Branding Step One

Happy Monday, good people of the blogosphere! This week I'm gonna talk about branding yourself. No matter what business you're in, it's a good idea to have a brand; something that says, "Hey, look here! It's me and there's no doubt about it!" Today's post is all about having an image. So, grab your pens and notebooks and let's get going.

If you've read my book The Indie Author's Guide to: Building a Great Book, you'll know branding is the first thing I discuss.

Why is branding so important? Ask McDonald's, Nike, or Coca~Cola. Those golden arches, the swoosh, and that pretty red color are instantly recognizable. No matter where you are, those are branding standards.

These companies have entire books on how their logo can be displayed, used, and colorized. If you take a peek inside the book, you'll see the requirements of size, space around the logo, and color options. Here are a couple you should look at: UPS, McDonald's, Twitter, and Facebook. You can look up any brand you may be curious about by typing the company name and the words brand standards into a Google search box.

You should also have a brand standard. Your logo or headshot, used as an identifier, should have some sort of requirement when shown to the world by others or yourself. It's helpful to have a standard when asking a designer to build something for you.

If you don't have a logo or something akin, you may want to contact a designer or photographer and see what can be done about it. A good designer won't just shove a logo at you. They'll give you an identity. Once you have one, use it everywhere.

Tomorrow, I'm going into color schemes and why companies try to keep it simple (and why you should, too!).

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

Social Networking Schedule - Day Fifteen WABC

Happy Friday, good people of the blogosphere! Today is the last day of the Winter Author Blog Challenge. I bet you've noticed the influx of discussion on social networking sites, eh? Over the last fourteen days, we've discussed Blogs, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, YouTube, Google+, Quora, FourSquare, GoodReads, Squidoo, StumbleUpon (amongst other social bookmarking websites), and Ning. It's been one hell of a couple of weeks! In the last few days, I saw people becoming overwhelmed by all the websites concerning social media. There were a couple I hadn't heard of, but I had a profile on most of them because I know social media works. Our prompt for today is:

What was your biggest takeaway from participating in the Winter Author Blog Challenge? What is your plan/strategy for integrating your social media platforms? What would you recommend to a new author who’s just getting started on social media?

First, I'll answer the questions. Then, I'm going to break down all this social media talk and give you some tools to help you manage your time when dealing with them so you don't have all the hours in your day sucked out by trying to be everywhere at once. Sound good? Okay, let's get going!

My biggest takeaway, as always with a blog challenge, is meeting new people and interacting on other blogs. It forces me to get out there and read and comment other blogger's posts.

I already had a social media strategy when I began, but I realized I'm not using it to its full advantage. From now on, I'll be following a much stricter schedule. One I'm going to share with you in a moment. If you're new to social media, I have one tip for you: Brand yourself across all your platforms. Whether with a logo, your face, or a cute picture of a bug, you need to have consistency. People who happen upon something belonging to you should know right away it's yours. A color scheme is a must, as is a consistent name. If you don't have an identity package, call a graphic artist today and get one. You won't regret it.

You should have a folder containing: Logo, icon, or headshot, preferred background design, html color scheme codes, and a bio. Label it Branding and never ever delete it.

If you don't have naming consistency across all your platforms, change them. This is KEY.

Now, on to the tools! We all know I love free. So everything I give you will have a free option. A couple of them allow you to pay if you want more functionality but it's not necessary.

First and foremost: Buffer and Hootsuite
I'm a huge fan of Buffer. I can go to a site, hit the buffer icon in Firefox, and schedule it to Tweet, post to Facebook, and pop a message on my LinkedIn wall with one click. It's awesome. Since I'm a free user, I get up to ten buffered posts. Best of all, I can control when they're posted. I can manage all three of those social networks for two to three days at a time by scheduling my posts to span.
Hootsuite is a little different an incorporates up to five social networks. I'm not sure if they have a Firefox plugin like Buffer, but here's a list of stuff they can help you manage:

• Twitter
• Facebook
• Google+
• LinkedIn
• FourSquare
• WordPress
• MySpace
• mixi

Now, you can also incorporate free apps into your Hootsuite. Just remember, you get up to five with the free plan, more will cost you money. Here's a list of their free apps:

• Tumblr
• Instagram
• Flickr
• Trendspottr
• Evernote
• MailChimp
• Constant Contact
• SocialBro
• StumbleUpon
• Reddit
• Storify
• Vimeo
• Scoop.it
• SlideShare
• Blogger

On a hunch, I did a search through the app store. Guess what? There's an app for that, too! Both Buffer and Hootsuite have an app you can download. If you haven't signed up with one of these management tools, please do so right now. It will help more than I can put into words.

