What is a social media strategy and do I need one for my book or author brand?
The Cambridge dictionary defines ‘Strategy’ as a detailed plan for achieving success in situations such as war, politics, business, industry, or sport, or the skill of planning for such situations.
Fortunately, we’re not actually going into battle with a social media strategy but we do need to plan.
The phrase ‘social media strategy’ can sound complicated, technical and overwhelming. But it is simply knowing what you want to achieve by using social media and having a clear plan of how you are going to do that.
Do I really need one?
YES! If you are going to use social media to build your author profile and promote your books then I really believe you have to have a clear plan of what you want to achieve and what you intend to do on social media.
This is so you can reach your ultimate goal, and check up on your progress along the way, but also so you don’t lose hours and days of your time not being sure what to do and hoping for the best when you post.
Being very clear on what you are doing with reduce the overwhelm and save you time in the long run.
Where do I start?
The starting point is to think about your objectives, what do you actually want to achieve on social media?
Most of the authors I meet say that their objective is to sell more books and of course that is likely to be your ultimate aim, but on social media you want to think what you want to achieve there, in order to sell more books. e.g.
It night be to build an audience of engaged readers
It might be to form connections with people who would influence the success of your book
It might be to build your visibility in a book loving community
It might be to encourage sign up to your newsletter
Maybe you want to grow your accounts, so you are in a good position to do social media advertising
Once you know what it is you’re trying to achieve you can start focusing on the elements of your plan.
Things you need to get clear on:
Who is your target audience on social media?
Who are you trying to reach? Being very clear on your target audience will help you know where to focus and what content to share that will resonate with them.
Some questions to think through when trying to decide on your target audience are:
What demographics do they fall into?
What are they like?
What else are they interested in?
Why would they be interested in you and your book?
Where will I find them?
This last question is crucial when you are thinking about where to focus your efforts. There’s no point spending all your time posting on Twitter if your audience is on TikTok and Instagram.
Bear in mind when you’re thinking about your target audience on social media that your target might not be the end reader, this is especially true if you are writing books for children where your focus might be building connections with parents, carers and teachers.
Where am I going to focus?
Decide on the channels you are going to focus on. For this I recommend thinking about where your target audience is spending their time but also which channels would you feel comfortable and could come to enjoy being active on – if you enjoy it you’re more likely to keep going!
Think about how you like to communicate and how creative you want to be. Which channels are going to play to your strengths?
Also think about how much time you have available. Social media can fill as much time as you give it and being on all the channels can be more than a full time job. I always recommend starting with one or two channels and building up once you’ve mastered those, if you need to and have the time to devote to it.
What am I going to say?
This is a big topic and i will do a separate post on social media content.
Essentially you want to get clear on what are the topics you would like to talk about on your social media which will be of interest and value to your target audience and will help them connect with you more, so they have a reason to follow you.
Once you have your topic areas brainstorm the different posts that you might like to share. You’re aiming for a mix of content that will position you in the market, potentially help your audience or entertain them and that also promotes your book – don’t forget this one, sometimes we can be so busy trying to entertain or be helpful we forget to promote ourselves and you need to tell your audience about your book.
Plan
Once you know what you’re going to say, to whom and where you can start to plan out your activity. Planning your content is much more strategic than trying to work out each day what you want to post.
Think about a posting frequency that you can maintain. Consistency is key on social media, so you want to be consistent with how frequently you post. For example, I would advise against posting daily on Instagram for two weeks, then once a week, then nothing for a month, then daily again.
Quality content that resonates with your audience is more important than constant content so don’t try to post every day if you can’t generate that much content. Much better to post 3 or 4 times a week and make an impact than daily and it be something you can’t keep going with.
Measure and adapt
A key element of being strategic in your social media activity is paying attention to what is working, or not working, and adapting accordingly. Get familiar with the analytics area of your channel and try to see general trends in what’s working or not – you might find particular types of posts perform better than other, or that there’s a time of day that you’re posting that’s more effective than others. Once you have a sense of what’s working or not then you can focus more on what’s working and doing more of that!
And that’s your social media strategy! In short, it’s being clear on:
What you are trying to do
Where you are going to focus
Who your audience is
What your content strategy is
Planning it all out
Measuring and adapting!
I hope this helps, if you do start developing your social media strategy do come and say hello to me, you’ll find me here:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kelly_weekes/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KellyWeekesUK/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kelly-weekes/
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@kelly_weekes
And if you want some ongoing support and guidance tailored to you and your books then you might be interested in my marketing mentoring package where I take you through this whole process as well as giving you guidance and best practice on your chosen social media channels. You’ll find more information about that here: