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LinkedIn seems to still be a mystery to many writers on how to use it effectively. In one of WOW!'s issues, we had a LinkedIn expert write an article for us about the best way for freelance writers and published authors to use LinkedIn for marketing and networking purposes. If you missed that article, you can check it out by
clicking here. If you are a published author--traditional or self, print or e-book--you are looking for readers. So, how do you find readers and connect with them on LinkedIn? It's not as hard as you may think. It will be easier for some authors more than others--depending on the type of book and the subject matter. But all in all, authors can take these few strategies below to help find an audience on LinkedIn when their book comes out.
- Who is your perfect audience? For example, if you are writing a memoir about being "an army brat" and traveling the world with a father as a colonel, you have a lot of different possible reader-types. Make a list: memoir writers, army brats, military wives and moms, and military enthusiasts. Now go to LinkedIn and go to the "Groups" choice in your tool bar across the top. Click on groups directory and start doing searches for the different perfect audience members. Some of the groups are open to everyone; some are closed. Decide which ones will accept you and what you have to offer and join. One word of warning: Don't join a group and start a hard sell. NO ONE wants to be pitched to. Build relationships in this group. Mention your book if it comes up casually. Make connections with others in this group. Writers tend to join groups of other writers on LinkedIn. How many writers groups are really going to help you sell your book? You need some for networking purposes; but other than that, you need to find readers!
- If you have a nonfiction book, you should be in the ANSWERS section of LinkedIn often to become an expert and meet people who have questions about your subject matter. To find this section, go to the tool bar and click MORE. You will see ANSWERS appear underneath it, click on this. Next, you will see several categories listed on the right-hand sidebar such as finance, human resources, and management. Click on one of these fields to read questions other LinkedIn users asked under this category. If you know the answer, you can comment. You can then connect with the person who asked the question. You can answer several questions in one category several different times to get to know more people in this section. Again, this is not a place where you are going to make a hard sell. If your book comes up naturally, great! If not, then you need to connect with others, mention your book in passing, and so on.
- You can do a general search for a type of job or skills on LinkedIn. I have a middle-grade historical fiction novel coming out soon. To look for readers to connect with on LinkedIn, I can do a search for elementary school teachers. There are tens of thousands of teachers on this site, so I might want to narrow it down. Plus, LinkedIn does not allow me to spam and contact all the people on this list. But if they are a 2nd or 3rd connection to me or in the same group as me, but I haven't "met them yet," then I can contact them as a friend and/or ask another one of my connections to introduce me. (There is a limit to how often you can get an introduction or send an "INMAIL" to someone you don't know with a free account. All of those details you can find on the site.) Anyway, if I wanted to connect with some of these teachers, who I want to read my book, I can start with this search. Then I can narrow it down by looking at the left sidebar, and clicking one of the choices, such as: GROUP MEMBERS or 2ND CONNECTIONS, and start sending connection requests. Then when I get more teachers linked to me, I can update my status or e-mail about my book.
Two of the worst things you can do is hard sell your book to your connections every time you communicate with them and/or only join and connect with other writers. Writers are supportive. Writers know a lot of people, but they also know a lot of people who already have books. Find people interested and needing your subject matter on LinkedIn. And always, always get involved in your alumni groups if you have some on LinkedIn (or Facebook, too). A lot of these people will support you because you went to their high school/college!
For more tips like these for using LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, (and possibly Goodreads and Pinterest, too, depending on the students' needs and desires), consider taking Margo's ADVANCED SOCIAL NETWORKING CLASS (online). It starts 8/13 and goes for 6 weeks. For more information, a syllabus, the fee, and to sign up, please go here.
Social media is a great marketing tool. It's a chance to connect with writers, readers, publishers, editors, and agents like never before. It's easy, and it's fast; but in order to use it effectively, you still have to follow old-fashioned, pre-social media rules of networking and building relationships and connections. You have to give before you can take. You have to be personable, and you have to share something of yourself. If you forget this, in your quick use of social media to promote yourself, then you will not be as successful. You cannot constantly ask people to do something for you without sharing yourself and giving to others.
Joel Comm, author of Twitter Power, which is a book I highly recommend, states on his website, "Whatever your industry, make sure that you're not just building followers but building those relationships and networks, too."
So, how do you do this? How do you stop ONLY promoting yourself and start interacting?
- On Facebook, you can visit other writers' pages and leave comments. You can follow your writing friends' links to their blogs and or book pages. You can leave encouraging words on their walls. Respond to their book signing and blogging events, even if you cannot attend.
