Debbie Ridpath Ohi: A Social Media Master Class for Authors & Illustrators

Debbie Ohi shares some of her best tips on social media for both authors and illustrators. Here are a few of my favorites (Debbie would type 'favourites' as she is delightfully Canadian):

For best results, you do want to learn some basic photography skills whether you are an illustrator or an author. Take photos of all of your events, yes. But for authors, you can also get the people who work on your book involved in your social media, too, and drum up visual content from those sources. Authors can take photos of their work environment and tools for writing. Authors, your illustrators would love to be showcased and credited in your social media posts! When appropriate, tag your publisher, editor, art director or agent, too.

Debbie's books! Easy to learn more about on her website

Debbie doesn't believe social media results in direct sales, it's about getting people talking. Change your focus from sales to connection, let us hammer you over the head with this:

Social media is for CONNECTIONS not SALES.

Love Debbie's Found Object Art series
which you can see on Instagram

Figure out which social media platforms you enjoy being on the most, and which audiences those appeal to (educators and librarians often are on Twitter, art directors love Instagram). From their figure out how to connect with those audiences and get to know them better, and how you can serve them and their needs.

Debbie stresses your work comes first! There is no one right way to do social media, and it is not the most important thing in your career. Try to make both outcome and time goals for your social media so you have a manageable schedule and provide quality content or interactions that make it worth taking your time away from your writing or art.


 Follow Debbie to see more best practices!
https://twitter.com/inkyelbows
https://www.facebook.com/DebbieOhi/
https://www.instagram.com/inkygirl/

Meet #LA17SCBWI’s Team Blog

Meet 2017's SCBWI Team Blog!

We'll be live blogging the 46th annual SCBWI Summer Conference from July 7-10th, 2017 here at http://scbwiconference.blogspot.com, and on social media using the hashtag #LA17SCBWI

Follow and RT:

• Lee Wind: @leewind
• Sona Charaipotra @sona_c
• Jolie Stekly @cuppajolie
• Susie Ghahremani @boygirlparty
• Jaime Temairik @jaimetem

Tomorrow is the final day to register at https://www.scbwi.org/events/46th-annual-summer-conference-in-los-angeles-la17/#event-registration 

Follow along and join the conversation:

#LA17SCBWI on Twitter
#LA17SCBWI on Instagram
#LA17SCBWI on Facebook
http://scbwiconference.blogspot.com

Cynthia Leitich Smith: The Social Media Panel

Cynthia Leitich Smith is the New York Times and Publishers Weekly best-selling, award-winning YA author of the Tantalize series, the Feral trilogy and several acclaimed children’s books. She was named a Writer of the Year by Wordcraft Circle of Native Writers and Storytellers in recognition of Rain Is Not My Indian Name. Cynthia is on the faculty of the VCFA MFA program in Writing for Children and Young Adults. She also serves on the advisory board of We Need Diverse Books. The Austin chapter of SCBWI has instituted the Cynthia Leitich Smith Mentor Award in her honor. Visit www.cynthialeitichsmith.com and www.cynthialeitichsmith.blogspot.com

Cynthia speaks of starting to do social media, and how her web presence in the early days (1999!) was a response to a larger cultural misperception of native people not being modern -- her being cutting edge helped reshape that to prove native people like her are "people of now."

She shouts out to Debbie Ridpath Ohi (http://inkygirl.com, @inkyelbows) as an author/illustrator who's doing a great job with social media -- offering both a tremendous resource for others and examples of her illustrations.

She also shares the example of YA authors Cori McCarthy and Amy Rose Capetta starting the Rainbow Boxes project to donate books with LGBTQIA characters to one community library and one homeless shelter in every state in the USA. We too can start a project related to a larger conversation, with a positive tangible end, and be involved in social media in that way.

Cynthia asks us to consider:

What do we have to offer, what's our unique point of view to share, and how can we share it in a way that's enjoyable?

The panel also covers platforms (you don't have to be on everything), time on social media (and tips for limiting it), not obsessing about the numbers, the professional/personal line, how social media can help you find community, how having a social media presence involves a lot of listening, and so much more!

One last powerful moment to share:

Cynthia tells us about losing followers when she's featured certain subjects on her blog. And how that's okay. One example: she featured -- in 2016 -- a series on LGBTQ YA, she signal-boosted it with an ad on Facebook, and she noticed that 35 people stopped following her within a half-hour of the post going up. Her response? A strong "I. Don't. Care."

Her space. Her rules.

Awesome!

Similarly, social media can be your space.

The Children's Books and Social Media Panel Begins!

From left to right:  SCBWI Team Blogger and moderator Martha Brockenbrough, blogger/librarian Travis Jonker, author/blogger Cynthia Leitich Smith, and librarian/podcast host/blogger Matthew Winner.

Martha Brockenbrough: Jumpstart Your Social Media... Ten Best Tips

@mbrockenbrough is Martha's
Twitter handle. Magnum Blackbeard
is her CB radio handle.

