Social Media Wrangling - Part 2 - The Checklist


This is everything I’ve been checking to make sure my social media is shiny and sparkling before I attempt to gain the public’s eye with my Young Adult novel. I wrote this list so that other writers might benefit from the work I’ve been doing for myself. I wrote a pretty extensive blog post aboutwhat I called Social Media Wrangling, which you can find by clicking on thissentence.

1. YouTube subscriptions:
-----People will see the list of people you’re subscribed to on YouTube, and they will think your list of subscriptions represents your opinions. Are you subscribed to FartDancer380? People will think you enjoy his work.

2. Who you follow on Twitter:
-----Same with YouTube. If you’re following ILovePot_29, people will think you are a pothead (FYI, I’ve never done a non-medical drug in my life, but I wanted to use that example). Will parents want their children reading books from a person they think is a pothead? No!

3. Facebook groups/pages/Notes Application.

4. Google Plus pages/communities/posts.

5. Tumblr, Myspace, Blogger, Livejournal, Xanga, etc.
-----Find those blog posts that you wouldn’t want your mother to read, and delete them. Also, for YA writers like myself, consider axing out any vulgar language.

6. Google all of the screen names you’ve ever used.
-----Find out where you’ve made a profile. If you’ve got an account on an embarrassing website, it might be time to delete it. Yes, that might mean deleting your My Little Brony account, the Miley Cyrus Forever Fanclub blog, or even that good old Club Penguin profile. Look for these smaller, fansites. This is where embarrassment lives forever, lol.

7. Check the YouTube videos you’ve personally uploaded.
-----Anything you’ve said that is not apart of your authorial message? Have you vlogged about anything so overtly political that it would keep someone from purchasing your book?

8. Remember, especially for YA-childrens-teen authors, kids will see the stuff you write online when they Google your name.

-----If you write Harry Potter but then write something awful online, kids will be listening/mirroring your awfulness.

9. Watch your vulgarity.
-----Nobody buys a book for a kid from a potty mouth.

10. Check all of your Tweets.
-----You might consider privatizing or deleting your old profile and making an entirely new one once you’re a published author. However, if you’re under 100 tweets, you might be able to go back and delete the bad ones.

11. Remember, just because you’ve privatized social media, doesn’t make it private.
-----Truth. If you become a famous author, your friends might sell access to your personal facebook profile. If over a hundred people can see what you’ve made “private,” then it’s not really all that private. Making your profile for “Friends only” is not keeping your facebook truly private.

12. Reviews/critiques of other novels and stories.

-----Your Amazon account. Your Goodreads. Your blog. Have you ever slammed another author / publishing house / etc. over a particular book you didn’t like? Have you gone on Amazon and given 1 star to another author’s work? If so, what do you think that more-famous-than-you author is going to do to your book? Do you think they’re going to give you a positive cover-quote? If you meet them at a party, will they kindly help you promote your book? Will a publishing house that you’ve deeply criticized publish your book? No, no, no… If you’re a aiming to become a known creator, you cannot start out by being a critic. You need friends, not enemies. Sure, Stephen King can say whatever he wants about whoever, but you? You need whoever you can keep! Be positive. Keep your positive reviews! Delete your negativity! Unless you’re famous already, being a downer is not going to make you any friends!

13. Check your favorites lists and quotes.
-----Do you want the public to know about your passion for the movie, “Jack’s Drug-Induced Adventure Through Stonerland?” No? Then take it out of your favorite movies list. Your favorites list indicates something about you. Check everything you’ve “liked” on facebook. Look at your interests page. Delete the stupid stuff. Check your quotes, too. Don’t leave terrible quotes you and your fraternity brothers made up one drunken night. Don’t quote world leaders that will incite anger because you didn’t know that they were evil—know who the people who quote are and the context surrounding the quote. Just because someone says one good thing does not mean that that person was a good person.

14. Check the other things you have written and published online.
-----If you’ve written erotica in the past (I have not, it’s just an example), you’re going to have to deal with that before becoming a children’s writer. Same goes for weird fandom lit.

15. Check your browser’s bookmarks.
-----Bookmarks are a great way to find a bunch of embarrassing things you’ve left on the Net.

16. Check your OKCupid and other dating website accounts.

Thank you for reading. I hope this helps you reach your goals. I will be adding to this list as I think of more things I can do to improve it. If you have more ideas, PLEASE share them in the comments. I will add your ideas and link to your blog/twitter.


Click here for a companion blog post about social media wrangling.




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