My Writer’s Platform

Hi All,

Yikes! The second half of the year is already upon us and before we know it a big guy wearing a red suit and sprouting bushy white facial hair will be throwing presents under a plastic pine tree.

There’s no time to sit back waiting for my dreams to happen so while I continue shopping my book I’m busy working on the second book in the trilogy and building my writer’s platform.

Most of you already know this is a big deal for me, however, you may not know why. The publishing industry has always been in a perpetual slump and it’s now the worst it’s ever been. This means publishers are continually looking for more ways to sell our books so it makes sense they would gravitate more towards authors who show a willingness to connect to their potential readers. Non fiction writers pretty much always needed a writer’s platform as they have to show they have a market for their specific topic, however, it’s now becoming more important than ever for fiction writers to start looking at ways to get the word out.

I initially kicked things off with my website, blog and Facebook page and I’m now looking at Twitter and linkedIn. I’ve turned to Google and YouTube to figure out how to make my Facebook page work for me and recently discovered I need to post more often. I’ve gone from one post per week to twice a day. They recommend four times per day but I don’t have that kind of time and I kinda worry I might become annoying. I also try to blog once per week.

Now I’m attempting to get a handle on this Twitter thing! I only recently found out it’s automatically connected to my Facebook and all posts go out as a tweet, including posts from my band and business pages. The problem is, I only have 8 itty bitty followers and no idea how to get more. If you know ‘anything’ about twitter, please chime in on the comments at the end of this blog…pleeease.

I recently found an awesome website ‘Your Writer Platform’ and am working my way through Kimberley Grabas’ (yes, that really is her name) article,  101 Quick Actions You Can Take Today to Build the Writer Platform of Your Dreams. Eww, 101? I’ll need more than one day but at least this is a start.

Thank you to everyone who’s taken the time to read my weekly blog, hit like on my fb page, shared my page with your friends and linked up with me on LinkedIn. If you haven’t managed some of the latter then please hit the link/s in this blog…you know what to do and you know you want to! And if you’re a twitterer, please follow me and/or help me understand how to rally more than 8 followers!

Have a great week all, take care, Viv