February 21, 2022

Lisa Norman

by Lisa Norman

It seems like whenever I talk to folks about social media, someone brings up how toxic the environment is these days.

They're not wrong.

But there is a cure!

I took a cooking class on how to use a knife. The teacher said one thing that stuck with me. "Remember, don't let the food tell you what to do. You're the one holding the knife."

In our social media experiences, it is easy to get swept up in the drama and carried away. We focus on numbers, quantity instead of quality.

We see the urgent, the surface level.

And social media becomes a danger zone that we avoid rather than the powerful marketing tool we need it to be.

Don't let the trolls define your social media presence. You're the one in charge. You're the one holding the metaphorical knife. Don't be afraid to use it!

Here are some techniques to detox your social media platform.

#1 - Create a Persona

Think about who you are as a writer. Think about who you want to be. If you were going to present in front of a large group of people, would you wear your sweat pants? Maybe you would. If that's your persona — no judgment from me!

But most people would dress up.

We don't see this as lying. This is just presenting our best public face.

Are you the same person when you go to a concert as you are sitting around watching Netflix? Yes. But you probably present yourself differently.

These are all variations on our persona.

As an author on social media, you want to present your best social media persona.

I knew an author who was known for hard-hitting, gritty adventure stories. These were not nice stories. He was not nice on social media. In real life, he was polite, kind, and helpful. But on social media, he was a total jerk.

Why did this work for him? Because his fans loved it. He had fun with it. This was the side of his personality that his fans wanted to see.

As a human being, he was both nice and a jerk. He wasn't lying when he was being nice, nor was he lying when he was being a jerk. He showed people the side of his personality that they wanted to see.

Who do your fans expect to see?

The reason they have these expectations is based on our style promise, the stories that we choose to write, and the author's voice that we use.

It gives you space. This persona is like a suit of armor — or a business suit — that you put on before going into this public arena.

It can also keep you from making costly mistakes.

Think about your persona before you post.

For example, if you write sweet romance, your fans probably don't expect you to be posting triggering political comments.

#2 - Learn how the platforms work

Each platform has its own method for choosing who you follow and who can post to your feed.

Take a few minutes to learn how to:

follow — and unfollow — people
mute someone permanently or temporarily
delete a comment on a post
ban someone from posting to your feed
report someone for misconduct or if reporting is allowed

Then judiciously apply these new tools.

Example: a friend of mine got really worked up about a topic and started posting all over social media about it. This particular topic was triggering for me. It made me feel sick every time I saw it. I tried to talk to her privately, but she was adamant.

I didn't want to unfollow her. She's a friend. I wanted to see other things that were going on in her life. But that topic was toxic to my sanity.

So, I muted her for a couple of weeks. Then I unmuted her and checked. She'd moved on.

We stayed friends and I didn't have to see the toxic sludge.

#3 - Guard your space — for yourself and your fans

We're writers. Our fans are often coming to us to escape from reality.

We have a responsibility to make our space safe for them. We also have a responsibility to ourselves and our families to keep ourselves as sane as possible.

As creatives, our creative muse is a fragile creature. It doesn't take too much to damage that creativity. If we want to write, we need to protect our muse.

We need to know the available tools and we need to apply them.

#4 - Never feed the trolls

In social media, some people are just trolls. They ask for money. They spout nonsense or spew profanity, not because there is an actual problem but because they are trolls. This is what trolls do.

If you acknowledge them, they multiply. They bring their friends.

Ban them, delete them, ignore them. They'll get bored and go bother someone else.

I first learned telemarketing many years ago. My boss told me that when I was on the phone I should have a mirror in front of me. I needed to make sure I was smiling.

People are attracted to people who are having fun.

You can hear a smile even through a telephone or a mask.

You can tell if someone is having fun on social media.

People are attracted to fun.

If you take part in a toxic social media environment because you think you need to in order to sell books, guess what? It probably won't work. You won't be having fun.

A Cautionary Tale

We've all seen examples of toxic social media. I recently saw one person battle — and survive — a toxic moment on social media. With his permission, I'd like to show you what happened, what he did wrong, and how he course-corrected to come out on top.

