One of the things that an author can do to help him stand out in the hectic literary world is to hop onto the social networking bandwagon. There are more people participating in social networks than ever and this is great news for authors who want to use the networks to make themselves more visible. In order to use social networks to build your platform, you must be willing to invest your time and energy to make it work. The key to making social networks work for you is to be authentic and generous. If you only use social media websites to push your books and give little back, you will lose followers much faster than you gain them. Social media marketing is not so different from traditional marketing and your success depends on how people will respond to your endeavors.

Facebook

This is definitely one of the most popular social networks and its creation changed people’s perception of social networking forever. It is now the most used social network and commands a substantial lead over the second-largest network. Facebook is quite flexible as a social network because you can simply tell friends what you are doing or thinking, upload photos and videos for them to see, make use of thousands of applications created for the site, and much more. For marketing purposes, Facebook is not something that warrants heavy use but it is an important tool to create a following if you are an author. The following are the things you should do on Facebook:

1. Network. One of the things that Facebook excels at is enabling you to find other people with the same interests as yourself. You can easily find fellow authors, readers, editors and other people who like writing and things that go with it.

2. Join groups related to your niche. If your novels are horror, you can easily find many groups that celebrate it and join one or more groups that you like. There are groups for virtually any subject and you can even create your own.

3. Create your group. If you are an author, you can create a group for your book or for the topics discussed in the book. The best group to create is one that has to do with your brand because it remains relevant even if you write other books. You should make sure that your group has content that offers genuine value to your audience.

Twitter

It is a micro-blogging platform which allows people to say what is on their minds in just 140 characters. You can follow people to stay updated with what they are talking about and other people can follow you. On this site, you should only follow people that offer you something important for your career/hobby as a writer. You should follow as many people as you can because you increase the chances of them following you back.

LinkedIn

It is the third social network in this roundup and it is aimed for professionals. You should use this site to connect with professionals in the literary world. Create a compelling profile and ask your contacts to recommend you. To add value to your network, you should answer questions and post other important pieces of information. You should also link to your blogs and websites.