Why is this important? Because it lets you manage all your social networking from one application. Imagine spending just one hour a day managing everything! Of course, visiting the app isn't really all you have to do. But it'll still only take an hour a day. Without further ado, here's a handy dandy schedule. If you follow it, you'll be on your way to social media ownership very soon!

Monday - 20-30 minutes for a blog post. You should have something integrated so your posts are automatically sent to your social networks when you click publish. I have the buffer button and all I have to do is click it after I post. 20 minutes to schedule posts across all media for the next two days. 10 minutes browsing Twitter and re-tweeting things you find interesting.

Tuesday - 20-30 minutes for a blog post. 10 minutes to answer a single question over on Quora. 10 minutes to share interesting things others post on Facebook. 10 minutes to visit and update your GoodReads page. Make sure you're clicking like on any reviews you've gotten.

Wednesday - 20-30 minutes for a blog post. 20 minutes to schedule posts across all media for the next two days and make sure it's all running smoothly. 10 minutes to record a video you'll use later.

Thursday - 10 minutes to upload video to YouTube. 20-30 minutes for a blog post incorporating said video. 15 minutes to create a Squidoo lens (can be about and incorporate your video as well!). 5 minutes to pin a couple of things over on Pinterest.

Friday - 20-30 minutes for a blog post. 30 minutes scheduling everything to update until Monday and coming up with blog post ideas for the next week and make sure everything is running smoothly.

Saturday - 20 minutes sharing on Facebook. 20 minutes re-tweeting on Twitter. 20 minutes to visit other blogs and pop in a comment or two.

Sunday - 30 minutes sharing on Facebook, 30 minutes re-tweeting on Twitter.

Now, lather, rinse, repeat. I added Saturday and Sunday because most people don't work on the weekends, but are on Facebook and Twitter just hanging out. Why not share a couple of things while you're at it? After all, social media is about being social, right? So many people shied away from FourSquare and Ning, I didn't include them.

Granted, it's going to take you an hour or so to get one of the above apps working in the first place. Once you do, you'll wonder how you ever got on without it. They're time savers! Use them! They're FREE!

Does this help you break it down? Does it all seem more manageable and do-able now?

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

My Social Network - Days Thirteen and Fourteen WABC

I've decided to compile today, good people of the blogosphere! There were two prompts from the Winter Author Blog Challenge that are quite close in nature, so I'm gonna discuss them both in one post. By the way, happy Thursday! Here they are:

What if you could create your very own Facebook? A social networking site that you run, based on your interests and whose members must abide by your vision, goals, and rules? Guess what, WABCers – you can do just that through Ning.com! I know – it’s crazy. Here we’ve spent the last 12 days talking about other social media platforms, and now your kooky leader is bringing up the idea of hosting your own network. There are drawbacks to be sure. T-I-M-E being chief among them. But if you have a special interest and haven’t found the perfect social site yet, Ning offers you the mechanism by which to create your very own social network. Ning has other benefits, though – chief among them being numerous sites on all sorts of topics that may attract your target readers. Are there any circumstances under which you could see yourself creating your own social network? Take a spin around the Ning Directory just to see what else is out there. Much like blogs, you’ll find half-abandoned Ning sites (ahem … I have one of those) and thriving sites. Are you inspired? Could you find time to visit one or two in your genre just to see if hanging out might be worthwhile? And by all means, if you already have a Ning site, share the link with us!

OK, some might compare today’s prompt to yesterday’s – but they are different. This one is a little more creative than necessarily practical. Your answer doesn’t even have to be physically plausible – the goal is just to have a little fun, now that you’ve worked so hard for nearly 2 straight weeks! Here’s the question: If you could create a social media platform that doesn’t exist yet, what would it look like? What would it do? How would you use it to promote your books as well as those of other authors you know/like?

First off, let me say I won't be joining Ning unless I can round up a ton of people to help split the cost. Plans starting at $25 generally turn into much more when you add bells and whistles. But I took a cruise around the site, and those with the cash flow have done some awesome things. So, let's jump onto the real question in both the prompts above: What would your social media platform do?

My rules would be simple:

• No spamming
• Keep it nice or get the hell out
• Love thy neighbor
• No reviews allowed
• Have a lot of fun

Functionality would include:

• A place to do a giveaway of your books - must be free and not require purchases
• Ease of upload for book covers and a place for a link
• Book lists
• A wall like Facebook's where things are streamed as they happen
• Easy to find author lists
• Easy to find reviewer lists and their genres
• One-click sharing across all social media
• One-click linkup of all social media accounts

Basically, like GoodReads and Facebook combined but only one 'group' allowed. It would be a place where authors could go and add themselves and readers could go to find great books without all the mumbo-jumbo of other sites. If you see something you like, share it. If you don't, leave it and move on to the next thing. Like a bookstore online where the authors are present and giving stuff away. How awesome would that be?

