The Best Social Media Site for Authors

#goodreads, #reviews #authors

Without a doubt www.goodreads.com is one of the best social media sites for readers and authors to connect on the Internet. The site has over 5.6 million visitors each month and 20 million total readers overall. Unlike most reading and book communities, there are readers than authors. With more than 100,000 authors participating on Goodreads, the ratio is still 1,000 readers per author. You won't find a better site that will give you that kind of access to avid readers. 

Most Goodread readers are addicted to reading. They love to talk about books and share what they've read and are currently reading. This means reviews for authors--and lots of them. Goodreads users create favorite lists by years, topic, genre and quotes using Listopia and readers' actions are published on a newsfeed to their friends and connections. Modern readers are savvy at using social media. They upload book covers and link them to Amazon and auto post reviews to all their other social media accounts.  

Goodreads uses an algorithm similar to Netflix to recommend books to readers who have read and liked specific genres. Books can only be put on the recommendation list after receiving a few hundred ratings. After your book has been out for a while, offer the ebook version at a discount or for free or for a discounted price for a couple of days and those ratings will start rolling in on Goodreads. 

Everyone on Goodreads must first create a free basic reader account. Once you have done this, you can then contact Goodreads and ask to be listed as a Goodreads Author. Using the Author features on Goodreads provides so much more. Upon the Rock Publicist includes Goodreads as part of our social media package because we believe it is imperative to authors who are building their online platform to sell books. 

Create an Author Page

Join the Goodreads Author program to get a dedicated author page and link all your books, connect your blog to auto post on your Goodreads Author page, create giveaways, create reader groups, advertise, publicize upcoming events, post videos, post quotes from your books, list a quiz, and get a widget for your personal blog or website to showcase reviews for your books. Goodreads provides a detailed instruction page that will walk you step by step through the setup process. 

List Your Books on Goodreads Listopia

Search through the Listopia section on Goodreads and find appropriate lists for your book genre. Click the “add books to this list” tab and do a search for your book. You can also add other books to the list. Be sure to vote for your books and ask your friends and readers vote for your books on the lists. Often the difference between 30th and 10th on these lists is only a few votes. 

List Your Printed Books on Giveaway Campaigns

List your print books for a giveaway on Goodreads for a limited time. Be aware that ebooks are not allowed. On average, 825 people enter each Goodreads giveaway and over 40,000 enter book giveaways daily. This will expose your book to a huge number of readers that may otherwise not hear about your book and some of them will go ahead and list your book on their "to read" list. 

Schedule Book Discussions

Goodreads allows you to host discussions about your book. Readers can ask questions and talk with each other about your book, and authors can be as involved as they choose to be. For the steps on how to start a book discussion, visit Goodread’s Featured Books.

Link Your Blog to Goodreads

If you choose to connect your blog to the newsfeed on your Goodreads Author page, Goodreads will email your fans once a week of all your new blog posts. This is a great way to reach other readers that may not have subscribed to your regular newsletter and will remind them about your work and keep your name in front of them. This is part of the Goodreads Author Program.

Ask Readers for Reviews

Since Goodreads features books based on the number of reviews, you will want to get as many reviews as possible. While it's natural to want a higher number of positive reviews than bad reviews, even the bad ones increase your overall number of reviews, which is all the algorithm takes into consideration when promoting your book on the Goodreads system. 

Advertise

Advertising is optional, but has its advantages if you can swing the budget for it. Be sure to target people who read your genre, give high ratings and reviews in your genre, and target the fans of other authors whose books compete with yours. Don't forget the reviewers who have rated your books in the past. Ads cost a minimum of $0.10 per click with a default rate of $0.50 per click, which is more affordable for those with lower budgets. 

Why You Still Need to Provide Email Newsletters

You may be wondering why you need to bother with a separate newsletter if you're already actively promoting yourself through blogging and social media. One of the main reasons is because it provides the best channel for direct access and target marketing.

On social media platforms, your news posts and tweets roll on and off people's newsfeeds before they have a chance to see some of your news and announcements. Additionally, they have the option to turn off notifications of your posts even if they follow you--and many of them exercise this right. You can't send all of your followers a direct message or it will be considered spam, and doing this could get your account suspended. Additionally, social media platforms are forcing people to pay for accessing the very social media platforms they've built on those sites through ads. As social media sites grow and paid advertising is dominated by the people who have the most money, once again small businesses--such as authors--will be lost in the mire of chaos and confusion.

