# Is anyone else having trouble building a platform?



## Grim Grady (Jun 22, 2014)

Industry professionals love telling aspiring writers to let the writing speak for itself. At the same time, they're almost unwilling to pick up an author who doesn't have thousands of followers on Facebook and Twitter. I won't pretend I'm not a little bitter about this, but I do try to keep with the times and put my best foot forward. The problem is... I haven't had much luck building that platform of followers.
Does anyone care to share some stories on how they've built their following in such a crowded market? I've had some small success on wattpad.com, I'm active in several forums across the web (although lurking is a vice of mine), and I've got all the appropriate social networking accounts set up and idling as I try to bring in new followers. I'm even considering the whole blog thing, although lord knows what I'd have to blog about relevant to my works. Any tips or anecdotes would be greatly appreciated. As it is, I seem to be missing something.


----------



## dale (Jun 22, 2014)

i'm horrible at it. it's part of the game i hate. what i basically do is get black-out drunk and make friends and connections. i just can't stomach it sober.


----------



## Grim Grady (Jun 22, 2014)

dale said:


> i'm horrible at it. it's part of the game i hate. what i basically do is get black-out drunk and make friends and connections. i just can't stomach it sober.



Interesting tactic.  But I _really_ don't represent myself well when blacked out.


----------



## shadowwalker (Jun 22, 2014)

I don't know where the idea came from that you have to have followers on social media for a agent/publisher to be interested. Look at some of the doofuses who have huge followings, and some authors who suffer from chronic foot-in-mouth disease. 

Agents and publishers want quality manuscripts.


----------



## Grim Grady (Jun 22, 2014)

I hope you're right, Shadowwalker.  It seems like everything I read in Writer's Digest and similar publications these days is all about the social networking and other internet marketing aspect.


----------



## dale (Jun 22, 2014)

shadowwalker said:


> and some authors who suffer from chronic foot-in-mouth disease.



lol


----------



## dale (Jun 22, 2014)

shadowwalker said:


> I don't know where the idea came from that you have to have followers on social media for a agent/publisher to be interested. Look at some of the doofuses who have huge followings, and some authors who suffer from chronic foot-in-mouth disease.
> 
> Agents and publishers want quality manuscripts.



but i have seen publishers like samhain actually require in their submission guidelines that they want the author to be hooked up on social
networking platforms. i mean...they actually make it a requirement in their guidelines. and samhain is actually considered a decent small publisher.


----------



## shadowwalker (Jun 22, 2014)

dale said:


> but i have seen publishers like samhain actually require in their submission guidelines that they want the author to be hooked up on social
> networking platforms. i mean...they actually make it a requirement in their guidelines. and samhain is actually considered a decent small publisher.



Do you have link to Samhain's? Because I looked at their site and didn't even see a mention of social networking re: submissions.


----------



## dale (Jun 22, 2014)

shadowwalker said:


> Do you have link to Samhain's? Because I looked at their site and didn't even see a mention of social networking re: submissions.



hmmm. i just went there and i don't see it. maybe i have them mixed up with someone else. i could have swore it was them, though.
whoever it was wanted the author to be on facebook, twitter, and have an author blog site. they actually said you had to do this
in the guidelines. maybe it wasn't samhain.


----------



## shadowwalker (Jun 22, 2014)

dale said:


> hmmm. i just went there and i don't see it. maybe i have them mixed up with someone else. i could have swore it was them, though.
> whoever it was wanted the author to be on facebook, twitter, and have an author blog site. they actually said you had to do this
> in the guidelines. maybe it wasn't samhain.



I would be greatly surprised if that was in any reputable publishers submission requirements. As I've mentioned before, some writers are excellent writers and lousy at social media. I hate to think what would happen if a publisher demanded I get into that sort of thing :nightmare:


----------



## TWErvin2 (Jun 22, 2014)

I believe *Shadowwalker *is correct. Focusing on a top quality manuscript is what publishers are interested in. 

Having a presence on social media, nothing wrong with that. If an agent/publisher is seriously considering offering to represent/publish a work submitted to them, I imagine they'd google the name of the individual who submitted it.

What would it reveal?

It very well could give a window into who they would be going into business with. Is the writer professional? Is the writer an obnoxious #&*$#^* (jerk)?

Sure having a lot of followers and friends online would be neat, but a writer is better off spending the hours learning and writing a great story rather than trying to beat the online bushes for 'followers' and 'loyal fans'--which, unless there is another reason other than writing the writher has, is really an uphill--I mean upmountain struggle.


----------



## Caragula (Jun 23, 2014)

My experience is also anecdotal, but my agent said he is looking always for the writing, so much so that he didn't bother with the synopsis of my submission until after he'd read the submitted chapters.  Then the publisher and commissioning editors were also looking at the quality of the writing, because the deal I have depends on me adding a substantial amount to the novel, i.e. it needs work.  The above is very flattering, and I definitely don't want to come across as 'hey look at me', because I know how it sounds to read this back, but this is what they told me when outlining what they are looking for, not me inferring 

There's been no mention at all of my social media skills.

I do have a blog but my approach with that has been to try and write about stuff that's interesting in and of itself (at least to me), rather than try and advertise my writing constantly.  The theory was that if readers want to make a connection and 'follow' the author, they want some authenticity, a connection with the human being, rather than a publicity tooled persona, because the former is what creates 'sticky' relationships.


----------



## Linton Robinson (Feb 26, 2016)

The common wisdom of spending time and energy buidling big webs of internet "friends" in order to sell your books has some major flaws.
Big one being... it doesn't really work.  Twittering doesn't really sell books.
You look at the blockbuster writers who've emerged in recent years and you don't see that pattern. (You also don't see big presses so much.... more like Wool and 50 Shades and The Martian, etc... indie books establishing indie writers)
I've got a white paper here on some "platform" planks that actually DO work (in fact, worked for those very books)  A free download  right here....

To quote the blurb on the download page:
A tutorial that tells you more--and different--things about platforms  than all those "experts" out there who published when already  established.  Do you know best-sellers who came from nowhere based on  their blogs and tweets?  Well, how about 50 Shades and Twilight and  Wool, that came in from fanbases that have nothing to do with that?   Have you heard an expert mention MailChimp?   Let this nice document open  you up to a whole world of different kind of "platforming" where you  are writing what you like to write and having fun while gaining readers,  not "followers" and "friends".


----------



## dale (Feb 26, 2016)

seeing this thread bumped and rereading it is interesting. i have to say now after this time has passed
and a lot has changed in my life and with my writing since last responding to this thread.....don't even
concern yourself with the social media aspect of this writing endeavor you're on. it's a waste of time. 
you write stories. you get better at writing stories. you get some publishing credits on your resume and you
keep writing until you've written something worthy enough to attract an agent. your published credits
on your resume, even if only a few, will help you a thousand times more in making an agent take notice
of your query than 2000 followers on facebook will. you can gain facebook followers just by being an obnoxious
dumb ass talking shit...or just by being an attractive female with a sexy profile pic. that garbage means
absolutely nada, as far as your hopes at having real success.


----------

