small achievements

We all know about the power of social media and I've certainly experienced it with scoring gigs and networking. In the past year I've dedicated myself to developing my social media following and posting every day. At first I painstinkingly copied posts onto each platform, then got some great advice to get scheduling software. So I started using Postly to manage and schedule my posts. I posted on every single social media platform. I kid you not: YouTube, TikTok, my blog, Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter. I spent a few hours a week creating promo images and hooks, developing my style an figuring out how to market my books.

At first it felt like torture, as if I was walking around naked. Why does anyone care? my inner monologue tormented me. But I persisted. I started a monthly newsletter and every single month for the past year I have sent a newsletter out to my subscribers. I learnt to develop systems to post about my books with preprepared posts and hashtags, and folders to collect newsletter content throughout the month. As I continued this process it got easier, more natural.

I found I love creating graphics and reels and sharing them. I learnt to think about marketing as sharing my joy and my news, rather than trying to sell books and it's made it a pleasure. While social media followings do not necessarily correlate to book sales, I can definitely say that I have achieved sales from my efforts.

Over time I have narrowed my focus and I mostly post on Facebook and Instagram and focus on my newsletter by participating in promos and swaps via Bookfunnel, as well as organic signs ups through my books. So tonight I'm celebrating some milestones that I'm so proud of: 2000 Facebook followers on my author page, 1005 Instagram followers, and 1175 newsletter followers.

While these numbers might be measly to some, and great to others, I'm just happy that I've kept my promise to myself and that I am getting traction. There is always more to do, but sometimes you just have to stop and enjoy the moment.
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PS The image below is created using Canva AI and there is a certain irony that Twitter or X is featured considering I've stepped away from the platform as it's become so spammy