Author: Dan Blank

If you are like many writers and creators, you wonder if you should be using social media at all, or if you should be using it differently than you already are. This debate can happen in your brain on a minute-by-minute basis, as you try to balance your very limited resources of time and attention, with your goal of ensuring what you create reaches your ideal readers.

Today I want to share my advice on how to reframe how you think about social media, continuing with my recent theme of turning marketing from fear to joy. In the process, I’ll provide some simple prompts that I hope will make social media feel more approachable to you.

Social Media is What You Make of It

Social media is many things. Often, I hear a writer tell me that social media is only this or only that. Their reasons are often logical and framed with examples. In these conversations, I often show them other people on social media who are using it in entirely different ways, filled with education, connection, empathy, and so much else that may be truly valuable. I also point them to communities that bring people together in powerful ways.

Social media is what you make if it. It is who you follow. It is what you share. It is how you engage. It is how often you show up. I am not trying to diminish the power that social networks have, the techniques they use to control what we see, or even the influence they exert in how we behave. I am simply highlighting that each of us gets to choose aspects of what the experience is in our lives.

In my book, Be the Gateway, I talked about ignoring “best practices” when it comes to one’s author platform and how you consider social media. What I was encouraging was to not just use social media in the same way as everyone else: copying the most boring aspects of how others use it, because they feel expected.

Why?

Because when you make the absolute minimum effort, mimicking what everyone else is already doing, it can be difficult to get out of it what we hope for: meaningful connections, new people discovering your work, and a sense of creative growth. Too often, “best practices” are a copy a copy of a copy of something that worked well 3 years ago. There are diminishing returns when you are the millionth person doing the same thing as everyone else. This is why when I work with writers and creators we go deep to get clarity on their messaging, their ideal audience, and find compelling ways to share their work.

There are an infinite number of ways to use social media, but if you are stuck on how to make it feel effective and meaningful, consider these prompts to help you find a path:

• What if you only share work that you truly love?
• What if your goal in how you share was to make someone’s day a little bit brighter?
• What if you were authentic in sharing who you are?

There are many ways to consider this: What if instead of worrying about how many new followers you had by the end of a week, you instead asked how many people you made smile? How many people you gave hope to? How many people you know truly felt heard in what they share? How many people you helped to achieve their creative goals?

In some ways, this can flip how we often think about social media, and in my experience, that can radically change the joy you feel in the process.

Social Media is a Choice

You have the choice to not engage in social media. To ditch it, to ignore it, to delete your profiles and never look back. I, of course, understand why someone would want to do that.

But it’s also worth noting that the choice to engage with social media is just that: an opportunity. The night before spring break ended, my family was having dinner. I looked to my 11yo who is in middle school and said, “Back to school tomorrow…” His shoulders slumped illustrating he’s not excited to go back. Then our 4yo said, “We GET to go to school tomorrow!” For him, it was an opportunity, not an obligation.

That choice is yours when it comes to social media.

When I was in high school, I saw the movie Dead Poets Society, and remember a scene about ‘the dangers of conformity.’ Robin Williams’ character encourages students to walk around a courtyard in unusual and unexpected ways in order to not conform to expectations. He sees one student not walking, and instead just casually leaning against the wall. Robin’s character asks: “Mr. Dalton, will you be joining us?”

The student answers: “Exercising the right not to walk.”

Robin’s character replies: “Thank you Mr. Dalton. You just illustrated the point.”

I am not saying you have to be on social media. I know there are many reasons one would choose not to. I am simply encouraging you to make a choice with clarity and purpose. And if you choose to be a part of it, do it with gusto. If you choose not to, then consider how else you will share your work in a meaningful way.

Consider the Power of What You Can Share

Let’s look at a real world example of what it means to go all-in with sharing what you love. For many years, a big hobby of mine was seeking out new music in the record stores of New York City. Here i would buy CDs and records, spending a better part of my paycheck.

