Welcome Frances Caballo and a Guest Post: "Five Tips for Creating Your Author Platform"

Welcome Frances Caballo, author of Avoid Social Media Time Suck: A Blueprint for Writers Who Want to Create Online Buzz for Their Books and Still Have Time to Write.  I feel very enthusiastic about sharing today's guest post because it is an area in which I am desperately learning as much as I can. I know I will definitely put all "Five Tips for Creating Your Author Platform" to very good use!

     

Thank you to Renee Roberson, blog tour manager at Wow- Women on Writing for providing today's guest post as part of Frances Caballo's blog tour.

Five Tips for Creating Your Author Platform

We don’t have a choice on whether we DO social media—

the question is how well we do it.

—Erik Qualman, How Social Media Transforms the Way We Live and Do Business

Today we understand that social media marketing is an essential ingredient of our author marketing platform that we can't ignore. Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn are well rooted in our world, and networks such as Google+, Pinterest, Instagram, and Tumblr are no longer newbies.

Yet practically every day a new application or social network— RebelMouse, Pheed, LibraryThing, Write or Read, etc.— emerges, and it can boggle our minds and tax our energy.

But you needn’t worry about having to jump on the bandwagon of every shiny new innovation because there’s a basic tenet of marketing that still applies for author marketers: know your audience.

Audience is a marketing term that simply refers to the people for whom you've written your book. For example, did you write your last novel for the YA (young adult) market? Are your colorful books designed for children between the ages of three and six?

Did you write a historical novel about France for all the Francophiles in the world? Is your Hiking on the Edge of the World nonfiction book written with hard-core hikers in mind?

Knowing your audience enables you to hone your marketing efforts and focus your social media attention on those platforms where you are most likely to encounter your readers. It's easier to do than it may seem at first glance.

For example, if you write with young adults in mind, then you'll need to be on Twitter and Tumblr because that's where you're most likely to find that demographic.

If your target market is women who are fifty-plus in age, then you'll need a Facebook page. Did you write a book about dressing for success? Then you definitely need an active presence on LinkedIn as well as Pinterest.

If you write chick lit, you probably won’t want to spend too much time on Google+. Instead, you’ll want to focus your efforts on Facebook and Pinterest, where women dominate the user base.

Five Tips for Creating Your Author Platform

Here are five tips to get you started on your marketing platform.

•  Your first step is to hire someone to build a WordPress website for you that includes a blog. Don’t use Vista Print for your website and don’t let someone talk you into using Joomla. WordPress is today’s go-to content management system for websites.
• Decide who your audience is and study the demographics of each social media network to determine which ones you should be using.
• Resist the temptation to embark on using four or five social media networks all at once. Start with one, get to know it, conquer it, and then move on to the next one.
• Be consistent in your posting on social media networks and your blog. Write new blog posts at least once a week. Post a minimum of once daily on Facebook, twice daily on LinkedIn and four times a day on Twitter. Use a scheduling application to help you be consistent in your posting.
• You will be known and followed based on the content you post. Make sure you post the best, most up-to-date content within your niche every day. Use the website Alltop.com or a curation application such asScoop.it to help you find the content you’re looking for.

What tips would you suggest to a newly published author?

Thank you Frances Caballo for sharing these helpful social media strategies! And, yes, developing a website has become my top priority. Also, I will be posting a review of AVOID MEDIA TIME SUCK here on All Things Audry in the near future. As I begin to read it, I am amazed how much time I actually waste on social media. Scheduling really is everything!  

About the Author: 

Frances Caballo is a social media manager for writers and author of  Avoid Social Media Time Suck: A Blueprint for Writers to Create Online Buzz for Their Books and Still Have Time to Write, Social Media Just for Writers: The Best Online Marketing Tips for Selling Your Books and Blogging Just for Writers. Presently, she is the Social Media Manager for the Women’s National Book Association-SF Chapter, the San Francisco Writers Conference, and the Bay Area Independent Publishers Association. You can find her on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, and Google+. 

Avoid Social Media Time Suck: A Blueprint for Writers Who Want to Create Online Buzz for Their Books and Still Have Time to Write.

Synopsis: Social media is no longer an option for writers--it is a required element of every author’s platform. If you’ve been avoiding Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and other social networks because you think tweeting and posting will take large chunks of time out of your day and leave you with little time to write, think again. Using social media to market your books doesn’t need to be time-consuming. And with the four-step formula you’ll find in this book, it won’t be.

