Setting Up a Cross Platform in Social Media

Social media isn’t just about Facebook. In fact, there are many social media networks, each catering to a specific group of people by age or special interest.  To be successful in social media as a writer, you have to post on several different platforms and then link them together in your own social media network. Doing so brings followers from one platform, like Facebook, to another.

The main social media platforms are Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Google+, YouTube. The last one is mostly for posting videos, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t use your smartphone to post a video of you in action once in a while.

So what exactly is a cross platform? To be successful in social media, you have to spread the word about yourself and your work to other networks. But it shouldn’t end there. Once you’ve begun regularly posting on the other networks, it’s time to link them together by sharing posts. Each time you share a post, another group of people see it. And so do their friends. If each person shares your post with just one other person and that person shares your post with one other person, your message will reach lots of people.

Facebook
So where do you begin? Once you’ve established yourself on Facebook—use it as your base of social media operations—you can venture forth to other social media networks. You might choose Twitter next. People on Twitter read their feeds almost as much as those on Facebook. Here, your posts will be shorter—even though Twitter recently increased the number of characters for each post from 140 to 280. Just because the network allows you to write longer posts doesn’t mean you should. Twitter readers are in the habit of reading short blasts, and they probably won’t change their habit for a while.

Twitter
Write a post on Twitter that’s related to the one you posted on Facebook. But don’t stop there. Be sure to add an image to your post. This can be hard if you’re posting about writing, but if you post about the subject you write about, it should be easier. You can also set it up so that you can automatically share your Facebook posts on Twitter. However, you cannot do the reverse.

Instagram
Now that you’re posting on the two primary networks, it’s time to check out some of the secondary ones. While users of Instagram will probably disagree, this network is a hard one to break into for writers because it definitely relies on image posts. In fact, you begin with an image and then add a caption to it. Also, you must have a smartphone to post on Instagram. While you can access Instagram on your computer, you cannot post from it.

Google+
Another secondary network is Google+. Its posts work much like Facebook, but its user base isn’t as large. In Google+ you can either post only text or text with an image. You used to be able to directly share your Google+ posts with Facebook, but now you have to physically post on Facebook, linking to your Google+ account. It’s a little more time consuming, but it works.  If you have images to share, you may want to set up a Google+ Collection. This is an image-based division of Google+ in which all your posts focus on one subject. Within it, you’ll find lots of photographers, antiques collectors, and such who post images related to their subject. Like Instagram, the image is the main thing, accompanied by perhaps a paragraph of text. You used to be able to share your Google+ posts directly to Facebook, but now you have to physically copy it and create a separate post on Facebook using the same text. Of course, you can still directly link to your Google+ account in your Facebook post.

Creating a Cross Platform
You should begin cross linking your posts as soon as you have one other social media network besides Facebook to which you’re posting. Try linking your Facebook posts to Twitter. Then slowly add another network, again linking the posts on it to Facebook and vice versa. As you add more networks, you can continue doing the same thing.

Let’s look at an example of how this works.  Let’s say you specialize in writing about antiques. You can do posts about the history of objects, their uses, historical anecdotes about them, their status with collectors, even the status of the current market. The list goes on and on. So you might begin by introducing the object on Facebook and mention how well it’s doing in the current market. Then you could do a post on Twitter that links back to your post on Facebook. If you’re on Instagram, you can post an image of the antique object and note a quirky anecdote about it in the caption. Finally, you could post an image of the object on Google+ and write a short paragraph about its history or how it originated. Naturally, you’ll want to repost a sentence on Twitter that includes a link to your Google+ post. You can then link your Twitter post to Facebook, putting you right back to your network base, but now with a different angle than your first post.

By building a cross platform, you’ll soon increase the number of your viewers across the board. But you must be patient. Social media doesn’t work overnight. It can take several months for your posts to get noticed. In the meantime, read, share, and comment on  other people’s posts in your social media accounts.

Learn more about me on my Web site, Writing at Its Best, and on my Facebook Page.

You’ve Got a Site—Now What?

Okay, so you’ve designed your writer’s Web site or had it done for you, now what? Many people think if they design and launch a Web site that visitors will come. Nothing could be farther from the truth. In fact, it usually takes at least three and sometimes six months for visitors to find your site. Why is that and what can you do about it?

The answer to the first question is simple. In order for people to find your site, they have to see it in search listings, but getting into search listings is no easy task. The extraordinarily long time it takes for your site to appear in search engine results is because it takes time for search engines robots to crawl your site. The next time you view your new site, imagine little things moving all over your pages. They’re recording keywords in the content and what the content is about. Then they send that information back to the mother ship, let’s say Google, so the search engine can create a listing that appears in visitors’ searches.

But once search engines have found your site, things will change and visitors will start going to it. However, by promoting your site through Email and social media, you can get visitors to go to it even before search engines list it. It’s imperative to promote your site from the very first minute it appears online. And don’t stop—ever.

In this era of social media, it’s important to let readers know where else you’re active online. After you get your Web site up and running, be sure to create a professional Facebook Page. This isn’t the personal page that most people use, but one that shows you as a writing professional. It’s the type of page people “like.” You’ll have to work to get people to like your new Facebook Page, and this could take some time. But once you’ve created your Facebook Page, you’ll be able to download the code for widgets to put on your site, so that visitors can go to it.

Unlike your Web site, your Facebook Page is more to show fans what’s happening currently in your professional career. Don’t, as so many book authors do, create a Facebook Page for your book. Rather create a page for your writing business on which you can showcase your writing, no matter what kind you do.

If you have notable media coverage, good reviews, positive testimonials, or a significant following on a social media site, such as Instagram or Twitter, tell your site visitors about it. In fact, you may want to create a media page on which you post press releases and links to articles and reviews about you and your work. Doing so will show visitors that spending time on your site is worth it.

Give your visitors a reason to come back. Just telling them you’re a writer isn’t enough. Just promoting your book isn’t enough. You must offer them something. Don’t just post articles or stories you’ve written. Instead, choose them for subject matter that may be interesting to your readers, so they’re then actively reading your work. Inform and entertain them.

If visitors reach the bottom of a page on your site, that means they’re very engaged and will likely go to other pages on your site. Use this as an opportunity to add a call to action, such as an email newsletter sign-up or the sale of your book. If you don’t engage them first, you won’t sell anything.

To maximize the effectiveness of your website, install a site analytics tool. Google Analytics is a free and popular tool available to anyone with a Google account. Once you install it, you can  immediately collect data on your Web site traffic and visitors. It will also tell you which pages of your site are the most popular. This will help you plan for future additions to your site. And most importantly, your site statistics will tell you how people get to and use your site.

About 20–30 percent of your site traffic will come from mobile or tablet devices. Is your site optimized for those visits? While it’s important to keep cell phone users in mind, don’t design your site specifically for them, or for that matter, for any particular Web browser. Design your site for the majority of users. Owners of too many sites today are redesigning their sites just for cell phone use which takes away from how they look on a wide computer screen.

Remember, you don’t have to launch and perfect everything on your site at once. In fact, doing so is against the grain of the digital era. Start small but smart, and build your skills and presence over time. Customize and add more complex functionality as you get more comfortable with the technology, and as you develop specific skills and career goals that require the investment.

Time is of the Essence

One thing you have on your side as a freelance writer is time. It can work for you or against you. Essentially, it’s all about how you play your cards—what you do with your time.  Play them right and you win. Play them wrong and you lose. But there’s always that constant of time.

You have plenty of time available. But does it seems to fly by more quickly than you’d like? That may be because you probably squander your precious working time. Realistically, you can’t write for hours and hours. The quality of your work will suffer, and your body will rebel.   

During an average workday, a writer’s work load consists of various important as well as less important items. Much of your time involves sending and receiving information. During the long hours you work, you’ll be doing a lot of fragmented things. Does this sound like your typical work day?

You need to be realistic when it comes to using your time wisely. Don’t take on too much, or you’ll set yourself up to fail. Only you know how much you’re capable of handling. Overestimating the number of projects you can handle at any one time will surely lead to disappointment. And if you keep that up, it will be more difficult to become more productive.

One of today’s biggest problems for writers is Email and varied other electronic distractions. If you receive lots of mail, you may find yourself taking care of it instead of your writing. It’s easy to procrastinate. And then there’s Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, to name a few of the social media distractions facing all of us daily. They’re addictive. And as with your Email, you may find yourself spending more time on them than on your writing. Set aside down time to take care of these tasks.

You may want to check your mail the first thing in the morning, then at a couple of specific other times during the day. But limit the time you spend with it. Before you know it, you could easily spend most of your morning doing basically insignificant tasks. And turn off any message or sound telling you that you have mail. That will surely draw you away from your work.

Avoid other distractions, too. Let your voice mail or answering machine take messages for you. You can call whoever called you back later. And don’t forget to turn off your cell phone. If you’re constantly checking your cell, you won’t get any work done, either.

You may also want to keep a piece of scrap paper handy on which to jot down thoughts about other projects that may pop into your head as you’re working. If you don’t, you won’t remember them later. And if you stop to pay attention to them while you’re in the midst of writing, you may find that they’ll knock you off your writing track.

Make writing a priority. But it’s also important not to write for long periods at a stretch. Take breaks every so often. Get up and walk around. Go for a walk, Do laundry. But don’t take your break at your computer. Surfing online isn’t really taking a break, and you’re body needs to get up and move around.

Schedule other duties around your writing. Write when you feel mentally sharp. That can vary from person to person. You may feel sharper earlier in the morning, so get up earlier to write. Or you may feel sharper later in the afternoon. Figure out when your mental peak occurs and work with it. Do menial tasks like cleaning or taking out the trash during your mental down time.

To help you get the most out of your time, create a daily or weekly To-Do List. (See my post “Smart To-Do Lists Get Things Done” from Sept.6, 2013). Use the A-B-C priority system. Once you have made your To Do List, place an “A” next to items of top importance, a “B” next to those less important but that still need to be done, and a “C” next to those with the least importance.  You may find that the ones with a “C” next to them may complete themselves automatically or may not need doing at all.

Schedule five minutes of review time into your day. Look at what happened yesterday, what will happen today, and what you need to do tomorrow. The more you plan out your day, the more you’ll accomplish.

If time is getting between you and your writing, start doing something about it before it’s too late.