Social media and me

Welcome back to another blog hop, with #OpenBook. Here’s this week’s prompt.

Don’t forget to click the purple button to see what everyone else has to say on this week’s subject. It’s at the end of my post.

What are your best and worst social media sites?

That’s a tricky question. Over the years, I’ve been on just about all of them at one point or another. My first foray into the world of social media was with Facebook, which I joined back in 2009. Originally, it was just as a means of keeping in touch with my daughter, who was back-packing around Australia.

When I retired for the first time and set up the Organic Bakery, in 2013-14, I used Facebook to advertise and promote what I was doing. It worked so well that I very quickly had far more customers than I could cope with and had to buy more equipment (and get up earlier) to fill all the orders.

As I started trying to sell my books, I thought that I might be able to repeat that success but it wasn’t to be. Although I got engagement, I saw very few sales resulting from my posts. So, I joined the other networks, because that was what I had been told you needed to do to get noticed. And I embarked on a frenzy of posting and engaging.

I soon found out that it takes a lot of time to keep up with everything on several networks at once, I knew it was important to raise my visibility but I couldn’t help thinking that it was time that might be better spent writing more books.

I’ve been given so much support and encouragement from other writers, my thanks to you all. What I hadn’t been told (but I found out fairly quickly) was that as well as the good ones, there were also a lot of nasty people out there. People who seemed more interested in pulling you down than building you up.  People who you can’t discuss things with, if you don’t agree with them, you soon find out how wrong you are. They hunt in packs, with long memories.

Gradually, due to the actions of trolls, general negativity and a lack of engagement, I’ve reduced my exposure by leaving most of them behind.

Now I’m back to just Facebook, where I’m currently languishing in Jail for Violating Community Guidelines. I’m unable to post or engage in hardly any groups, although I can lurk, and post on my own timeline/author page. How long this restriction will last is anyone’s guess. I think I upset a bot, it’s impossible to tell as you cannot talk to a real person to try and fix things.

Strangely, this lack of engagement is somehow liberating. Not feeling under pressure to post or keep up with a conversation is refreshing. I can see all that’s going on but don’t have to get involved. The downside is that, when someone offers you the chance to promote your work, you can’t.

I can still talk to friends via messenger, I’ve noticed that my book sales haven’t suffered too much. The best bit is, I have more time for writing.

Maybe I’ll be able to take part again soon. To be honest, I’m not particularly bothered.

Until next time.

Let me know what you think about this week’s subject.

I’d love to get your comments, please leave them below. While you’re here, why not take a look around? There are some freebies and lots more content, about me, my writing and everything else that I do. You can join my newsletter for a free novella and more news by clicking this link.

Now see what the other blogs in this hop have to say by clicking below.

Check out the other great blogs here.