Technology has made the world of the author into something very different from what it once was. Not only do we have the ability to self-publish and reach a mass audience through ebooks, but marketing has changed with the advent of social media. The level at which you do this is entirely personal preference. You’ll find scads of articles both for and against large use of social media as a marketing tool for authors. Whether you use it a little, or a lot, OneNote can help you get organized and stay on top of what can easily become overwhelming.
Getting organized for your social media has several benefits, including:
- making it less overwhelming
- ensuring consistent usage
- ensuring varied types of posts and higher level of interest for followers
- spreading usage/types out evenly each month
- pre-planning for important events (releases, book cover reveals, etc.)
- tracking ideas
My use of OneNote to help me organize my social media is very basic (and therefore easy to use and easy to keep up with). For social media I do two things in OneNote: keep track of ideas, schedule a month at a time. Let’s look at both.
Social Media Idea Lists
This is as easy as keeping a bulleted list. Pay attention to what you see other authors do (or anyone using social media for marketing) and add to your list anything you personally liked or found effective.
- In a Notebook
- Create a Section (tab at the top) called “Social Media”
- Create a Page (tabs down the right side) called “Ideas”
- I would recommend a separate list for each social media platform (Facebook, Twitter,Pinterest, Blog, Website, Newsletter, etc.).
- Type a title (ex. Facebook)
- Click the “bulleted list” icon in the top
- Start typing
- Hit the enter key to add another bullet
- Hit enter twice to stop the list and add a new section
- Any time you see something another author does that you found effective at drawing you in, add it to the list of ideas.
***At the bottom of this post I included my personal list of social media ideas. Sharing is caring friends. Feel free to add to my list in the comments!
Monthly Social Media Schedule
At the end of each month I create a social media schedule for the upcoming month. My preference for this is a table (see my previous post on creating tables).
- Create a table with the following columns
- Date
- Events (if any that month)
- Blog
- Facebook/Twitter
- Create a row for each day of the month
- Fill out your event schedule first
- dates for releases
- dates for giveaways – start and end
- other big promotional/writing/publishing moments
- Fill out your blog schedule second (how often you blog is up to you)
- Use your events list to determine key blog post timing.
- Fill in the rest of the blog dates with ideas from your Social Media Ideas page.
- Fill out Facebook/Twitter schedule
- Blog post and event announcements get copied over.
- Fill in the rest of the days with ideas from your Social Media Ideas page.
- Feel free to leave blank spaces – just remember to do something that day.
- When executing, feel free to NOT do what’s on your schedule if what’s happening in your life/writing gives you something else to post.
- As you complete your posts…
- Change the text on your tracker (grey, strike-through) so that you know what you did and what you missed (keep that unused idea to be used later)
- Update the tracker with what you do end up posting
Note that social media experts recommend more posts on Twitter daily than on Facebook. I don’t put every Twitter post on this tracker as I schedule many of my tweets through Hootsuite, so that is a schedule by itself. I reference my Social Media Schedule when scheduling those tweets in Hootsuite.
As much as you are able, get a head start on your above calendar by scheduling Facebook and Twitter posts ahead of time. If you can get most of your blog posts written and scheduled, even better (but harder to do because they are much more time-consuming).
Pay attention to when you will be unavailable to post – like when you’re on vacation, and get anything for that time period completed and scheduled ahead of time.
If you have a different method, please share. I’m always happy to find better ways to do things!
Happy social media scheduling my friends!
Abigail’s Social Media Ideas List
(As of 1/16/15)
Blog
- My experiences (writing, marketing)
- The Little Things series of posts
- Editing
- Querying
- Writing etc. (grammar, classes, new methods)
- My updates on progress
- Keep lists on research and interesting stuff while writing a new book to post when release comes around
- Writing and editing progress on books
- Release date announcements
- Cover reveals
- My books
- Inspiration
- Character interviews
- Character discover
- How I came up with a character or plot idea
- Book excerpts
- Book trailer releases
- Cover reveals
- Release announcements
- Author Spotlights (TWRP Tuesday)
- Bigger Giveaway Announcements/Details
- Lists (hottest characters, super powers, etc.) – good for blog
- OneNote Tips series of posts
Facebook/Twitter:
- Links to blog posts
- Holidays/Celebrations (http://www.emotionscards.com/locations.html)
- Pinterest pins
- Just for fun (quotes, memes, etc.)
- Writing resources
- My pins for my books with why they’re relevant
- Share things from my favorite authors
- Industry news I find relevant
- Share things from my peers
- Throwback Thursday
- Dr. Seuss Quotes
- Princess Bride Quotes
- Observations about life/people (fodder for books)
- Scavenger Hunt in my books
- Small Giveaways (participation raffle – relate to new release if coming up)
- This or that (ex. Beach or mountains, shifters or vamps)
- Favorites? (types of desserts, vacation destinations, character in a series)
- Reader Preferences (hero archetypes, chapter lengths, etc.)
- How do you picture this character? Building? (they send pics)
- Quote from my books with picture (characters, places, things, activities, etc.)
- Interaction with readers (favorite book? Favorite character? What book made you love reading?)
- Requests for author or character questions from readers for blog post
- Small teasers for the next books/story lines
- Did you catch this small detail in the 1st two books?
- Favorite quotes from other books
- Periodic reminders about other social media and books – “re-announcements”
- Previous blog posts
- Songs related to the books/characters/situations
- Pictures of me doing stuff (writing, traveling, etc.)
- Goody pack giveaways
- Screenshots of my computer – things I’m working on
- Puzzles pieces of an image – to announce the next book cover
- Geek out moments
- What’s on my Kindle (or Reading Corner)
Pinterest Boards
- Series – research
- Single books – research
- Writing resources
- Author Spotlights
- Big Giveaways (prizes, links to fun, etc.)
- Book covers I like
- Holidays
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