People use social media in varying ways. Some hop on and check it several times a day, while others once a day, and some may go several days between logging on. Just because you have a number of friends and likes doesn't mean they are interested in YOU and what you have to offer, instead many are hoping you are interested in THEM and what they have to offer. Others are looking for friends, but they may not have an interest in what you do or want you marketing books to them.

Providing a newsletter, whether monthly or quarterly, gives you tangible names and emails of people who have an interest in what you're providing--the types of books you write. If they weren't interested, they would not opt-in to receive your email newsletters, or if they are already readers, they wouldn't be buying your books. This is your target audience. Your newsletter is delivered directly into their inbox and they aren't likely to miss it as they would on a social media site. It feels more personal when they have something delivered to them and they don't have to go looking for it or stumble upon it.

A social media post is only limited to 140 characters on Twitter and a bit more on Facebook. You can post 1,000 - 2,000 words in an email newsletter, including photos and videos. There are few limitations. It will sit in a person's inbox until they have time to read it in detail, after the kids go to bed, early in the morning when getting their coffee and checking their email, or after they return from vacation. It isn't rolling off a timeline. The sense of urgency isn't as demanding as it is with social media. I hate it when I see something on someone's feed, and I don't have time to respond or read it. Later on, I'm forced to go digging for it on their timeline and by then I may not find it or I might forget about it and distracted by new posts on my timeline.

Blogging is a better advantage in being able to post as many words and images as you want, but people either have to remember to return to your site, bookmark it, or subscribe to it on a reader feed or have it delivered to their inbox. This is more like receiving an email newsletter. It's more personal and direct.

If you use an email newsletter service, you have a general idea of who is receiving it--at least their name and email address. Also, you can see how many people click to view it, which links they click on, how many subscribe and unsubscribe each month. You can view an overall report on what topics and posts appeal to people the most and target future topics accordingly.

Do you already send out an email newsletter? What is your experience? What would you advise others to consider? 

Using Google Analytics to Measure Social Media ROI

#GoogleAnalytics, #SM, #SMM, #SEO

If you aren’t already using Google Analytics to track your website/blog performance, you’re missing out on a great feedback system and it’s FREE. It isn’t necessary to have a Blogger blog. It can be used on static websites hosted on your own server, on Wordpress, or some other platform. You will need a Google account and then follow the directions in how to place the codes on your site so that it can begin tracking the activity on your site.

I use Google Analytics to get an idea of how many visitors I receive each month, to track new first-time visitors vs returning visitors, and to measure my blogs' traffic flow from social media. It let’s me know the percentage of people from the US, Canada and other countries, who is using what browser platform to view my site, and what percentage of my readers are on mobile platforms such as Verizon Android or iphones. 

Why is this important? It helps me tailor my content, and to use gadget plug-ins that will work with these features. I don’t want to use something that the majority of my readers’ software won’t be compatible with and will prevent them from viewing my site. My goal is to gain readers, not lose them. This means I have to tailor my content to something they can use and value, as well as be compatible on the reading device they choose to use. 

Google has implemented the Social Plug-In Analytics. It shows how many people visit your site from Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, and Google+. This eliminates the guess work in how much of a difference your social media efforts make in your overall platform. It can be great info for the Marketing Plan piece of your proposal. It isn’t enough to have 8,000 Twitter followers and 2,500 likes on your Facebook page. Those numbers are only a start—they give you “access” to people you wouldn’t otherwise have. Now take it a step further, and learn the percentage of those people who are actively engaged in following your posts and interacting with you.

• Do they take action and click onto your website/blog and read the whole post? 
• Do they now follow your blog? 
• Did they like your content enough to further promote it to their friends and family? 

You can know the answers to these questions by keeping up with how many +1 hits on Google, shares it on Facebook, or retweets it on Twitter. If this is happening, you have Social Media spreading your news by “word of mouth marketing”. This is what you want—other people promoting your work. You won’t know this without some mechanism to track your efforts--and why not use a free, accurate system like Google Analytics?

