In my previous posts, I discussed how the first step in building a professional social media presence is to comment on other people’s posts… but at first, even this can be nerve-wracking, so here’s a few tips to help get you moving.
Spend 10 minutes scrolling your feed or search a hashtag relevant to your writing or genre. Be curious. Find the content you actually care about.
When you see a post that genuinely piques your interest, that makes you ‘feel’ something, you can think about commenting.
- What did you like about the post or article?
- Is there something that really stood out to you or resonated with you?
- How does this fit with your genre, writing, knowledge or experience?
- What could you add to the point?
- Have you a particular experience or story you could share which relates to the point they were making?
Don’t use commenting as an opportunity to promote your own book or writing unless it’s really, really relevant or invited.
Use commenting to add value or simply to send a positive message.
If you still feel nervous, start even smaller by writing a very simple comment such as ‘I agree’ or ‘I love this’.
At this stage, it’s all about forming the daily habit of reading and commenting on other people’s posts. It’s the backbone of everything you’ll do as you build your own social media profile as an author.
About The Author
Nigel Cooper
Nigel’s debut novel Beat The Rain was a semi-finalist for Best Debut Author in the Goodreads Choice Awards 2016. His second novel The Pursuit of Ordinary was a finalist in the People’s Book Prize for Fiction 2019. It was also one of the 8-12 titles ‘called in’ for the Man Booker Prize, a first for his publisher. It was also long-listed for The Guardian’s Not The Booker Prize. His third novel will be released in September 2022 and is now available for pre-order. Nigel brings his own experience of the trials of getting published, building an author profile and marketing his own novels to AuthorSpark. As well as co-founding AuthorSpark, Nigel co-founded digital marketing agency and employee advocacy platform We Are Togethr alongside Andrew, alongside online content sister company Togethr Lab. Prior to that he was a newspaper subeditor and a writer and editor for Channel 4 Interactive.