If you’re looking to sell more books, you’ve likely heard that you “need a platform.” While this is true—you do need a platform (and I’m thrilled to be able to help you build the one you need)—the platform you need may not be the platform everyone is telling you to build.

Your platform is, in short, whatever avenues you have at your disposal to get the word out about your book.

While social media is not the only way to build a platform—your website, a podcast, speaking engagements, in-person book events, tours, etc. all count as your platform as well—it is statistically the easiest way to build a platform in the current age.

But which social media should you use? Which ones are right for your brand, your goals, and your comfort level online?

Each platform has its own strengths and weaknesses, and as new platforms pop up, a few of these platforms consistently adapt to what’s wanted by the masses at the present time.

Facebook

Facebook is extremely powerful and is a solid one-stop shop for most authors. Their support for photos, text-based posts, short-form videos, long-form videos, and links is unmatched by any other solo platform. They also offer a separation of personal and professional spaces (allowing you to not feel bad about self-promotion to the same group of unwitting friends every time you post) and have support for powerful advertising if you want to move out from organic reach. This is the right platform for you if you’re not quite sure what you want to do yet and you’d like a space to explore all your options.

Instagram

Instagram is well-known for aesthetic profiles and accounts, square photos, and more recently, Reels. Reels are short-form videos (similar to TikTok content) that’s distributed through trending sounds, hashtags, and user interaction. Instagram is also well-known for their 24 hour Story feature, which bled over to Facebook and a few other platforms soon after, giving you a way to highlight something interesting without having it live on your grid forever. If you like photo content and you don’t need to share a lot of links, Instagram may be the right platform for you.

Twitter

Twitter is a text-based, fast-moving online space where users are limited to a character count when they share their thoughts. If you’re concise and you like posting often, Twitter may be the right platform for you. Twitter also supports video, photos, and links, but the platform moves quickly so it doesn’t work very well as a long-term searchable source.

YouTube

YouTube is a video-based online search engine where people go for entertainment and education. If you like long-form video creation, YouTube may be right for you. They also recently released YouTube Shorts, as a competitor to TikTok and Reels. They share a search engine with Google, and the algorithm is very good at pushing your content out.

TikTok

TikTok is a short-form video platform with a similar setup to Instagram’s feed/grid system and one of the most powerful outreach algorithms out there. Contrary to popular belief, TikTok is not only dances, music, and fashion. Every niche seems to have made its way over to TikTok in some way, shape, or form. It often takes about two days for the algorithm to figure out where to put you and your content, but once it does you’ll be hard-pressed to find an algorithm like it. It does not manage text, links, or photos well (if at all) but what it does well (short-form video) it does extremely well. TikTok moves almost as quickly as Twitter, however, so if a fast-moving platform makes you hesitant to sign up, this may not be the platform for you.

There are many other social media platforms out there, but these are the most popular (at the time of writing). Which of these are you looking forward to testing out?

Concerned about the reality of trying to implement all of these on your own? I would love to help you get set up in a platform that fits your needs. Make sure to check out my services or my online course to get started on a platform that will help you sell more books with less work.

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