This will give you a “return on your investment” of time, types of posts, and content that people are interested in sharing and seeing or hearing. Often, what we “think” they are interested in is completely different than the “truth”. I can get people to share an image of Bambi on Facebook much faster than I can one of my devotional posts or an announcement about my books or events. Yet, on Twitter, people will retweet one of my devotions or my book announcements easier than on Facebook. It’s given me a chance to get to know my readers better on each individual social media site. Each social media site has its own culture, and you must learn them.

Here is an image of traffic flow that Google Analytics will show you from your Social Media sites. It will show you what percentage of “click thrus” come from which social media, which page they entered, and which pages they clicked on next and when and where they dropped off from your site. This will also give you an idea of which content (blog posts) people are interested in so that you will be able to target your future posts to garner more interactions. 

Below is an old image from one of my personal blog sites. 

If you want specific directions in how to implement the code on Blogger, click here.

What are your thoughts? Have you used Google Analytics? Did you know about the ability to also track your Social Media actions? Would it be helpful in helping you with YOUR online marketing efforts?

The Low Down on TweetAdder 4.0 & Warning on Other Twitter Services

Here is the background: On April 6, 2012, Twitter launched a lawsuit against 5 services, 3 of which were Tweet Attacks, Tweet Adder, and Tweet Buddy claiming that the services violated Twitter's spam policy by providing auto follows/unfollows. (More info here and here.) Tweet Adder was the only service of the three to settle with Twitter and agree to provide alternative solutions. The result was TweetAdder 4.0 with significant changes. 

For the record, and in my humble opinion, TweetAdder has never been a spam software nor did it ever encourage users to spam others. What Twitter didn't like about TweetAdder is that it allowed automated following and unfollowing, but that isn't exactly spam. Traditionally, spam has been defined as sending and/or posting unwanted content to people and places who never subscribed or agreed to receive it. Spam is not following and unfollowing people whether manually or automatically, especially when users have the right and the ability to protect their accounts from being followed without prior approval. 

This post is merely meant to provide a little more information to other users who may have been like me and not following this piece of developing news. TweetAdder was not very transparent in the transition of its services, and certainly not forthcoming and honest about the upcoming changes from TweetAdder 3.0 to 4.0 to current users. As a paying customer, I feel like they at least owed me the truth. 

Even if you want to keep using TweetAdder 4.0, comments have been closed on their help blog. Emails are not being returned. Customers are being ignored, and the new upgraded program keeps crashing. I still believe there are some useful features in the new version, if only I could keep it running long enough to find out for sure. 

After May 24, 2013, the former 3.0 version will no longer be supported and may not work for those who currently have it, so reverting back to the old version may not be an option. 

I caution people who are looking for alternatives to invest in. I've seen a lot of people talking about switching to Tweet Attacks and/or Tweet Marketing Robot (aka: Tweet Demon) on forums, the latter now being touted as the TweetAdder alternative. Please do your homework. Tweet Attacks was listed in the lawsuit as well and their services will soon be unavailable, if not already. Then remains the question, how long will Twitter allow Tweet Marketing Robot to keep operating?

If Twitter refuses to allow the use of automated follow/unfollow services, then it is only a matter of time before they go after other services and have them shut down. Therefore, I caution you to consider this before investing money into another service that claims to be similar to TweetAdder's former services. 

In the meantime, I hope TweetAdder will get their act together and start responding to current customer concerns, crashing issues, and do damage control (PR) for the less than professional way they have handled this transition. As others have already stated all over the Internet, I'm disappointed in the WAY TweetAdder handled this situation. 

As Lynn Serafinn posted on a recent blog post: TweetAdder Could have practiced the Grace of Transparency and I couldn't agree more. 

Ways to Measure Your Online Influence

Have you tried Klout? It's an online service where you give it access to all your social media accounts  and it tallies up your performance at socializing and how much influence you have on others, then it rates you in comparison to others who have signed up for the service. It's absolutely FREE.

However, it does have it's criticisms, such as the company’s privacy, transparency, and how it formulates its comparisons. I'm on Klout and to be honest, I'm not sure if it is a true measurement. My scores consistently range from 50-75. At the height of my book launch campaign, I was charting 75, but the highest rank one can get is 100. It doesn't seem to be able to differentiate daily Klout measurements verses and active online campaigns, which will obviously spike a person's score. After the campaign, it seems like you fall off a cliff. Other iffy comparisons is how someone like me could have as high a score as a celebrity or brand name companies who have a much higher influence status?. Thus, are some reasons for a few new competitors who are trying to take the measurement scale a little further, and ultimately, to more accuracy.

