Marketing Tips for Authors on Twitter

If you’re an author who is looking to grow their Twitter following, you probably have a lot of questions. What types of posts get the most impressions? How often can you post links to your books? What kind of content can you reasonably schedule ahead of time?

I’ll answer those questions and more in this post. Here are my top 10 marketing tips for authors on Twitter.

Now, disclaimer, I don’t have a massive Twitter following. As of writing this post, I have 1,281 followers. I also don’t put a massive amount of time into my Twitter (for marketing purposes) because I use it to connect with other authors, keep up to date with their book news, and share my latest posts and updates on my weekly episodes for my Kindle Vella stories. I don’t put as much energy into having a huge following as I do interacting with authors that I actually like to get updates from.

However, I have managed social media accounts for other authors as well as a small press publisher, so if your goal is to get a larger following, these tips can certainly help. This post was inspired by a recent unfollowing spree I had to go on because of authors that were spamming their books every ten minutes and generally not engaging with their followers in any sort of meaningful way.

Marketing Tip #1: Schedule Tweets Ahead of Time

You don’t have to use a content management system, such as Hootsuite or Buffer, to schedule your tweets. Simply click the calendar button on the bottom of the “New Tweet” box and choose a time that works for you.

It can be helpful to schedule at least one post per week so that your account stays active even if you are busy writing and don’t open your social media for a month. However, it isn’t reasonable to just schedule hundreds of posts and then forget about it.

If you pose a question, such as “Who is your favorite author?” be available to respond to comments. Don’t just throw question after question into the Twitterverse and then miss the opportunity to reply to the comments. This type of interaction is gold for Twitter, which finds its success in creating interesting engagements for followers.

Marketing Tip #2: Know the Type of Posts Your Audience Connects With

Even if you don’t use Twitter, you are likely to come across snarky tweets that have been reposted to Facebook or Reddit. These posts typically are only text with some brief observation or comment from the original poster, known as the OP. Text posts can be very successful for authors too, especially when sharing big news like signing to an agent, publisher, or announcing a new book you are writing.

But posts that include some sort of imagery, be it photo or video, are often better for getting people’s attention when they are scrolling. These posts tend to perform better but only if the images are high resolution and aesthetic. Know your strengths and don’t create image posts if you don’t know how to make high-resolution ones. (Hint: Canva and BookBrush are two resources that make this incredibly simple.)

Marketing Tip #3: Be Active in the #WritingCommunity

I’m so happy that I decided to join twitter!! Between reading and responding to SO MANY wonder people in the #WritingCommunity I’ve just about completed my rough rough draft for chapter one of my yet-to-be-named story.

Question for you self-published:
Do you use beta readers?

— Amanda-Carrie von Grüsse (@Amanda_Carrie1) November 14, 2021

Most people will tell you that the truth is that most people don’t buy books from Twitter. First, Twitter doesn’t sell books itself so people must click a link to go to another site. If someone is on Twitter, there is a good chance they intend to continue scrolling for some time and won’t click your links.

You are even less likely to sell books if you are trying to sell to other authors. So, why should you participate in the Writing Community which is made up of other authors? The value comes from connecting with others writers and their audiences. If you write romance, try to connect with other romance writers. The same goes for every genre.

The value here is in networking. If you get to know other authors, perhaps you can do a newsletter swap or do cross-posts on each other’s blogs. These relationships can have unexpected rewards. Don’t undervalue them!

Marketing Tip #4: Follow and Like Posts by Other Authors

One of the easiest ways to connect with other authors is to interact with their posts. Follow authors in your genre, like their posts, and comment when you get the chance. I’ve made friends this way and as I mentioned in the last tip, this has helped me make connections too (like doing author interviews!) I met most of the Scifi Fantasy Collaborative through social media.

Marketing Tip #5: Don’t Spam Your Book

I unfollow any author that crowds my feed with the same book post. It’s one thing to share a few ads or news about your book and another to post the same image ten times in the same day, with nothing new or interesting to add.

Bonus: Another pet peeve of mine is when authors use their platforms to whine about not being successful. If you are openly getting angry with your followers for not being engaged enough, you will lose followers and that isn’t great.

Marketing Tip #6: Share Your Book Where Appropriate

#WritingCommunity, it’s #ShamelessSelfpromoSunday.

Share your books, WIP or anything else you want!

— Despoina Kemeridou (@DKemeridou) November 14, 2021

This is sort of the opposite of the last tip. When you see a post where someone asks for fantasy books, feel free to share a link to yours. This doesn’t mean that you should share your horror book on that post about fantasy books though. If you share a book that is completed unrelated to the topic, it will seem like spam. However, if someone posts and asks for book links, go ahead and share your book.

Marketing Tip #7: Share Book-Related Content

Your posts on Twitter should vary a little bit. You can’t advertise the same book for 24 hours a day. However, you can still be part of the conversation by posting book-related content such as blog posts, author interviews, book reviews, or news. You can even share posts by other authors and remain active. Just keep it relevant to your brand.

Marketing Tip #8: Share What You Are Reading

#writingcommunity What are you currently reading?

— Carey Sloan (@careyksloan) November 13, 2021

One great way to share content about books is to share the books you are reading right now. This might be in the form of a pretty bookstagram style pic, an in-depth book review, or just sharing what books you have added to your TBR lately. Readers like to know what types of books their favorite authors are into and this can be a nice opportunity to share those other Indie authors you’ve been networking with as well.

Marketing Tip #9: Value Organic Following

If you’ve been following me for any length of time, you probably remember that I have a day job and part of that is helping other authors write, edit, and market their books. (Eliza Stopps is my fictional pen name.) One thing that always shocks me is how many of these authors try to purchase followers on social media, even though it is against the rules of most platforms.

If you aren’t convinced that this is a bad idea, remember that fake followers won’t create organic engagement on your posts. They are easily spotted by real followers and that cheapens your brand. Furthermore, fake followers won’t buy your books. So, what is the point? In the best-case scenario, you get more organic followers because people think a lot of people suddenly followed you. Worst case scenario you get banned from your social media accounts and lose your outlet to interact with readers.

Marketing Tip #10: Run Giveaways

How can you gain organic traffic, if you don’t buy followers, then? All of these tips can help get you there, but one way to get a lot of followers is to run an interesting giveaway. Maybe it is a signed copy of your latest book, book merch, or gift cards.

The only negative is that you might get a lot of traction from people who are just there to get free stuff (in other words, they won’t be buying your novel) and aren’t interested in your books or your brand.

Bonus Marketing Tip: Check Your Spelling and Grammar

I am an affiliate for Grammarly, but I do use their applications to proof my posts and social media content. it even works with Canva. This can help avoid simple misspellings and embarrassing grammar mistakes.

I hope this post helps you manage your author platform on Twitter. I’ve been on there since 2016 and I’ve seen a lot of changes in how people share content, but these tips applied then and they still hold up today. Create meaningful content and you will find a genuine following. Good luck out there!

Oh and follow me on Twitter @ElizaStopps 🙂