How To Get More Book Reviews: Social Media

Are you using social media to get reviews?

One of the purposes of having set up your social media channels is to promote your book. This includes getting reviews.

Whether you are engaged on ONE channel or a dozen, that is your choice and depends on your communication preferences and time constraints.  Channels could include:  a Facebook Personal Profile or Facebook Fan Page,  Twitter account(s), Pinterest, Google+, LinkedIn, Instagram and many others.

Start Yesterday!

If you plan on having one or more Social Media channels,  and don’t have ANY, start NOW.  Don’t wait until you’re finished your book and have time … it will be too late.  Start now.

The “secret” about Social Media is that … well, it’s SOCIAL.

It takes time to set your channel up.  It takes time to get ten friends.  It takes time to do the “social” part which means talking to them.  Posting, telling them stuff about you and what you are doing.

Be generous and share posts, retweet, help promote other author’s books, share information and cool photos. Found a blog article you love? It takes seconds to share it on Pinterest, Twitter, Facebook or StumbleUpon.  Do it NOW as you bump into interesting and useful information.

SEE the sharing symbols that float along the side of THIS page?  You will see share symbols in similar positions on other websites. You may see them at the bottom of the page. Use them.  If you share throughout your day you don’t have to worry about creating content for your networks!

By the time you are ready to start promoting, you will have an audience that is interested!

Your NEW book

Presumably you have been sharing and building relationships while working on your book. You have been talking (posting, tweeting) to your friends about your upcoming book.  Maybe you’ve dropped a few hints about the book.  Perhaps your friends have helped you name the main character, or have helped make a final cover choice. In other words, you have “involved” them in your book ahead of your publishing date.

When you were almost at the final draft you asked for volunteer beta readers and got some help finding typos and errors and maybe a few tips on how to improve your story or content.

Fast forward to the day you publish your book.   NOW is the time to capitalize on the relationships you have been building.    Tell your followers that your new book is about to be published, or is hot off the press.  Ask for reviews.  If reviews are slow in coming, offer to send a gift or free preview copy.  Let your followers know about FREE and 99cent days.

Be friendly and informative  vs needy or demanding.  Here are two messages I came across … note how they ASK for a review.   *** Keep a swipe file of ideas you can use.

“My new #SciFi Romance is #FREE today, please be sure to download it  (include link here) and I’ll send you virtual kisses if you post a review!”

“Just In Time Tips for Moms is on sale for only #99cents today. If you find the tips to be of use, please let others know in your review.” (include link here)

PERSONALLY ask your beta readers to post a review on Amazon.  Pick up the phone, connect with a SKYPE call.

Be sure to ASK your followers to post or re-post to their groups. Make it easy for them by posting fabulous looking graphics and sending them the copy for some great information they can copy/paste into a post.

Are you sending out enough “ASK” messages?

A few months ago I tweeted out several times a day to one of my lists and got three reviews within two days.   I’ll definitely be doing this again, next time a little more aggressively.

What is aggressively?  How many messages should you be sending? How often?

If you are like “most” authors, you are likely not sending aggressively enough.  ONCE is not enough.  Why?  The nature of social media is that the content is flying by.

Let’s say for example, you sign onto Twitter at 1:00 PM.   You have ten minutes to write some tweets,  reply to a message and read some tweets.  Your twitter feed is flying by.   Unless you have a very small number of people you are following, there are probably hundreds of messages.  You are likely seeing tweets sent out within in the last 30 minutes or hour … if that!

So the message YOU send, is seen only by those people logging in at approximately the same time as you.  What about the other 23 hours?  NO one sees your message.

Don’t hesitate to send the same message several times a day … and several days in a row.  Change the message slightly if that makes you feel more comfortable.   On some of my networks I’ve had the same message repeating every few days for over a year.  I am still getting responses or traffic from these messages.  This is known as drip marketing. It is used by the biggest and most profitable companies in the world. For more information about Drip Marketing, CLICK HERE.

Send a few more messages than you are comfortable with.  If the world doesn’t blow up … send a few  more. Try not to be obnoxious.

OBNOXIOUS is sending the same message every 15 minutes.  If I get this too often from the same sender, I just remove them from my list.  It is probably of little concern to them because they are obnoxious.  LOL

If you have any fabulous ideas for using Social Media Channels for getting reviews please SHARE!

Book Reviews are critical to your book’s success.
Be sure to read the entire How To Get More Book Reviews series:

How To Get More Book  Reviews: Your Website
How To Get More Book Reviews: Social Media
How To Get More Book Reviews: Author Groups
How To Get More Book Reviews: Facebook Groups
How To Get More Book Reviews: Reviewer Blogs
How To Get More Book Reviews: Amazon Reviewers
How To Get More Book Reviews: Purchase Reviews (this method is legit)

Another GREAT Article: Asking for Book Reviews

Check out my list of recommended Books on Getting Book Reviews