Author Social Media: If I Was An Author I Might Post…

We recently discussed how authors are small business owners. I offered a list of all the hats you should be wearing that go beyond writing and beyond the general writing process; this included marketing and publicity.

This is a hat I can help with (or wear for you)! I am not a literary agent, nor do I currently work at a publishing house, nor am I an accountant, but what I do know a little something about is social media marketing including graphic design and copy writing.

I want to provide some tips and some ideas for what you may want to post at different levels of your career. Because, yes, it’s “best practices” to start before you’re published! Let's build your author social media account.

Copy

Copy writing and novel writing are two different beasts! Just because you have beautiful prose in your novel, doesn’t mean you can write perfect copy.

While copy can and should have voice, it also needs to be easily digestible. Usually, you want to stick with short, concise, and active sentences.

Copy should also have a focus on keywords while remaining in a form that is pleasant to a reader. Writing for robots and humans if you will.

Ex. 1 

I think you’ll like [novel’s title] because it has vampires and lots of action.

Vs.

If you like vampires, heists, and fast paced action, you’ll love [novel’s title].

Don’t hedge with “I think.” If these people like these ideas, genres, and tropes, assume they’ll like your novel, and say it with your whole chest!

Give us more keywords! Nobody is searching for “lots of action" but they might search for “fast paced”. Heist is a great subgenre keyword.

Don’t bury the lead. Captions get cut off, or people stop reading; put those keywords in first! Putting your novel’s title up front feels like the right thing to do. You want people to know the title, you chose it with care, but it doesn’t do enough work when people are scrolling through their feeds. Using it is important because you want people to remember and find it later, but it's not the attention grabber, it’s not the familiar ideas that hooks people into reading more.

Ex. 2

In my novel, curly haired Janine proposes to her golden-locked girlfriend, Stephanie, during a scenic hike up a mountain in the beautiful Rocky Mountains of British Columbia. Drinking champagne and devouring snacks from a picnic basket turns quickly from romantic getaway to dangerous trek.

Vs.

A romantic proposal turns dire in this thriller novel about a sapphic couple hiking the British Columbian Rockies. After a heart-felt proposal, a little bubbly, and passionate roll in the grass, the two women’s lives are changed forever during their dark descent.

On the page, we love to know what the characters look like, but nobody cares when they’re looking for book recs. (With the caveat of identities like ethnicity, culture, disability etc.) At this point in grabbing your reader’s attention, they don’t even care about their names!

Again we bury the lead in the first example.

Get the genre out front, and use its name! Reading the first one we might think we’re getting into a romance, so the sudden shift to thriller or horror makes a reader feel like they’ve been tricked and their time wasted. Or worse, they don’t read the whole thing, buy your book, and are disappointed.

A human reader likely knows this is a sapphic book by reading the first one, but a robot might not realize it. So say sapphic! Say queer! Say lesbian! Readers are searching for these terms and robots are the ones that find them.

Give a bit more specificity to the inciting incident. In this case, it’s a dangerous event during the hike. A dark descent assumes something kept them out til dark which is usually not the plan when hiking. You could (should) get more specific by mentioning an injury, a lost map, something stalking them, whatever. Despite using them all the time, I find coming up with examples so difficult! 

And once again ditch the unnecessary context. “In my novel” adds nothing to the information. This copy is going to be accompanying a graphic; the graphic will show it’s a novel and you’re the one posting it. Make the copy work with your graphics instead of repeating all the same information. (And use alt text so visually impaired people get everything too!)

Think about what you search for when you’re looking for book recommendations online and use that to focus your copy.

Actual Post Ideas

Okay, let’s think about some specific posts you can make and what copy might accompany them. I have one single, one carousel, and one reel for each “level” of an author's career.

Aspiring

You haven’t published anything yet, but you are working on something (or, if you’re like me, many somethings). This is where you build a presence around you and your general writing vibes. People love books, yes, but they also love to support people they've made a connection with.