Author Martha Brockenbrough shares some fantastic and salient social media marketing gems. Spoiler alert: It's all about relationships!

Your strategy for social media, says Martha, is not to be on there to sell books, it's to build relationships. It is not about the technology/particular media platform, either, that is totally secondary to the connections you make on whatever platform you are comfortable being in or on.

You wouldn't start an in-real-life friendship by telling someone to buy your book, that's not how you should approach social media either. It's fine to make people aware that you write or illustrate, but Martha's hope is that you instead focus your efforts on being friendly, interacting online, and adding something to the conversations.

Give them reasons to interact with you: you can show snippets of your life, your family, vacations, things that inspire you.

Who are you building these social media relationships with? Five-year-olds don't tweet, but booksellers, librarians, teachers and parents do! All of these people are potential gatekeepers to your intended audience of your published book.

If you aren't published? Well, your fellow industry professionals, fellow authors and illustrators and agents and editors are on social media, and you can start building these relationships now and support authors and illustrators you are fans of and herald their work.

Martha's Core Principles for Online Social Media (and Martha can do an 8-minute plank, so she knows about core strength)

1. Be Positive
2. Focus on the long term
3. Build an authentic community (Martha admits it is difficult to be careful and professional while also being authentic, but hold both of these things in mind when you do broadcast yourself/opinions online)

Martha provides some platform-tailored tips and hints for how to interact on Facebook, Twitter, Linked In, and more, for both your personal and professional pages.

One Facebook hint: Images are often more popular than text-only posts for views and shares, consider making a quote from your book or a new, glowing review you want to share as word art or an image. Or consider using pictures to promote your event, like one of Martha's most popular booktour event info posts was this one:

See some great social media in action by using Martha as a case study:

Martha's website

Martha's blog

Martha's Twitter

Martha's Facebook

Martha's Instagram

Martha can also help you help your online self!

Martha Brockenbrough's PRO Track Session: Building A Killer Public Presence

Team Blog's very own Martha Brockenbrough is the author of five books for young readers, including the YA novel Devine Intervention and the picture book, The Dinosaur Tooth Fairy. She has a killer public presence - check out her website at www.marthabrockenbrough.com and on twitter @mbrockenbrough

Martha Brockenbrough just before her session started (before the room filled to overflowing.)

Martha starts out by saying to the beyond standing-room-only crowd that:

It's not about marketing, it's about building relationships, and those relationships sell your book for you.

It's not about the hard sell - it's about this question: Do you enjoy meeting people who love books as much as you do?

YES!

"Connect with the right people and you'll ultimately connect with the right readers."

The breakout session was structured as the five key steps to building those relationships (and that killer public presence.)

I'll divulge one of the steps here::

Define your brand

Here's how that breaks down:

1. Identify who your ideal reader is

Martha's is: A weird independent nerd

2. summarize your book, who it's about, tone, sense of stakes

What is Martha's YA novel, Devine Intervention about?

"It's about the world's worst guardian angel, the girl he accidentally kills and the 24 hours they have to sneak her soul into Heaven before it disappears forever."

3. summarize your writing as a whole

Martha's website header says it all: "Author of Books for Smart Kids and Juvenile Adults"

4. convey it visually - while still being your authentic self

Martha has that cool streak in her hair that makes teen girls say, "I like your hair!"

5. leverage your unique background

Martha leveraged her passion for grammar by founding The Society for the Promotion of Good Grammar and creating a holiday for it. This got her a lot of press coverage, and her reviews often speak of her love of language.


Martha is a fountain of information, and her session covers so much more! From how to leverage common core to the significance of pre-orders, we get example after example of how she and other authors did things right.

It's essential, inspiring, and as the person next to me said after the applause tapered down at the session's end:

"That was awesome."

Emma Dryden and Harold Underdown's PAL workshop: Social Media for Authors & Illustrators

Harold Underdown is the man behind The Purple Crayon website, one of the first online resources in children's literature. He posts great links and articles about things going on in this industry and also tweets.

Emma Dryden has a website describing her Drydenbks business, and is very active on twitter and facebook and she's even moving into google+ as well.

They are sharing a virtual handout with amazing resources to check out and a paper handout that reviews a large number of the social networks for readers that are out there.

The first thing they suggest to do is to get a website.

Think about your website as a living document - a forum for you as you grow, with new artwork, new sketches, but not everything - you want to give a sampling, a showcase of your writing, your illustration, your interests, your links, song lists, book titles. (But don't give away the store.)

Some great pieces of advice:

Think about who your audience is going to be. The audience for picture books are not going online. But if you write picture books, you could have resources for parents and teachers.

Don't put your unpublished manuscript on your website, but once it's published, put up a few chapters - people love to preview.

Do not post photos of your children: be careful of the presence that you have online - it's totally public. Keep your boundaries in mind from the very beginning.

Own your own domain name (and don't let it lapse.)

They're explaining and discussing the pros and pitfalls of facebook, twitter, and twitterchats, myspace, LinkedIn, and Google+, sharing strategies for how to manage the flow of information.

