social media - Kelsye Nelson

Are you making this mistake with your Facebook ads?

One of the biggest complaints I heard from the authors who completed my 2016 Book Marketing Challenges survey was how easy it is to waste money on advertising.

Luckily, I've tested strategies and practices that remarkably improve ad results. This means that I've also paid good money for ads that were complete flops. Painful! These failed ads taught me very important lessons. I am happy to share my experiences so that you don't have to make the same mistakes I did.

Here is a quick 2-minute video lesson that shows how a specific change I made to my Facebook ads TRIPLED my book sales.

If you don't have time to watch the video, here's the big lesson I reveal.

Don't direct your ad directly to your Amazon book page. Instead, offer an easier "next step" such as downloading a sample of your book for free.

Insider tip: This lesson is a free preview of my Online Marketing Masterclass for authors that will be released to the public later this week.

Publishing Advice - 03/28/2016

The give and take of social media marketing (Plus my golden rule of self-promotion.)

Want to avoid irritating the crap out of your Twitter followers, but still need to make sure the time you spend on the platform results in traffic and sales? Here’s my golden rule for self-promotion on Twitter:

Don’t exceed a 3:1 ratio of "gives" versus promotion.

What does this mean? This means for every single time I talk about myself, or my books, or classes, I talk about something completely unrelated to me at least three times.

Give. Give. Give. Take.

This 3:1 ratio is a bit high on the promotion side. I only talk about myself this much when I have something I am pushing hard. When I don’t have anything new, that ratio drops down to more like 10:1, or even 20:1.

Guy Kawasaki, who was my mentor and advisor during my Writer.ly years, told me his ratio might even be much higher on the “give” side. He manages aggregate news sites and tweets a huge volume of content. For mere mortals, the 10:1 or 3:1 goal is more achievable.

How does this play out? Let’s say I am promoting a new free class. Even though the class is technically a “give” as a free resource, it’s a “take” as I’m talking about myself and asking people to give me their emails when they sign up.

I know that to meet my signup goals, I need to tweet about the class about three times a day. I will use Hootsuite to schedule my tweets for prime times (early in the morning, one in the afternoon, one late in the evening). I make sure to change the tweets so that they don’t all say the same thing.

Once my promo tweets are scheduled, I fill up the space between with at least 3 high-interest “gives”.

What counts as a give? A give can be an article, a quote, a writing prompt, a recommendation, a joke, or links to other people’s events or books. As long as the gives are appropriate and interesting to my audience, no one seems to mind the tweets about my class. Most of my followers will miss them all, even though I spread them throughout the day.

The take is just as important as the give if you are on Twitter for business or audience purposes. If all you post are “gives”, then your efforts will not feed your email list or sales. If you have nothing in particular you are promoting, you can at least schedule out occasional tweets for people to come back and look at your most popular blog posts, or to sign up for your wonderful email newsletter.

It’s more of an art than a science. I break my own rules occasionally and do not always follow my own advice. Luckily, Twitter has a short term memory. It’s easy for my followers forgive my occasional over-excitement for my own projects thanks to the all the other wonderful content I curate for their benefit and enjoyment.

Do you need help using Twitter more effectively?

Sign up for my 3-Day course "How to Get More Followers on Twitter." It's free and delivered via email, so you can complete it on your own schedule.

>> Sign up here. <<

This is day three of my week of social savvy posts. Check back tomorrow to learn more about how to use Twitter to achieve your promotion goals.

Publishing Advice - 03/16/2016

How to use Twitter without embarrassing yourself.

Promoting your books does not need to be a painful exercise in narcissistic flailing and squandered efforts. Approached with the correct mindset, it might not only be very effective, but also fun! If you would like to know how to use Twitter without embarrassing yourself or wasting time, here is what you must keep top of mind. It's the biggie...

Twitter is the place for first discovery, not the final sale.

If you have ever worked in sales or marketing, you may have heard of the sales funnel. As you can see in the illustration below, social media sites (such as Twitter) are at the very tippy top of the funnel. This is where you get your first introductions. Potential readers may see your clever tweet and discover for the first time that you even exist.

This first discovery moment is not the time to ask for a book sale. Sure, if you ask 100 people, you might get one or two sales. Is that what you're after, one or two sales? Is it worth annoying the 98 or 99 other people that didn't take you up on your quick offer?

Use Twitter to entertain or inform your potential fans. Give them interesting content to earn their attention. Invite them to click through to your blogs, or freebies or collaborations.

Here's an example of how I invite my Twitter followers to come visit my website:

In SIX WORDS or fewer, write a story about how to get over it. Share it here: https://t.co/R2eRXq07KX #6words #story pic.twitter.com/AVWoBa6vhi

— Kelsye Nelson (@Kelsye) March 11, 2016

Since my audience is full of writers, I offer the fun game as a way to interact (play!) and drive traffic back to my blog. It's subtle and appreciated by those that participate. You'll notice there is no sales push. I'm not selling anything with these games. I use the games as a way to move beyond introduction and discovery and give my audience a chance to get to know me.

More directly, you can offer information or freebies on Twitter. Here's an example of just that:

Struggling with your creative projects? Free guide and video: Discover What You Love https://t.co/RCTTzyG4FT Created by @NFAJeff #creativity

— Avasta Press (@AvastaPress) March 15, 2016

This tweet really helps move potential fans through the funnel. Not only do we go past introduction to entice people back to the website, but we offer them something of high value for free. While they may watch the video right away, if they want the guide they need to provide their email address. Once we receive their email address, we have permission to continue building our relationship and provide them more offers leading to a single sale, or even a life of fandom. (So we hope!)