I'm a big fan of a TikTok personality, "Old Trucker." He is a truck driver who has a cat named Popeye as his companion in the truck.

Here's one of his most popular videos:

https://www.tiktok.com/@old_trucker/video/7056517534186589487

The persona: Let's think about Trucker's persona: he's cheerful, and... it really is mostly about the cat. He covers other topics occasionally, and as I've gotten to know him over a few months of watching his videos, I've become interested in the house he's building, the routes he's driving, and of course... the cat.

What happened

A troll, possibly more than one, began impersonating him and trying to extort money from his fans and from him.

Compare the popular video above to this one:

https://www.tiktok.com/@old_trucker/video/7062250663648120110

Remember his persona. People want joy and cheerfulness from him. They don't want sad trucker. Look at that second video again. See how that toxicity has affected his presentation? It is painful to watch. There were other videos, even worse, but TikTok has removed them. Yes, you heard that right. TikTok deleted his videos, but not the troll's fake accounts.

A bunch of folks popped in and encouraged him to ignore the troll.

How the platform works: TikTok is much more likely to ban you for being aggressive to a troll than to ban the troll. He tried to report the troll, and TikTok retaliated against him for posting videos about the troll. But fans can report the troll as an impersonator.

Now, let's play a game. Can you tell the trucker from the trolls?

The real Old Trucker has over 363 thousand followers. The fakes aren't even touching a fraction of his followers. In fact, it doesn't take much work to spot the real one. If you look at their profiles, they have fewer videos.

What he did wrong

He fed the troll. When a friend told him about the troll asking them for money, he didn't tell the friend to report it. He took action. He thought he could scare the troll into backing down.

The troll reported him for harassment and almost got Old Trucker kicked off TikTok.

Trucker wanted to protect his fans. But here's the thing: his fans are pretty smart people. They're not generally just going to give money to a random stranger. You see, Old Trucker doesn't ask for money. He just shares his joy and his cat.

How he course-corrected to come out on top

He realized that in order to protect his fans, he also needed to take care of himself. He found his joy.

His fans have rallied around and are sharing the information for him, reporting the fake.

Here's a more recent video:

https://www.tiktok.com/@old_trucker/video/7063439083313450287

On that video, someone tried to bait him into talking politics. Here's his response:

As you can see in previous videos. I keep my page free of politics. My page is not a political outlet.
Old Trucker - keeping his platform safe!

That is how you keep your social media safe for your fans. It is respectful and clear. If someone violates that policy, he can remove their comment and block them from posting on his stream. He’s learned how to use his tools.

And now we have more joyous, encouraging cat videos!

Have you seen toxicity on social media? What can you do to protect yourself and your fans? Please bring your stories and any questions down to the comments!

About Lisa

Lisa Norman's passion has been writing since she could hold a pencil. While that is a cliché, she is unique in that her first novel was written on gum wrappers. As a young woman, she learned to program and discovered she has a talent for helping people and computers learn to work together and play nice. When she's not playing with her daughter, writing, or designing for the web, she can be found wandering the local beaches.

Lisa writes as Deleyna Marr and is the owner of Deleyna's Dynamic Designs, a web development company focused on helping writers, and Heart Ally Books, an indie publishing firm. She teaches for Lawson Writer's Academy.

Interested in learning more from Lisa? See her teaching schedule below.

Classes:

March: Crazy Easy Social Media for Authors
May: Digital Organization Skills for Authors
June: Crazy Easy Awesome-Author Websites

Credits:

Sad Troll Image by OpenClipart-Vectors from Pixabay.

Old_Trucker's example used with permission. Cat image is a still from one of Trucker's videos. Now that's a happy, relaxed cat!

Know Your Motivation

Image looking down at a man's hands typing on a manual typewriter, he's typing a list of things I wish I knew before I published

You are a writer. You already know how much self-discipline it takes to write a book from first idea to polished product. Applying the seat of your pants to the seat of your chair may not be a problem for you when you’re writing. That kind of motivation is a big picture motivation. But what about the other stuff that a successful author must do?