It's not a realistic site, but it sure would be fun.

Tomorrow, I'm going to be presenting a list. Call it a schedule, if you will. So everyone can use every social media platform we've discussed this week and it only take up an hour a day (this includes your blog!).

Let me tell you, I've used an hour a day for over a year. In January of 2012, if you plugged my name, Jo Michaels, into Google, I didn't show up anywhere. Now, just over a year later, because of that hour a day, I'm every search result on the first page but one. Remember that video I uploaded last week? It's there already.

Check it out: Jo Michaels Google Search Results

And tell me I'm crazy. How would you like for that to be you? It's possible. Don't get overwhelmed by all this stuff. It's easy to manage when you take small bites and spread the butter thin.

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

To Stumble is not to Fall - Day Twelve WABC

Happy Wednesday, good people of the blogosphere! Today's prompt is all about social bookmarking sites. Mine of choice: Stumbleupon! Here's the prompt:

A social bookmarking site is a “centralized online service” that gives its users the ability to add, annotate, edit, and share links to web documents. Bookmarking, also known as “tagging” is a significant feature of social bookmarking systems, enabling users to organize their bookmarks in flexible ways and develop shared vocabularies known as folksonomies. Popular social bookmarking sites include Delicious, StumbleUpon, Reddit, and Digg. Do you regularly use any social bookmarking sites? Why do you use the ones you use? What are the benefits of social bookmarking? What are the specific benefits of social bookmarking to authors? If you’re not using a social bookmarking site, you’re missing out on a key aspect of social media: referrals by the users. Is social bookmarking something you should consider incorporating into your online book marketing strategy? Give us links to your profiles, if you have them.

You followers of my blog already know my age, so I'm not really dating myself when I tell you I was around when Stumbleupon was the big thing. Not only that, I was around when it was the only thing. There was no Reddit, Digg, or Delicious back then. By the time those hit the market, stumbling was a thing phasing out.

I remember getting lost for hours stumbling around the web when I would come across a site like: Perpetual Bubble Wrap or Jackson Pollock Painter. Turn up your volume before clicking the first link. If you click the second, move your mouse then click the left button, then repeat, and again, and again! It was a time suck, for sure. Greater than Facebook could ever be. Seem hard to believe? Go sign up for an account on SU and click the stumble button. You'll be hooked like a fish after a juicy worm.

I created this today on the JP website above:

How cool is that?

How does this help you as an author? Well, get out there to one of the sites, make a profile, tell the darned thing what you like, and see what happens when you click the button to take you to the next relevant site. If you go stumble your own pages, the social bookmark will be filed and others can happen upon your content without you ever doing a thing but filling out a form and putting it out there for the world to stumble upon.

Here's what a profile looks like: Jo Michaels on StumbleUpon.

I'm sure there's an app for that, I just haven't taken the time to go find it. But I do have some statistics for you! I had this image on a popular photography website:

It got stumbled. Within the time span of three days, it got 25k views. That's a significant number and one that shouldn't be ignored. It's 25k potential new customers/readers/clients.

So, if you're out to waste time or looking to join the fray of internet marketing, you want to be on one (or all) of those social bookmarking sites. It take minutes to tag a page but it could be the difference in being seen and being passed by.

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

Squids! Ewwww - Day Eleven WABC

Happy Monday, good people of the blogosphere! Today, we discuss Squidoo. A site a know a little about, but haven't really poked around until today. Still rolling with the Winter Author Blog Challenge (four days left), here's the prompt:

Do you have a Squidoo lens? Founded by Seth Godin, Squidoo is a popular free site that enables users to create single webpages (known as lenses) about their interests and recommendations. Users can even earn money for charity or themselves. The credibility-building potential rivals Quora, but unlike question-answering sites, Squidoo users are free to create content of their choosing. The SEO rankings are quite high – but it remains incumbent upon the site’s users to double-check the veracity of information provided. Challenge questions: What are the benefits to using sites like Quora and Squidoo for building credibility? What can they offer that your website or blog doesn’t already do? How could this help you sell more books? If you are on Squidoo, remember share the link to your favorite lens.

I now have a profile there. I created a lens there this morning. You can find it here: Formatting Your Book for Print.

Okay, how did I just use Squidoo? I created a lens with an excerpt from my book on self-publishing. This gives folks a look inside, some information, and a buy link. I also included URLs from my two sites: Jo Michaels ~ Author Blog and Indie Books Gone Wild.

By creating that lens, I gave folks a peek into what my book can do for them. If I wanted to create a lens to drive people to buy Yassa, my book on Genghis Khan's coming-of-age, I would talk about the man himself and what kind of things he went through to get to where he was when he died.

I can see the usefulness of Squidoo and I've been meaning to do what I did this morning for a while. Thank you, Laura, for pushing me to get it done. I think, unlike Quora, Squidoo can be a bigger help because you don't have to start with a question from someone else to get the ball rolling. You can answer a question you know lingers in the world wide web with your expertise and go from there. No prompting needed beyond your own drive.

I have a ton of work calling my name today. I hope you all enjoy the lens and take your own steps to creating one today! I look forward to seeing what others can do with Squidoo.

That's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

Good to Go on GoodReads - Day Ten WABC

Wow. Happy next post, everyone! This time, the post is about one of my favorite reader websites: GoodReads! I use it for a lot of things that I've been prompted to discuss. So, without further ado, the prompt for day TEN:

Are you on GoodReads? It seems a pretty obvious place for authors to hang out, yet I’m not sure authors are using it to quite the maximal benefit. If you are on GoodReads, how often do you visit/use the site? How often do you update your reading list? What other kinds of things do you post? Are you finding yourself using it the way social media was intended: to create a community? If you are NOT on GoodReads, have you made a deliberate choice to skip it? What other mechanisms do you utilize for meeting other readers/writers/authors? How else could you begin to create your very own community? If you are on Goodreads, remember to give us your profile link.

I think every author worth their salt is on GoodReads. Every reader is, too! You can find my profile here: Jo Michaels.

As far as visits to GoodReads goes, I pop over every day to say hello and check up on things. I'm a member of a number of groups there and visit them pretty often to poke around and see what's new. I do giveaways on GoodReads every time I release a new book (about once every other month). My blog auto-posts over there from here and I get a couple of reads on it every day. I post every review I write there, too.

When I did my 12 Days of Christmas Party, I utilized GoodReads to host my event and invite people to join me. I had an amazing response and around thirty indie authors pitched their books to me before the end of my challenge. There's no way I could've reached that number without the help of GoodReads and their event application.

I've met a number of cool indie authors via GoodReads and am the moderator of my own group there with a handful of members. We aren't too active though. It's a small group and I like it that way.

As far as my reading list goes, I don't update it very often. But, when I do, oh man! I slash and burn that list. If I'm not gonna read something, I don't like it hanging out in my proverbial coffee shop window.

I like the way the site links up with my Facebook and how easy it is to add friends to my list. Navigation could be improved and I think they need larger servers to accommodate the huge number of people on the site; but, other than that, I love it.

If you're a reader or a writer, you'd do well to join up over on GoodReads and poke around to see what they have. Your eyes will pop wide open. Enter to win a book or two (or three) in the giveaways. The more reviews you write there, the more likely you are to win! It actually says that in their terms.

I'm looking forward to connecting with the other folks in this challenge over there!

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

FourSquare - Day Nine WABC

Happy Sunday, good people of the blogosphere! I'm playing a bit of catchup for the blog challenge today so you're gonna get two posts from me. The first is about FourSquare. An app I've never used but I've been poking around in for the last few minutes. First, here's the prompt for this post:

What are your thoughts about FourSquare? For those unaware, FourSquare is a location tracking platform. Its users “check in” at various locations with a mobile device and are able to find out (track?) where their friends are. Location is based on GPS hardware in the mobile device or a network location provided by the app itself. Many members use foursquare and its competitors for the discounts. Or perhaps you want people to know which bookstore you’re in for your signing or event. Are you using FourSquare? Is there a way to use it to encourage better attendance at your signings and events? What are the pluses and drawbacks? Be sure to give us the link to your profile!

I find FourSquare to look a lot like my Google maps app. While I can see the usefulness of it if appearing in public, I'm a bit of a private person. I'm not really keen on everyone being able to find me anywhere I'm hanging out. Same reason I use a pen name. Not awesome to have folks you don't know loitering on your lawn or sending you angry letters because you had the audacity to write something they didn't agree with.

Now, if I wanted to know where to find something and didn't have a different maps app on my device, I'd consider using FourSquare for that function. But to have a whole plethora of people knowing where I am at any given moment of the day? No, thank you. I'll pass.

If you're a big-time author and are making an appearance or love to have fans all over you all the time, I say, go for it! If you're a small name author who's trying to make a name for yourself and want fans all over you all the time, I'd say keep writing great books with zero controversial content, become a big name author, and then go for it! Ha!

I know this post was short, but que sera sera.

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo