All social media has marketing potential
Social media is an excellent marketing tool for aspiring mind, body, and spirit authors and self-publishers and a stellar way of expanding your platform.
The platform is all about your audience reach. The greater your reach the more people you can influence to buy and read your book. As a mind, body, spirit author, that’s what you will want. It is therefore important to invest your time across at least 2 social media sites – well before your book is released.
Popular social media sites include Facebook, YouTube, Whats App, Instagram, WeChat, TikTok, Sina Weibo, QQ, Telegram, Snapchat, Kuaishou, Qzone, Pinterest, Twitter, Reddit, Linkedin, and now the new Threads, and plenty more. Facebook and Instagram are popular social media platforms for authors.
It is helpful to think of social media and the effort you invest there as stepping stones, leading potential customers to your online home, your author website. Your social media author pages should always give an attractive and coordinated first impression of you.
Set up author pages on 2 social media sites
Be selective and set up on a couple of popular social media sites. This may mean setting up an account, a Personal Page, and a customised Fan Page or Business Page (Author Page) from which your business profile will be made public.
Additionally, there are social media sites like Facebook that have many other features; you can set up shop, post updates, articles, photos, videos, events, and more. Use fonts, colours, images, descriptions, and a biography that best reflects your brand.
Recent social media statistics may help you to decide which platforms to go for depending on your audience type. Think hard about who your readers actually are. Ages, genders, interests, issues. Where do they like to spend time online and why?
Social media statistics:
- Facebook has 2.96 million Monthly Active Users (MAU), predominantly female, ages 18-49
- YouTube has 2.2 billion MAUs, who are predominantly male, ages 18-49
- Instagram has 2 billion MAU, predominantly female and under 35
- Pinterest has 444 million MAU, predominantly female, ages 18-64
- LinkedIn has 424 million MAU, slightly predominantly male, professional
- Twitter has 338 million MAU, predominantly male, ages 18-29
Social media brand summary
What kind of author are you or do you want to be?
What problem are you here to solve for your reader?
Your online presence requires coordination and your brand and message should be concise and authentic; a clear expression of who you are, and what you value and offer. At once, you want your social media presence to stand apart from other mind, body, spirit authors, and yet you want to be known as an author of your genre – it’s a fine balance.
Work out colours, fonts, and images that give the best impression of you, the mind, body, spirit author, to be then used in the design of your social media headers (banners). Consider 2-3 headers:
- 1 Facebook Personal Page header
- 1 Facebook Author Page header
- 1 social media site header – YouTube, Pinterest, LinkedIn, or Twitter (Instagram doesn’t use a header).
Craft a brand brief to understand what your business is about. You can then use this as the basis for your website design. A brand brief is much more than fonts and colours, etc., rather it’s an overview of your business mission, values, audience, competition, voice, and image.
*Please note – If you already have an author website and a brand worked out, use your established design as inspiration when creating your social media headers. It’s best for your website and social media pages to have a similar look and feel, then your fans will quickly recognise you online.
Social media header designs
Make the header design for your Facebook Author Page and your second social media site similar. However, the header design for your Facebook Personal Page should be different – so your reader can easily identify your Author Page.
Facebook Personal Page
The Facebook Personal Page header needs to re-direct people to your Facebook Author Page. When readers come across your book or a blog post you’ve written, they may search for you on Facebook. What can happen is that new followers arrive at your personal page rather than your author page which is not what you want. They may not realise you have an author page. Thus, a Facebook Personal Page header that neatly informs them of your author page is a great help and they will appreciate your thoughtfulness.
Facebook Author Page
Social media headers aren’t a place to advertise your book image; nor is the space meant for your profile picture. Rather the header should represent your brand. Your brand should be the essence of you, the author, that is your likes, values, and what makes you tick. A feeling of who you are will be communicated through the header image – its fonts and colours. Your book (and future books) can make appearances in other ways, via posts, advertising, and links, and from within the page’s shop.
Social media author profile
Get 2 headshots yourself and choose one for your social media sites, that represents you the author. Use the other one for your personal accounts or pages. They should be different. Ask someone you know who has the talent to take photos or visit a professional photographer’s studio. Invest in your image.
As an author, you are the face of your business, so present yourself well, and ensure good lighting when having the photos taken. You can polish the images and improve their file size, if necessary, in Canva or another graphics/photo program (learn about pixels, PNG, and JPG).
You will also be required to provide an author biography and details like your website URL, email, etc. when setting up social media accounts/pages. Make your biography clear and precise, and reflective of your brand. Consider hiring an editor to refine your biography.
*Please note – As an author, you are a public figure and though your author page is made public, and your personal page header and profile picture are also made public, it’s best to make the content of your personal page private. Review the privacy settings of your personal social media accounts.
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