sharing. My favorite plug-in for WordPress is AddToAny; it allows easy sharing on not just Facebook and Twitter, but all the social bookmarking sites you could possibly imagine. Add a social sharing button to your emails, as well. Not only does that get the contents of your email newsletter out there on Facebook, but the numbers of times that people share your news is a good indicator of how engaged your readers are.

5. Don’t Have a Personal Page—Have a Fan Page: There’s a limit to how many friends you can have on Facebook, and if you’re really popular, you’ll quickly hit that 3,000-friend limit. Get a fan page—it not only allows you greater privacy, but also gets away from that limit.

6. Request Recommendations: Ask your existing fans to recommend your page; if you’ve been doing a good job of keeping them engaged, many will be happy to do it. Make it simple for readers who may be new to Facebook by telling them exactly what to do to recommend the page to their friends.

7. Create a Landing Page: If you can teach yourself FMBL, or, better yet, find someone affordable who knows it, build your page so that those who haven’t liked you yet see an attractive, but limited, page telling them all about the great content they’ll see once they click the Like button. Then deliver on that great content with

Guest Expert: Teresa Morrow

The statistics continue to rise regarding the importance of social media marketing, such as Facebook, for authors. The power of Facebook allows a more direct connection with the author creating a more personal experience for any avid reader. By implementing the following basic fundamentals, Facebook can showcase you as an author readers should get to know.

5 Basic Facebook Fundamentals:

1. Author Profile Picture: Choose a picture of yourself that really reflects you as an author. For you this can be you dressed up as a character from your book. Or it could be of you dressed in professional attire. Even though you are an author of a book, it is recommended to have the picture be of you the author and not of your book cover. People like to connect with the person not the product.
2. Interests: Don’t underestimate the importance of filling out the personal interests, such as hobbies, movies and books (especially this one!) of your Facebook profile. This section may seem trivial however, it could be a great way for your readers to get to know more about you, which is what they want. You are creating a more personal connection between you and your readers. Remember, you don’t have to write down every single interest either…just highlight a few of your favorite interest with detail.
3. Pictures: Again, your readers will  love to get to know you better and to see you out in your everyday life. One great way to share more about you with your readers is with pictures. Be sure these are pictures don’t show you in any way that could be deemed inappropriate or unprofessional.  Perhaps a picture of you with some of your readers at a local book signing  or you with one of your favorite authors.
4. Connecting: The main reason for social media is to be social. Don’t just set up your author profile and then come on Facebook sporadically. Create a social media schedule for yourself and be as consistent as possible.  Take the time to engage in conversations, meet new people, share your ideas, and be there to support others. Let your online community know you are on Facebook because you want to be there.
5. Sharing: Just as you want to know more about other people on Facebook, realize that people will want to know more about you. As you are connecting, be sure to offer glimpses of different aspects of your life (however, don’t reveal what you don’t want the world to know about because what you reveal will be online forever).  You can share about the subject matter of your book , your expertise, offer tips, resources, link to your blog posts, and industry news with your Facebook community.

Facebook has been consistently gaining in popularity and the trend does not seem to be slowing down (especially since a little movie came out called ‘Social Network’).  With the basic Facebook fundamentals as having a author profile picture, filling out the personal interests, adding pictures , connecting and sharing, you will find Facebook to be a great vehicle to showcase the message of your book. Facebook is a wonderful delivery platform you to share their expertise, knowledge and interests directly with your fans…your readers on a global scale.