If you would like to know how to use Twitter without embarrassing yourself, just keep thinking of the network as a very first introduction to your potential readers. Give, give, give.... give resources, information or entertainment. Be yourself and don't worry about "pushing" anything. Provide opportunities to invite your followers back to your website or to your events. Keep thinking about what you can offer to move your potential readers through the funnel and closer to fandom.

Do you need help using Twitter more effectively?

Sign up for my 3-Day course "How to Get More Followers on Twitter." It's free and delivered via email, so you can complete it on your own schedule.

>> Sign up here. <<

This is day two of my week of social savvy posts. Check back tomorrow to learn more about how to use Twitter to achieve your promotion goals.

Publishing Advice / Writer's Life - 03/15/2016

Why should authors be on Twitter? (4 reasons)

So little time, so much to do, right? As an author, not only do you have to actually write your books, but you also need to promote your works to readers. This can be an incredible amount of work. While social media provides direct access to millions of potential readers, most authors fail to use platforms in way that effectively promotes their books. It's easy to waste a lot of time messing around on social media without getting results. So, why should authors be on Twitter?

Here are four reasons why I highly recommend authors that authors check out Twitter.

1. It's easy to find people on Twitter who have specific interests that align with your books.

This is also called "targeting' your market, which sounds like a mean thing to do but is actually very thoughtful. For example, if you write historical fiction set in the Pacific Northwest, you can identify readers who might be interested in your books by searching what they are tweeting and which accounts they are following. In this situation, you might search for people tweeting about other historical fiction books they've reviewed on Goodreads, or using a #historical hashtag, or retweeting the @Smithsonian magazine account.

2. You can scale quickly.

Scale matters. If you only have an audience of 100 people, those 100 people won't be able to provide enough support to promote or buys your books in quantities that will enable you to make a living (or break even!) as a writer. Simply by following people interested in topics related to your books, you can build a targeted, respectable following. (Here's help on how to do that.)

3. You can use tools to dramatically reduce the amount of time you actually spend on Twitter.

Would you believe that I spend less than an hour or so each week maintaining my Twitter accounts? It's true! This is possible with third-party tools that help you post content, manage your following and respond to mentions. Here's my magic formula:

Feedly - Used to find excellent content worth sharing

Hootsuite - Used to schedule content and monitor mentions, conversations and topics

Tweepi - Used to manage and grow my following

4. Twitter can drive a lot of traffic.

Most importantly, authors that manage to connect with a decent amount of likely readers can use the network to drive a lot of traffic to their website. Twitter (and all social media networks) are at the very tippy-top of the sales funnel. [ctt title="'Savvy authors understand that Twitter is where you make an introduction, not a sale.'" tweet="'Savvy authors understand that Twitter is where you make an introduction, not a sale.' http://ctt.ec/brdYN+ via @Kelsye #selfpub" coverup="brdYN"] Authors posting compelling blogs, offering awesome freebies or hosting online events may tweet links to turn Twitter acquaintances into website visitors, book readers and possibly, eventually, fans for life.

Twitter can help authors connect with potential readers, build a sizable following, save time on marketing and drive traffic home.

Do you need help using Twitter more effectively?

Sign up for my 3-Day course "How to Get More Followers on Twitter." It's free and delivered via email, so you can complete it on your own schedule. Click here for details.

Publishing Advice / Writer's Life - 03/14/2016

Claim your name: First steps for authors on social media

Authors on social media often struggle in the beginning.

Aside from the fact that self-promotion seems daunting and distasteful, you must also contend with a vast number of social networks to choose from, each with their own best practices, unspoken rules and effectiveness. How can you possibly be expected to know where to start?

Good news! You don't need to figure out everything right away. You have plenty of time to try out different platforms. You may explore each one-by-one if you wish, trying them on for audience, ease of use and enjoyment. This is my best piece of advice for authors on social media.

Do this right now:

Claim your name on all the major social media platforms.

What does this mean? This means creating an account on all the major social networks, as well as any niche networks you think might be a good match for your work and your readers. This does not mean that you need to start using all these accounts right now. This simply means that if you do decide to try them out in the future, you will not suffer the annoyance of discovering your name is already taken.

These are the social media networks I suggest for all authors. Do you already have your name claimed on these sites?

Twitter
Facebook (A public page, not just your personal account.)
Pinterest
YouTube
Instagram
GooglePlus
LinkedIn
Goodreads

There are many other social media or community sites that may also be a good match for you. Check out:

There are a billion more. Ask your readers where they spend their time online and what sites they like. That's where you need to be.

When you create your username, you will be very lucky if you can get your first name, or even your full name. Already taken? Don't worry, there are many ways you can craft a well-branded, professional username that will likely work across platforms. Let's say your name is Stephen King, you could try these public user names:

Stephen
StephenKing
AuthorStephenKing
StephenKing
StephenWrites
SKingAuthor
theStephenKing
RealStephen
StephenSpeaks
MeetStephen

If possible, you want to find a user name that you can use on as many social media platforms as possible. This will make it easier for people to find you.

Tip: DO NOT create profiles in the name of your book. You're an author for life, right? You are going to write many books, yes? It will be a big pain to have to start over again every time you publish something new.

Are you 8 for 8 for claiming your name on the primary social media accounts I listed? Do you know more social sites for authors and artists that I may add to the secondary list? Let me know in the comments below.

Do you need help using Twitter more effectively?

Sign up for my 3-Day course “How to Get More Followers on Twitter.” It’s free and delivered via email, so you can complete it on your own schedule.

>> Sign up here. <<

Publishing Advice / Writer's Life - 03/07/2016

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