Why Creating a Simple Spreadsheet Helps With Platform Building
Especially now, success as a writer unfortunately isn’t about the quality of your work — it’s about being able to prove to a publisher that they’ll get sales and a good ROI. That’s why there’s such an emphasis on platform building, including social media. The more people you’re connected with, the more they see you as a safe bet.
But how do you connect?
Part of it is taking the time to participate and leave comments on other people’s posts. But those interactions are often opportunities to share your work — including social media posts where you’ve discussed and linked to specific articles/essays/excerpts — to demonstrate its relevance and your expertise. Each time you do this, it helps raise awareness about what you’re doing and improves your overall credibility.
That matters because credibility and reach are not the same — you can have tons of people know who you are without people taking you seriously. You don’t want to just contribute to the conversation — you want to shape it. And given that writers often are limited in funds, taking advantage of exponential marketing — that is, the fact more people will see your contribution the more the other person’s post gets shared — is economically savvy.
The trouble is, as a writer, you might have dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of pieces and related posts. Looking for a specific post or article/essay/excerpt can be a pain, eating up time.
In the video below, I share a simple tactic that can make it easier to find your work you want to share. It’s a great example where AI is actually useful for authors instead of destructive.
[Transcript summary]
Hello, my friends. I’m Wanda Thibodeaux. I am the sole proprietor of takingdictation.com, and I have a bit of advice for you fellow writers out there.
If I can give you a little tip, go ahead, and when you post on social media, put it in a spreadsheet. Just grab the URL of the post, put it in a spreadsheet with the title of the post — or however you can remember it. Because then, when you go to engage later on social media, there will be a point where you see somebody’s post and you’re like, “Oh, I wrote about that!” or whatever, and you want to engage with that person, and you want to share your work, but you don’t want to spend half an hour looking for the post that you did, you know, six months ago, right? If you’ve got the spreadsheet, it’s right there for you.
Now, another quick tip, you can automate this. There are RSS feeds and [everything] else, depending on the platform that you’re using for your social media. So, you can totally use ChatGPT to set this up. [There are] all kinds of ways to use technology to your advantage here.
But get that spreadsheet up. I promise you it will help you with your engagement and sharing your work.
Take care. Bye.