Whether you’re a seasoned or a newbie social media user, this book will introduce you to posting schedules, timesaving applications and content-rich websites that will help you economize the time you spend using social media to promote your books. You will learn:

• How to create and perfect your author platform.
• Where great content exists on the Internet and how you can use it to further your brand within your niche.
• The importance of being social and applications that make this task easy and fun.
• Tools that enable you to track and measure your success so you can better understand the return on investment of your valuable time.
• Which tools prevent you from accessing the Internet when the time comes to sit and write that next book.
• Exercises for introverted writers to help you feel comfortable on the social web.

Frances Caballo is hosting a book giveaway for Avoid Social Media Time Suck on Goodreads during the month of April.

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I'm standing atop my virtual author platform here to share with you my novels:

GOING BAREFOOT IN GREENER GRASS

A wedding, a broken engagement and plenty of kick off your shoes fun!

Spring-fling low rate of $5.99 on KINDLE and NOOK

SECRETS, LIES AND APPLE PIES

An affair, an epic car accident and a basket of delicious deceptions!

Yummy read at $5.99 on KINDLE and NOOK

What is Luck?

I'm feeling very "lucky" to share with you the opening excerpt of my next novel (which is still very much in progress and will be for a few/several months).

Feel free to share what think of it by leaving a comment here or on my Facebook Page. I would love to hear your thoughts!

As you will read, Lucy is a down-on-her-luck character with an unlikely sunny disposition. Soon, Lucy's luck will change after visiting her "hippie" mother in Los Angeles results in winning a trip of a lifetime on The Price Is Right. I am still ironing out the details of how the story will unfold. Yet, one thing is for sure: the theme of luck will play a major role! 

How Lucy Got Lucky 

by Audry Fryer

What is luck? A four leaf clover plucked from the warm Earth may be lucky for the recipient, but not so fortunate for the clover. A lucky rabbit’s foot surely wasn’t such a welcome fate for the rabbit. And, that penny lying face up on the sidewalk? Think of the person who dropped it. As for me, I identify with the rootless clover, the three footed rabbit and the penniless soul. Some might call it a run of bad luck. Others may call it being misfortunate. I call it normal.

There’s a level of security when you’re consistently on the wrong side of luck. It’s sort of an upside to a downside. I don’t play the lottery. And, in that way, I never loose. I don’t believe Prince Charming exists. And, in doing so, I save myself the trouble of a broken heart. I am certain I will never land a dream career.  And, because I lack such aspirations, I am free to feel grateful that I have a job at all; even if it is plunking mediocre diner food accompanied by room temperature coffee in front of the good people of Scarlet’s Mill.

            Who’s to say that good luck is really good and that bad luck is really bad? Honestly, how does a four leaf clover pressed between wax paper and hidden in the pages of a heavy book make all your dreams come true? Does having a rabbit’s foot dangling from your keychain magically transport Mr. Right to your door? Does that penny you found beckon untold riches? No, no and no.

            Is the bad luck of being locked out of the home of your good-for-nothing boyfriend really so bad? For those unaccustomed to such ridiculously absurd circumstances, standing out in the cold could be seen as a major imposition. I, however, am unfazed as attempts to call said loser boyfriend have not met with success; nor has forcefully banging on his door.

Why would he awaken to let me back in? I had let myself out at a much earlier hour than he prefers to rise in the morning. And, poor Nate was probably exhausted from last night’s two brief episodes of what he calls “sock knockin’”. (Yes, he does keep on his socks.) Anyway, I wouldn't be attempting to break back into his house if it wasn’t for my car not starting.

Many people who live far more fortunate lives would be frantic by this point. They wouldn't know how to come to terms with how the door had locked as if by magic behind them. Nor could the average person reconcile how every door in the house seemed to be guarded by a military grade security system.  Plus, by this point, most people would be cursing their car in an enraged state of disgust. It’s how I differ from nearly every person in this town if not the entire world. Bad luck follows me like my shadow. So why shouldn’t it start to snow as I decide to walk the nearly mile to The Scarlet Diner where I’d surely be late for my shift?

