Social Media for Freelancers

How many of you have blogs? How many are on Facebook? Twitter? LinkedIn? I suspect most of you are on most of the social media sites.

But why?

What’s your goal for your Facebook account? Your blog? What do you hope to get out of it? Is it truly only social, or do you see the professional potential?

Social media used strategically can be a boon to the freelancer.

We’re not always so good at strategic thinking, though. When we decide to go on a trip, we check with Mapquest to see the best route to assure we get to our destination efficiently and successfully. Do we use that same strategy in life? Not so much.

We might know that, if we’re going to Minneapolis, there’s a good road to get there, but we’re not entirely sure when or how to get on that road and how long to plan for the trip.

Social media can be your freelancing Mapquest, helping link you with editors, sources, research materials, and tools for organization and promotion that can get you from a wannabe to a published writer.

Let’s look at how to use social media strategically:

PLANNING

A blog can be an excellent planning tool for a writer. I have three blogs:

This one, PEP Talks (the PEP refers to my initials, which is how I signed notes to students), for Drake students and alums.

Magazine Masters, which is a company Sammye Johnson (my co-author on The Magazine from Cover to Cover and I started for our magazine consulting business.

And Positives About Negative, a breast cancer blog I created to help women understand and deal with hormone-receptor negative breast cancer, a form I had not even heard of when I was diagnosed with it almost four years ago.

I use these blogs as my “notes” for two books I have in the works—one on breast cancer and the third edition of The Magazine from Cover to Cover. When I come across news, I put it on my blog, so it is there for easy reference. This is especially true with the cancer blog, a I not only have the information, but the data I need for a citation.

I use the blogs as journals to throw out thoughts and get reactions to them. And even if nobody responds, I still have found a way to express myself that will come in handy eventually in some way—maybe I will pick an entire graf from the blog for a book, maybe I will never look at it again, but the act of having written it helps me get me head around a concept. My Life in Cemeteries,for example, was something I enjoyed writing, and I like having it on my blog, but it will never go anywhere other than this.

However, articles on breast recurrence statistics are some of my most searched topics. I realized this, in looking at Sitemeter, which tells me what topics people searched. When I put the label TRIPLE NEGATIVE RECURRENCE on posts, it upped my page views significantly.

So, in writing my breast cancer book, I use this information to assure that I cover the topics women are most concerned about. And I get letters almost daily in which women ask me specific questions, giving me additional information on what they need to know.

RESEARCH

If you’re researching a difficult topic, ask your FB friends for help. I have seen people asking for sources, for names of editors at specific publications, and doing simple surveys.

Experts now say that Facebook might replace Google as a research tool. Why? Because we can ask targeted questions of specific people and know we can trust the answers. When I was planning to cover this topic, I asked my Facebook friends what I should cover.

Some answers from my friends:

We all like to work with people we know, like, and trust. However, we don't always remember to use the people we know, like, and trust when we get the chance. Social media is a way to keep yourself on the minds of your friends and family so they'll think of you when they need your services.

The only drawbacks I see in social media sites generally are privacy and needing to invest time to manage your online profile -- particularly if you have a common name where you could be confused with professionals in other industries.

I am on LinkedIn, Plaxo and Facebook. Each of them allows me to stay connected with colleagues/friends and makes me visible to others I may not know yet. I have been contacted a handful of times by people in my career field that I have never met who wanted to know more about me, or tell me about themselves, because of the public profiles I've posted.So far, two of them have told me about potential openings within their company and asked me to apply. Although neither position was right for me, I would not have know about the openings without the social networking sites I was a member of.

PUBLISHING

Of course, a blog gives you the chance to get published quickly, but that doesn’t mean much unless you publish something worthwhile. In fact, it can be problematic because once something is online, who knows where it might go.

Publish something of quality, and who knows what might happen. Stories of blogs becoming movies and books abound—Julie and Julia being the most recent.

My cancer blog was one reason I got a book contract. It showed the editors that I was qualified to write such a technical book, and the fact that I was already online on the topic meant they had a built-in audience and means of promotion.

Likewise, I was recently asked to be on the board of directors of another cancer organization and I am negotiating to blog regularly on still another cancer site. When they called to talk to me about blogging, they called me an expert in the field. I got there by writing about the topic, largely on my blog.

PROMOTION

Promoting your work on Facebook and Twitter, and cross-promoting it on your blog drives readers to your site, it reminds readers that you’re out there writing things worth reading, and it helps build your reputation as a professional. That's why this post has so many links to my other sites.

But strategy is essential here. Your Facebook friends should include people who can help your professionally. It’s great that Mom is impressed, but professionally, she's really not that much help.

CONNECTION

Connecting with people with similar interests around the world allows a writer to develop a global perspection and to build friendships with like-minded folks you would otherwise not have met. I have regular readers from Indonesia, Sweden, Japan, England, Australia California, Massachusets and most of the 50 states. When I check who is reading me, the global mix is startling and greatly rewarding. Even more rewarding are the letters I receive from these readers. One was titled, "I my darkest hour, I found your blog." Wow. Some examples:

I am devouring your blog and am so happy to have found you!

I found your site a couple of months ago and I feel so "privileged." You are an inspiration.

I found your Positives about Negative blog this morning and have spent the last hour or so completely engrossed. THANK YOU so much for your amazing, educational, helpful, reassuring, thorough blog. i have sent the link to all my TN friends.

Those comments alone are worth the effort.