One of those places was a small store on Bleecker Street called Rebel Rebel. Compared to other stores, it was tiny. But like the best that any city has to offer, it was an experience. This was the outside of the shop:

 

And here is the overwhelming inside:

 

The owner’s name was David, and he was always behind the counter. Always. Rebel Rebel was a social network, of sorts. All through David.

He specialized in rare imports, which was what I loved. For regular customers, they would walk in, and he would hand them a stack of CDs that he had saved specifically for them. There were always stories of celebrities who frequented the shop: Dave Gahan from Depeche Mode, Prince, Robert Plant, and many others.

For the first few years I went there, the door was locked. David had to buzz you in. There are signs everywhere that photography is prohibited. David is one of those classic New Yorkers: on the outside, he is calm and cool, a man of few words. But then he looks at you and surprises you with incredible kindness.

The store felt like a scene, a place you wanted to be. It’s what you came to New York City for: the unexpected, the hard to find, the connection to a community that feels rare and special. David connected people to music and to each other. You can read stories online of the meaningful relationship that people had with the store. There was a sense that you were participating in an institution, akin to getting a sandwich at Katz’s Deli, or a haircut at Astor Place Barbers.

This is Rebel Rebel today:

 

It likely won’t surprise you that the store is gone, the result of stratospheric rent increases in Manhattan. One day David was simply told that he had to move out at the end of the month, after 28 years. Rebel Rebel was the left 1/3 of this clothing store, which expanded into his space. You wouldn’t think by looking at this, that the tiny portion to the left could become something special all by itself. An amazing place where creative work is shared, where people felt as though they belonged, where one person can create a respite in an otherwise overwhelming city.

But David created exactly that. And that is your choice every day with what you create, and how you share and engage. Could social media be a part of that for you? If you want. Could you make your Twitter or Instagram or YouTube as special as Rebel Rebel. Yes. If you want.

Like David, you can create a place that is unique to who you are. That shares things you feel are incredibly meaningful. That walks a careful line between being a wonderful community, but with personal boundaries that make you feel safe.

I remember the first time a friend took me to Rebel Rebel and rang the doorbell. Through the window, David glanced at us, sizing us up. Then, the sound of the buzz, and the door unlatches. The expectation of what was inside was palpable as we moved through the threshold.

How can you create that experience for others?

Thanks.
-Dan

Further reading:

• Does social media sell books?
• Social media doesn’t sell books, but…

A couple of weeks back, my website went down, the result of “malware,” a term I didn’t really know much about. My website hosts more than 10 years of my blog archives, plus my entire business. What happens with malware is that the software is designed to break in to a website and then they start adding files, changing files, just basically breaking things.

I have to say, it’s a horrible feeling to see something you have built be maliciously destroyed. Unfortunately, this happens across the digital sphere.

Recently, a writer I know had her Facebook author page, with thousands and thousands of followers, completely disappear. It got caught up in Facebook’s own algorithm where it was mistakenly flagged as breaking some kind of rule. They deleted her author page permanently and without explanation or warning. All those years of posts, all of those connections to people who follow her writing… gone.

Another friend lost several weeks of writing on her most recent book manuscript when her computer died. She almost lost the entire thing, but was able to find a copy of it that she had emailed to someone.

The other day I wanted to share an essay I had published years ago in an online literary journal. The essay is now missing from their website.

What you create matters. To who you are, and to others who will be moved by your work. Yet, very often, we don’t treat our work with the respect it deserves by preserving it. Today, this is what I would like to talk about how to secure your creative work so that it lasts. And I apologize if this is a boring topic, but I believe in it strongly: please backup your work.

What does this include? The following:

• Your writing
• Your computer
• Your photos
• Your phone
• Your website
• Your email newsletter list
• Your social media accounts

I’ve heard plenty of people avoid this work, concluding, “If I lost my photos (or my website, or social media account), I would just move on. Like the old song: Que Será, Será (Whatever Will Be, Will Be).”

But on a random Tuesday, no one wants to realize that their stuff is missing. No one wants to spend hours on hold with customer service trying to figure out what happened. No one wants to think, “I’m ending the day with less ways to connect with readers than when the day started.”