Your main goals are: connection, conversation, and inspiration.

Single Image - Conversation

[your laptop/notebook, a drink, and a snack. Optional text: “How do you fuel your writing?”]

Copy: When I sit down to write, I fuel with tea and cookies. How do you fuel your writing?

Carousel - Connection

[Text:Hi I’m {name}, meet me in fives!]{A picture of you either with a nice background or remove the background and use branding colours]

[text: Five Books][[five of your favourite books]

[Text: Five Movies][five of your favourite movies]

[Text: Five Snacks][five of your favourite snacks]

you can choose different items and more items

Copy: Allow me to introduce myself: I’m Your Name and my current passion project/WIP/whatever is my [genre novel] manuscript. Outside of writing I’m a [one sentence about some of your other identities and interests]. I’d love to connect with readers and writers who enjoy [genre/ hobby/ interest]. Tell me what your top book, movie and snack are below!

Reel - Inspiration

Text: POV you’re writing a [genre] novel and you just hit the 20,000 word mark!

Video: b-roll of you at your laptop, a screenshare of you clicking over to 20,000 words,  then celebrate! A little dance, a cheer, a snacky reward.

Copy: I’ve hit 20000 words on my [genre] novel, celebrate with me!

How do you celebrate your milestones?

Querying

You’ve completed your manuscript and started sending it out to agents. This is where you start building hype about your specific project while continuing that personal connection.

Your main goals are: connection, entertainment, and some promotion

Single Image - Connection and Promotion

[Text: Looking for an agent to champion my {genre}, {trope}, {unique selling point} novel.][your cover if available or you “pleading” with a bookish background]

Copy: If you want to see this novel hit the shelves, please leave a [novel appropriate emoji] in the comments to show agents the readers are hungry for it!

Carousel - Entertainment (storytelling)

[My Writing Journey so Far:]

[I started this manuscript on {date} with the initial idea of:{idea}]

[That all changed after the first draft! {give one specific (spoiler free) example: ditched a character, changed the love interest, realized the journey needed to start somewhere different]

[10 drafts later and…]

[... now I’m querying!]

Copy: Use pictures of you writing, stationery, fancy coffees, flowers. Something that matches your genre but falls into the background.

Writing isn’t easy and sometimes writing the first draft is where you find out nothing is working. It wasn’t a waste of time, because now you know, but it can be disheartening. One of my early struggles was [specifics here]. But I persevered, and I’ve finished and edited my manuscript!

What hurdle have you come up against that almost made you stop? How did you keep going?

Reel - Connection

Text: Manuscript finished.

Video: You sitting back and closing your laptop clearly satisfied with yourself.

Copy: And now the “fun” begins. It’s time to query my [genre], [trope], [unique selling point] novel. Who else is diving into the query trenches today?

A Self Publishing Aside

Your querying stage doesn’t really exist, but you have publication instead. You can begin building hype and share your journey in cover creation, professional editing runs, and where and how you will publish. It’s probably going to blend in with the surrounding stages of aspiring and debuting.

Debuting

Your book has been picked up and you have a (probably tentative) publishing date. Now is the time to start ramping up your promotion. But don’t forget about those other posts! If you start posting only promotion for your novel, followers will notice and new faces won’t get to see what else you have for them.

Your main goals are: promotion, entertainment, and conversation

Single Image - Promotion

{your book cover} 3 to 5 tropes/genre/unique values scattered around it with arrows pointing to the cover. 

Copy: If you like , , and __, save the date for {novel title} publication on {date}

Carousel - Entertainment (and Promotion)

A [protagonist]

In [setting]

Fight [antagonist]

To [goal]

Can they {overcome climactic struggle}?

Images: Use stock photos or commissioned art to exemplify the big pieces of your novel for all but final slide where you reveal the cover

Copy: Find out on {date} when {title}, a {genre} novel, drops in stores near you!

