Social media is an overwhelming and chaotic space, especially for shy writers. However, by using social media effectively, it could lead to getting a publishing contract, or at least building an audience that will make a publisher’s mouth water.
That’s what Ally and Darrell Vesterfelt found anyway.
Listen to the interview (37:53)
[audio:https://s3.amazonaws.com/scc_files/Darrell+%26+Ally+Vesterfelt.mp3]About the Interview
Darrell and Ally Vesterfelt own Prodigal Magazine, an online magazine of vulnerable stories. When Ally was finishing her first book, Darrell pretended to be an agent to help her book get bought by a publisher. In this interview, we talk about:
- The power of travel to inspire your writing
- How to use social media to build your Cartel
- The Do’s and Don’t’s for Using Social Media
- How to connect with influencers over the Internet, even if you’re a shy writer
Enjoy the interview!
If you find Twitter confusing and overwhelming, we’ve developed a great 2-week course just for you called the Twitter Challenge Pack (and as a member of this Cartel, you get it free!). It makes Twitter simple enough so you can focus on your writing without wasting all your time building your platform. I recommend taking the Twitter Challenge Pack in Unit 6, but if you’d like to start now, click here to sign up.
Move on to the next lesson.
Hmmm… this is a great interview but it doesn’t leave me any wiser about Twitter. I’m having a whole lot of trouble just using twitter… dinosaur me!
Haha. I was just thinking the same thing. Twitter is still pretty confusing for me, too.
Like the man said, its a cocktail party… http://www.adventuroo.com/2010/08/making-sense-of-twitter-its-the-never-ending-cocktail-party/
Bernard, what is your Twitter address?
Kate – I’m not currently tweeting, as I’m not sure who I would be tweeting to! But I have bagged @AlexBrantham …
Well you now have a follower….that would be me. Its good once you get going. You need to search for writers, and then take it from there. Follow me back and then you can see if you like anyone that I am following!
I actually use my Twitter almost entirely for my writing. I have mostly authors, book promoters, and such as followers. I don’t tweet alot right now but will once my book closer to being finished. I have actually ended up reading several books from authors because of their tweets, so I look forward to hopefully others doing that for me. I can see why Twitter is a good source for building your Cartel, it has helped me.
It’s kind of exhausting following writers on twitter. i found some I really like, and I’ve ordered some books that they have written, so i guess that works. I am re-tweeting, helping to promote peoples work, etc, but it takes a lot of time. Anyway, i shall persevere…
OK, I signed up for twitter, but I still have no clue what to do with it, although I think I understood what not to do with it. BTW, does that mean that we shouldn’t be posting links to our own blog posts on the google+ page?
Twitter: another source of useless junk mail. What is the junk to $ ratio?
I signed up for it, but I have no idea how to use it. So for now, 0 dollars…
I love Twitter. I really think that this interview will help me use it more wisely in my writing pursuit.
I have such a love-hate relationship with Twitter. I’ve heard it said the quality of your experience is all in who you follow. Right now, my feed is full of people auto-tweeting book promotions with no real interaction in between. Personally, I try to keep a balance of the two, but I don’t spend much time on there unless I’m involved in an active conversation.
I agree – I have seen LinkedIn work and create connections on a more professional level.
I have an account on Twitter, but like most of the comments I’ve read, I still know very little about it. I seem to get more response and help on other links of mine. I especially like linkedin, I guess because my presence soared so quickly on that link. I am getting a trickle of Twitterers weekly but have not really done very much with it.
I have learned one thing in all of this and that is that you can become so involved in your relationships on social media that you spend almost all your time responding and not actually much time on writing a book.
What lovely people. Great interview, Joe. I really like how down to earth and open you are, even taking the lead on admitting mistakes (we all make them). That allows everyone to take a breath; “Okay, we get to be real here”, is the feeling I got.
Great job!
Loved this! Their story is so inspiring! I need to do more traveling.
I just wanted to comment that I am not a fan of Facebook or Twitter. I have done a small amount of research and the overall impression I am getting is that neither one equates to book sales or really sales in many industries for that matter ( I am in I.T.). My question is can someone please give me a counter argument to discredit those numbers. Perhaps there is something I am missing. I realize perhaps this is a bigger picture discussion (book sales are not what happens here – it’s connection building and finding Influencers). I just don’t wish to waster time to deal with Social Media that may or may not bear fruit.
DISCLAIMER- Currently I do not have a Facebook or Twitter account. The only people that I know the businesses that I do work with tend to have both and yet do not place much credence in them. The analytics don’t seem to support the information that I am getting either. Author’s websites, things like Goggle Ads, Blog Posts and Promotional Campaigns (BookBub etc.), Podcasts, etc. seem to exhibit numbers that support their worth.
Oops – I think I might have gotten a bit ahead of myself on my comments here. I didn’t see the Twitter Challenge Pack offered here. I signed up to check it out – so in fairness to all the Twitter defenders out there – I will go through this and try to see for myself.
Honestly – If it can work than I am all for it and will be a big supporter of what it can offer.
Fair points, James. Social media can definitely be overhyped, especially in the context of direct sales. If you use it well though, it can be a really amazing part of your funnel. It’s not going to convert all on it’s own, but your fans who are ALSO followers on social media are much more likely to buy your books than fans who aren’t followers. Increased engagement leads to sales.
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