- On Twitter, you can retweet a friend's interesting tweet that links to her bog. You can recommend another author's book as a holiday gift. You can get involved in a hashtag chat and share your opinion and ideas with other writers.
- On Linked In, you can recommend friends whom you have worked with personally or whose books you have read. You can answer questions in the QUESTIONS section of the site. You can also participate in group discussions in the groups that you are in, especially if someone is asking for people's advice and/or experience.
I know what you're thinking. This is going to take more time, and you're right--you could spend hours on this. But you have to limit yourself, and you have to look at it as marketing/networking time, which in today's publishing world is as equally time-consuming and important for the author as creating new work. Devote thirty minutes a day to social media for a couple weeks, and make sure you are sharing and building relationships--not just promoting yourself. See if you notice a difference. Are you gaining more followers or fans? Has your blog traffic increased? Have you sold any more books? Be honest with yourself. Are you being as consistent as you can? Are you sharing bits of yourself while also selling your work? A final note--if all you do is constantly put up links to your blog and your books on the three major social networks, people will stop reading your tweets and status updates. They gloss right over it--at le
I am currently teaching WOW!'s Social Networking online workshop, and it's made me think more and more about how important it is to have goals for your social networking sites. I know what you're thinking: I already have goals for my personal life. I have goals for my novel and some for my daily writing tasks. I don't need another set of goals--especially for Facebook and Twitter. But I believe this is a mistake many of us make. This is why sites like Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook become overwhelming and a time-suck. So, what kind of goals should you make and how do you use them to help you with your social networking skills?
Ask yourself this MAIN question: Why am I signing up for Facebook/Twitter/LinkedIn/GoodReads/Google Plus and creating a profile?
Your answer may be something like some of my students:
- I want to promote my book.
- I want to find clients for my life coach business.
- I am trying to build a network of writers because I plan to host an online writing conference.
- I am new to the writing world and am going to be trying to find an agent for a YA book. I need to make contacts and educate myself.
- I am trying to drive more and more readers to my blog, which is the platform for my self-published e-book.
You get the picture. These are specific reasons why these writers have signed up to use social networking. I'm not saying that they aren't also going to connect with high school friends or follow Ellen on Twitter, but this is the main reason why they are on the sites.
Once you know WHY you are on, now you can set some goals for the use. If you are on Facebook to promote a book, then contact everyone you've ever known that could be a potential reader and re-connect with them. Create a Facebook business page for your book. Join a Facebook fan page that has members who will want to read your book. Create events that surround your book--either in person or online--and promote them on Facebook. With the goal of promotion in mind when you log on, you will use your time more wisely.
One final note, you should never ONLY promote yourself on any site--even LinkedIn. The best way to connect with others and get them to buy your book/hire you/read your blog is to take a personal interest in others. Spend five minutes one day responding to your friends' Facebook status messages. Spend five minutes another day reading tweets and re-tweeting or replying. This is what causes people to notice you and want to help you with your goals.
It's an amazing success story! An unheard of twenty-six-year-old woman sold 900,000 copies of nine different books since she first put her work for sale on April 15, 2010. There are paperback copies that sell for $8.99 and $9.99, but the ebook editions are the ones selling like wildfire at $2.99 and .99. Just check out the local news story in the video below:
Amanda Hocking tried to go the traditional publishing route for eight years but received countless rejections. She never thought of self-publishing as a viable option.
"Everything I'd heard about self-publishing is that is was impossible to make a living, reach readers, or produce a quality product. But last year, I heard about how some others like Joe Konrath and Karen McQuestion are doing well with ebooks. So I thought I had nothing to lose."
So how did she sell so many books? She worked it via social networking, of course!
"I didn't really have a strategy. I think one of the advantages I have is that stuff considered marketing is stuff that I do a lot anyway. I've been active on social networks and blogs for years.
"I also send ARCs out to book bloggers. Book bloggers are a really amazing community, and they've been tremendously supportive. They've definitely been a major force that got my books on the map.
"When I first published, I did do a bit of promoting on the Amazon forums, but they're not really open to that, so I haven't really interacted there much at all in months. I hang out at Goodreads, Kindleboards, Facebook, Twitter, and I blog. And that's about it."
She now has an agent who is working on selling the foreign rights to her books. She plans to continue self-publishing, but isn't turning her back on traditional publishing.
"As amazing as this ebook revolution has been, it's only 20-30% of the market, and I'm not going to ignore the possibilities to reach the other 70-80% of readers. However, it is hard to compete with what my books are already able to do with Kindle and PubIt."
While that may be true, rumor has it that she's been shopping a four-book series to major publishers and attracting bids well over a million.
