I’ve been doing a social media push these past couple of weeks to promote One Cobble and Hold on to Your Horses. I should probably call it a social media creep, because I’m reluctant to be pushy. So much so, that my sister, who was watching for announcements and information, did not see any. She suggested I might want to increase the volume just a little to get any results.
My reluctance stems from a belief that merely collecting Likes or followers is not inherently beneficial. The person who is excited and interested in Hold Horses will click Like, watch for updates, and be a willing supporter of the sequel. Someone who has just clicked Like in order to enter a contest or win a freebie will probably evaporate when the time comes to support the sequel. I could be wrong about that. It could be that once people show up, they’ll stay and become engaged. I just feel better about hawking my wares if I believe I’m talking to an audience who wants to hear about them. I’m not trying to inflate the number of Likes on the Hold Horses page, I’m trying to use the number of Likes to gauge interest in a sequel. That effort will fail if I use contests or giveaways to artificially inflate the number of Likes. this article is most talking about how buying likes leads to false search data, but it also supports what I’m saying. Spending money and effort to acquire Likes or followers is wasted. Instead I must focus on creating compelling content and use social media to help people become aware that the content is available. Good content + awareness = a growing group of people interested in new projects.
So I’m working hard to be content with a slow-growth model of building fanbase. Yes I get impatient. Yes sometimes I feel like I’m tap dancing to an empty theater or an unresponsive crowd. But I’m still pretty convinced that this is the right way for me to approach social media. I just hope I can build up enough momentum to support the sequel I want to do.
While I usually purchase Novels unread. But not picture books. They cost about as much in my preferred printing (soft cover for novels, hard for picture books). Picture books are for sharing and for repetitive reading. There are so many picture books that are perfectly OK, but that I have no desire to read again after reading the first time.
Therefore, the media push that worked for me was when you posted the PDF of the full story to read for free. Although I liked the concept as described, and the cover are pleased, I probably would never have purchased if I hadn’t found a way to read the story first.
I then bought a copy for me, two for the local library, and one each for two of my relative families that had girls hooked on horses. And the main reason I purchased was because they’d never find it in a library, so the only way they’d get this story was if I sent it to them.
Good luck with the book promotion.
Hannah
PS, my oldest wants to know why Tuesday doesn’t have anything happening on it. I can’t remember if your blog said anything about that or not…
Tuesday doesn’t have anything because I only had so many pages. Poor Tuesday, left out of the book.
Good to know about the free pdf. Sounds like it worked for you. Thank you for all your support. It is much appreciated.
Wow, I needed to proof read that post. Sorry for all the grammar and spelling errors. My brain went to bed early yesterday.
Don’t worry about Tuesday. You can safely delegate the task of not letting Tuesdays be overlooked to my oldest. He will keep track of it. =)
How do you feel about being creepy then?
(I had to.)
*Smacks self in head* I totally set myself up for that one.
I can agree and support your claim with personal evidence. We are in the midst of a KickStarter Campaign (one of our backers turned us on to you). We have 167 likes but 41 backers. A problem with the like system is that it gives people the feeling they have done something when really they haven’t done anything at all. Likes are great but like any lip service to a cause or project words have to be followed by deeds.
This is why I figured I needed around 1000 likes before running the Kickstarter, because I’ll need 250-500 backers. However I’m re-thinking whether I should wait for the likes before doing the Kickstarter. I have some friends with large social media footprints. I’m willing to ask for help spreading the word about a Kickstarter. I’m not willing to ask them to spread the word about a Facebook page. Ultimately, I won’t know how it turns out until I actually take the plunge. At this point I’m looking toward March as Kickstarter month.