I would like to preface this by saying that I am in no way an expert at marketing or at using Twitter successfully. If you’d rather continue on playing Candy Crush … I mean continue “writing” I understand completely.
I started this year with 2,498 followers on the Musk owned platform. When I decided to write this marketing series, I looked at my Twitter profile to see what the number was. It was sitting at 2,407…a decrease of 91 people! Now granted, those people were most likely robot and/or spam accounts, but they were mine. I earned those fake follows. For some odd reason I felt an intense void in the pit of where my heart should’ve been. Then I felt angry. How dare they abandon me without so much as a Dear John letter.
However, I quickly found out the reason. I asked on Twitter “So after falling about 100 followers I have to wonder: is it because of my content or are all of my followers just bots????”
I really thought that the four question marks would’ve drawn people in.
After two days however, at the time of this writing, only 99 people have seen the tweet. That’s about 4% of my followers. In researching how to increase my Twitter following, I found a couple of websites that offered some good tips. I’ll make sure to mention them at the end. That way if you try them and they don’t help, then you can blame them and not me. Haha.
The first tip I found was to choose the right handle, profile photo, and header image. Apparently you want to have an easy-to-remember, short, and recognizable Twitter handle. Mines pretty simple: @JamesTheMaster (if you’d like to follow me). However, the tip goes onto add that the handle should be consistent across all social media platforms. Ugh.
- TikTok made things difficult, I had to go with James.The.Master
- Facebook I guess doesn’t have the handle for pages anymore? I couldn’t find it, but I think “James Master – Author” is pretty close.
- My Instagram handle was “jamesmasterauthor” but that’s not short or catchy and while “JamesTheMaster” wasn’t acceptable, James.The.Master was…so I guess I will be going to change my Twitter handle now.
- Twitter is being difficult because “James.The.Master” is one character TOO LONG. So I guess I won’t change it after all.
- And no, I don’t have a MySpace handle. Quit asking.
The tips continue as they address the profile picture. It says to use a professional headshot (I almost thought that was a Call of Duty reference but it’s not sadly). As much as I hate to see my weird profile picture of me dressed as a wizard (fake beard and wig included) I guess I should go the legit route…sad times.
So those were a few tips that are pretty generic, honestly. What about some tips that writers might be able to use?
There’s one big one tip that I actually have used that did get me to that 2,500 amount (you know, before the exodus occurred). I participated in several “writer lift-ups” where writers would follow everyone else on the original post. It was a great way to meet other writers on Twitter and connect.
In fact, that sort of leads me to my next tip. Be more involved with Twitter’s Writing Community. Just like in the real world, marketing involves a lot of networking. Try finding some online writing friends! And don’t just stuff your Tweets full of book covers and links to your newest website post. People want to connect with you, not just your book or website. Personally, that’s something that I’ve got to work on more.
Be yourself. When you’re posting, make sure to be authentic with your followers. Let your posts reflect who you are. Another great way to boost engagement with your followers is to ask questions. Having said that, you might want to avoid getting overly political or strong minded. Treat Twitter like you’re having Thanksgiving dinner at your significant others house for the first time.
That about does it for today. For the next week, I’m going to utilize these tips and see if I can’t gain more than 2,407 followers. I’ll report back to y’all next week. Until then, keep calm and write on!
Sources:
The Writer's Apocalypse 