How To Use Social Media: An Author's Perspective

As an author I am always trying to find new ways to connect with readers and other writers. Social media has been a godsend for those of us in the book-making community, much as it has been for the rest of the business world.

The obvious benefits of social media for an author are:

• Relationship building
• Free advertising
• A World Without Borders
• Unlimited access to going through the same trials and tribulations

I have often linked posts to my Facebook or Twitter accounts because those seemed, to me, to have the most recognizable benefits from an advertising perspective. What many writers, and business people in general, fail to recognize is that the best form of advertising is relationship building, connecting with your audience, and actually getting to know one another.

When your audience cares about you, who you are as a person, they are much more likely to be interested in whatever it is you do - and if you are a writer - they will be that much more interested in your novel and that much more likely to pick it up or purchase it.

To that end, Instagram and Snapchat are perfect windows into your life.  They say a picture tells a thousand words.  So from that logic one photo on these accounts is saying about 8 times as much as a Twitter character count. While Facebook allows users to share posts up to 63,206 characters, most of that will be hidden unless you click to open more, and let us be honest, with Facebook's terrible algorithms there is a good chance that most of your audience will never see it anyway. One way to increase the amount of people who might be able to see it?

Include a picture.

So, if pictures are still king when it comes to communicating, Instagram and Snapchat should be leveraged. I know, I know: 

But I am a writer - how do words apply for a person like me? 

Listen up you clod.

You can take pictures of your words.  Or books.  There are entire communities of people on Instagram that search for pictures of words, poetry, quotes, books.  These communities are using relevant hashtags in order to find the items they want, hashtags like (and I didn't use commas so you can cut and paste these hashtags for writing and reading straight into your posts): 

#writers #readers #bookstagram #writerscommunity #poets #quoteoftheday #writersofig #poetsofig #igreads #poetrycommunity #author #poem #qotd #prose #booklove #yalit #booknerd #wordporn

That is just a few! Also, they are the most popular hashtags for writers and the most popular hashtags for readers. For an example check this out at my Instagram:

I literally wrote something I thought up, on a coffee stained napkin.  No one cares.  They care about the words.  Those are the type of people you want to attract, become friends with, and ultimatly -hopefully - convert to readers.

Now Snapchat is a little more difficult.  This community is developed purely by people who are interested in looking into your life.  My best advice for this is the following:

• Be yourself
• Do not be all business, let them see your day to day
• Use the video feature, people want to hear your voice
• Do NOT make massive stories.  People will get bored (no one's life is that interesting that we need a 100-photo flip book). Or worse, people will unfollow -which in case you missed the point of this blog, is completely counterproductive. Five photos and videos a day should be your max.

What is great about this forum is that Snapchat has enabled users to simply scan a user's photo in order to add them.  My Snapchat @ndenmon looks like this (sorry for the growl I was pretending to be Sirius Black from Harry Potter when he was in the newspaper as a wanted murder:

Nicholas Denmon

So add me and let's get to knowing each other!

Oh, and in case you were wondering what Sirius Black looked like - it was this photo from the movie. Let me know what you think of my impression - but only let me know by Snap-chatting me. See what I did there?

Sirius Black:

TTFN Denmonites!

-ND

Giveaway Time - Indie Blog Hop

Every now and again a few of us author types like to do something strange like give away our hard work for free. This is one of those times. In the name of celebrating the independent author and those who support the independent voices of literature we are giving away a bunch of novels written by those types.

We have allindieebooks.blogspot.com to thank for arranging this awesome giveaway!

For other blogs hosting giveaways click HERE.

If you comment on this blog or any of the blogs in that list you are entered in the giveaway. The more comments you leave the more entries you get!

The books being given away are of course, For Nothing by me and then these four as well:

Allie Burke- Violet Midnight

M.E. Franco- Where Will You Run

Thomas Amos- An Apple For Zoe

Mireille Chester - The Chosen One Trilogy (three books)

Halloween Update and Script Update for For Nothing

Hope you all had a great weekend.  Mine was relatively relaxing and I was able to write a bit so that was nice.  Weekends can sometimes get away from me because the family expects me to crawl out from under my rock every now and then to visit with them, but this was a kindly weekend and fortunately I was able to accomplish both my familial responsibilities as well as my professional goals.

I just have a few quick updates on this manic Monday...(pause for the 1980's flashback brought to you courtesy of the Bangles).

Update Uno:

The second installment of my Halloween Special Dark Places will post this week, most likely on Wednesday so keep an eye out.  I love the feedback so far, and thus the story weaving continues!

Update B (yes I know it is not 2, have a sense of humor!):

The screenplay being written by Welsh Lord, Thomas Humphreys is making serious progress.  In fact, he has decided to grace us with a snippet of the work in progress. So without further ado, please read on:

Catch up with writer Thomas Humphreys on Twitter @Mr_Frodo_Esq

For Nothing Movie Adaptation Update / Preview

I thought some of you might be interested in the latest news about For Nothing. As some of you know, the story is being reworked into a screenplay by the talented Welshman, Thomas Humphreys.

Thomas, who has fought through breaking his wrist, has been working diligently to try and get this disaster into top screenplay form. It means a ton that he believes in the work enough to undertake the monumental task of parsing a 300 page story into about a 100 page screenplay. But to break your wrist and still find ways to work on the project, that is dedication my friends.

For example, I was once hungover and so did not write a word.

At any rate, Thomas and I had a bet as to who would finish first: me on the sequel Buffalo Soldiers or him on adapting For Nothing into a screenplay. Since he broke his wrist he is at a serious disadvantage at the moment. As I round the 60-65% complete mark, who knows where Thomas is on this adaptation...

But alas! Thomas does, and has sent us a preview of the screenplay!

