Social Media for Authors, Questions from the Teleseminar Part 2

A few days ago I did a teleseminar for around 400 authors on how to use social media. Prior to the seminar I received around 130 questions. I couldn’t get to all of them on the seminar so I thought I spend a few days and go through them here. There are a lot of questions so if my answers aren’t as in depth as you would like I apologize. Questions that say something like “how can I marketing my novel,” will also not be addressed because a lot of that was covered on the teleseminar. This is part 2.

Let’s get started:

How did you manage to get up as first result in Google?

SEO my friend. Read this post and quick and easy SEO tipis for URL structure (which also includes tips for title tags and meta descriptions). SEO is about making your relevant content more visible.

How can I link up to the best master mind group for my interests, tap into the best ideas for extension and do it in a comfortable amount of time?

Chances are, the best master mind for your group already exists out there somewhere, did you try searching for it? If not you can also find people with similar interests and create your own private wiki or ning community.

Can an author sell a book well in this day and age without being a part of Facebook and other social on-line groups?

Sure you can, but would you want to is the question? With more and more people going online and sharing information why would you not want to tap into social networks?

With little available time to be online, which ONE social media tool would you recommend to an author like me?

This depends on where your audience is. If you had to only pick one tool, I would probably start off with a blog because allows you to share information while interacting and engaging with your community.

What’s the easiest and most simple first step I can take today to drive traffic to my site?

This question scares me a little bit because it gets asked a lot. People want to know about all the easy stuff and to be honest “easy” only gets you so far. You get in what you put out, if you put in easy you will get out mediocre, you have to work! However, if you want to start somewhere I would recommend ranking for your name or book title as a start, then reach out to people with similar interests and start writing guest posts.

I have an extensive and information-filled website that was designed specifically to keep people there…so they will purchase products and services. How does that intention get met and merge with social marketing? In other words, does your social marketing site \compete\” with a website? or how would it compliment the website.”

You can use social marketing to hell promote and market your content. Your site is only good if people get to it. So, use social media to help people get to it. This doesn’t mean spamming people with products, this means providing people with information about your products/services/industry that will make them want to visit the site.

I just finished my first book, should I set up a web site or look for a publisher?

BOTH!

How do you use social media to sell books without annoying your list?

You don’t spam your list. If you have a list of people you talk to you can tell them about your new social media sites but don’t send them cheezy marketing messages. Social media was never designed to sell anything, it was designed to connect people.

That’s it for part 2. I will get to more of the questions soon. Have anything you want to add?

check out part 1 of social media for authors

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