Reel-Promotion

Vibey b-roll with voiceover: [specific quote set up and quote]

[Example: When a pirate captain realizes he’s fallen in love with his first mate, “The captain steps out onto the deck and everyone freezes, ‘First Mate, I need to see you in my chambers.’ The crew lets out mocking hollers assuming he is in trouble. The first mate blushes when he catches a glimmer in the captain’s eye.”]

Copy: In this { unique trait, genre} novel, watch as {plot point unfolds}. 

Specific Example: In this swashbuckling romance, watch as forbidden love finds a way while the rest of the crew seeks a great treasure of their own!

Published and Continuing!

You’ve published your first novel and you’re working on the next one. This is when all of these things come together. You want to keep promoting your first novel while building hype for your next one, and continuing to connect with readers, building community and a larger audience as you go.

Your main goals are: connection, inspiration, and promotion.

Single Image - Connection, Inspiration

Then and Now Horizontal cut

On top - Then - A bad writing habit you had before you published [you frustrated at your laptop]

On bottom - Now - The habit you replaced it with [you thriving at your laptop]

Copy: I’ve learned better! Sometimes you have to do things the wrong way to learn the right way.

What’s something you had to learn the hard way? Have you outgrown that habit yet?

Carousel - Promotion

Text: Don’t read this book if…

Text: you hate {trope}

Text: you hate {trope}

Text: you hate {trope}

Copy: Because {novel title} is absolutely filled with {the same three tropes maybe stated in a more specific or simply different way if you can}.

Reel - Connection

Text: I’m working on my second novel, ask me anything!

B-roll of you working in a cozy or otherwise aesthetic place.

Copy: Do you want to know about my experience publishing my debut? Do you want to know what this next novel is about? Do you want to know what I’d do differently if I was writing my first novel again? Ask and you shall receive!

Thoughts about audience

Authors want to post about author things (the process, the struggle, the stats) and that is great! Writers are readers afterall, so building some of your audience from other authors is great. However, you don’t want to focus on that content because you’ll be missing out on a whole audience of people that only read. Some readers enjoy watching how the sausage gets made, and many are happy to hype you through your struggles, but remember that your ideal audience is [your genre/vibe] readers.

That means you should weave in some other personal but still adjacent ideas. For example, if you’re a horror author, consider talking about your recent horror reads or watches. If you write cozy fantasy, consider posts about your slow living routines. If hard sci-fi is your thing, post about your favourite fun facts relating to your research or interests.

You can also consider posting less genre/vibe adjacent posts about your other hobbies. Especially if you can somehow relate them back to writing, “needed a break from writing so I went for a run,” needed a screen break so I’m listening to a book and crocheting this blanket,” “need some inspiration so we went out to the farmer’s market to shop and people watch,” “a writer’s gotta eat, this is what’s fueling me today.” This shows your audience that you are a real person behind the writing persona they see otherwise. It opens up your audience reach just a little bit to possibly snag some new readers. Because when you think about it, your ideal reader is probably quite like you.

Final Thoughts About Author Social Media

Hopefully this gave you some ideas about where to start and what posts to make. I can’t say it’s easy to do this whole social media thing. If I were to give one more piece of advice, it would be to be sustainably consistent. If you can post great posts once a week that’s way better than low effort posts three times a week. You have other things to do!

Okay, there are a few more tips I want to share, but that was the most important in my opinion. Daily posts are not sustainable for most people! But a few more things you can do to make the most of your time…

• Create templates

• Batch and schedule (make four posts and schedule one a week and now your month is complete)

• Hire help (templates, launch campaigns, and full social media management are available to you)

One of these things is not like the others, but I truly want to help authors get their books read! People can’t read your book if they don’t know it exists, and trad publishers only do so much (and self-published books get basically nothing if you do nothing!)So, if it is within your budget (and I’m happy to talk budgets) please reach out if you’d like a helping hand with getting your account started, ramping up for launch, or just a little pick-me-up from where you are now.