Indie Life: How I use social media in my writing career

Today I'm participating in the Indelibles Indie Life blog hop. On the second Wednesday of every month we talk about various aspects of being an indie author, and luckily the A to Z blogfest is dedicated to the letter I today.

Social media is part of my life as a writer. I blog, both here and for Gadling, the leading travel blog on the web. I also have a Twitter feed and a public Facebook page.

I do set up certain limits to my social media presence, however, because I recognize that it can only do so much for my career and can easily become a waste of time. If you look at my feeds you'll notice that I don't use them as often as some people, and have fewer followers than most.

The main reason for this is that I don't play the "follow me and I'll follow you" game. I don't see a point to that. I want followers who are actually interested in my writing, and I only follow feeds that I'm genuinely interested in. Even then I don't read them on a daily basis. I simply don't have the time. And even when I do read them I only comment when I have something to add to the conversation.

As I mentioned in a previous post, I'm trying to get beyond the indie author's echo chamber. While I love my fellow indies, our community runs the danger of being a closed one. That's one of the reasons I'm also getting more into Goodreads. I like the conversations on there and I think it offers a great way to connect with readers.

You might also want to look at my post on Twitter for writers.

I've made it past 300 posts!

This past week I've gone past 300 posts! I didn't even notice at the time, but my post on Thanksgiving in the Civil War was number 300.

This blog keeps growing. I only started in July of 2011 and I've collected a nice group of followers. I appreciate every one of you! Thanks to you my hits have risen to an average of 250-300 a day. I'm planning on expanding this blog in 2013 with more posts and participation in blogfests. I'm always open to guest posts too.

I'm sort of spread out on social media right now and I think it's best to focus only on one or two. This blog and my Goodreads account will be getting the most attention. I'll also be using my Twitter feed, because that brings in new readers.

So what does this picture have to do with anything? Well, it's a 300-pounder Parrot gun, a rifled cannon used as a shore battery that threw a 300-pound shell. The photo is courtesy Wikipedia.

Fantasy ebook sale and writing tips

It's a sunny weekend here in Santander and we're enjoying the last few beach days before the winter sets in. I still have time to make a few announcements, though! Fellow archaeologist/blogger A.J. Walker is having a fantasy ebook sale of the first two volumes of his Timeless Empire series. Check them out; they're only on sale until Monday!

Ninja Captain Alex Cavanaugh did a great guest post over at My First Book about marketing your work. Lots of good advice there.

Last but not least, I discovered an interesting blog while scrolling through Twitter. Yesenia Vargas did a post about useful twitter hashtags for writers. It included a few I didn't know about.

Do you have an announcement that's at least vaguely related to the subject of this blog? Drop me a line and I'd be happy to spread the word!

Is Twitter useful for writers?

I've had my Twitter account since January 2010. After my first week of tweeting I blogged about the uses of Twitter for writers. You might be interested in reading that post before this one.

Back? Good. Now after two-and-a-half years tweeting I can say that Twitter can be a useful tool for writers, and also has some serious limitations.

First off, it's a great way to get readers. I tweet everything I write for this blog, my guest posts on other blogs, and my travel writing on Gadling. I also retweet interesting stuff from other writers, historians, etc. These tweets, with their generous use of hashtags to bring in a wider readership, really up my hits. Blogspot allows me to see the source and timing of hits and I see a spike every time I tweet.

It's also a great way to keep abreast of current events and trending stories. I've found a fair amout of material for travel blogging thanks to Twitter.

But what every writer wants to know is, can Twitter sell books? It seems not. I do tweet about my books but I've seen no evidence that it translates to sales. I don't hard sell on Twitter, and don't follow anyone who does, but about one in ten tweets is related to my books. Too many writers nowadays seem to be on Twitter for the sole reason hawking their wares. Judging from their Amazon rankings, it doesn't seem to be doing much good. Twitter users want content, links to cool stuff, not sales pitches.

Fellow blogger and indie author Alex Cavanaugh told me about a Twitter app called WhoUnfollowedMe. I've found two trends from this useful app. The first is that some people, so far entirely indie writers, will follow you so you follow them back, and then unfollow you. When I catch a person doing this, I unfollow them. I don't like being used. Also, some people follow me and then unfollow me after a few days when I don't follow them back.

Sorry, folks, but I only follow Twitter feeds that I find interesting. If I like your stuff, I'll follow you (unless you pull a fast one). If I don't like you're stuff, don't leave in a huff. Chances are I wasn't going to buy your book anyway. It's not like I expect everyone who I follow to follow me back. I'm pretty tickled that Clive Barker follows me, though.