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| Author Carmen DeSousa |
It wasn’t just the terrific stories
written by Carmen Desousa that intrigued me. Carmen has valuable information on
publishing, marketing, and promotion that she actually shares with other authors!
For instance, I didn’t see the value of sharing more than an occasional post on Twitter. I mean,
does anyone really read all those tweets? Carmen shared her experiences with Twitter and really opened my eyes.
Did you know that studies show a person should tweet 4 to 6 times an hour to keep a feed active and of interest to followers?
First, here are some basics:
- Be careful about what you tweet. Some things might come back to haunt you.
- Be picky about what you retweet. (For this reason Carmen doesn’t use the auto-follower.)
Don’t share old news, only choose tweets that are interesting.- Use the 'pinning' feature on Twitter which allows a tweet to be pinned right at the top of your Twitter feed.
- Always follow back someone who tweets that they just downloaded your book. Word of mouth is still the best form of advertisement.
Here are the most important points Carmen made about Twitter
Before following someone who follows her, Carmen reads their profile and a sampling of their tweets. (She has read every single profile for the last five years of people who followed her!) If she follows them back, and they retweet her somewhere down the line, they are eventually added to a ‘special’ list of names of those that she will retweet (but only if the tweets are interesting.)
Before following someone who follows her, Carmen reads their profile and a sampling of their tweets. (She has read every single profile for the last five years of people who followed her!) If she follows them back, and they retweet her somewhere down the line, they are eventually added to a ‘special’ list of names of those that she will retweet (but only if the tweets are interesting.)
Why go through a detailed process like that on Twitter? The answer is also why we need to connect ourselves with authors in similar genres. It's all about marketing and promotion--branding our name!Carmen explained it through this terrific story about retweeting:
Carmen met an author on
Twitter a few years ago. "Deb" (fake name) wrote what she did, romantic suspense. Carmen
started following Deb and retweeted her books. Deb did the same for Carmen. Then Carmen noticed beneath her list of books
on Amazon that Deb's books appeared in the ‘readers who
bought this, also bought this’ section. The same thing happened for Deb about Carmen's books on her page.
Essentially they swapped readers. Each of their fans recognized that they wrote similar
books. Deb just happened to be a NYT and USA Today bestselling author. Carmen felt lucky to share Deb's fans, which increased her own sales.
Find out specific details on what led to marketing success for Carmen using other websites and social media when you visit Carmen's website and read her articles.
Find out specific details on what led to marketing success for Carmen using other websites and social media when you visit Carmen's website and read her articles.
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| Order all of Carmen's books at Amazon.com |
Articles worth reading by Carmen DeSousa:
Great post with valuable information! thanks for sharing!
ReplyDeleteRegards, S.J. Francis.
Wow, Carole! I guess I didn't expect to see this posted so quickly after our conversation yesterday. Yep, I said all that, but you made it look much more informative than I remembered. LOL!
ReplyDeleteI'm so glad you took something away from our emails. And funny story...Twitter is how I found this article. I love knowing who comments about my books, so I use a service called Talkwater. Even though you didn't post my Twitter handle to the post heading, because you used my name, Talkwater notified me.
I love finding new friends when sites mention my quotes or books. Just another way Twitter connects me with my readers. I truly believe when we have a personal relationship with our readers, they are that much more likely to share what they liked about our books...and I learn what readers want, so I can write what they want to read. So yes, I love social media!
Thank you for sharing!
I admit it: I sometimes, okay, I frequently tweet, connect, follow, whatever on twitter, FB etc. I'm proactive about getting my name out there. I write, therefore I am. I try to tweet at least twice a week, sometimes I tweet everyday. What do I tweet? Everything and anything that others may enjoy, laugh or learn from. I RT others. I favorite others. I encourage and help others. I think Carmen hit it on the head with tweeting 4 to 6 times and hour, though how many can seriously do that? Tweet as often as you can and see what happens. I try not to tweet about me. I'd rather tweet about others. I also check profiles of those that follow before I follow back. People can tell a lot by our associates.
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing. Regards, again, S.J. Francis
"People can tell a lot by our associates" I agree, S.J.
DeletePeople often ask: "How did you get your followers?"
Me: "One follow at a time."
I read EVERY single profile and look at a few tweets before I follow back. I've never used an auto-follower system, as I do want to know whom I'm interacting with. Plus, those other numbers are fake and don't add up to a hill of beans when it comes time to get the word out.
As for content, again, I agree. I send out maybe one or two tweets about my books all day. The rest of the info is my writing posts and other authors. Of course, I do retweet my friends when they share something of mine, only because it seems like the right thing to do...to show them I appreciate them sharing. Again, though, I limit this to about once an hour. My way of thanking my friends is to retweet their tweets, tweets that I find interesting and that I believe my 11k followers will enjoy. As much as I'd love to thank everyone, I don't. Simply because then I'd have a stream filled with hundreds of 'thank you' tweets, and let's face it, only one person appreciates that. Which brings me to #FF, Follow Friday. This is where once a week, I can sing praises of great peeps who hang out with me, and I hope get them more friends. It's like TGIF meet and great.
Cheers!