Still going through my impressions from the writer’s convention! I want to make sure my fellow authors know I am not criticizing them – but I kept hearing the same answers to my questions, and they were alarming. I was truly afraid for many of my fellow writers.
Do you know the major reason a lot of writers are rejected? We’ll ignore the common answer “You’re not ready to be published yet” – I gave the answer to that on April 6’s article.
Why are most writers rejected?
Answer – no writers’ platform. Wait before you hit the back button – I’m not about to sell you a $1000 a year writing course. I’m not about to sell you anything. I’m GIVING AWAY the solutions.
And here’s the scary thing. A lot of people have a reaction to change – they turn turtle, pull themselves inside their shell and pretend it’s not out there.
Answer – you’re writing your book, so you’re passionate about it. It represents a portion of your life, whether a month or three months (a novel should never take longer than three months to write the first draft).
If you fail to build a writer’s platform, here’s your only option – self publish or vanity press. I feel strongly that both are a waste of time. And if you’re self publishing, you need a writer’s platform EVEN MORE than a traditional publisher!
What is a writer’s platform? It’s very, very simple. An online presence. A website. A social media presence, interacting on at least three social media platforms.
Pick the three. Twitter. LinkedIn. Pinterest. Facebook. Instagram. Whichever platform you do best at.
Should you be on all of them? No. Pick two or three. Make sure you’ve got regular content on your website.
The Website
Write an article a week, and be consistent. Might want to write 40 articles just to get some content on your website. You can go up or down in your content, just try to be consistent. I try for four articles a week. If that’s too hefty a work load, go lower. Just make sure you’ve got a lot of content on your website.
Your personal page for your friends or family is not going to do. Matter of fact, you may need to go through your feed and ask yourself – have I liked anything, or posted a meme that would offend potential buyers and readers? I guarantee you can find a dozen things almost immediately. Unless you’re using a pen name, you’re going to have to go through and sanitize your entire Facebook history.
You should setup a writer’s page on facebook – if you choose that social media platform. I personally am not a fan of facebook – it’s not a medium I do well in. But it is a major player, being the most popular social media platform out there. It’s something to consider. I personally am concentrating my efforts on Twitter and LinkedIn at this time.
Twitter is my platform – I do well there. I explained to two authors at the convention how Twitter worked, and I explained you’d only need about seven tweets a day. “Seven? That’s a lot!” I explained it’s probably not even close to the optimum amount! Really, I should be tweeting eleven to fourteen times a day, and I’m doing half that!
LinkedIn is a crucial social media platform, but be clear on what it is – it’s business oriented. The standard explanation is this – consider every post and article on LinkedIn as a job application. If you wouldn’t say it during a business meeting or during a job interview, don’t do it. Once a week day is all you need to post here. You might want to write your LinkedIn content first on your social media day, and then do your Twitter.
The Front End
I recommend using a front end to schedule your posts. I use the free plans for Hootsuite and Buffer. There is also Feedly (which I need to sign up for), and I’ve read of (but never looked into) Missinglettr, Alternion, and GrabInBox. (update – I tried Alternion, and it appears not to be connecting to any social media any more). Once I’m a best seller and can afford to pay for a premium plan, I’ll decide between Hootsuite and CoSchedule. The free Buffer plan allows ten posts for all your current social media – roughly a day of social media interaction. The free Hootsuite plan allows for thirty posts. Between the two, I can schedule up to four days of content right now. The premium plan allows 100 posts to be scheduled – which would take care of my current posting schedule for twelve to thirteen days.
“I don’t want to get involved in all of that.”
The idea behind writing your books is you want people to read them, to have an emotional reaction to them. That’s why you’re writing. If you DON’T have a social media presence, you will NOT be signed. Bottom line.
Why do I say this? When I finished my third novel, I began going to a number of traditional publisher websites, and literary agency sites. I saw it over and over again – “we publish writers who have a literary agent, write quality work and have an active writer’s platform.”
If you don’t have an active writer’s platform, you will not be signed.
Bottom line.
Don’t fight it – learn to use it to your advantage. If you don’t, your books will be undiscovered, unread, and unenjoyed. That would be a tragedy.
