The Usage of Social Media Sites to Promote Yourself

When a book is in its final stages, the writer that is promoting the book on their own is faced with marketing strategies. Plans need to be thought out how to bring this newly published book to the masses, and one way of doing this that many writers are taking advantage of are the social media sites like Twitter, Facebook, DIGG, MySpace and others.

Twitter is one of the websites that has become extremely popular and is used not only by people that go there to read, but are also able to leave comments or follow other people. DIGG is also one of the sites where readers can follow each time someone posts that they enjoy reading their content, but they can also vote with what is called a DIGG to move the content up in status. MySpace on the other, hand is set up a little differently, with the ability to put pictures, and content like what is found on websites and at the same time have a blog. Facebook, is one of the sites that is not unlike MySpace in the respect that the more SEO friendly the content, the faster it will move up the search engines, rather than depend on followers.

While each of these social media websites offer something a little different, what they have to offer the author is exposure to the public and in effect, readers. This is one of the most important things that will need to be done by any author, is to bring their name, face, and writing to the public, if they want their book do sell. Most of all it does not matter what type of publishing is used for the book, whether it is traditional publishing with a brick and mortar publisher, if it is a print on demand self published book, or a self published e-book. They all need all the marketing skills that the author can find if the book is to reach the intended audience.

Each of the social media sites have slight differences in how they are set up to work, Twitter is a site where Twitter Find can be used to follow people that are of interest, this means their content being posted regularly is interesting and is something that the reader can comment about. The author can place a personal profile, they can at the same time promote their latest book, and it has the opportunity to be seen by millions of computer users that frequent the website.

There are some key points when deciding to use a social media format, the first rule to being successful on a website of this type is to post new content often, this can be something that is written in a few minutes or something that takes much thought. Do not make it extremely long worded as this can become boring to readers on the Internet.

While it should have the writing industry included in the content, refrain from the constant buy my book approach, this will lose followers quickly. Most importantly on this type of site, once the author has followers it is possible to lose them quickly by not posting on a regular basis, these readers want to see fresh content when they click on your Twitter or DIGG page.

There are several rules to follow on these sites, if the writer is going to successfully market their book. The first is post original content regularly, visit other pages on the site that are of interest and comment if you feel compelled. The largest mistake is when visiting any other page, do not take their post back to your own page to comment on, and make your post for the day about your like or dislike of the post. This turns followers off, because it is not original thinking or anything that will peak their interest.

One of the great things about these social media sites is that the author can see how many followers they have, and if there are not enough, they can turn the heat up on their posts to attract more followers. The larger amount of people following what is being written the more people that are going to look at the writers profile and buy their book, because they like what this person has to say.

MySpace is one of the website communities that gives the writer the chance to publicize their book, give a personal bio, and at the same time post to a blog to keep their site moving up the search engines. This will help to gain new followers to the blog, and that means more exposure for the author and for their book. Facebook is another site that runs on the same principle, using the search engine ranking for Internet users to locate their page. That means the content is important, along with the keyword usage for the site to move up the search engine.

There are some things that these sites have in common; the first is that they give the author exposure to the largest audience possible, which is what they need when marketing a book. The second thing is these social media sites are free to use, that gives the writer and extra added benefit, reaching a possible large audience at no cost. The third benefit is that it is an enjoyable way to promote a book, from the comfort of home and without any opposition, other than the occasional comment that could be left. This makes social media sites one of the greatest tools to attract new readers to both the authors’ online presence and to the sales of the number of books.

While Twitter, DIGG, MySpace, Facebook, are not the only social media websites, they are among the most popular and can draw in more readers when promoting a book than many other types of marketing. The Internet is becoming the marketing place of today and the future, when most people want to look for something new; one of the first places they look is on the Internet. This is because it is more convenient to search the net for a new book than to leave home and browse through the book store, and they also read the news and press releases on the Internet. That means finding an author that posts regularly on one of the websites will become someone they can feel comfortable with purchasing their books, because they are a friend instead of just another writer.