Motivation for the Traditionally Published

A traditional publishing company will create deadlines relayed to you by your editor. Revisions are due on this date, approval of copywriting is due on a different date. Motivation to complete those tasks cannot be the money or the hope of publishing fame. It takes a distinct set of self-discipline skills to finish creative tasks in a certain time frame. Your publisher may dictate other things as well. Your contract may dictate where and when you make appearances. It doesn’t matter if you don’t feel like it. It’s part of your contract.

These situations and time-frames do not have to be negative. Many authors have very pleasant and lucrative relationships with traditional publishing. Educate yourself on what to expect. Ask authors published by that company what their experience has been like. Know what your contract obligations are. Understand yourself, your self-discipline, and your expectations. Be prepared and you won’t lack motivation.

Motivation for the Independent Author-Publisher

When you’re self-employed, no one will yell at you if you’re late to work or even skip a day. You have no boss to remind you of your deadlines. You must be self-motivated enough to glue your butt to the chair to get the work done.

Winging it isn’t the path to success. Have a plan. Have tools ready to help you stay on track. You also will need tools to get back on track when you’re depressed or after a hurtful review or an illness. When you are self-employed, you have to be worker bee, cheerleader, and taskmaster, sometimes all at once.

What I Wish I Knew About Motivation

I do not lack motivation to write. I love the entire process, from idea creation to rough draft to editing and polishing. What I wish I knew from the beginning was that I needed a system to ensure all the other tasks get done. I also wish I’d found the motivation to learn self-promotion techniques earlier.

What to Know About Copyright

Image of the copyright symbol on a white page, wrapped with a chain and secured with a padlock, one of the things I wish I knew before I published

Every author needs to understand the copyright laws of their nation and know if their nation takes part in international copyright agreements and what those agreements are.

The Library of Congress is the largest library in the world. It is the research library of the U.S. Congress, the U.S. national library, and home to the Copyright Office. Tens of millions of works have registered copyrights and are in the Library of Congress. As a research library, they do not check out materials. Researchers use materials in-house only.

The Copyright Law of the United States (Title 17), is a long and complicated document. Do you need to read it in its entirety? Probably not, but you should consider it. The more you know….

Part of US copyright law says is from the moment you commit an intellectual property to a permanent or semi-permanent media (paper, computer, disc, etc.) you own the copyright to that work. It also says the owner of the copyright can sell or transfer parts or all of the rights.

It does not guarantee you the legal right to sue for compensation if someone has violated your copyright. For that, you must register your copyright with the U.S. Copyright Office before the offense occurs.

Disclaimer: I am not an intellectual property rights attorney. It is your responsibility to understand copyright laws and seek legal advice from professionals as needed.

What Traditional Publishers Know About Copyright

Registered copyright is pretty important in the world of traditional publishing. So important that the publisher takes care of it. Look at any traditionally published book on your bookshelves, you’ll see the notice. They also register the book with the Library of Congress.

What Independent Publishers Know About Copyright

Unfortunately, too few independent authors understand copyright law. Many feel it is unimportant to register their work. Others still think that mailing a copy of their manuscript to themselves in a sealed envelope secures their copyright. It does not.

There is a cost to registering your copyright, though in the grand scheme of things it is not much. The registration process can take a month or more. Time many independent author-publishers do not want to spend. They feel getting the product out and selling is more important.

But a registered copyright is proof of ownership if ownership comes into doubt.

What I Wish I Knew About Copyright

I wish I knew more about registering copyright and getting my books in the Library of Congress before I published. It would have been nice to know one must register the copyright within three months of having published a work. (My bad. I should have done more research.) And I wish I’d known more about how to get my books into public libraries. (Hint: having a registered copyright helps.)

Know How to Protect Your Rights

Cartoon image of a police officer on one side of a copyright symbol on a red page that a thief is creeping out of

From plagiarism to piracy, content thieves are everywhere. So all authors need to know how to protect themselves and their rights.

Plagiarism refers to someone presenting your words as theirs. Piracy is when a website or person takes a copy of your book without your authorization and places that book on the internet for people to download either for free or for profit. Sometimes a pirate puts up a copy of your book’s cover for sale but doesn’t have your book and has no intention of selling anything. These pirates are after the credit card and identity information entered by unsuspecting buyers. Depending upon the laws of the nation(s) involved, this may not be copyright infringement but would be fraud.

It is illegal to publish any copyrighted book without permission. Even reading an illegally published book is illegal. Yet, E-piracy is big business. It affects all authors regardless of their publishing path. Just as the internet makes publishing easy for us, it makes it easier for thieves to steal. It’s also easy to hide identities, locations, and if one site gets shut down, another pops up somewhere else.

What Traditional Publishers Know About Piracy

Traditional publishers often have a team of intellectual property lawyers. As a result, some pirates consider traditionally published books more risky and avoid them.

What publishers know is that they have to defend their copyright in order to keep it. When they receive notification of an infringement, the publisher’s attorneys send a cease-and-desist letter. The attorneys may send a more strongly worded letter or start legal proceedings if the website doesn’t take down the book.

What Independent Author-Publishers Know About Piracy

Should you worry? Yes, and no. When you learn an unauthorized copy of your work is online, you need to protect your copyright. (If you don’t, your right to legal recourse may be damaged.) You’ll need to find out who owns the website and send them a cease and desist letter. You can find detailed information, letter templates, and other resources here or by contacting any reputable intellectual property attorney. (Note: Some attorneys offer an initial brief consultation for free.)

Many authors see e-piracy as a modern form of book-lending. Others see it as free publicity. There is some truth to both statements if the book is being offered for free. You will need to decide what you will tolerate.

What I Wish I Knew About E-piracy Before I Published

E-piracy was big news when I started my publishing career and read a lot about it before I published. I knew there was a strong likelihood that a pirate would steal my book. And I knew that there was little chance a pirate would make any money on an unknown author like me. But I wish I’d known how to uncover a pirate's identity.

I also wish I knew not to engage with readers who think “information should be free.” I wish I’d understood that readers who intentionally download pirated books aren’t important to an author’s career. Most readers buy the books they want to read.

Know Your Reader

Practically every article on self-publishing includes the admonishment: Know Your Readers. It’s well-intentioned but leaves beginning independent author-publishers out in the cold. How can you know your readers when you don’t have any readers yet? How can you find out about your readers when only your writer’s group has read your book?

What “know your reader” means is knowing the genre you write well enough to know the tropes. Use the tropes of your genre in your fiction. Give those tropes, that genre, your unique twist, one that readers of that genre will enjoy. That twist makes your readers, your readers. Know what twist they expect from you.

Do Traditional Publishers Know Your Readers?

Maybe. Traditional publishers shepherd hundreds of books into the book world. That means their goals are not the same as the author’s goals. The author wants people to read their book, to earn money from their book, and maybe to gain some fame. The publisher wants to keep the big business engine running. They buy books they think will sell. They decide which books are potential bestsellers and invest most of their time and money into those books. The rest of the books they publish need to make money in order to support those best-selling books.

Traditional publishers use a team, and a lot of shortcuts to keep churning out books. The first reader reads the manuscript and recommends it to the editor. The editor reads the book on the subway, during meals at her desk, or late at night. She may be the last person at your publisher who reads the book. She presents a synopsis of the book and why she thinks it’s the one to publish to a team that usually includes the editor-in-chief (the title varies), marketing, art department, and all the other editors on that team who are presenting books they want published. The editor-in-chief can’t accept all the books even if she wants.

Often, marketing and art departments decide what cover and marketing effort to make based on that brief description of the book and on what they think will sell.

Do they know your readers? Typically, the editors focus on a specific type or genre of book. One team reads and publishes science fiction, another does romance, another does nonfiction, etc. So they know the genre. They know what sells (or they should). But they don’t know your readers. If you have a bestseller, they may focus more on your readers. But as a substantial business, they cannot focus on the small stuff. Therefore, you must. How? In much the same way the independent author-publisher does.

