Chuck Sambuchino’s “Platform & Social Media: How to Use Both to Make Connections and Sell More Books”

This weekend I attended a two-hour workshop with Writers Digest’s columnist and writer Chuck Sambuchino on “Platform & Social Media: How to Use Both to Make Connections and Sell More Books.”

Here are some highlights I compiled from the event:

On Platform:

-Fiction writers must have a platform to sell books, meet readers, and increase their value.-Platform equals money and control over your writing destiny.-Platform includes Twitter followers, newsletter subscribers and blog hits.-Platform building is a great thing to do during our downtime, when fiction writing isn't flowing.

Chuck 2 Edited

On Twitter:

-Twitter is the top social media platforms for writers. Second to Twitter is blogging. Facebook, for the most part, doesn’t translate into sales.-The goal with Twitter is to be followed and the only way to do that is to provide quality content. Tweet valuable information so that when users click on a blog post they find valuable content.-In about five seconds people will decide if they follow us or not. We must have a compelling description under our name and a good profile picture.-Use a tool like HootSuite to schedule tweets. Have them go out between 11am and 2pm.On Facebook: -When posting a blog link to Facebook write a few sentences describing the blog and that the blog is about. This will add value to the post.On Blogs: -The best way to gain readership is staying focused on the content.-A website is not a blog. A website, in the author world, is usually a stagnant page that talks about your books. But a blog is something that is continuously updated. You can have your blog in your website or you can have it somewhere else. A blog is in motion; it includes pages that are changing. You are providing new content and you are sending users back to the website and that is where you buy your book.-You don't have to go it alone, you can find other like-minded people who want to produce content or guest blog for existing blogs. You can piggy back on everyone, everywhere.-Add links to related posts at the end of your blog posts.-It’s not a good idea to start a blog written by a fictional character.-Writers should stay away from topics like politics or religion, unless these are the central theme of your work. Why take the risk of alienating some readers?-Tie blog posts to Twitter by adding a line that says, “if you want to follow me go to @…”On marketing yourself: -What are you marketing? A connection to yourself. You are establishing a permanent connection with yourself. This way you can choose what marketing tools to use. If the result is not a connection with yourself then it will not translate into your marketing goal, and it is not worth our time.-You can learn only so much by instruction, instead look at what other people are doing and use it. Take that idea and form it around something you want to do.-Make yourself easy to contact. Have contact information on your page.-Start small and hope for tipping points - the snow ball goes down the hill very slowly. You don't know when the tipping points will happen.-Have a plan but feel free to make tweaks: analyze and evolve.-Try to be open, likable and relatable. It is a fancy way of saying “be a nice person.” The way of reaching subscribers hinges on relationships.-Title posts in a way that people search for the topic. Check Google to see how people are searching for a topic and include these words. The same goes for the way that pictures are labeled.-Optimize your posts by including key words that appear in Google searches. Goggle will scan the first 100 to 200 words when bringing up search results.On a platform for non-fiction writers: -The more narrow you can make yourself the easier is it for you to become the go-to expert. For example if you are working in a saturated topic like ADHD you might consider a more narrow focus like ADHD in eight-year-old boys.What are you going to blog about? 1. The loose subject connection niche: what do you talk about on your novels? Is there a subject connection between the books? Can you expand on that subject? For example there is a woman who writes historic romance. She wrote a blog was about sexual encounters that have had an effect on history.If the topics of your books will constantly change, try to find a connection. If you don't have a connection don't use this path.2. The altogether different niche: Use this idea when there is no major theme that ties the books so authors create content about topics that interest them. Ask yourself, what can I talk about for five years and never get bored? And that is the content you provide. You build that content as big as it can possibly be. Build a tower and let people come to it. And if they are readers you direct them to your book.3. The writing focus niche: the focus of our blog is about topics related to writing and publishing. But beware of talking too much about yourself. A blog needs to provide content that helps others, not just yourself.What are the fundamental principals of platform? And what are good ideas to use when you are marketing yourself?1. It is in giving that we receive. We need to give people a fundamental reason to follow us. The money question is, does anyone really give a damn about our content? Does anyone care? This is the major disconnect and malfunction between writers and their audience. Writers think people care what they think. They put stuff out there and they don't realize that they are doing it for themselves.How do you take content and turn it into something others can benefit from? We take a topic that interests us and turn it into something that is beneficial for others. We ask ourselves, did the content take time to put together? If the answer is yes, that is good, it means it was worthwhile. The more time you put into it the better it is. We turn the spotlight off ourselves in order to provide value.About Chuck Sambuchino:

This workshop was adapted from Sambuchino’s book Create Your Writer Platform. You can follow Chuck Sambuchino on Twitter @ChuckSambuchino and Chuck Sambuchino's Guide to Literary Agents.

PlatformMayraOctober 28, 2014