Wednesday, April 6, 2011

Writer Wednesday: The Use Of Social Media and Multiple Postings

Yes I am on social media a lot. I get asked this question often. " Why do you post the same thing multiple times a day?" The easiest answer is it's my job and it's how I market what I do. My platform as an author, i.e. my blog, books that I have released, other blogs, articles or people in the industry that I think have valid and insightful info I will post and re post frequently. (Although sorry about that double posts within like 2 minutes of each other. I was made aware of that and I think I have it turned off now.) So with this post I hope to offer some ideas and also explain the reason behind not only multiple post but the timing of those posts.

There are a varitey of social media dashboards you can use for multiple timed posts. Tweetdeck and Hootsuite are ones that I have experience with. However, Hootsuite is my dashboard of choice. Because I have a Twitter account as an author and contribute to the Astraea Press account as well the same thing with Facebook and Blogs everything I do is twice as much work. So using these tools help me to utilize my time to market and write. Because lets face it if I can't write novels what's the point?

When people have numerous friends posts can get buried. This is why I post several times what I want people to see that day. There are some key times of day to post. I'll explain them below.

  • The Early Birds: 5-7 AM: These are the people who get on before work or school
  • Just Got To Work: 8-10 AM: These are the people who as soon as they clock in and before they even begin working must do a quick social media check.
  • Lunch Time: 11-1 PM: This is quite literal. These are the people on their lunch break combing the social networks via their phone or laptop while they gulp down lunch.
  • After School: 2-4 PM: These are they kids or adults who have been at school and are literally jonesing for a social media fix.
  • After Work: 5-6 PM: These are the people who get off work and instead of starting dinner, laundry or kids homework they would rather get lost in the gossip of Twitter and Facebook. (that's me)
  • Nightowls: 7-midnight: These are the people who stay up way late hoping to the be the first to jump on a juicy new youtube video or some breaking gossip. At Astraea I tend to try and market our YA novels at this time of day. Because teens like to stay up late.
I hope this explains why I do what I do and I hope that my friends will be patient with my marketing efforts. And on occasion if they feel impressed share a post or two. So have any of you become annoyed or ever wondered about the multiple posts?


4 comments:

  1. Interesting to see your whys and wherefores. However, if you post too much, you run the risk of over-exposure. People stop looking at what you're posting because they assume they have already seen it, or they are so inundated that they are exasperated. It is a delicate balance, I am sure.

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  2. It is a balance. Also pictures help show people it's a different post.

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  3. It's kind of a matter of knowing who your target audience is, and then maybe tailoring each post to fit that target group at the appointed time. That's what TV commercials do, so it must work. That way, you aren't posting the same thing all the time and the over-exposure risk is minimized.

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  4. Thanks for these tips on when people use SNW. I've just jumped in with my own blog, dogleadermysteries.com to build an author platform. I haven't used any of the tools you mentioned because sometimes others have ended up sending me 8 in a row of the same post (fills up a Twitter feed). Can I use those tools from a Mac computer? How can I make sure I don't send 8 at a time?

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