Last year, Kred launched and focuses on analytics and marketing tools for brands. The company pays top dollar for unique access to Twitter's tweets. It synthesizes and sorts them in communities of interests. Klout uses a method of sorting influencers by topics. While it assigns people an influence score like Klout, each point is traceable to the tweet that earned it. This is a new feature that Klout doesn't provide. Right now Klout only tells you have may retweets you received over the last 90 days, but you have no way of being able to determine which tweets were retweeted the most and when.

Another alternative is PROskore, which appears more professional as it measures influence beyond social media, such as past job titles, education, and experiences.

Have you tried any of these platform measurement tools? What are your thoughts? Do you feel something like this would be helpful to determine if you're on the right right track with your platform building goals? Are there other social media measurement tools you've tried other than Google Analytics? 

Why Marketing Plans Are Important to Authors

Regardless of whether you're pre-published or published, writers should consider creating an annual marketing plan. Such a plan helps you evaluate where you are and prompts you to think about where you want to be at the same time next year. Otherwise, you're just floating along and hoping to make progress without really being deliberate, consistent, or strategic.

If you have new books coming out, you probably have a book launch campaign and you could incorporate that into your overall plan, but don't let your campaign be your only plan. There are some basic steps you can incorporate into your daily routine that will build your platform while you write the next book. If you're pre-published and you aren't yet doing any speaking engagements, radio talk shows or book signings, I'll bet you're online and could benefit from a marketing plan that would increase your social media platform.

It isn't necessary to hire a professional publicist to create your marketing plan unless you're published and at the stage where you need to take your platform to the next level. If you've never written a Marketing Plan, you can start out with something basic, depending on how much time, money and effort you want to put into your marketing plan. No boiler-plate marketing plan is going to work for everyone. We are all different, our schedules vary, our talents unique, and our books are in various niches. The marketing plan you create for 2012 may not be the best one for you in 2013.

Below are some basic categories I would suggest to start. 

• Book Launch Campaigns - If you have any new books coming out this year.

• Internet Presence - This is your home place on the web. It's usually your domain location whether it be a static website or a daily/weekly blog. 

• Traditional Media - TV and radio shows, newspapers and magazines, and places to distribute media releases. These days most authors are concentrating on using traditional media through local outlets unless they are a huge NY Times best seller.

• Social Media - Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Google+ and YouTube, as well as online forums.

• Digital Media - Blog interviews, e-zines, podcasts, videos, and video book trailers.

• Speaking Engagements - Conferences, workshops, webinars, video conferencing, Skype and Google+ Hangouts.

• Book Signings & Readings - Some of these are just signings and others allow authors to provide a reading, offer Q & A, or give brief presentations.

• Print Publications - Graphic Design and printing of bookmarks, flyers, business cards, postcards, signs, banners, magnets, and memorabilia.

If you noticed, I've absorbed Public Relations into Traditional, Social and Digital Media. It's started taking on different forms these days, but should be utilized in all three mediums as needed. How best could you see yourself using a Marketing Plan? Do you think it would help keep you motivated and give you milestones to target?

Are You Using the Subscribe Button on Facebook?

Along with Facebook's new Timeline, people now have the option of allowing others to Subscribe to their Facebook profile without accepting them as friends and allowing them to have access to their entire profile. This is perfect for authors who may not have set up their Author Page on Facebook, or for those who don't want to keep up with both a profile and an Author Page.

You can set some posts for only friends to view or to public for those who subscribe to your posts. You have more control over your content and how it's shared. Also, if you block a person, that individual will not be allowed to subscribe to your profile, so it's a win-win situation.

Here's the thing, way too many people have set their bios and all their personal info to private. How can someone know if they want to subscribe to your profile, if you don't tease them with something about you? Make sure you at least post a public bio and give them something to go by in determining if they want to subscribe to your page. You don't have to give up all your life's secrets, but you can share something.

I'm constantly getting friend requests from people who don't allow anyone to see anything about them. I'd like to know if they are Christian, if we have any similar likes or dislikes, if they are writers or readers or someone who just happens to be looking for friends and networking. Tell me who YOU are. Don't be so obscure. You can't build a platform on obscurity.

This simple act will increase your chances of subscribers, especially if you plan to use your profile as a way to build your platform and connect with other people who you don't personally know.

