Viviana Enchantress of Books: marketing

To start with, lets NOT FREAK OUT!!

Before we start yelling Bloody Murder or complaining that YET AGAIN Facebook is "THE BIG BAD" lets see what is going on here. Yes, there is a 'new' update to Facebook Pages that will be occurring within starting soon if not already. The new updates will affect the number of LIKES that pages have. How will the LIKES be affected? Are they REMOVING LIKES NOW? You mean, besides them limiting who sees our posts, they are now removing LIKES?!?!?!?! Uhm... CHILL OUT!

Let's start with correctly defining the differences between a FB PAGE and FB Profile. Why do I need to define the difference, you ask? Unfortunately, many use the term as one in the same or refer to their Profile as their page because its their AUTHOR/professional account. Here's the MAIN difference. PAGES have LIKES and Profiles have Friends. PAGES have UNLIMITED numbers of people that can follow (and by follow I mean LIKE your PAGE) while Profiles have a limit of 5,000 Friends. Once you reach your limit of 5,000 you can no longer add friends. PAGES should be used for Blogs, Business, Authors, etc and Profiles is the account you use in order to create the PAGE, its a user account. You can still use it from a networking perspective but know that it will have its limitations. I have both a PAGE and my Profile. I post all about Books, Blogging, Promoting, Marketing, Sales, etc., on my PAGE! Things like what movie I'm looking forward to or my "Owners of a Kentucky haunted hospital plan to make it a haunted hotel" article or pictures of my doggies on my Profile. My PAGE is also about ME so I do post some of those things there but I don't bombard my friends and family with Books and Marketing stuff. Do I have bloggers and authors "friending" me? YUP! Do they interact with me? Some but most don't. I will accept them as friends because I have become friends with SOME awesome bloggers and authors that started with a simple friend request.

The differences are big and important because having that separation between "business" and "personal" is important and when things like gaining new possible readers is part of your branding and marketing strategy, having a rafflecopter giveaway that includes LIKE A PAGE and then sends the possible new reader to a Profile... well, you could potentially loss HUNDREDS if not THOUSANDS of NEW READERS!!! YIKES!

Back to the new FB Updates!

Now that you know the differences between a Profile and PAGES and that no longer are freaking out, here is what's going on with the drops in LIKES. All Facebook is doing is removing LIKES from DEACTIVATED accounts! Basically, if an account is inactive, meaning, an account user has liked your page but since then has cancelled/closed their account (is now deactivated), Facebook will remove that account from your "LIKE" count. The truth is, the removal of non-active accounts will give you an accurate number of how many people are actively engaged and interacting with you!

Woohoo NO MORE INFLATED NUMBERS!!

From a business perspective, this is fantastic!

We want to see accurate and true numbers!! Before you start with "Oh readers are not seeing my post" blah blah blah... I'm sorry! I get that many may not see your post, but the truth is that if a reader/follower of YOUR PAGE really wanted to know what you're posting, they are going to FIND YOU! They are going to add you to the "Interest List" and they will TYPE OUT YOUR PAGE'S NAME on that lovely search bar and CLICK on your name to see what is up with you! So this bitching and complaining about "oh, FB is limiting my views", just stop! Post unique content! Interact with people and accept that that there will be some days when people will drop by and say hi and others when they will not and its going to be okay. You will survive! But what's most important is why are you doing what you're doing? To be popular or to share your love of books and share your passion for this industry? Does it matter whether you have 10 LIKES, 100 LIKES or 1,000 LIKES? Quality not Quantity!!!

Many bloggers and authors will have giveaways to gain LIKES and that's fine, but then what? How many of those "LIKES" truly stay engaged because they want to? How many actually follow your blog or read your books? Do they write reviews and leave them on Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, etc.? Do they interact with other readers/followers on the page? Do they BUY your books? Do they SHARE your posts when you're posting something funny or about your latest upcoming release, basically something other than a giveaway entry that will get them something for free?

If the answer to all or most of these questions are no, then what's the point of having 10K+ LIKES?