Thanks Mr. Humphreys. That actually got my adrenaline going. How exciting! Though I feel safely ahead...for the moment.

Follow Tom on twitter @Mr_Frodo_esq

Movies Based on Comics Are Taking Me For Granted and Why Shouldn't They?

The weekend is usually a good time to relax and rinse away the rigor of the work week.  But every so often you have so much to do or have so much fun that you are actually more tired on Monday than you were on Friday.

That is pretty much how I feel today.

I had a going away dinner for my brother Rob who is becoming a Customs Border Patrol officer on Friday.  So the evening was full of good food and drinks as we toasted him a farewell before he leaves for months of training and then to wherever they decide to place him.  It was a good time and you can't help but be happy for someone who gets something they have been working towards for a good long while.  But part of you is also sad to see them go.

Four of us brothers lived here in the greater Tampa Bay area just three short months ago, but now only two of us remain.

Ah, the price of growing up and moving on.

So in good Denmon fashion, we hid our feelings behind a wall of booze and laughter and on Sunday I watched Captain America in honor of my brother Rob who is probably going to keep a few of the worlds bad apples away from American soil.  The movie was decent, enjoyable even.  But I think I might have been distracted through the entirety of the film by a PREVIEW.

Another damned Spider-Man movie? Really?? Even worse, it seems to be the retelling of the story from the beginning, from the spider bite, sans Toby Maguire.  How many times must I suffer Hollywood's lack of creativity?

Some guy named Garfield who is a new Spider-Man

Oh well.  I will probably see it and help perpetuate the notion that retreads are a good idea when it comes to lining pockets versus actually coming up with something new.  Captain America, despite this distraction, was a fun film and the Avengers movies are going to make a boatload of money.  They already have, but wait until they all join forces in one movie in 2012.

My brother Rob standing strong at the border.

Other than that, I got into some scotch and cigars in order celebrate my buddy Craig's engagement to long time sweetheart Stacey.  His parents always throw great parties and this was no exception.  If you happened to show up, I was the guy hanging out by the meatballs and the aforementioned scotch. 

He is getting married in March so I need to find the best place to rent a donkey for his bachelor party...

The donkey show from Jay and Silent Bob

On the writing front, I am about 17,500 words into the sequel to For Nothing.   Buffalo Soldiers is really coming along and I think everyone who read For Nothing will love where I am taking the Upstate New York Mafia Tales. Here's to hoping!

Cheers!

Teaser Chapter for the Sequel to For Nothing - Buffalo Soldiers; An Upstate New York Mafia Tale II

Teaser Chapter:

Buffalo Soldiers

Rafael Rontego tasted the iron flavor of his blood running over what was left of his cracked lips as the warm liquid filled his mouth.   He couldn’t see a thing and he felt a burning sensation on the back of his neck where it pulled against some unwilling tendons.  It was unnatural to hang your head so far forward, but Rafael dared not let them know he was awake under the hood.

The hood.

The damn thing smelled like straw, canvas, or dust.  Some sort of sack, Rafael mused.  It scratched at his face, and if his hands weren’t tied off behind his back he sure as hell would have tried to scratch half of his face off.  Or wipe the blood from his lips.

Or kill the bastards who brought me here.


Rontego couldn’t remember much.  He lay down to catch some sleep.  Sleep was all he had done it seemed.  Don Ciancetta told him he needed to lay low for a while.  The heat was too hot.  So he rented a suite at Salvatore’s Grand Hotel.   He felt the fog lift a bit as he thought of the place with its perfectly polished floors and marble.  Marble everywhere.  But it was the Jacuzzi hot tub that made him almost smile right there with the blood running down his face and the hood blinding him. The things he and the blond had done in there.  It was almost unfair to let them ever rent that room out again.  The room lay right next to the thruway and so had an easy escape route if he needed it.  Canada wasn’t far away and there were half a dozen neighborhoods he could disappear in if someone came looking for him.

The price was right too.  The owner knew Rafael Rontego.  He knew the hitman, and he knew his boss, Don Ciancetta. Everything was going well.  The stories on the news slowly drifted out of circulation.  The little amount of evidence, the Buffalo Police Department, had was destroyed, purchased, or went missing.

Even scared that cop straight into an early retirement.


This time he did grin, but the pain of his cracked lips brought him down in a hurry.   He had to focus.  Everything was so damn quiet.  Even though he couldn’t see a thing, Rafael closed his eyes.

Drip. Drip-drip. Drip.

The water was faint but his ears caught it all the same.  He prided himself on his hearing.  The notion made him grimace.  He never even woke up.  He never heard them when they grabbed him.  He assumed it was they.  It must have been well organized because he had lain down…he had lain down…and what?

What did I do before I lay down.  I drank a scotch.  I drank a scotch, laid down, and then… and then I was slung over someone’s shoulder and bumping my head on someone that smelled like old cigarettes and sweat.


The bumping felt like stairs. Rafael vaguely remembered hearing the thud of boots on wood too.   Then there was the dripping, the infernal dripping somewhere to his right.  Rafael strained his nose to smell past the iron and the damned sack covering his face.  It smelled wet.

Rafael’s heart sank.

I’m in a fucking basement.


He knew what happened in basements.  He had been on the giving end of a few of those wonderful parties.

His heart thudded against his chin threatening to knock through his chest and slap him in the face.  It only got worse when he heard footsteps descending.

Thump.  Thump. Thump.


The footsteps stopped, but a second joined the first and then he heard voices.  At first Rafael decided he must have been hit harder than he thought.  He couldn’t understand anything that came out of their mouths.

Then it hit him.  They were speaking a different language.  A language he hadn’t heard much of for the last eleven years.

They were speaking Russian.