Do You Have Time For Social Media?

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Freelance writers lead busy lives.  Well, the successful ones do, anyway.  Seems like we are always up at the crack of dawn. A distinctly cool thing during an Alaskan winter.  Alaskan Summer? Not so much. We always seem to get that gotta have it done NOW job just as we’re walking out the door for dinner with the family, and weekends? What the heck are those?

So in the midst of all this making a living we got going on, how do we find the time to engage in social media?  Or is it even a concern?  If social media has not been a concern for you then it should be.

Freelance writers should be thoroughly engaged in social media for a number of reasons:

• Far from being just a way to chat and keep track of friends, today’s social media sites are an excellent way to connect with clients and potential clients.
• Social media is an excellent way to spread the word about your freelance business and it doesn’t cost a thing.
• A strong presence in the social media arena leads to opportunities you may not have even considered.

Those are some compelling reasons.  As well, they just barely scratch the surface of the possible advantages for freelance writers.  Here are a couple of examples of how social media use has affected my writing business:

• I’m a big user of Twitter.  I joined over two years ago when it was just getting started.  At first, I didn’t get it.  What I ate for lunch in 140 characters or less?  Who cares?  Ahhh, but it is so much more than that.  I worked it for a long time and now I’ve got over two thousand followers who see everything I tweet, including blog posts.  Last year I wrote an article on the sorry state of freelance writing pay and because of Twitter, it went viral.  Well over one hundred comments and a tremendous amount of page views.
• Face Book. Confession time!  Overall and for the most part, I can’t stand Face Book.  It’s too busy with gadgets, badges, invites and all manner of fluffy things.  With that said, I do have a FB page.  I rarely post anything over there yet the page chugs along on its own just fine.  Last week I did a rare wall post and announced my completion of National Novel Writing Month. The response was huge and instantaneous.  Amazing, the amount of people on FB.

These two sites alone have done great things for my freelance writing.  A side benefit is that I can get a sense of what is trending and I can maneuver my writing to take advantage of that.

There are literally thousands of articles out there about the use of social media.  The topic is certainly larger than this blog post.  With that said, the point here is that as a freelance writer you need to take advantage of the social media scheme and incorporate its use into your daily routine.  Make a few friends, meet colleagues, find companies you never knew existed.  The advantages far outweigh any time you may spend tweeting or wall posting.

How do you use social media?

Oh, and you can always follow me on Twitter. www.twitter.com/GeorgeAngus