Tag: social media

Mob Rule and Other Rules for Authors

anger-18658_640This post is going to have a bit of a split personality. Two entirely different subjects with the flimsiest connection. Consider yourself forewarned.

The inspiration for this is a blog post from Nora Roberts who many of you will recognize as one of the most successful and prolific romance authors in the world. Those who don’t know that name might still be familiar with her pen name of J.D. Robb, also extremely successful. For those who don’t want to read her full post, I’ll give a quick summary. (If you’d prefer you can go read the whole thing. Just remember to come back here afterwards.)

Another author, unnamed in Ms Robert’s post, noticed that Ms. Roberts had a book with the same title. So, she did what anyone with a hair trigger temper and a persecution complex would do. She posted on social media, accusing Ms. Roberts of stealing from her. By the time Nora heard about this, pointed out to the other author that her theory had some major holes, one of the biggest being that Nora’s book had been published first, and the other author posted her retraction, the damage was done. Continue reading “Mob Rule and Other Rules for Authors”

2016 Social Media Platform Cheat Sheets Part 2

social media cheat sheets social-1148035_960_720The need to keep your social media presence accurate and viewable is increasing every year. Optimizing your profile pictures and sharing the best quality layouts goes a long way to representing you and your brand.

This week, we continue our adventure through the maze of social media platform specs. In this installment, our 2016 Social Media Cheat Sheets focus on LinkedIn, YouTube, Pinterest and … new this year … Instagram. The Instagram cheat sheet was supplied by our friends at Buzzoid, so a big thanks goes to them for wanting to educate our readers!

Unfortunately, each social media platform is different … of course! We here at Indies Unlimited are trying to make life a little easier. If you missed my last post, you can find the cheat sheets for Facebook, Twitter and Google+ here.

So, without further ado … the 2016 updated Social Media Platform Cheat Sheets for image size and general rules.  Each downloadable cheat sheet (just right click and hit “save image as”) gives you an overview of the best image sizes for each social network. Continue reading “2016 Social Media Platform Cheat Sheets Part 2”

2016 Social Media Platform Cheat Sheets

social media cheat sheets social-1148035_960_720The need to keep your social media presence accurate and viewable is increasing every year. Optimizing your profile pictures and sharing the best quality layouts goes a long way to representing you and your brand.

Social media platforms are constantly evolving. It’s difficult to keep up with all the changes to profile pictures, timeline rules, and Tweet specs. A few weeks back, we received a request for updated cheat sheets for the major platforms. We haven’t compiled this information since 2013 and a lot has changed since then.

So, here you are … the 2016 updated Social Media Platform Cheat Sheets for image size and general rules. Today we are focusing on Facebook, Twitter, and Google+. Each downloadable cheat sheet (just right click and hit “save image as”) gives you an overview of the best image sizes for each social network. Continue reading “2016 Social Media Platform Cheat Sheets”

Writing on Our Walls – Our Facebook Walls, That Is

writing on the wall facebook graffiti-482367_640I’ve written about using your author’s Facebook page to build you platform several times before, here and here. Still, in almost every authors’ group I belong to, I hear the familiar refrains: “Facebook sucks.” “I’m not paying Facebook to show my posts to my own fans.” “Facebook stopped working when they changed their algorithms.” Those things may be true for many writers, but they are not true for me. After my mailing list, my Facebook page is my second most effective free platform builder.

In my previous articles, I shared a few of my strategies for building up your traffic and fans on your Facebook page before — post consistently, don’t post about your books constantly, put links that lead off Facebook in the comments of your posts instead of the body of your message. Here’s a new idea for you, though — write. You’re a writer, so write. Continue reading “Writing on Our Walls – Our Facebook Walls, That Is”