Let’s Talk Social Webbies Part 2: Facebook: The DOS

“Man, I fucking hate Facebook! I can’t stand it!”

You have no idea how many times a week I hear this. It gets to the point where I just zone it out and I implant these words into an author’s mouth instead:

“Man, I fucking love Facebook! I’m on there 3 or 4 times a day!”

Let’s face facts, if an author or anyone else for that matter hated Facebook that much, they wouldn’t be on it, they would avoid it like the plague. But most authors are on Facebook and with good reason.

Let’s get into the nuts and bolts before I get into some dos and don’ts.

As of January 2011 there were 600 million registered Facebook users and by the end of the year there may very well be a billion.

That’s right, by the end of the year 1/6 of the world's population is going to be a registered Facebook user and for that 1/6, this will be the way they view the internet. It will be where they come for news and entertainment stories. This will be how they communicate with family and friends. Facebook will be the primary way an author, whether established or new, will market the stories they have to tell.

I know there are going to be a lot of people out there who say you shouldn’t be using Facebook (or any social network) for marketing purposes. It should be for social interaction and social interaction alone. And what I have to say to these individuals is:

You’re being naïve.

When you have this many people logging onto a single site on a daily basis, you’d be a fool not to use it for marketing purposes. But I will say this, marketing and trying to get the word out about your writing should not be the only thing you’re using social media for. When it comes right down to it, the key to social media is being SOCIAL.

And I know what you’re thinking: No shit, Rawson. Duuuuhhhhh…That’s why they call it SOCIAL networking, dumbass

The only problem is a good hunk of writers out there aren’t getting the social end of things AT ALL and are turning Facebook into a giant billboard.

Okay, before I get into the dos and don’ts, I want to point out some writers who I think get Facebook absolutely right. Why am I doing this? Well, sometimes it’s good to see what others are doing—and what they’re being successful at—and not so much trying to replicate what they’re doing, but observe and maybe pick up a few pointers along the way

Here are my Top 5 Facebook users:

Jason Pinter
Christa Faust
Tom Piccirrilli

Kyle Minor

Joelle Charbonneau

I’ve set links to all of their accounts and if you’re not friends with them already, I encourage you to request them.

Alright, let’s get to the nitty gritty.
(and I guess I should mention that I don’t want anyone to use what I’m about to write as a Facebook Bible. Nothing here is written in stone and if you have a “strategy” that is working for you, please keep doing it. I am by no means what you would call a social media “guru”—because what the hell is a guru anyway?—I’m just a guy who spends way too much time on the internet. ‘Nuff said)

Dos

I think it’s best to start off with the positive before I head into land of ‘stop doing that because all you’re doing is alienating potential readers’ land.

So her we go:

#1: Interact

I think this is the hardest one for writers to grasp. When you post a link—whether to a news article, a link to your latest book, a positive review, whatever—and someone responds to it, make sure to respond back. Now I’m not saying hover over your computer and wait for a Facebook response e-mails so you can immediately jump online and provide your thank you. But if you’re cranking through your latest work in progress and you take a break and check e-mail and you notice the notifications starting to stack up, log onto FB and respond back. The great thing about FB these days is you can now individually tag users in a post so you can personally respond to every one who’s taken the time to comment.

And once again, I know what you’re thinking, I already do this, you’re not telling me anything I don’t know. But once again, it amazes me how little interaction goes on in posts sometimes, if any at all.

#2: Get Personal

This is one of the cooler recent posts I’ve read on Facebook and it comes from Dave Zeltserman:

"I've got a family of foxes living now in my backyard. It looks like 2 adults about 6 pups. It could be worse. When I called animal control, I was told some people in town are seeing fisher cats roaming their backyards."

Why is it that I think this post is so cool? Simply put, it’s giving us a brief glimpse of Zeltserman’s daily life. Yes, we all know that Dave has a million books out there in either print or as e-books, but it’s rare that we get a glimpse into Dave’s private world. Yes, having foxes living in your backyard may seem trivial, it may seem like no one in the world could possibly care about those foxes, but they do.

They care about the foxes

They care about your kids

They care about what you’re having for dinner

They, in general, care about you as a person.

Yes, chances are they’ve never met you, but they read your stories, they feel that they know you through your fiction, so don’t be afraid to let them get to know you on a personal level.

This means post pictures, post how you’re feeling—both physically and mentally—In your status updates. In the long term, this will draw readers in.
(Quick Note: Only release what you feel comfortable with. Sometimes getting too personal can backfire if you drag them into your own personal soap opera.)

#3: Interact on OTHER people’s pages

I know we’re all busy. Most writers work day jobs, they have families, they actually want to get some writing done between it all, but I can’t stress the importance of going outside the boundaries of your page. It takes five minutes to congratulate someone on a story acceptance, a book deal, a birth, or offer sympathies when something has gone not so right. This will also help you in actually in creating a network of other writers and friends when something great happens to you. Which leads me to…

#4: Networking

Here’s an interesting only to me fact: Did you know when Cam, Liam and I released Kung Fu Factory the link was reposted 75 times on Facebook? Yeah, and with issue 5 it was reposted 63 times. That’s a pretty broad reach and most of this has to do with the fact that, yes, Crimefactory is a solidly made product and that we have a large audience because of it, but it also has to do with the fact that Facebook is a network of friends and it’s a network which I’ve spent the last three years carefully cultivating by trying to get to know the people who I’ve become “friends” with. True, I’ve had other interactions outside of Facebook with my core network, but a solid chunk of folks who support my writing and publications are people I only interact with on Facebook.

And I know this may sound trite, but I appreciate every single one of those people. Yes, reposting a link only took a second, but in that second they exposed Crimefactory to all of their friends and there’s a better chance than not that one or two of their friends then reposted. Yes, sometimes Facebook can be nothing more than one great big chain letter, but a chain letter that actually works. So try and get to know the people you’ve become friends with and support what they’re doing if you think it’s cool (I’m going to be going into this aspect of social networking in the DONTS portion)

#5 Have Fun

Here’s another one that a lot of writers seem to have a tough time accomplishing and I largely think this has to do with the fact that they consider social networking and the marketing end of writing a job, it’s a chore. But I’ll tell you this right here and now, it’s okay to be cruising the social webbies all day long if it’s your job (Yeah, right here.) but it’s quite another thing if all your doing is web crawling instead of writing. Social media for the non professional should be something you do in your spare time ONLY. Because I swear there seems to be dozens of writers all do nothing but post to Facebook and the other social sites. So I repeat this once again, SOCIAL NETWORKING SHOULD ONLY BE DONE IN YOUR SPARE TIME. Seriously, you have much better things to do

Anyway, that was a bear of a post and hard to believe its only part #1.

Hopefully I’ll have part #2: The DON'Ts ready to go by tomorrow.

By the way, if anyone has any questions through out the course of these posts, please feel free to leave them in the comments section.

And I have a link to share with you as well.
After nearly a year on ice, Tony Black’s Pulp Pusher is back in Business and you can check out the details right HERE