Do Independent Author-Publishers Know Their Readers?

Some independent author-publishers really get their readers. Many do not.

Knowing your reader is more than creating a faux person you imagine being like your readers. Know your brand, your genre, and where your readers (or potential readers) hang out online. Be where they are. Learn what they think is fun, what they like to talk about endlessly. Cultivating huge lists of followers on social media can be helpful, but not all followers are engaged readers.

Be authentic and within your brand when interacting with readers. Create and maintain an email list of engaged readers.

What I Wish I Knew About Knowing My Readers

I wish I’d understood what the phrase meant earlier than I did and figured out my brand sooner. I wish I had understood that not knowing my “exact” readers was okay. Most of all, I wish I had understood that readers are far more forgiving than all the “publishing experts” imply they are. You don’t have to be perfect to start.

Oh, the Things I Wish I Knew Before I Published

Yes. There are a lot of things I wish I knew beforehand, but I remind myself that I am only one person. Traditional publishers have multiple people working on specific parts of book production (including copyright) because it’s nearly impossible for one person to know it all. So yes, I wish I knew more, but I’m glad not knowing didn’t stop me. Publishing is a big and complicated world. You can be successful and learn what you need to know when you need to know it. The best part is that you get to choose your own adventure, mix and match, or change paths according to your own needs, opportunities, and goals.

What does your publishing adventure look like? Are there things you wish you'd known earlier? Please share your story with us down in the comments section!

About Lynette

Lynette M. Burrows loves coffee, reading physical books, and the crack of a 9mm pistol—not all at the same time, though they all show up in her stories. She writes science fiction about characters with the determination and strength to make courageous choices about self, family, and life.

Her series, The Fellowship Dystopia, presents a frightening familiar American tyranny that never was but could have been or may be. In My Soul to Keep, Miranda will fight the tyrants, even if they are family, even if it means her death. Book two of the series, If I Should Die, will be published in the spring of 2022.

In Fellowship, the series companion novel, a desperate young man and his siblings must find the one who betrayed their parents before government agents find him and his siblings.

Owned by two Yorkshire Terriers, Lynette lives in the land of Oz. You can find her online at her website, on Facebook, or on Twitter @LynetteMBurrows.

Image Credits

First photo by Vlad Deep on Unsplash
Second and third image by mohamed Hassan from Pixabay
Final image by Angel Hernandez from Pixabay

Know Your Motivation

You are a writer. You already know how much self-discipline it takes to write a book from first idea to polished product. Applying the seat of your pants to the seat of your chair may not be a problem for you when you’re writing. That kind of motivation is a big picture motivation. But what about the other stuff that a successful author must do?

Motivation for the Traditionally Published

A traditional publishing company will create deadlines relayed to you by your editor. Revisions are due on this date, approval of copywriting is due on a different date. Motivation to complete those tasks cannot be the money or the hope of publishing fame. It takes a distinct set of self-discipline skills to finish creative tasks in a certain time frame. Your publisher may dictate other things as well. Your contract may dictate where and when you make appearances. It doesn’t matter if you don’t feel like it. It’s part of your contract.

These situations and time-frames do not have to be negative. Many authors have very pleasant and lucrative relationships with traditional publishing. Educate yourself on what to expect. Ask authors published by that company what their experience has been like. Know what your contract obligations are. Understand yourself, your self-discipline, and your expectations. Be prepared and you won’t lack motivation.

Motivation for the Independent Author-Publisher

When you’re self-employed, no one will yell at you if you’re late to work or even skip a day. You have no boss to remind you of your deadlines. You must be self-motivated enough to glue your butt to the chair to get the work done.

Winging it isn’t the path to success. Have a plan. Have tools ready to help you stay on track. You also will need tools to get back on track when you’re depressed or after a hurtful review or an illness. When you are self-employed, you have to be worker bee, cheerleader, and taskmaster, sometimes all at once.