Be honest: how many of your followers are writers or authors and how many do you follow because they are writers or authors? My blind guess would be about 95%. I admit, when I started out with social networking on Facebook, all I did was trying to gather 'friends' and I envied those who had over 1000 on their list. Same with Twitter, I connected with anyone whose name I vaguely knew. It became clear very soon that having all those writer friends on facebook didn't really bring me much other than having their constant promotion in my face as soon as they self-published. I started to delete those I never really talked to and kept those who are dear to me and with whom I have interesting, funny and informative exchanges.
On Twitter, I stopped following back. Instead I take a look at the profiles and blogs (if link provided) and decide then if they are 'worth' to follow. The problem is that I'm an author myself, so my tweets or the tweets of my followers will most likely be about writing or the books. It's preaching to the choir. There's no need to gather as many followers as possible, because only if your followers retweet your tweet, you'll have more exposure and that only if they have plenty of followers themselves. I have a few followers who have over 30k people following them, we never talk, they never retweet my tweets so I'm wondering what's the point of following them?
I observed that I'm gathering new followers (mostly writers) and when I visit their profiles and they don't interest me enough to cause me to follow back, they'll unfollow me a little bit later. We never exhanged a word. Which means, they didn't follow me because they found my tweets or profile interesting, they followed me in order to get a follow back. Well, no, I don't see the point.
Please don't get me wrong, I love the people I connect with, they are carefully selected -- at least those who'll stay in my list as I'm slowly going to clean it up -- and I'm having good conversations with many of them. Sometimes we don't talk for ages, but that's a Twitter thing, time differences, life, etc., but I only follow those who will catch my eye, be it due to their profile, their blog/website or because of our exchange.
To up your 'presence' write interesting blog posts, informative, educating, be versatile; something that'll make you stop and read another person's blog. Write about what you know, blog regularly and be selective with the people you connect with. A following of 4k or more won't help you if they only follow you because you follow them.
Have you noticed that a large following helped your exposure? I'd like to know about.
Hi Stella,
ReplyDeleteThese two ladies created a blog purely to promote a book about motherhood they wrote. I think their idea of promoting the book rather than themselves is a good one, as potential readers are more likely to be interested in the subject matter rather than authors they've never heard of.
Hello, Zaki
DeleteYes and no. I personally like to read a bit about the author, their struggles, their other writing, how writing affects their life, how they do it, etc. I do see my books as products, yes, but I also like to help others -- new or older writers -- who might find a tip or two on my blog.
I do like other writers'/authors' sites, but it really depends on the person's blog to be honest. I'm sure many find my blog boring. That's fine by me.
The 'followers' on Twitter who quite frankly annoy the hell out of me are those generated by auto-bots. I give you real estate agents, get rich quick idiots and the like. I stopped blindly following ages ago Stella my love. I suggest for your own sanity, that you do the same. :)
ReplyDeleteOh I don't follow those anyway. I follow those who interest me. I also don't necessarily follow celebrities. Does it sound really arrogant if I say followers must be earned?
DeleteI mean, yes I do have friends I follow, but I have been friends with those authors long before twitter, so I want to stay in touch with them, but everyone who just follows me just to gain a follower will be disappointed.
Love this!..Iv'e been cheeky and re-blogged..hope you don't mind! .. jx
ReplyDeleteOh, hello, Jane. Lovely of you to pop by :-)
DeleteNo problem, if you have told your readers where you nicked it from ;-)
I have so not figured out Twitter. I hope I'm following you. For me the most interesting thing in meeting other authors is how their journey got them where they wanted to go. Thanks for the post!
ReplyDeleteI'm like you, Stella. I hopped on twitter and followed people like a mad woman. No one really knows what they're doing in this crazy indie publishing world, and so we all start out like the proverbial sheep being led astray. It's only after the first 2,000 or so followers that you discover you've created a base of people just like you, which is great if the intent was to follow other writers' lives. However, if you want to use twitter/FB as a forum to create a fanbase, you have to design the site as such and draw people to your work ... in a personal, non-spammy way, of course! :-) I do love twitter, though. I've met wonderful writers, such as yourself, and incredible bloggers all across the globe! Who knew we could create such friendships 140 characters at a time?
ReplyDeleteHello, Jenny, thank you for stopping by. Nice to meet you.
ReplyDeleteTook me ages to figure out Twitter. I found out about the @mentions tab on my profile months later and with it, that I rudely ignored people by not responding to me. Very embarrassing. ;-)
Liz, my favourite stalker :-) Hello, love, how are you doing? How is the sequel doing? Hope it's well-received. Yes, building a fan base is something that should come automatically. You cannot force anyone to like you or your writing. If your writing is good enough, the fans will come. For that, just in case (as you see, my hope's not died yet) I have a facebook fan page. Not that I visit often, or fans for that matter. haha.