I rather have what I have and have it be a small community of TRUE followers/LIKES that interact with me and instead of MILLIONS of sheep that only want to like my PAGE because of my next giveaway. That is just me, though. YOU do YOU! Do I periodically have giveaways that will have a "share" or "Like"? Sure! I want to make sure that the winner is a member of my PAGE. Do I include entries to LIKE my page or follow my other social media platforms when I organize an event? Yes, this provides me with a larger audience and visibility to help promote the authors I support and love! BUT I know many will like my PAGE (and follow my other sites) and NEVER visit me again! Does it SUCK? YES! But that's why I'm okay with Facebook getting rid of the deactivated accounts! I'd be happy if Twitter and the other social media platforms did something similar!

Don't fret, the GOOD NEWS is that if the deactivated account that was removed from your LIKE count becomes active again, the LIKE will be re-added to your page count.

See Facebook isn't a complete monster!

For more information, please visit the "Facebook for Business" link.

Tell us what you think! Should Facebook be messing with the PAGE LIKE Count? Are you concerned with loosing LIKES on your FB PAGE?

There is a new social media platform on the block called tsū. Around the second and third week of December both authors and bloggers swarmed and joined this new site that mirrors Facebook in many (okay in like 99.9%) ways. I had known about tsū for a little while before the masses jumped and joined and created an account but was not using it actively. Why get an account if you're not going to use it? To save your user name! Remember, BRANDING is major in marketing and you want to be able to use your name (author's or blog's) and have it be consistent with the other social media outlets/platforms you're on. Nothing worse than typing out your name and get the "That name is already in use"!

So what's the big deal about tsū? Honestly, the biggest draw right now is that it's not Facebook. Towards the end of 2014, EVERYONE was talking at one point or another about the newest "updates" FB pages were going to go through in 2015 and how it was a negative impact to authors, bloggers, reviewers and pages who supported authors by sharing information such as sales. This of course is second to the already hated "limited view" posts get. Enter tsū!

As I said before, it mirrors FB and this includes how it started. Currently you are only able to create a profile and either friend or follow other people. If you're friends, you don't need to follow and vice versa. You don't want to do both as each has a limit on how many you can friend/follow. There is nothing similar to groups or pages, but I'm sure this is something that is being worked on.

Oh before I forget... this social media platforms differs from FB and all the others out there in that you potentially can earn money for the things you post about and having people share. You read correctly. You can get paid for doing what you're already doing. Now, hold on a minute, before you start thinking diamonds or if you're anything like me, book cases and new reading material, know that the royalties you earn are $0.01 - yup 1 CENT per post shared. THIS is the one main "negative" thing I've read about in all the research I did on tsū. Its been called a pyramid scam to a bunch of other scam. Though this isn't the first or only social media platform that pays people that post. They are just not as well known as FB or Twitter and now, tsū. However, with this being said, the majority of the authors and bloggers who flocked to tsū were not doing it for this reason. They want readers/followers/friends to see what they post and use the platform to expand their brand and product (i.e. their books/blogs). I know I joined, not for the potential $$$, but to stay connected and to try a new avenue for social media. Its part of my gig to stay on top of the latest and greatest. Since joining I've "earned" $0.60. It can stay in the bank. :) So if you're planning on joining to make lots of $$, go for it and best of luck! If you're joining to try a new social media platform and hope to network and meet new people, go for it and best of luck!!

Now you know the basics. Want to join me? Here's an invitation!

Don't worry about having to learn yet another new platform or having to figure things out. Remember, you know FB so you know tsū. Additionally, Parajunkee did a fantastic Tips & Tricks for Tsū that you should check out. She did a fantastic job of breaking things down and providing details about the platform.

One thing I want to point out that is an awesome feature that tsū has that none of the other social media outlets have is the ability to edit images!! THIS is one of the reasons I'm using tsū! I can edit images directly on tsū vs. having to do it ahead of time using a program/software. Granted, the editing is limited to affects and basic editing options (cropping, sharpness, red eye, etc.), but this is more than enough for personalizing/customizing an image :) What do you think of my example below?