You can also have a blog as your website. Emma mentions the article Alice Pope wrote about starting a blog in the recent SCBWI Bulletin, and recommends it. You can also use your blog as your website. One way to take the pressure off is to be part of a group blog - a Glog - (like INK)

Some authors doing social media RIGHT that Emma and Harold suggest you look to as inspirations:

Ellen Hopkins

Laurie Halse Anderson

And another example of an author doing an excellent job with twitter is Maureen Johnson

There are even publishers and authors who are tweeting AS characters!

Of course, you can't do everything. (Emma likes twitterchats, Harold doesn't...)

"Social Media is not something you HAVE to do, but maybe you can find one part of it that does work for you." - Harold Underdown

And the attendees of this session are now armed with loads of practical information to help them figure that out!

Alice Pope and Greg Pincus: Moving Your Career Forward With Social Networking & Blogging

Greg Pincus is a poet, author and social media guru who, through the wonders of social media (and his talent as a writer) got into the New York Times and landed a two book deal with Arthur A. Levine.

Alice Pope is the official blogger for SCBWI, Team Captain for SCBWI's Team Blog, and the former editor of the Children's Writers and Illustrator's Market Guide.



Here's a taste of their words of wisdom:

Greg: There's no one way - each person can follow their own path.

Alice: Just like getting published - it's the same with social networking.

Greg: Recognize that it's not always linear, but a good thing is a good thing. In advertising there's a rule of 7 times of being exposed to something before people buy it. If they see you 6 times via social media, and the 7th time they see your book is in a bookstore... that's good!

the effects are cumulative

You are what you say and do - think of ebay, if someone has a 99% rating, then we trust that seller. Similarly we are all building our reputations online.

Be careful not to hurt yourself - be smart. Greg quoted Jenn Bailey who said that "to get something off the internet is like getting pee out of a swimming pool."

Alice reminded us that in all our interactions we want to ADD VALUE - how can you help? how can you further the conversation?


They've started to share examples of how authors and illustrators have been using social media to further their careers, including:

Readergirlz, five authors who created a safe online community for teenage girls - they're offering virtual author visits and a place for girls to talk books.

Lisa Yee's blog has helped her success and the character of Peepy has become a fun funny extension of her personality.

And me, Lee Wind, with my blog "I'm Here. I'm Queer. What the Hell do I Read?" - which have given me an expertise in GLBTQ Kid Lit and a platform.

There are so many examples, great points and insights being offered.

Here's an amazing one!

Mitali Perkin's blog, where she talks about multicultural books for kids, even includes a post where she talks about and how through twitter she sold five of her books to India!

They're speaking about blog book tours now... Alice is sharing about author Holly Cupala's book blog tour that she recently hosted one stop for on her SCBWI Blog.

Someone asked how you get Twitter followers, and Alice gave this great advice:

If you participate, people will notice you.

In answering a question about Facebook Fan Pages versus Personal Facebook Pages, Greg says: Everything you say and do online is PUBLIC. And stay active - people want to connect.

Another example of someone doing it right is Cynthea Liu's recent book launch, where she raised money for a local school and adding that selfless focus was very successful for her.

As Greg says about his own 30 poets 30 days project, which highlighted poems of other people on his own poetry blog, you don't want to just talk about yourself all the time.

They're sharing so much beyond what I've been able to blog here - Greg and Alice really are Social Media Gurus!

I'll give Alice the final words here for us to remember:

Social Networking is not rocket science - it's just talking.

And as a bonus, Greg reads his poem "I'm pretty well connected" to the room's applause.

Jenn Bailey: Viral Marketing/Promotions

Jenn Bailey - Graphic Designer/Professional Blogger

(Jenn Bailey is coming! Jenn Bailey is coming!)

Lesson #1: you can’t teach viral marketing, but we can get the ground ready for a viral campaign.

Viral Marketing: We want to pass on messages; make sure people are aware of us; increase brand awareness; increase product sales; word-of mouth.

On to a bit of history ala Jenn about...

Paul Revere: He knew how to get any kind of message he needed to out there. He was a virus.

Now a tip: “People will like helping you. You just have to ask them to.”

Who are our Paul Reveres today?
Cynthea Lui - The Auction
Neil Gaiman – The Party
John Green – The Movement
Tammi Sauer & Dan Santat– The Launch

(Check 'em!)

To dos:

1. Build Community

2. Create a call to action

3. Find your community, all the people in your life. Use them.
(We know Jenn means this in the nicest of ways. Reach out and let people know what you do.)

4. The Conversation and the Love: You have to have love and passion. And you must show love and passion back to your community.

(I’m showing my love by sharing with you right now! *smile!*)

5. Rewards: reward people who are participating (sometimes it’s just a thank you or photo)

6. The Sequel: follow up with something else

You have to have the right mind set to get there.
-Be patient.
-Be a friend to get a friend.
-Know your audience.
-Be yourself – everyone else is taken.
-Have fun. It’s called social for a reason.

(Now, spread the word!)


--Posted By Jolie