Many new authors shy away from Twitter, because they find it
confusing, yet they know they have to post on Twitter daily if they want to
find an audience for their books.
The feed you set up so carefully, the followers you found to read
your promotional material, it all swims by at an alarming speed. Can anyone see
how you used exactly 140 characters to describe your book? Did they even notice
that you added in a couple of tags to get others to retweet your post, or those
adorable hashtags in plain view? Your tweet will soon be lost in the endless
twitterstream!
Fear not, here's a few tips to make using Twitter easier.
Twitter
Jail: Breaking
these rules will land you in Twitter jail faster than you can say
"Peep!"
- Less than 2,000 followers? Make sure you don't follow more than 10% over the number of followers you have. (i.e. 2,000 followers means the maximum number of tweeps you can follow is 2,200.)
- Don't add more than 2,000 people per day to the list of people you follow.
- If you have a lot of people to retweet for, be sure it’s not more than 2,400. I’m proud to say that I’ve been in Twitter jail 3 times in the last month, all for trying to do too many tweets. No worries, it’s only for a few hours, then you can jump back on the Tweet horse!
Tweet
Schedulers: The most popular two are HootSuite
and TweetDeck. These programs allow
you to schedule your tweets ahead of time, freeing you to continue working on
your next book. Just remember to set up a schedule so you don’t forget to schedule
your next round of tweets.
Notifications: This is where
you’ll see a list of those who have retweeted your work, followed you, clicked
on favorite for something you’ve tweeted, or are conversing with you. Be sure
to visit this section at some point during the day to retweet those who have
done the same for you, tweet things people have tweeted about you, or get into
conversations with your followers.
A few
hints about the care and feeding of followers.
1.
Always thank people for retweeting your tweets. Some may say
you’re welcome, some will ignore this. Experience has taught me this simple
kindness garners more followers and more retweeting of my tweets.
2.
Say you’re welcome if
someone thanks you.
3.
Always retweet someone who has done the same for you.
4.
Thank your new followers and then follow them back, after
retweeting one of their tweets.
Finally,
don’t just tweet about your books. Add tidbits about your day—what you’re having for dinner, the
game you just watched, even the weather will get people talking and tweeting.
And don’t never get into a fight on Twitter. One of the things authors need to
learn from the start—our public face must always be nice, no matter how nasty
the other person is.
©2014 K.C. Sprayberry
Born and raised in Southern California’s Los Angeles basin, K.C. Sprayberry spent years traveling
the United States and Europe while in the Air Force before settling in
Northwest Georgia. She and her husband of more than twenty years are empty
nesters which leaves her plenty of time to figure out new ways to torment her
characters and come up with innovative tales from the South and beyond.
A multi-genre author she gets her ideas from the
strangest sources. Some of her short stories have appeared in anthologies,
others in magazines. Three of her books: Softly
Say Goodbye, Who
Am I?, and Mama’s
Advice, are Amazon best sellers. Her other books are: Take
Chances, Where
U @, The
Wrong One, Pony
Dreams, Evil
Eyes, Inits, Canoples
Investigations Tackles Space Pirates, The
Call Chronicles 1: The Griswold Gang, and Starlight.
Additionally, she has shorts available on Amazon: Grace,
Secret
From the Flames, Family
Curse … Times Two, and The
Ghost Catcher.
Follow K.C. on:
Twitter:
https://twitter.com/kcsowriter
Website:
www.kcsprayberry.com
Pinterest:
http://pinterest.com/kcsprayberry/boards/
Authorgraph: http://www.authorgraph.com/authors/kcsowriter
We hope you enjoyed this week's edition of our #WW Writer Wednesday Series! Thanks to K.C for taking time out of a busy schedule to share these twitter tips with you. Stay tuned: Next week we will host author, Faye Rapoport Des Pres as she talks about allowing discovery in the writing process. Don't miss a single issue of this series - follow us!
Cheers!
~ The Black Cat
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