‘ If you don’t like something, change it. If you can’t change it, change your attitude.” Maya Angelou
Ever since its introduction, Facebook has dominated the social media platform and still continues to attract individuals from all around the world. Over the years, the platform has been transforming gradually even as it continues to attract a huge fun base. Today, besides being used as a social site for connecting with your long lost connections, people have realized the economic values of the social platform and are now maximizing the unlimited opportunities that Facebook has presented them with.
With the right content and a huge following, writers can take advantage of the billion users to market the craft
With the many opportunities presented, writers also stand to benefit. With the right content and a huge following, writers can take advantage of the billion users to market the craft. Advertising on Facebook is free and when you combine this with the over one billion users, you can understand why Facebook forms a perfect hub for writers. Whether you want to promote yourself as a writer or your craft, Facebook has all the answers for all your marketing needs.
Facebook provides you with the option of creating either a personal profile or a Facebook fun page. Personal profiles can be used to help connect with friends and families while a fan page is ideal for writers who want to take their craft into a whole new level. Say for example you run a blog; you can use your Facebook fan page to promote your blog. On the other hand, if you are an author, you can use this page to promote your books, build a community and perhaps increase brand awareness.
EssayDot has researched how, as a writer, Facebook can help you promote yourself and your brand in the following ways:
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Ensure you have regular updates on your page
Regular and relevant updates on your brand page will ensure that your followers remain engaged all the times hence the reason why they’ll always want to come back for more. Your active involvement will trickle down to your followers triggering them to want to return the favour by participating more. With such an active following, increasing your followers becomes a walk in the park.
One thing you need to note is that you do not have to make all your updates promotional in nature. This does not reflect well with your followers. Try to create a balance between interaction and promotion. As a matter of fact, there is a rule of the thumb which states that 80% of your content should be more of interactive in nature while the other 20% can be promotional.
To increase your success rate, you may also want to consider merging your brand page with your personal profile. After changing a few settings on your privacy settings, you should not have any problems when it comes to merging your pages. Remember that Facebook does not allow individuals to use their personal profiles to promote their work.
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Ask for reviews
Maximizing the many different opportunities presented by Facebook should always be your priority as a writer. Therefore, if you have an opportunity to ask your followers for reviews on a book you wrote, grab it with two hands. Consider setting up reviews and asking your fans to fill out reviews.
You do not have to demand a lot from the readers, just asking them to give you their ratings on your book or better yet leave some comments should be enough for you. If you are very active and you never disappoint your audience with your posts, chances are that they’ll respond by giving you positive feedback which is what you want displayed on your fan page.
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Do not be afraid to try out a small paid advertising campaign
The fact that an ad on Facebook does not really take a huge chunk of your budget should encourage you to try out. The best part about Facebook ads is that they can be very specific and highly targeted. You can create an ad that targets a specific age bracket or only target users who have already liked your page and see if the ad will bring you any returns on your investment.
Facebook also allows users to target an audience based on their geographical locations. This means that say for example you a planning a visit to one of the cities in your country, you can promote yourself and your brand on that city specifically by simply selecting that city as your target audience.
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Host contests
You’ll be doing yourself a lot of favour by opting to host Facebook promotions or contents on behalf of your fans. This is a wonderful marketing tactic writers can use to increase their fan base and their brands.
The biggest challenge with this tactic is that Facebook does not support the hosting of contests on their platform. This means that you’ll need to get creative. Perhaps consider using a third party app to create a contest which you can then redirect your users to the app and then back to your Facebook page. Most of these apps are free to use hence you can take advantage of the offers.
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Joining groups
This is yet another tactic writers can use to promote their work. By join a group of like-minded writers, you expose yourself to an avenue where you get to share ideas and build one another as writers. A group also will help to build your reputation because your followers can identify you with the group you are in and if it is made up of some of the best writers in the industry, you are most likely going to share in their reputation.
Facebook has opened us to a world of many possibilities and it is up to us to know how well to capitalize on the many opportunities. There are still individuals who are yet to benefit with what Facebook has to offer while there are others who are enjoying the fruits of their labour. It goes down to how well you can take advantage of the opportunities presented to you.