            Here, again, is the upside to the downside. When my shift is over, I will consume an over-sized, fat laden meal without one worry of the calorie count in honor of this long, freezing cold trek. Plus, it really is pretty in a winter wonderland sort of way. There’s something about how a smooth, blank canvas of snow can hide a small town’s many imperfections. I wouldn't have appreciated the scenery nearly as much from behind the wheel of my car. Now, I have the length of this walk to do plenty of appreciating, calorie-burning and, let’s not forget, stewing about a boyfriend I’d like to dump.

            I pull on my sunshine yellow mittens and tighten my matching scarf, both hand-knitted by my mother.  As I pause to look back at Nate’s house, I can’t help feeling like his house is giving me the cold shoulder; much like Nate did last night when I asked him to join me on a trip to visit my mother in California.  “L. A.? No way,” Nate had poetically said. He has a thing for rhyming, if I haven’t mentioned it so far.  “Want great? Ask for Nate,” reads his Realtor slogan printed in large block letters on signs poked into the front yards of several properties in and around Scarlet’s Mill.

            I turn in the direction of the diner and start walking; positive that if I come across one of his Realtor signs, I may have to rip it out of the ground and throw it. Oh look, there’s one … frozen solid into the ground … just my luck.

Thanks for reading my excerpt! I hope you enjoyed it. 

Again, if you would like to share what think of it, leave a comment here or on my Facebook Page. I would love to hear your thoughts! Now time to get back to work on the rest of the novel. I'll leave you with this one last thought (well, actually, it's a joke):

What do you get when you cross a four leaf clover with poison ivy?  A rash of good luck!

Blog Hop (No, it's not a new dance move!)

All Things Audry has been invited to participate in a Blog Hop Tour.  Basically, it's like playing a game of tag between blogs (and not anything associated with hip-hop or actually hopping up and down to stay warm).

Thank you Cindy Buccieri, professional blogger, author and consultant, for contacting me with this fabulous idea! If you are a blogger, then you must check out her blog at www.cindybuccieri.com for wonderful tips about blogging success.

I've decided to participate in the Blog Hop Tour, so now I must attempt to answer four mind-probing questions about my fascinating life as an author.

Question #1: "What are you working on?"
I would like to say how I am working on Novels #3 -5 that will be set in the same location as Secrets, Lies and Apple Pies, Scarlet's Mill, depicting the lives and stories of the people who live there.  I'd like to say that I'm making great progress on a story about an unlucky woman who works in the local diner that suddenly wins big.  However, as I write this post on Friday, February 14th from my home in Southeastern PA, I am working on digging out my driveway from snowstorm after snowstorm and entertaining my children who have been off from school more than they have been there this winter! Kidding aside, I am enjoying my time with my family and feeling inspired by the snow.  Hmm, a novel about a meteorologist just may be taking shape in my head ...   

Question #2: "How does your work differ from others of its genre?"
Humor mixed with drama. I like to write funny banter between characters and balance it with a healthy amount of tension. My novels are definitely character driven. Also, I believe a story fueled with emotion keeps a reader engaged and invested in the story. Plus, I like to add what I call "real magic".  For example, in Secrets, Lies and Apple Pies, Braeburn's deceased father seemed to give her some heavenly reassurance when she needed it most.  

Question #3: "Why do you write what you do?"
I write the type of novels that I like to read.  After my twins were born and I had left my teaching position, I began reading paperback after paperback passed on to me from my mom.  As I read such skilled authors as Jodi Picoult, Emily Giffin, Claire Cook, Krisitin Hannah and Anna Quindlen (to name a few), I became inspired to write. When I began writing, I wanted my stories to reflect what I had enjoyed so much from all those books.    

Question #4: "How does your writing process work?"
First, I organize a general outline of how the novel will progress which includes a detailed description of each main character.  After wasting a lot of time on trying to figure out names for my characters (I get so caught up in those baby naming websites), I take those notes and plan out scenes.  Next, I pray for it to stop snowing so much. Once the kids are off to school and I am not distracted by all things domestic, I sit in my quiet house (unless the phone rings) and write out scene after scene.  Finally, I read and reread, revise and delete, add more here and switch that up back there ... it really is a wonder that I have written two novels.  
And yet, I 100% believe that #3 will be completed within the next six months!     

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Audry Fryer is the author of ...

         

 

SECRETS, LIES AND APPLE PIES 

available for KINDLE and NOOK

& GOING BAREFOOT IN GREENER GRASS 

available for KINDLE and NOOK