Stephanie O'Brien
  • Home
    • About Stephanie
    • Privacy Policy
  • Stories
    • Novels >
      • The Silent Fugitive Series >
        • My Fugitive
        • Voice of a Silent Fugitive
        • Silent Fugitive: The Complete Series
      • Heroic Lies
      • Catgirl Roommate
    • Short Stories >
      • The Aristocrats and the Beasts
      • Upholding the Covenant
      • The Echoes In Our Heart
      • Living Through You
    • Fanfiction >
      • Undertale - Just Cause >
        • Just Cause, Chapter 2
        • Just Cause, Chapter 3
        • Just Cause, Chapter 4
        • Just Cause, Chapter 5
        • Just Cause, Chapter 6
        • Just Cause, Chapter 7
        • Just Cause, Chapter 8
        • Just Cause, Chapter 9
        • Just Cause, Chapter 10
        • Just Cause, Chapter 11
        • Just Cause, Chapter 12
        • Just Cause, Chapter 13
        • Just Cause, Chapter 14
        • Just Cause, Chapter 15
        • Just Cause, Chapter 16
        • Just Cause, Chapter 17
        • Just Cause, Chapter 18
      • Skyrim - Your Truth Cannot Stand >
        • Skyrim - Your Truth Cannot Stand, Chapter 2
        • Skyrim - Your Truth Cannot Stand, Chapter 3
        • Skyrim - Your Truth Cannot Stand, Chapter 4
        • Skyrim - Your Truth Cannot Stand, Chapter 5
        • Skyrim - Your Truth Cannot Stand, Chapter 6
        • Skyrim - Your Truth Cannot Stand, Chapter 7
        • Skyrim - Your Truth Cannot Stand, Chapter 8
        • Skyrim - Your Truth Cannot Stand, Chapter 8
        • Skyrim - Your Truth Cannot Stand, Chapter 9
        • Skyrim - Your Truth Cannot Stand, Chapter 10
        • Skyrim - Your Truth Cannot Stand, Chapter 11
        • Skyrim - Your Truth Cannot Stand, Chapter 12
        • Skyrim - Your Truth Cannot Stand, Chapter 13
        • Skyrim - Your Truth Cannot Stand, Chapter 14
      • Farscape - Means to an End
      • Don't Starve - Four Times I Begged Them
      • Avengers Endgame - Baby Pictures: How Endgame Should Have Ended
      • Subnautica Below Zero - It Will Be Okay
      • Subnautica Below Zero - Regrets of Sellswords and Scientists
      • Subnautica Below Zero - Naked Secrecy
      • Subnautica Below Zero - I Wish You Were​
      • Wakfu - Echoes of Bitter Comfort
    • Undertale Webcomic - Just Cause
  • Art & Commissions
    • Commissions
    • NFTs
    • Undertale Fan Art
    • Farscape pictures
  • Merch
    • Pride flag art
    • Abstract art
    • Symmetrical art
    • Floral art
    • Animal and People Art
    • Text Art
  • Videos
    • Art Videos
    • All Farscape Videos
    • Funny Farscape Videos
    • Peaceful Farscape Videos
    • Energetic Farscape Videos
    • Farscape Songs
    • Undertale Videos
    • Extended Songs
  • Patreon & Ko-Fi
    • Patreon
    • Ko-Fi
  • Contact
  • Blog

Writing Stories or Engaging With Fans: How to Balance Writing and Social Media

19/9/2017

0 Comments

 
Picture
I recently had an interesting conversation with some of my fellow writers who were struggling with social media addiction.

They wanted to focus on creating content, but they felt compelled to continuously check their notifications on their favorite social channels.

As a result, they were struggling to actually make time for writing, because they were spending so much time online.

But as I pointed out, social media addiction isn't 100% a bad thing. I have the opposite problem: if left to my natural tendencies, I'll sink into content creation mode and forget to check my social media for weeks.

If it isn't in my calendar, it probably just isn't happening!

​I have to schedule dedicated social media times into my calendar several times a week, to make sure my messages and replies don't end up sitting neglected.

Obviously, writing is important. But if you don't put your work out there and engage with your audience, then all that content creation is nothing more than a secret hobby.

How can writing hermits and social media addicts find balance?

Obviously, this isn't a question with a one-size-fits-all answer. Different audiences hang out in different places and want different levels of engagement, and different authors have different strengths, styles and challenges.

In this section, I'm going to give you some guidelines you can use to create a social media management schedule that works for you.

1. First, get clear on your goals and needs.

All the planning in the world is worthless unless you know result that plan is supposed to create.

That being the case, your first step is to get clear on what you want to accomplish through your online interactions.

Do you want to build a highly engaged audience that eagerly snaps up each new story you put out, and that readily shares your content with their friends?

Give people a way to contact you and to stay informed about your latest projects?

Learn about your industry and hone your craft?

Just have fun?

Once you're clear on what you want to accomplish, you can work from there to create a plan to accomplish it.

2. Determine what you're good at and what your writing career needs.

As noted above, different authors have different strengths and styles, and different people have different needs.

So in this step, you need to look at what you need and what you're equipped to provide.

If you're self-published and doing most of your book marketing yourself, being a social media addict can work in your favor, as long as you focus your social time mostly on interacting with current and potential readers or with people who can give you exposure to more readers.

If you're more of a hermit, like me, then you should probably still spend some time on social media, but you may need to deliberately set aside time for it.

Put it in your calendar to check your social media channels every day or two, answer any messages or replies you have, and post helpful comments and questions in groups that are relevant to your genre.

But what if you're traditionally published, your career doesn't need that level of social media interaction, it DOES need you to spend more time on writing, and yet you still can't pull away from the siren song of your notification icons?

3. Set boundaries.

If your social media addiction has reached the point where it's preventing you from writing, there will be times when you need to draw the line.

If you can't have your social media page open without constantly checking it, then log out, close the tab, and mute any notifications that you can get even when you're logged out, if that's what it takes.

You don't necessarily have to do this all day, but if you can't focus on your writing for any length of time unless you do this, set aside a chunk of time and commit to working until that time is over.

How long this time increment is will depend on your attention span. If you can work for an hour straight, awesome! If not, try scheduling four different chunks of fifteen minutes into your day.

One method I use is to find an hour-long song compilation or a fifteen-minute song extension on YouTube, set it going, and keep working until the music stops.

This makes writing more enjoyable, and it's a constant audio reminder to stay focused. It also gives me a clear indication of when the assigned time increment is over, without the threat of a jarring, startling alarm hanging over my head and tugging the edges of my concentration.

But what if closing out your social media windows feels like too big a commitment, and your reluctance to finish your social session and close the tabs actually makes you spend MORE time on the sites?

In that case, I recommend putting all your social media tabs in one window and minimizing that window, so you aren't constantly seeing the tempting tabs while looking at your other tasks.


4. Use scheduling software to avoid temptation.

If part of your social media strategy involves posting on your page or profile once a day, and you can't do that without getting sucked into the inexorable whirlpool of your notifications or timeline feed, it's best to find a way to post content without even seeing that temptation.

If this is an ongoing challenge for you, a social media scheduler that can post content to your channels without you actually logging into those channels can be invaluable.

Personally, I use Hootsuite, but there are other options available if you don't like that one.

Do you have any tips to help writing hermits engage with their readers, or to help social media addicts to focus on their writing?

I'd love to hear from you in the comments!

0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Author

    Stephanie is the author of My Fugitive, Voice of a Silent Fugitive, Heroic Lies, and Catgirl Roommate, as well as the artist behind the Undertale webcomic Just Cause.

    This blog often updates with new stories and artwork, so please keep checking in!

    Categories

    All
    Art
    Art Tips
    Behind The Scenes
    Comic Dubs
    Don't Starve
    Excerpt
    Fan Art
    Fanfiction
    Farscape
    Flash Fiction
    Humor
    Interactive
    Just Cause
    Madoka Magica
    MCU
    Music
    Music Videos
    Observations And Opinions
    Other People's Blog Posts
    Personal Stories
    Poetry
    Print On Demand
    Reviews
    Romance Writing Tips
    Special Opportunities
    Subnautica
    The Elder Scrolls
    Underfell
    Undertale Fan Art
    Updates About My Novels
    Videos
    Wakfu
    Works In Progress
    Writing Tips

    Archive

    March 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012

    RSS Feed

Proudly powered by Weebly