Why is being able to edit images such a big deal? Images are powerful on social media! Creating unique images for your posts allow your posts to stand out! Images grab your attention! This is important to know as its a major part of marketing your brand! With that said, I have to caution you - presentation matters!! There is such a thing as "too much" or not a "good graphic". This includes fuzzy, pixelated and out-of-focused images or fonts that were to not easy to read because of style or font size. Additionally, the color contrasts as well. Keep in mind that tsū is available as a mobile app when creating those teasers - font size and style matter!! There will other posts regarding images and how to properly create one for marketing purposes.

Okay, now you have some information regarding tsū and I'm sure that you like the idea of having another venue to spread the word about your books or your blog, should you jump ship and leave Facebook? Oh HECK NO! Facebook is still the #1 social media platform out there and has the largest audiences. Continue to utilize FB as you have so far and start GROWING your audience on tsū. Include your tsū account on your website and share on your social media outlets. You can cross-post your tsū to Twitter and/or FB. By cross-posting on all three social media platforms, you reduce the work load on yourself. This is another perk of tsū!

Hashtags work the same way on tsū as they do on FB and Twitter. Hashtags are a great way to search for specific things like #freebooks or a #giveaway. When you use hashtags in your posts, it becomes more visible to others not only on the social media you're posting on, but on search engines (i.e. Google, Bing, Safari, etc.) as well. There's been a lot of inquiries and confussions on how to correctly use a hashtag for marketing and on social media and we'll be diving into that topic later on!

This is a new platform, have fun! Create unique posts by sharing information about your books and/or blog. Remember, sharing is caring! Teaser images are a great way to promote your books and gain new audiences as well. Also, interacting with your followers is a MUST!!! This is with any social media platform. Its why its called "social", you have to socialize! LOL. Oh and i must take a minute to say this one thing.... people want to interact with YOU! Lately, there's been a growing trend where the "assistant" of the author has been doing over 75% (I really want to say almost 90%, but lets give it the benefit of the doubt) of the posting of the page. The "assistant" identifies themselves with "*insert name" and that's fine to keep the page moving, but I got to be honest... it gets old FAST! Especially, if the "assistant" is posting similar things on other author's pages she's working with as well. Its extremely important to foster the relationships you have with your readers, but when your "assistant" is the one posting instead of you, its rather difficult. Keep this mind when! Your readers/fans/friends/bloggers/etc. are there to engage with YOU!

I mentioned cross-posting earlier and while that is an awesome feature, I also want to point out that each platform (i.e. FB, Twitter, Tumblr, Tsū, etc.) all work slightly different and you'll also want to pay individual attention to each. You'll have people following you on multiple sites... do you really think they want to see THE EXACT SAME THING on all? "But FB hides my posts!" Yeah, yeah... want some cheese with that whine? YES, FB may be hiding your post, but the truth and reality is that the readers/fans/bloggers/friends (how ever you want to categorize them) that TRULY REALLY WANT to know what's going on with you will search FOR YOU. They won't just be happy with what's on their feed! So do some exclusive "FB Only" and some "Tsū Only", you get the idea. Let the exclusive be anything from graphic teasers, cover reveals (Sneak Peak - meaning first thing in the morning and then you can share everywhere else in the late am/early afternoon), excerpts, snippets and of course giveaways! Give me a reason to follow you on your multiple sites!!

Now that you know more about tsū and how it works, I hope you'll join and we can be friends! I truly think this is a great opportunity for all and can be a alternative to FB. As with any website that is growing, tsū will certaining be adding features similar to Pages or Groups and websites like Google and Wordpress (and others) will begin creating apps/widgets/patches to be able to autopost on tsū as well. Until then, GROW your AUDIENCE!!! Focus on how tsū differes from the other social media platforms and ENGAGE!!!

Here is the invitation for tsū again. See you there! Great! Now that you know me over at tsū, how about you get to know some awesome authors and fabulous bloggers!!! Please letme know what you think of this post and if it helped. If you're a blogger, reviewer, author, and want to connect with others on tsū, leave your link in the comments! Don't forget to follow/friend those already listed below!