What about you? Have you enabled the Subscribe button yet?

Personally, I haven't enabled the Subscribe button on my page since I've already established an Author Page on Facebook.

New Publishing Trends Increases Authors' Need for Platform Building

It's true, history repeats itself.

It would be nice if society could learn from past mistakes, but we seem doomed to ignore the hard lessons previous generations have learned and make them our own challenges with a modern spin on it. While it may look a bit different with new technologies, different people, places, and time--the ultimate issues are still the same.

People are hungry for power. They work hard to build a business empire, rake in as much profit as possible, put competition out of business. They start out with excellent customer service because they have to, but once they're on top and the only game in town, they begin flexing their muscles and setting unfair prices, contracts, and percentage rates with their partners.

Who are we talking about? The publishing industry.

First, it was the small publishers who were ousted by the big six publishers in NY.

Now, it's the big six along with book stores, facing the threat of the powerhouse of Amazon.

As usual authors and agents are caught in the middle. We're still producing our stories. Agents are still submitting them, but we're all listening, trying to discern where the winds (or trends) will lead us.

Here's one thing that won't change: 

• The old publishing model depended on an author's platform and their ability to promote themselves.
• The new publishing model will still depend on an author's platform, and more so, especially their online platform. 

Do not be discouraged or deceived. Every new follower you gain on Facebook, Twitter, and to your blog--matters. Every new subscriber you receive to your email newsletter--matters. Each new connection you make on Goodreads, Google+ or Pinterest--matters. It's one more person who has the potential to hear about your books and buy them, including whoever they have the ability to influence. This is limitless. Promotion is hard and sometimes it isn't fun, but it does make a difference.

People can't buy books they've never heard of before. And even if they've heard of your books, you must give them a reason to buy your book over all the other many choices competing for their attention. Sometimes it's by allowing them a chance to get to know YOU through interviews, personal blog posts, book signings, and sharing the blessings God has given YOU to pass onto THEM. People are more willing to buy and support an author they feel like they know than from someone with whom they have no connection. 

Thus, authors not only need to network with agents and authors, but these days they MUST network with readers as well. Social Media has given authors a direct platform to readers. No longer must they work through the gate keepers of traditional media and old-fashioned PR to reach their readers.

I want to leave you with a link to a blog post that will make you think.
Amazon--Beware of Greeks Bearing Gifts by Kristen Lamb

The Benefits of Google+ Hangouts

If you haven't tried it yet, Google+ has a great feature called Hangouts. You don't just hangout a traditional chat room where you type to each other, but you hangout in a video/audio chat area. With the camera on your computer or tablet, it links everyone up and you can see each other and chat by audio/video. It's nice to see facial expressions and hear voices. No more typing and skimming to read text to keep up with the conversation. Some say it's better than Skype.

You can broadcast live on Google+ and YouTube. You can host free conferences for up to 10 people at  once. 

This could be a great feature to use during book launches. Instead of hosting, the same old contests where people leave a comment and the winner is drawn and posted later, you could do this live. It would had more fun and be more like an actual event. You could schedule the event ahead of time and announce it to your Social Media networks so people would know what time to "tune" in.



Have you tried Google+? If so, did you use it for book promotion? Do you think it's better than Skype?
What are your thoughts?

The REAL Deal with SEO Marketing

You've probably seen the online articles and Twitter tweets about improving SEO performance, but what does it REALLY mean beyond the acronym of Search Engine Optimization?

It's improving the visibility of your website through a natural, organic process that doesn't cost money, but be assured, it WILL cost time.

Marketing is an ongoing process and you'll never be able to do enough of it. Therefore, unless you have unlimited funds to spend on buying top search engine placement, you'll need to spend some time improving your site's rankings and page algorithm. When people search for a term, they aren't going to click on hundreds of pages until your site pops up in the listing. This is why you want your site to come up as high as possible in the rankings, hopefully the first page or the first few pages.

However, don't get too caught up in "rankings" since it is only one algorithm used to upload pages to key search words. If you have enough "quality" backlinks linking key search terms to your page or site, it's possible for your site to beat a higher ranking site on that particular key search term. You need to consider the top search words and phrases people will use to find your site. Incorporate them into your html, your blog posts, headers, tags, etc.

Here are a few techniques to improve your site's rankings and algorithm:
1) Cross Linking - This is linking pages within the same website or blog. Examples of  this would be creating a sitemap, a resource center of links to previous articles, archives, top visited posts, etc.

2) Multiply Incoming Links - You want to get as many "quality" sites linking to your website/blog as possible. This is sometimes called Deep Linking. It tells the search engines that you have a lot of worthwhile content. Ways to improve this are offering guest posts to other blogs, uploading your archived articles to other ezines and allowing your articles to be reposted by other bloggers as long as they use your byline and link back to your page.

3) Write Good Content - Make sure blog posts and/or articles contain frequently searched keywords and phrases, but don't overdo it to the point that you get your site banned by the search engines. Just make sure each page contains your key search terms for that page at least twice.

4) Update Content Often - This lures the search engines back to your site to crawl over your content and re-index it. It also builds traffic. This is another reason why it would be better to blog at least 3 times per week.

5) Multiple Domains - Search engines only list one page per domain, therefore, if you have several topics that are strong enough to support their own site, go for it. Examples of this are ministries, author sites, homeschooling pages, and side businesses. I own two author domains, www.jenniferhudsontaylor.com and www.authorjenniferhudsontaylor.com. Also, I own a few more business domains. They all link into each other.


6) Strategize Anchor Links - It may be tempting to anchor as many links as possible to your url, but to the search engines it may look like automation and could result in getting your site banned from search engines. Therefore, use your url, but also link to various pages on your site. Include links to your individual book page, speaker page, bio, and archived articles where appropriate.

7) Use Text Links - Even where you've used an image to link to another page or site, be sure to include a text link above the image as well. Spiders and webcrawler search engines pick up text links first, so list them above the image, not below.

8) Use Frames & Flash Sparingly - So many people have switched to using frames and flash to develop their sites, but they don't allow links to individual pages. It's all or nothing.

9) Truth About Paid Links - Unless the paid link is embedded in the body text and not obvious sponsored links, it does nothing to improve your SEO. It only provides a few clicks to your site. So if you pay for a link, be sure to place it on a quality site and have realistic expectations.

10) SEO is Daily - Be aware that the landscape for search engines changes daily, therefore, you must expect to work on your SEO daily. At least keep it in mind for each blog post and each time you update your site/blog.

Need Some Social Media Knowledge? Or a Social Media Job?

HootSuite is now offering HootSuite University. Here's an excerpt straight from their latest newsletter, Marketers, industry professionals, consultants and those looking for advanced social media skills will enjoy the helpful webinars and a bevy of new videos too. Curious? HSU is offering the first video series free for everyone. Visit learn.hootsuite.com to watch.

Of course, the first "free" video is only the basics, most of it is self-explanatory and you can pretty much figure it out yourself. Therefore, in my humble opinion, there isn't much they're offering for free. However, you can advance to the next level, for a fee of $21.99/month if you already pay for their Pro-package, or $26.99 if you're using the free version of HootSuite. 

I'm not sure if one can learn enough from the first month or two or how long the process takes before you earn your certification. And yes, they are offering certifications. For those of us who may have graduated college with a marketing degree before 2011, I'm sure your field of study didn't include Social Media and you're now being asked to figure it out as you go along. I'd be interested in hearing from anyone who has taken HootSuite's course. 

One great aspect I believe is going to be very beneficial is their Social Media Job Board. They have listings from companies all over America hiring for positions requiring Social Media skills and knowledge. 

Are you already using HootSuite? How do you like it?

Authors, Don't Be Fooled By the Recession

There's some good news in the midst of all the bad news, a single ray of sunshine. Whenever there is a recession and people are hoarding their few dollars for emergencies and the unknown, they still need a wee bit of entertainment--history has proven that they turn to books. They're seeking a ray of hope in the midst of their despair and that's when our inspirational books serve their purpose the most. 

Books are cheap compared to lots of other forms of entertainment--both print books and e-books alike. So authors, don't despair, thinking your books won't sell well in this climate. They may sell better than they would have if we were in a booming economy. People can't go anywhere, they aren't taking as many vacations, are eating out less, are spending less time at the malls and stores, are buying fewer gadgets, and that means they have more time on their hands. Eventually, they run out of movies they've seen over and over again, and they get bored with reruns on TV. There's only so much computer time one can take. A book is the next logical choice. 

These days authors also have a form of free advertising at their fingertips that authors in the past didn't have--Social Media. Word-of-mouth advertising is still over 70% effective compared to all other advertising, and according to several recent studies, Social Media has made that percentage sky-rocket. 

If you're on a tight budget, use the tools of Social Media to spread the news of your book. Use blogs, podcasts, vlogs to put out informative, consistent content and readers will find you by word-of-mouth recommendations through Social Media. 

What are some of the silver linings you've discovered in this near broken economy? How has Social Media improved your networking and promotional efforts? Please share and give others a little encouragement. 

Social Media: Stay Connected Monthly Package

Stay Connected Monthly Package ($150)

This package is for authors who have established accounts and who need to be actively promoting and growing their Social Media, but also need more free time to write and meet deadlines. This package includes the following:

Facebook

~ 50 Friend invites and/or readers targeted to your author page per month

 Twitter

~ 300 Targeted followers per month

~ Monitor return follows & unfollowers, mentions & retweets, thank retweeters & mentions

LinkedIn

~ 100 Targeted connections per month

~ Respond to friend requests

Pinterest

~ 50 Targeted connections per month

~ Respond to friend requests

YouTube

~ Upload new videos to YouTube Channel as needed

~ Manage subscribers and subscriptions

~ Respond to friend requests each month

Goodreads

~ 50 Friends per month

~ Respond to friend requests each month

~ Upload new events and books as needed

LibraryThing

~ Respond to friend requests per month

~ Upload new books each month as needed

Google+ 

~ 30 Targeted friends per month in circles

~ Respond to friend requests each month

~ Upload new events and books as needed

Note: We cannot guarantee people will accept friend requests or follow back. Therefore, targeted means we will try and target these numbers for you, but there is no guarantee.

Social Media: Get Connected Package

Get Connected Package ($500)

This is our start-up package for authors who are just beginning Social Media. If an author already has an account set up at some of these sites, we would work on optimizing what they already have and create the new ones. Please note, we can only target a number of followers/friends. We cannot guarantee a specific number. This package includes the following:

Facebook

~ Create account/profile 

~ Create an Author Page on Facebook 

~ Consult client on creating a 3^rd party App promoting books on FB

~ Create Facebook/yourname for a shortlink
~ Target up to 100 likes within the first month

~ Set RSS feeds from your blog
~ Will email html code to author for a Facebook widget or buttons to be embedded on author’s website/blog

Twitter

~ Create account/profile

~ Design a customized background and header

~ Target up to 500 followers

~ Set RSS feeds from your blog
~ Will email html code to author for a Twitter widget or button to be embedded on author’s website/blog

LinkedIn

~ Create account/profile

~ Set RSS feeds from Twitter

~ Target 100 connections
~ Will email html code to author for a LinkedIn widget or button to be embedded on author’s website/blog

Pinterest

~ Create account/profile

~ Create up to 2 story boards with at least 5 pins on each board from author’s website/blog to promote their books.

~ Will provide html code for a widget or button to place on author’s website/blog.

YouTube

~ Create account/profile

~ Upload current video book trailers if there are any

~ Target 10 subscribers/Friends
~ Will provide html code for a widget or button to place on author’s website/blog.

Goodreads Author Page

~ Create account/profile

~ Request Author page for your books (books must be available on Amazon)

~ Set RSS feeds from your blog

~ Target 100 friends
~ Will email html code to author for a widget or button to place on author’s website/blog

LibraryThing

~ Create account/profile

~ Request author page

~ List your books

Other Account Set-Ups

~ Create Twitterfeed account 

~ Link Twitterfeed to Twitter and Facebook accounts and set RSS feeds from your blog(s)

~ Create Hootsuite account/profile 

~ Link Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn accounts for tracking 

~ Note: Hootsuite may also be used to track future social media contest/campaigns

~ Create Booktour.com account/profile

~ Note: Booktour events can be linked to your Amazon Author page

~ Create a Google Gmail account for all your social media so your main email will not be bombarded with tons of alerts.

Amazon Author Page (Optional)

~ Consult client on how to create an account/profile or optimize your current page

~ Upload video book trailers, new books

~ Set RSS feeds from your blog(s)

Google+ 
~ Create account/profile
~ 80 Targeted friends in circles

Note: We cannot guarantee people will accept friend requests or follow back. Therefore, targeted means we will try and target these numbers for you, but there is no guarantee.