It’s time to face the truth: social media just doesn’t live up to its reputation.
Every author knows social media is a necessary evil–or a lively place to advertise–depending on your personality. Unfortunately, however, it doesn’t live up to its reputation and it has led to disappointment and discouragement for many authors and publishers. This is probably because the platforms simply aren't the magical tools most authors think they are. People think of social media as a surefire way to propel their careers to success. Not happening. That's kind of like saying, "well, I showed up to the interview in a suit and tie, with a resume. I just can't understand why I didn't get the job." Well, because everyone else had a resume and wore a suit too. Big deal.
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If you’ve stopped here, chances are you are an author or are hoping to become one. You may also have friends who are authors or who work in the literary world in some capacity. We can probably all say we’ve heard this story at least once:
An author self-publishes a book and the author nearly breaks his or her neck racing off to all the social media platforms the moment the book is live to share it with everyone. Naturally, all the author’s friends and followers will certainly drop what they’re doing to purchase his or her debut novel. After all, the author has been talking about it for months and almost everyone hits that like button whenever the book is mentioned. Surely they’re all waiting in the wings to buy it and will do so without delay now that it’s for sale.
Sadly, this is not what happens. It’s easy to hit a like button. But most people don’t go any further than that. Yes, it seems like a nominal thing to ask….drop four bucks to support a friend and get the person’s book on Kindle, but it rarely happens. Even rarer is someone bothering to leave a review. Probably the reason is that everyone is advertising everything on their Facebook pages all the time. People advertise their businesses, they advertise products for sale, they advertise services, and they advertise creative works such as books, paintings, and crafts. What I’m getting at here is that people are immune to those kinds of ads. They will wish you luck, they’ll say “atta boy” or “atta girl,” but they won’t usually help you out by buying anything. This is because they are inundated with solicitations of all kinds, and yes, “please buy my book,” is regarded as a solicitation by most people. At any rate, that’s typically the first reality check that new authors have. But they're still determined to conquer social media and figure out how they can turn all those eyes into readers.
That’s an even bigger waste of time.
I know authors who spend hours a day on social media, deluding themselves into thinking they are advancing their careers. Some, who are very good at advertising, or who have very deep pockets, can be successful with this, but most of the people I see are simply wasting time that would be better spent on their actual writing or the sending out of query letters.
Some of the worst things you can waste your time on are getting involved in discussions in “writers groups,” or participating in “shameless self promos,” or “writers lifts.” The former is the equivalent to spending two hours a day in the break room at a traditional job. It’s a lot of talk, but it does absolutely nothing to advance your career.
Image by Gerd Altmann
The latter is not worth a second of your time because no one is going to buy your book and review it for you. “Writers lifts” are a way for other writers to get their page to rank a little bit because this tactic brings it a lot of traffic: every writer and every writer wannabe rushes over to post their link, but that’s all they do. Nobody looks at anybody else’s. People delude themselves into thinking if they put it up there, somebody will notice it, like it, and buy it. But what they need to ask themselves is how many times THEY bought an Indie author’s book the last time there was a “writers lift.” Hmmm.
Don’t waste your time getting involved in “shameless self promos” or similar activities if the only people you’re going to be advertising your book to are other Indie authors. They are the worst offenders when it comes to buying and reviewing books. Rarely does a self published author bother to buy the books of other self published authors. They typically have their favorite writers and they stick with them. I’m atypical in that sense. I mostly buy books from other independent writers. Some have been great, some have been a hot mess, but the same can be said about all those books on amazon, as well as those lining the shelves of bookstores and libraries. However, most people don’t do what I do, and you’re ultimately wasting your time to participate in those kinds of “events.”
The key is getting your book in front of readers who love the genre you write in, not pitching it to other authors. They're too concerned about pitching their own book to bother with yours. The bottom line is, 99% of the time you spend on social media would be better spent somewhere else with regard to advancing your career and selling your book/s. More on that in the next post. Write on!