It seems we are entering a new and inspiring age, where traditional publishing certainly isn't the last word. Being rejected by a publisher isn't the end of the line. If you have the drive to do it yourself, why not? Publishing, marketing, and creating websites is the cheapest and easiest it's ever been. And in most cases it's free. If you have any thoughts on this topic, we'd love to hear them!
To find out more about Ms. Hocking's books, visit her Amazon Author's Page.
Quotes from The Huffington Post interview, Meet Mega Bestselling Indie Heroine Amanda Hocking.
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Class: Social Networking for Writers: Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and More! Learn how to leverage the power of social media with this four-week e-course.
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By: MP,
on 5/28/2010
Blog:
WOW! Women on Writing Blog (The Muffin)
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Marketing With What You’ve Got:
Learning to Use Technology to Jumpstart Your Book’s Success
by Michele Howe
Becoming active on social media websites such as Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn can quickly render an author feeling overwhelmed, defeated, and somewhat hopeless. Why is this? Simply, it’s the age-old trap of making comparisons. One author’s speaking/writing/publishing platform compared to the next; one author’s sales numbers compared to the next, or one author’s three signed book contracts compared to the next (or more specifically, to yours). As soon as any of us begins to make comparisons, we’ve made the biggest mistake ever. Our job, our personal mission, is to write and work and market according to our best ability.
Easier said than done, I know. After a brief period of lamenting all that I couldn’t do (or didn’t have the resources to utilize), I started looking at FaceBook/blogging/enewsletters/websites from a different angle. Once I did, it changed everything. Instead of focusing on what I lacked in comparison to bigger name authors, I decided to watch and learn.
The Essentials
• Facebook -- First, I set up my Facebook account for sharing and updating primarily work related information with family/friends/colleagues/readers and anyone interested in my writing/reviewing/books. Second, I added a “fan page” for my new book project; Burdens Do a Body Good. Here, I posted all current book information/media exposure/quotes from the book/quotes from the book’s endorsers/reviews and anything remotely related to this specific project.
• Twitter – This is a simple device to open and use. It’s important to link this marketing tool with others such as Facebook. Your “tweets” are very short, pithy updates that alert your followers of what you’re up to at the moment.
• Linked In – A good place for your business profile and to continue building and connecting with others in your field.
• Blog – I use WordPress.com, it’s free, it’s pretty straightforward to get started, and they have excellent customer care when you’re setting up a blog for the first time. This is also your “home base” to situate any/all your work related information.
Daily Habits to Incorporate
• Check your sites – Every morning, I do a brief check on my main sites (FB, Linked In, blog, journalist enews requests, and two email accounts). I quickly answer emails/requests/queries, and then move on.
• Promote all current work regularly – I keep that ongoing (and always changing) marketing list next to my computer and give it a brief read every day to make sure I’m on time/on target with any upcoming book deadlines.
• Help someone out – Almost everyday on FB, some other writer will ask for help and I offer that help when I can. Often when perusing the journalists callouts for information, I’ll frequently see something another writer can speak to better than I can and I pass that request on to them immediately.
• Keep tabs on what’s effective and what’s not – As I look down my marketing list, I can quickly identify those areas that are not working for me. When I write to a number of editors but get no response, that’s the clue I need to change my approach.
• Be willing to try new things – Refuse to say no to a new opportunity without giving it ample thought and consideration. Don’t see the obstacles, see the possibilities.
• Look ahead – Just when I think I’ve exhausted all I can do to market my work, I think some more. Here are some specific angles that get me jumpstarted when I’m fresh out of ideas. Think local. Think state
Intersting like always really nice! Thanks!
Many thanks to the person who made this post, this was very informative for me. Please continue this awesome work
interesting post! like it
I love the interaction that comes from Twitter. I put links up to my blogs, of course, but I tweet them a maximum of three times. While I'm eager for people to read, I don't want to alienate anyone if I can help it. The thing about Twitter is that it's a *social* network. You shouldn't be using it if you don't want to communicate with people. I've come across numerous writers and readers thanks to Twitter and I thoroughly enjoy using it.
Margo, this is great advice. I am just a novice at using social media, but I have seen a difference in the traffic to my site since I started using it in earnest.
@CharmedLassie: I am a big fan of Twitter, too. I think it is important when you have an especially good blog post to tweet it more than once as you mentioned to catch people at all times of the day. But each time you tweet it, you probably want to change your "headline" so that you are not tweeting the same exact tweet.
@Linda: I am so glad to hear that! You have an important message to share with the world. You will also meet so many great people and network with them. :)
Wow rally important massege! Thanks for she with others people!