This is the first post in the series Developing a Stellar Social Presence: Attract, Bond, and Cater.
Most authors whether traditionally or indie published market their books using social media. To do this requires a little effort and simple tactics which you mostly likely already know from daily business and social interactions.
Let’s pretend you’re at a business luncheon where you know no one. There is a group of people surrounding one person, and you know your chances of speaking with that person are slim—its just too difficult to get through the crowd. You make eye contact with someone, and then approach him only to find out that all he wants is to sell you something. Others you introduce yourself to just want to exchange business cards, adding yours to a large rubber-banded stack. At last, you start a conversation with someone who is more interested in you than promoting herself. She is confident, knowledgeable, and helpful. She understands your needs and offers to introduce you to others who may be able to help you.
Of all the people you met, this person is the one you remember. Her offer to help made your shared time valuable. The odds are you will reciprocate the favor, if given the opportunity. It’s a win-win situation for both of you.
Just like at business network meetings, you need to use similar tactics—attract, bond, and cater to another’s needs—as the building blocks for developing a stellar social presence. It is your value to others, not your striving for success, that will make you stand out.
“Try not to be a man of success, but a man of value.” – Albert Einstein.
This post discusses how to make yourself glamorous to and attract followers.
Make yourself glamorous
Your profile picture
People decide within less than a second whether to stay on a webpage or not. For this reason, make your header an attractive personal statement. Use a recent head-shot for your profile picture or create a unique avatar. People want to know what you look like, they don’t want to see the default icon. If you use an avatar, create one that depicts the essence of who you are or what you do.
Don’t pick a frog as an avatar if frogs are a personal favorite but do not reflect you or your subject matter. Also don’t select an icon on the basis of one book. I did this with my first book. With the advent of my second book, I needed to rethink my decision; I decided to go with my profile picture.
Turn your profile photo into a favicon and use it everywhere to make easy for readers to find your messages, comments, and tweets.
Update your photo infrequently and when you do, update it across the board.
Capture your uniqueness
Make a great first impression with a unique profile. Too many writers define themselves as “author and public speaker.” Set yourself apart from others by telling them what is unique about you and why that makes a difference to them. Don’t define yourself in boring ways—use “sexy” words that grab the reader’s attention. If possible, add personality, and always be honest. For example,
- Travel writer: “Adventurer sharing her exploits through books and presentations.”
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Mystery writer: “99% of my readers are surprised by the ending.”
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Horror writer: “My books will scare the bejesus out of you. Sometimes they even scare me.”
Get the gist? Play with your profile statement and see what comes up. (Leave a comment below showing the before and after.) It should not be too difficult for you to find a red-hot way to describe yourself and what you can do for your reader.
Having a descriptive profile will attract readers interested in your topic and weed out those who are not. Too often twitter profiles claim “prize-winning author” or “Amazon number one seller” without specifying the genre. This omission could eliminate potential followers or get you followers who have no interest in retweeting your tweets. To help spread your message, attract the right type of followers.
Do the same with your short and long bios. Make them interesting and compelling with personal stories that showcase your expertise, tell why you write, or why it matters to the reader. Identify the ideal reader. For example, “Read this book if you…” Showing the reader the value of your book makes it a more compelling buy.
Be consistent in your description
Use the same unique phrases and words everywhere on the web, in profiles, short and long bios, press releases, business cards, introductions, and handouts.
If you have more than one area of expertise, create separate descriptions for each, and used them separately, but consistently.
Give your contact info
Don’t make it difficult for your followers to tweet about you, link to your page, or contact you. Place this info in your profiles and everywhere.
If you don’t want to give your email address, add a contact form on your web page.
How to attract loyal followers
Identify your tribe
You want to attract followers, not just get them hit or miss. To do this:
- Define who are the people you would most like to attract. For me, it is non-fiction adventure readers, travelers, hikers, other writers, indie authors and publishers, and those interested in the Camino.
- Determine where your tribe hangs out. My readers hang out on Goodreads, Amazon, Pinterest, and Facebook. My contempories are on LinkedIn, Amazon, Goodreads. My influencers, people that help me or whom I follower for guidance, have personal websites. Everyone is on Twitter.
- Start contacting your tribe. On twitter, many people create list. (I have several: readers, writers, promoters, hikers, reviewers, etc.) Use someone’s list, perhaps an influencer’s, to initially find members of your tribe. If you pick someone who has similar interests, the odds are that the people in their list will be interested in following you as well. Start tweeting and do so regularly On Facebook, search keywords. On Yahoo Groups, search by topic.
- Join groups on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Google+. Become a discussion commentator or start a discussion group. As you participate in the groups, you will increase your status.
- Provide useful content. No one will follow you if your content is not pertinent.
Be social
Block out time each day for social media. Post frequent blogs, at minimum several a month. Use Facebook and Google+ several times a week. Use Twitter daily (use schedulers to assist in tweeting) but be sure to answer direct messages (DMs) daily.
Add social media buttons to your website
Once you attract your followers, make it easy for them to like your pages, follow your post, or tweet about you. Add the social media buttons to your website.
References
I encourage you all to revisit your profiles and bios and make them shine. Use these revised profiles and bios to set yourself above the competition. Leave a comment on how you did it and what the results where. I’d love to hear from you.
