Monday Morning Marketing Tip – July 4, 2011

This week’s focus:

Every community needs a hub and a leader who keeps everything together. As an author, you should position yourself as the ringleader whom all of your readers revolve around. This doesn’t mean that you act like an arrogant dictator who bosses people. Instead, you act as the central point for online communication. You can create this dynamic by setting up an author website and specific pages on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, or YouTube. These sites serve as meeting points for your followers to receive updates, new content, post feedback, and converse with other members of the community.

You want the online activity to happen around you, rather than wait for someone else to setup and control the discussion about your books. If you wait, then you’ll be on the outside looking in on a conversation about your own work, which is awkward. That’s like waiting for someone else to throw you a birthday party. It may never happen, or it may not be your kind of fun. So, take the initiative to setup on your own online presence and maintain it as the leader. This means checking in at least every few days to post new information, address comments, and wield your status as an object of interest to keep people connected. Feed the discussion with open-ended questions, articles, latest news, quizzes, free resources, etc.