Books on Social Media discussion

Hi,
I am Carmen, a mum entrepreneur, Social Media Expert, Blogger and Self-Published Author, living in Southampton, UK. My latest book Social Media Trends for 2017 was published on Amazon just before Christmas :)
Check-out my Social Media Blog http://carmenlascu.com and sign up to my intensive training http://training4socialmedia.com/ to useful social media tips.

Hi, I'm Tim Hughes, I'm the author of the best selling book, "Social Selling - Influencing Buyers and Changemakers" - My company helps other companies with Social, so board level understanding of social, social selling and employee advocacy programs and we also run corporates and people's social for them. http://www.digitalleadershipassociate... or you can catch me @timothy_hughes where I have some 170,000 plus followers.

Hi, I'm Stephanie Osborn, author of the ebook bestsellers Burnout and The Y Factor, and the award-winning Sherlock Holmes and the Mummy's Curse. Unfortunately recent years have not been as successful as I'd like from a sales standpoint, and I'd love some ideas on how to inspire my fan base on social media. They seem...apathetic. They want me to keep writing my books, so they can keep reading them, but they can't be bothered to even "like" my announcements of sales or new releases, let alone share them. And that's going to eventually drive any author into quitting writing to find something to pay bills. I could use advice.

Howdy, I'm Lynn Hallbrooks. I've been around Goodreads, Twitter, Google+, and LinkedIn for awhile now. I do my best to help out other authors with their works as I can. I'm looking into some other options and ways to market the books I've written but don't have loads of time to study all the books, tips, and tricks of the trade. I'm hoping that this group will help me find something that will fit into what I'm already doing without being time-consuming.

Lynn

Hello and welcome.
I would love to share some of my tips with you. First of all, I think Twitter and Facebook Groups work best to promote your books and engage with your readers.
You're right Stephanie Osborn It's hard to make them like or share / retweet. I had the same problem until I changed my strategy... My main advice is to provide value, offer useful content, without promoting your books constantly. If your followers love what you share on social media, they will become interested in your work.

Carmen wrote: "Hello and welcome.
I would love to share some of my tips with you. First of all, I think Twitter and Facebook Groups work best to promote your books and engage with your readers.
You're right [aut..."

You've never seen what I post on socmed, then. I'm a rocket scientist, with multiple degrees in four sciences. I am constantly being asked science questions, and have created groups specifically for that science, where I post things like the current level of solar activity, etc. They share those!

It's anything to do with my actual books -- even including the popular science ones -- that they can't be bothered with. Even in my "fan club" group, where the members have placed themselves in the group because they self-identify as my fans.

So...no. I do NOT "promote my books constantly," and I DO "provide value, offer useful content," and it STILL does not help.

Sorry.

FWIW, I am not the only author of my acquaintance currently having this sort of problem.

Hi Stephanie, I didn't want to upset you. When I said "don't promote your books constantly" I was referring to you as an author in general. I don't know your activity on social media, but I've seen many authors that only tweet about their books, nothing else... The recommended rule in social media is to share 80% content from others and just 20% your own.

You are doing great engaging with your readers. I know, it's hard to make them retweet but, on the positive side, they buy your books

I'm sorry. The situation is becoming frustrating in the extreme and I'm knee-jerking a bit. They are indeed buying, but not in sufficient quantity to keep me in business this way.

...Okay, I'm knee-jerking a lot...

In case any of you aren't aware, you could join KBoards - http://www.kboards.com/ - where there are sections which allow authors to ask questions about topics of mutual interest. Some are very supportive as they understand frustrations. There are authors with lots of experience and sell lots of books mixed in with those that are either in the middle or very new.

Hope this helps with your frustration level a bit, Stephanie.