Every
now and then, I’ll come across a writer saying that they’re looking for an
agent. But instead of looking for
quality writing, the agent is more interested in how many followers the writer
has. Because how many people you can
spam with messages to buy your book is, apparently, an important factor in
modern publishing. I understand that it
is a publishing business and
businesses need to make money and they will try everything they can to get a
slight edge. I understand that, but it
sucks for people like me who aren’t much for engagement. I don’t have a panic attack if someone
comments on a tweet of mine, but I will spend several minutes overthinking if I
should reply and if I do, what should I reply.
Anyway,
for the last few years, I’ve tried to engage more on social media. Which is easier said than done. Especially for someone like me who only has so
much social energy and can’t just spend it willy-nilly. For example, a couple years ago, I noticed
that I sent out the majority of my tweets in the afternoon. While that probably worked fine to find
readers here in the eastern US, it was probably harder for potential readers in
the UK and Australia. So I started trying
to spread my tweets out throughout the day.
Has this helped? I don’t know. Mostly because what usually happens is I’ll
be sending out tweets about Book A, and someone will buy Book B, and I don’t
know how they found out about Book B.
And even if they do buy Book A, unless they actually send a message, I
have no idea if my tweets was what led them to it. So I’ve had little success in judging how my
tweeting strategy has led to book sales.
Earlier
this year, I started a little experiment where I can actually get some results
that may help me narrow down my strategy.
Each Monday I post a question, and I record how many comments, retweets,
etc. it gets. But each week I post it at
a different time. The hope is that a
pattern will emerge of when my tweets get the most attention: maybe they’ll do
really well in the mornings and I should refocus my tweets then.
Even
if you have tons of social energy and are constantly tweeting or Instagramming
or whatever, it may be beneficial to do your own social experiment to see when the
best time for you to post stuff is. If
you’re selling your books, then it is a business and you want the most bang for
your buck. And even if you just write as
a hobby, would you rather have two readers, or ten?
***
Image
from Pixabay.
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