Quick Tricks for Authors on Branding, Twitter, Social Media & More

Brand Storytelling

“It’s not about the product. It’s about how it makes people feel, and telling great stories!” —Dave Kerpen | Article

This is such a great statement and one that authors, as much as—if not more than—any brand should truly live by.  Your brand is a perception from the people who read and feel from your books. The feelings you build in them, good and bad, are what build your brand.  You can also help set their trust by making all of your marketing efforts focus into those emotions, finding ways to tug on them in the right ways.  Two quick ideas:

• Your website colors.  Are they happy? Deep? Dark? Funny? Light?  Do they set the same tone that your books set?  I write historical romantic suspense, so my colors are muted, shadowy with the occasional pop of color for contrast. (I love contrast. Love, love, love it.)

• Your social media conversations. Again, consider your writing and match your tone.  Are you funny?  Are your books light hearted? Then talk about light-hearted topics, such as TV shows, hobbies, movies, music.  Are you a historical author in a specific genre? Then become the go-to person for that genre.  Or if you’re like me, with intentions to write in different eras, be sure not to pigeonhole your topics.

How Not to Succeed on Twitter

One of the biggest mistakes I see authors make in their marketing efforts is how they handle twitter.  They approach is like an advertising tool, shoving in as many characters into a 140 character tweet as they can.   It tends to make my twitter feed look like the classifieds for authors.  Page after page of it.  Authors, this isn’t the way to seem authentic or engage people on a conversation.  This is like placing an ad in their face and asking them to read it.

We’re all looking for ways to market our work, that’s why we do the blasted social media to begin with, right?  But do yourselves a favor before you tweet.  Pretend you have a potential fan sitting right in front of you.  Imagine SAYING the words in your 140 characters to their face.  Does it feel natural? Authentic?  If not, don’t tweet it.  Revise until it sounds like a true, real person said it.

What do you say instead? Here are five quick topic ideas:

1. What was the last TV show you watched and what do you like about that genre?
2. Go read an article about the genre you write in and retweet it, with a summary comment from you
3. What is your day job? Something unusual in your day? Or routine. Share a tidbit.
4. What book are you currently reading?
5. How are you spending Valentine’s Day?

Market your book. Talk about it. But remember that being behind the technology of social media shouldn’t make us any less human.

Where are people spending their time on Social networks?

I recently read an article that talks about the age ranges of our audiences and where they spend the majority of their time.  For as much as people like to say that Facebook is “dead”, it really isn’t.  The numbers prove otherwise.

This jives with the Reader report I stumbled across a few months back, where readers stated they mostly got information about favorite authors on Facebook.  I wish I could remember where I got the report, because it’s filled with TONS of great info.  I’ll keep searching.  So for authors, keeping up on Facebook is still very important.  (And difficult, to understand how Facebook ranks items for the news feed at times.)

And with that, this chart about the growth of Facebook and Twitter is interesting.

The article states that even though people like to compare and contrast, Faceook and Twitter aren’t really competitors. I agree. People come to Twitter and Facebook for different things.  For instance, i stalk people on Facebook…err, catch up with what’s going on in the lives of family and friends, I mean.  On Twitter, it’s more about immediate conversations.

Quick Tips

One Way You Can Instantly Improve Your Facebook Reach

Talk to your audience when THEY are online.  Facebook page Insights offers detailed information each week about when your audience is hitting Facebook. And getting them to see your content is the first step to engaging them.  To find this information:

• Go to your Facebook page (not profile)
• Look for the ‘insights” section and click on See All
• Click on “Posts”
• Right on top, you’ll see : When Your Fans are Online. It will look like this:

This is a one-week view, but if you take a few weeks and keep track of the stats, you’ll get a good gauge for the times when your audience is on Facebook and time your posts around that.  The object is to be seen and interacted with.  This provides a step up to make that happen.

Articles of Interest

• Email Marketing Tips from Female Entrepreneurs | read article
• Some great Visual tools to use if you don’t have Photoshop | read article
• The Six Secret Ingredients of Contagious Content | read article

Great quotes

“Listening is being able to be changed by the other person.” –Alan Alda

Great Products

Mailchimp

I’m guessing most of you know about this online email marketing service, but how many of you know that you can have a list of up to 2000 people free?  (Yes. Free. The easiest marketing step you can take.)  Mailchimp also integrates beautifully with a lot of other apps and products out there, including Wordpress.   You can easily put your email registration form right on your website.

Free Stock Photos

123rf.com is a great site for stockphotos.  And did you know they have a free section?  These photos are up for a limited time only, but there is always a ton to seach through.  This is a great hidden resource if you haven’t found it yet: http://www.123rf.com/browsefreeimages.php.

Font Addictions

I am a font addict. I love them. Can’t download enough of them.  I’m a little afraid to count how many I have.   Here’s one of the newest I’m enamored with:

Antiquarian Scribe 

I love this font.  And I admit, I did notice it because of the word “antiquarian” — which is what Aria’s father does for a living in Cloaked in Danger.  But the font itself is just so pretty!

That’s it for today!