I will be clear about my recommendations:

• Backup your computer! At the very least, use a cloud-based system such as Dropbox or iCloud. But I would go a step further, and purchase an external hard drive and use software to also backup your entire computer to that too. There are programs that automate this for you.
• Backup your phone! So many people have thousands of photos, their entire contact list, notes, etc. that are never backed up. It’s not that difficult to lose your phone. Some of this, you can backup wirelessly to the cloud. But also consider plugging it in and backing it up to your computer too, for easy access.
• Backup your website! If you are using WordPress or other popular platforms, there are plug-ins that will create automated backups for you. Use those! But I would go a step further, and do manual backups of all the files and the database too.
• Lock down your website! Make sure all of the software is up to date. If you can, use some common plug-ins like Wordfence or Sucuri to apply safety measures.
• Backup your email list! It’s a simple download. If you spent years developing that list, don’t risk it.
• Backup your cloud files! If you use Google docs or other online documents, download copies of critical files so you have local versions too.
• Backup your social media accounts! Did you know that all major social networks will create a simple download file of all of what you share, who you follow, etc? Get the download!
• Backup your published writing! If you shared posts on a blog, newsletter, on Medium, in a book, anything — have backup copies of it that don’t rely on someone else to preserve them.

I would even encourage you to go a step further: have backup systems. Workflows that consider what would happen if one of your tools broke down. For instance, I have redundant backups of my computer. If one goes down, I can immediately work from another. If that goes down too, I have a third I can work from.

I always remembered this moment from an early 2000’s Apple Keynote address. Steve Jobs is on stage doing a demo of some new Apple software, when something goes wrong. Here he is in front of hundreds of people in the audience, with thousands more watching through a livestream, and instead of feeling the glory of showing off an amazing new product, he is showing them an error.

What happened next is why investing in systems matters…

He calmly moves his hand to the right, flips a switch that brings up a backup a computer, and says: “Well that’s why we have backup systems here.” His presentation went on without a hitch. No sweat. No panicked looks to an engineer offstage. No headlines of how badly the keynote went.

Yet so often, writers and creators don’t backup what they create. They don’t invest in systems that protect their ability to create. They don’t preserve their own work. They don’t honor the connections to others they have forged by finding ways to ensure it isn’t at risk.

For the recent issue with my website, I had previously taken lots of steps to protect my it. Or so I thought. Turns out, I had missed quite a bit. Yes, I had backups of my website, but I also had big gaping security holes: old files and software that wasn’t updated. Think of it like this: it’s as if my house had 1,000 extra doors that I didn’t know about. These doors are old, with rotting wood and rusty hinges. When I discovered the problem because my website was down, I took a serious look at things.

I deleted thousands upon thousands of files that I didn’t need, and updated everything else. I added a couple of layers of active protection to ensure I can monitor the health of my website automatically, and am paying for a team of security experts to help clean up the mess and ensure it is now safe. Of course, I made lots of small changes to ensure it was harder for someone to break into my site.

Too often, we see prevention of risk as a cost. I mean, who wants yet another $20 per month fee for security, or to spend 4 hours figuring out how to create backups. But the truth is really the other way around. Prevention is an investment. Here is a non-digital example to illustrate what I mean: I have a friend who is in his 60s, very active and fit, and no stranger to doing serious (and safe) labor. The other day, he was coming down the ladder from his roof holding a pole chainsaw. Suddenly, he fell 7 feet to concrete. He did not land on his feet. Even though he had likely climbed down that ladder hundreds of times, his conclusion was simple: “I’m lucky to be alive.” He had some bruises but no other injuries, and he headed to the hospital to ensure that was the case. He has heard the stories of how an accident like that can cause serious injury or worse.

He’s decided to make changes to how he uses ladders, the kind of precautions that people often skip. He’ll be ensuring there is a second person there to hold the ladder and monitor activity whenever he uses it. Does that make it 3x more complicated to do the work he wants to do? Yep. Could it literally add years to his life? Yep.

I know everyone reading this already has too much to worry about. Why add a list of backup procedures to your to-do list like I’m writing about here? Well, I have found that it encourages me to simplify my platform as a writer. To consider: what is most important to me, how can I protect that, and how can I let everything else go?

So in the past couple weeks, I let go of a lot of old projects hidden on my websites, that turned out to be risking my main business. But that digital cleanup helped me to recommit to what matters. And protecting that feels good.

Much of this work can be automated, and for the rest, you can set simple reminders in your calendar.

I’m curious: when is the last time you backed up the creative work that matters most to you?

Thanks.
-Dan

Join me this Tuesday for a live workshop on Zoom, where we will discuss flipping marketing from fear to joy. Register here. (If you can’t make the live event, register anyway and you will receive a recording.) Okay, on to today’s message….

Often, when an author considers asking a reader to pick up a book, they consider the financial cost. You may see lots of social media posts from an author stating: “The book is on sale, it’s only $9.99! Grab it now!” And while that cost is a factor in whether a reader purchases a book, that is not the primary one. What is? Their attention and time. I just finished reading two biographies, and am coming close to finishing a third. This is the commitment:

• Book #1: print version: 982 pages; audio version: 50 hours and 28 minutes.
• Book #2: print version: 539 pages; audio version: 22 hours and 53 minutes.
• Book #3: print version: 400 pages; audio version: 18 hours and 4 minutes.

Even if I had paid $200 for each book, that would have been worth if for the sheer number of hours of education and entertainment I received from these. But of course, they didn’t cost that much, and the main factors I weighed in buying them was the topic of the book, the writing style, the reviews, and for audiobooks, the narration.

Reading these books is a huge commitment for me as a reader. It’s not just about doing the math of “look how much entertainment value you get for $20, it’s such a deal.” Because there are millions of books. And my interests and attention are, if I were being honest, really specific. So when we consider what it takes to get someone to become aware of your book, to consider it, to purchase it, to read it, and to tell others about it, there is so much more going on here than price. It dives deep into who they are, the experiences they want, committing their very finite resources of time and attention, and how what we create connects with those things.

If you are subscribed to this newsletter, chances are you are a writer or creator. You likely have a goal of figuring out how to share what you create in a way that feels authentic to who you, and that reaches your ideal audience in a meaningful manner. I want to offer you a powerful way to do exactly that, and invite you to join me for a free workshop this Tuesday when we kick off a special challenge that, I hope, will open up some doors to more people becoming aware of you and your writing.

What I will share is practical, and something you can do immediately. Is accessible to first time writers, as well as seasons pros with multiple published books. It’s what I feel works when it comes to how to connect with others around what you create and why.

I mentioned a word in last week’s email: gratitude.I’ve worked full-time with writers for 12 years, and I have found that this word is a powerful way to achieve what so many of you hope for:

• To connect your book with readers in a meaningful way.
• To establish and grow your author platform.
• To find ways to share what you create, with a powerful sense of authenticity.
• To ensure your work truly has an impact in people’s lives.

Sometimes when I see people talk about marketing books, they talk use terms such as “bestseller,” “viral,” “influencer.” And sure, those things are good. If I asked a writer why they would want those things, they would likely answer: “If I had that much attention, I could use it for good. I would help people through my writing.”

But, you can do that right now. Today. And everyday. (Without having to do a viral TikTok dance.)

Gratitude may sound wimpy next to “viral bestselling influencers,” but I honestly think it is more powerful. Not just because it feels good, but it makes for great marketing.

Okay, here is what I’m proposing:

1. Every day for one week, send one email or Direct Message on social media to someone.
2. That message should express gratitude for who that person is, and what they create.
3. That’s it.

Can you make this super strategic in terms of being aligned to your goals as a writer? Sure. You can do a big calculation about which podcasts you would love to be a guest on, and then send a gratitude email with the hopes of getting your foot in the door. But… you can just email someone who has no connection to your writing as well, and thank them.

