Social media is a powerful and resourceful growth tool for writers in today’s digital economy.
Having an authentic social media presence separates you as a professional writer from an up-and-coming writer.
Your ability to use social media effectively and efficiently brings about your brand visibility, profitability, and connectivity.
Understanding the use of social media and how to pivot your writing career using the platform is essential to building a successful writing career.
It is an open secret that 80 percent of your results will come from 20 percent of your efforts. In a similar vein, 20 percent of your efforts on social media bring 80 percent of the results you aspire to as a writer.
Here are five strategic social media growth tips for writers:
Having A Content Plan
Sun Tzu, in The Art of War, said, “Plan for what is difficult while it is easy. Do what is great while it is small.”
As a burgeoning writer, you can’t afford to not have a content plan. You can’t go on to social media and start pushing out what doesn’t resonate with your author/ writing brand.
Otherwise, you would get your audience confused.
A content plan will guide you to curate your brand message as it’s meant for a specific audience. Your content plan will vary with the aspects of writing you wish to focus on.
As a part or full-time author alone, your content plan will differ from an author who’s also involved in the business of writing.
If you’re a writer testing the waters, your content plan will differ from a freelance writer who already has a specific niche, services to offer, and a target audience in mind.
Business of Writing, Storytelling, Social Media Strategy, Book Marketing, Content Marketing, Content Creation
Knowing the above, you must carefully research topics or create your ideas under these categories and craft content that suits your readers/audience’s needs or solves their problems.
A content calendar is a strategic schedule for your content. It helps you as a writer in checking what’s next content. It includes months, weeks, days, times, topics, tags, and social media channels.
Long-form content (1000+ word count) suits Facebook. LinkedIn and Instagram are more medium content channels.
Twitter is a short-form-content channel while YouTube thrives on any form of video content, long or short.
Take time out to draft your content plan. If you have a strategic content plan, it makes the audience feel relatable to the content and gives them a sense of your authenticity.
Having a content plan places you in the right position on social media.
Telling Stories
As a writer, if you are infusing storytelling into your content. You are on the right path!
If you are an author, storytelling is already your way of life.
Kieran Drew once said, “Storytelling is a superpower.” Using storytelling in content draws the emotions of the readers.
In his writing theory, Kieran Drew created what is called ‘Magnetic Writing’.
Magnetic writing consists:
- Storytelling
- Advice
- Personality
Kieran Drew believed that good content should have storytelling infused in them. And so, magnetic writing is incomplete without stories.
As a writer, there are niches you can carve, but the need for learning the art of storytelling and applying them to your content is important.
For content writers, here are eight practical steps to writing stories:
- Bullet Headline
- Introduction
- Hook
- Stories
- Development of characters
- Questions
- Answers
- Conclusion
You can source stories from your personal experience, trending stories, and stories around you.
If you have been telling stories in your content, continue to do so.
But if you are not, dare to put storytelling into practice while creating your content, because people love to hear stories.
Identifying Target Audience
80 percent of writers create content that is not directed at a specific audience. And again, most writers confuse the two; an audience and a targeted audience.
Audience — the random person consuming your content without yielding results.
Targeted Audience — the person whose needs you’ve identified and solved their problems through the consumption of your content.
You can now see the obvious difference between the two.
As a content writer, storyteller, or author, when crafting your content, put it at the front of your mind of having at least a goal.
This goal could be:
- Who is the content for?
- What are the person’s needs?
- What are the person’s problems?
- How can I proffer solutions to the person?
When you ask those questions and get them answered rightly. Then you have identified your audience. You have also tailored your content toward a specific audience.
Build on the audience. Turn them into followers. And gradually they would become your fans, readers, and clients, which establishes you as an authority in your niche.
Tracking Engagement Count
Good content is likely to have high engagement. And even if that doesn’t happen, there is nothing much to worry about.
However, as a writer, you need to monitor your engagement count.
The purpose of engagement count is these:
- To know how many engagements you had
- Know the metrics of your content
- To have feedback on the content.
Anytime you experience a low engagement count, it indicates the quality of your content is not low or you’re experiencing slack.
Create good content. Track your engagement count. It helps your growth on social media as a writer.
Engaging and Responding to Comments or Interactions
Engaging and interacting connect you with your audience.
Being a writer, you communicate through your content, and your audience gives feedback through their comments.
A writer’s rise is with him/her taking comments or interactions on content seriously. So engage, interact, and comment on your content. It grows your authenticity and influence as a writer, storyteller, or author.
Endnotes
If you are practicing any of the above on your social media platform, go back to the drawing board and re-strategize. To scale your results, you need to implement these growth steps to dominate on social media!
