Tag: facebook

What’s in a name? Adjusting one’s eplatform.

For the last ten or twelve years, I’ve worked on building an e-platform that will hold me in good stead when I begin marketing my books in earnest. You know my books right? Well maybe not yet, but you will. Currently they are “works in progress,” or “making the rounds,” or “on submission.” Nevertheless, I have great faith that they will be published and when they are, they will need to be marketed and publicized.

I have spent much of my time (probably too much) keeping up with the newest social media marketing trends all under the name Anna J. Boll. However, recent unexpected life events have brought me to a new path, and I have decided to take back my birth name for my professional and personal life.

Cyberspace, meet Anna Eleanor Jordan.

I am not unique in this. People get divorced and married and divorced (1 divorce every 36 seconds according to this). What is newish and more difficult is changing the e-platform that is so much a part of modern daily existence.

Luckily my Twitter handle was @annawritedraw (no need to change)…

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…but my email, and Facebook had to change. My name-based gmail has been relatively simple (although it ends up being crazy long because shorter versions were taken), and I can easily have the old gmail forward to the new. Facebook gives you a spot for a parenthetical name which is nice.

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Pinterest even allows you to choose your own URL suffix. (I went with annawritedraw to make it the same as Twitter.)

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I’ve yet to deal with LinkedIn (which I use only for people I can recommend or for those who can recommend me) and this very webpage has to change.

Creative Chaos will eventually be found at annaejordan.com as soon as I figure out how to forward it properly.

But then there are other less public things. All the sites that I subscribe to, usernames, and passwords need to be changed and updated and on and on. In fact, it is a veritable web – intricate and extensive – of minutiae alterations. Just when I think I’m done, there are another thousand bits to change.

What’s not going to change is my commitment to the kidlit community, or my writing, or my passion for championing diversity in children’s literature, or my love of books, poetry, art and illustration, education, family, and matching children with wonderful new literature. Thanks to all for the support that I’ve received thus far and thanks for your patience with my spotty posting.

See! I still have to change my bio below, ugh, and Goodreads, and…

 

 

Member Monday: Getting the most from Social Media

This weekend I had lunch with some wonderful, experienced NESCBWI writers and illustrators who are, like many in the industry, a little overwhelmed and perplexed by social media. They wonder if they have to do everything– Facebook, Twitter, Pintrest, Goodreads… They want to know how they are supposed to have time to still do their work if they are busy posting status updates and being cyber-social with everyone on their list. They want to know what their ROI (Return on Investment) will be once they take the time to learn and then use social media platforms.

I’m not a social media expert but here’s what I’ve gleaned from listening to editors, agents, and other writers/illustrators about the subject:

  1. If you don’t like it, don’t do it.
    Social media is at its cyber-heart– social. Whatever platform you adopt should be one that you enjoy and that you will do regularly. If you don’t want to put the time into blogging– don’t blog.  If you don’t enjoy perusing Facebook updates or following others on Twitter, your friends and followers will know. Take some time to be familiar with the various sites out there and make an informed decision. This is one of my favorite explanations:

    Social Media Explained From Geek.com
  2. Once you decide on a social media site, take the time to learn about it. Watch a few tutorial videos, read a few blogs so that you can maximize the time you waste put into it in the future. Most of these sites have ways to make groups so that you can view your close friends, your writer/illustrator friends, and industry professionals separately. Learn how to search for keywords that are important to what you do. There are a bunch of “Third-Party Applications” that you can use to follow more than one social media site at a time. I’m currently using one called Tweetdeck but I hear that Hootsuite is good too. I’ve included a few links here to other blogs that review/discuss these and more. This one has an interesting graph that shows the variety of apps out there: THIRD-PARTY TWITTER APPS STILL THRIVING This one is a review post: 8 of the Best Third-Party Twitter Apps for iOS [App List]
  3. What goes around, comes around. Even if you are doing this to expand your marketing platform, no one will follow/friend you if all you do is toot your own horn. Pass on industry info, help launch other people– in general, be a good neighbor in the kidlitosphere. No one really knows what the ROI is. Does social media really sell books? Maybe not. One thing marketing professionals agree on is that word of mouth is very powerful. I can tell you that if I follow a link to your book and I’m interested, it goes on my Goodreads list which I pull up on my phone every time I go to the library or  bookstore. That’s social media in action.
  4. Set some limits for yourself. You can set time limits. (ex: I will look at Twitter for 15 minutes three times a day.) Or day limits. (ex: I will make Monday and Friday mornings my marketing time.) Or carrot limits. (ex: If I write 1500 words today/ finish the color study on this spread, I will go online.) If you don’t have this kind of self-control, there are productivity programs that you can set to block your own internet. Freedom. Or you can literally unplug your router. Remember, if you don’t DO THE WORK: write, read, draw, paint, focus on craft– there will be nothing to market.
  5. The party goes on without you. I distinctly remember when my parents would have parties (I was about five years old) and I wouldn’t really want to go to bed. I’d sit on the stairs and watch them talk until I got so tired I’d fall asleep on the landing. At some point, Dad would take me up to my bed, but the party went on. In the social media party, you will always miss something. Make your peace with it. Look at whatever is on your screen at the time, set your limits and then move on with your life. Cyber space is vast. Don’t fall into a black hole.


Five on Friday and a Poem

1. The SCBWI Conference was a great break from the studio. I’m back, and working with the ideas from the Revision Workshop with Cheryl Klein. I’d like to report that I’m moving forward at great speeds but that would be a lie. I spent the week writing a letter to myself, processing the good, the bad, and the ugly about the manuscript. I also wrote the flap copy and tried the “summarize your novel in one sentence exercise.” Perhaps I shouldn’t be so hard on myself. I urge my own students to spend time on prewriting to make the writing easier– this is all necessary pre-revision work that will save me time later on.

2. I’d be less hard on myself if I wasn’t aware of all the time I “wasted” this week. As you can see, I’ve moved my blog to WordPress.com in part because of the page building aspect of the site. My website was terribly outdated and I appreciate the ease with which I can change things in WordPress. However, like everything, there is a learning curve (with all of its fumbling, backtracking, exploring, searching) takes time away from writing. Also, most of it goes on when my children are asleep which means I am up too late and tired through the day. This too, slows production and puts me on shaky emotional ground. Yesterday, just before I had to pick up a kiddo  I thought I had lost all my work. I rolled up to the school 15 minutes late, exhausted, and weepy. “What am I doing?” I asked my very wise yet young son. “This stupid website is supposed to advertise my writing. If I’m not a writer, what’s the point?!” He patted my shoulder, “Shhh. You are a great writer. You just need a nap.”

3. My efforts with two other members of the Brunswick community to make April 26th Poem in Your Pocket Day is moving along nicely. We have a variety of events that are being planned including a community poetry open mic night, and a presentation by Wesley McNair our Maine Poet Laureate. We are applying for grants to cover the cost of flyers, school visits/programs, and stickers. On April 26th people are encouraged to wear the sticker and carry a Poem in their Pocket to read to others. Please visit our newly minted Facebook page and “like” us.

4. The deployment is officially one month down. I’m humbly accepting Sunday dinner invitations for my family.

5. The triathlon season is just around the corner. First tri, April 15th. Writing down publicly makes it much more real and imminent. Happily, I signed up for a spinning class that fits my schedule perfectly. The teacher said she’d also be teaching a tri prep class on Mondays and Fridays. While I could train on my own, I know that I’ll be much more consistant if I join the class.

A Prayer
by Anna Boll

Oh, Dear Tech Gods,
let technology help me today.
Allow me to be more productive,
not less.
Watch over my computer
do not let it crash.
Keep my documents safe.
May my website, web
my downloads, load
my plugins, plug
my widgets, widge.
As I tweet
and blog
and update
and friend,
grow my platform.
Protect me from hackers
so I may keep my identity
to procrastinate another day.