In Tuesday’s workshop, I’ll dig a lot more into this process, exactly what I recommend writing, and how I’ve done this myself and with many authors I’ve work with.

Often, writers don’t have the powerful asset they need to ensure their book gets attention: a network of colleagues. Yet, if you signed with a big publisher, one of the first things they would send you in terms of marketing is an Author Questionnaire. Basically, they will ask you about everyone you know (and have known), every place you worked, every organization you have a connection with. Why? Because they know that people who know you already, are those who are most likely to support and talk about your book.

I strongly encourage you to develop a community of colleagues around what you create. Gratitude emails are a powerful way to do this. What’s more, they just feel good. What are the goals? Here are a few:

• You will likely discover that you have a bigger network than you think, but that you may have fallen out of touch with many people. Gratitude is a great way to reconnect.
• This process helps you think critically about who else aligns with what you create, and how to reach those people.
• Learning the process of outreach (how to send a simple but effective email) is a critical process in book marketing. Why not practice that skill on something that brightens someone’s day?
• It helps turn marketing from fear to joy. So many writers worry about putting themselves and their books out there. So let’s focus on making people feel good in how you share.

I hope to see you this Tuesday in the workshop. Register here.

Thanks.

-Dan

It is a difficult thing that writers and creators do. Not just the craft of writing, but the way it ties into who we are and how we relate to others.

For the novelists I work with, their stories tend to reflect an entire universe that they see in their mind. So many times I have spoken with writers about how deeply they care for their characters, or how those characters won’t stop talking to them. Of course, the writer must create an entire world around these them as well: the towns, the people, the rules, the context. That world has an infinite number of corners. Who this writer is, the narratives that play in their mind, the actions they cause their characters to take, can often reflect on deeply personal ways the author sees — or want to see — who they are, and who we are. What novelists do is magical, I’m in awe of how an author creates them.

For memoir writers I work with, they are sharing something deeply personal. They are allowing us in to their inner world, and perhaps into the lives of those who they love deeply. Memoir operates in this fascinating space that is a bit autobiography, a bit like a novel in how the story is crafted, and a bit like nonfiction because it is common for the reader to pull incredible life lessons from it. I have read memoirs from authors I work with that I read as if it were a novel. The stories were so well crafted, the narrative arc so beautiful, that it just sucked me into that world. I am always fascinated by what memoir writers do, there is something so delicate to it, so brave about it, and so potentially life-changing for those who read it.

For the nonfiction authors, they are often taking a deep personal experience, expertise, or passion, and helping others to embrace or grow within them. These books open up entire worlds for people. To dig deep into a biography, to finally learn a skill, to understand a time and place you never experienced, these books expand who we are. I always love looking at someone’s personal library of nonfiction books. Seeing where their mind goes when they are learning. How they are trying to grow. What they would love to talk about endlessly for hours. For the nonfiction author, they are demystifying a complex world, and opening up pathways for people. I mean, who couldn’t love that?

Of course, there are many other forms of books and writing, some of which completely defy easy categorization. It will be no surprise to you that this is why writers and creators inspire me. They create something out of nothing every day, and can choose to fit within, or outside of, our existing culture and expectations at will.

I often consider the work I do, and its value in the world. I don’t necessarily help a writer write a better book, though I do sometimes do that by accident. Just yesterday, a writer shared with me that I may have inadvertently helped them determine the next book they will write. My whole life I have surrounded myself with creators, and this is why. The inception for an idea happens when you least expect it.

I help writers and creators share their work. To feel that this idea that started in their mind, could possibly reach someone else, and forge a place of deep meaning or respite in their lives.

I want to ensure my work is truly helping make people’s lives better. That, when I look back on 12 years of doing this full-time, there is a body of work and accomplishments in the lives of writers’ lives that I am proud of. In considering this, I become enamored again with what it means to write and create. Which is why I am writing this now.

Today, I simply want to thank you for writing and creating. For sharing who you are. For exploring what can be.

And thank you for being here with me.
-Dan