Social media is one of the greatest overall tools in the self-publisher's toolbox. I've written about Twitter, Facebook, and Youtube this week and dug into how each of them can help self-publishing authors get the word out about their books.
Today I want to write about how they fit together, beginning with the idea of storytelling.
Chris Brogan, who is great at social media, wrote a post a few months ago saying that Social Media Isn't Dead, It's Just Boring. The subtitle is, "Isn’t it time we started telling bigger stories than this?" He goes on to talk about how businesses need to approach social media in a bigger way, not just as tools to use. And that's definitely the case when you approach social media as a self-publisher.
I think it's about the story, not the tool or the individual share.
Whatever social media networks you are using and active on, the idea is to have everything you do be part of the larger story about who you are and what you're doing. Telling a story with you as the hub is a great way to do that.
For example, I did a Kickstarter for a book I wrote. It gave me context to talk about writing, editing, publishing, and then getting the word out about my book. It was a journey over the course of a year that was not just about the book itself, but about my struggles and triumphs of writing and publishing that book. People were interested and had something to contextualize my sharing. I was moving along a path. What I put on Twitter and Facebook and Youtube all came back to the central storyline of my evolution as an author. They were connected.
An author is a natural storyteller, and social media is a great way to tell the story as it happens. My own story continued after publishing the book because I could talk about readings and new opportunities, or about the authors and others I met as a result of writing. And now I'm talking about my next book. The story continues.
Have you seen authors use social media as an integrated approach to telling their story in an interesting way?
Image Source: normalityrelief via flickr
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