Anyone participate in #bookstagram at Instagram?

[Tom Wood]

There's this video from Mark Dawson:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F2qBD3XnNaM

The discussion of #bookstagram/Instagram starts at about the 15:45 mark.

Here is her Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/outofthebex/?hl=en

There are over 24 million images posted to #bookstagram, so it's easy to get lost. Many of them are carefully staged pictures of books in various settings. I didn't see too many authors using it though.

She says that authors "can just walk in" to the community, but we know that can backfire if handled clumsily. (See: Goodreads)

Anyone have any experience/advice they care to share?

[Denise]

I know authors who do well there. It's great for YA.

There are two ways to "join" it.

- You can have your own bookstagram account, where you post pretty pictures of books, including beloved books in your genre. If you like taking photos, this is a great idea.

- You have your own "author" account, and post pretty pictures of your book.

Then many reviewers have instagram and might post pictures, so if you contact a blogger for review, for example, it could work. Some authors have pretty boxes with stuff in it, contact famous bookstagrammers and send for review (get them to approve you first). It doesn't result in many sales, though.

When I send ARCs of my last book, I sent print copies to bookstagrammers who were in my mailing list. They'll get you some pretty pics...

[Tom Wood]

I'm considering a different approach. I can make a series of images like the one below, each with excerpts from the book I'm about to launch. By posting them at Instagram, people can follow along as I tell the first scene a couple of sentences at a time. It would be a slow reveal that would take about 60 days prior to launch. Or, they can go to my website and download a PDF of the first chapter(s). Or, from there they can also go to Bookfunnel to download an ARC. (First 100+- takers.)

My question is whether or not this would be seen as 'spammy' to the regulars. #bookstagram now has nearly 30 million pictures of books, so I don't think I'd be much of an intrusion. #warcross and #readyplayerone are my target audience for also-boughts, so I was thinking that I would post there only 2 times a week since they are smaller groups. For #ya, I'm not sure of the frequency. If people stumble across one of my posts, they can go to my Instagram feed and get caught up, or go to my website.

I'm interested in reactions and opinions.



Technically there IS a book in the image, so it fits with #bookstagram. The idea is that books are filled with wonder and imagination.

Those are the first two lines to Ultra Mod: A Futuristic Adventure (Agents of DISRUPT #1). YA post-cyberpunk lite. I write in cinematic present tense.

I haven't started posting the images yet, but my Instagram is here: https://www.instagram.com/agentsofdisrupt/?hl=en

I will likely stay with this series (up to ten novels) for the duration, so I'm taking the approach of promoting the series as the brand rather than myself.

[Denise]

What bookstagrammers want are pretty pics. Yes, they can have quotes. I'd work on making them look even better. Get some cool fonts and really work on those quotes. If they can have some sort of meaning for someone who hasn't read the book, even better.

A bunch of quotes won't do much, and you also won't develop a following all of a sudden. Like any social media, it's something slow and won't do much by itself. If you posted less quotes, it might be something that your readers come to enjoy after they read your book.

[Tom Wood]

Thank you!

In retrospect, I think bookstagram is WAY too broad a category anyway. I already interact with the Ready Player One and Warcross enthusiasts on Facebook, Twitter and Reddit, so adding Instagram is just doing more of the same. I already enjoy the social interaction with those two groups, which is the whole point. If I get just five people to show up with reviews on launch day, I'll consider that a good day.

I'll work on the graphics. ::grumble:: I refuse to add puppies and flowers though!

[Tom Wood]

I'll participate on all the channels, but Pinterest is actually set up for exactly what I want to do:



Note that those are not finely tuned quotes, but actual lines from the novel in the sequence that they occur. For each launch, this will go on for about 60 days and end at the end of the opening scene of the novel. I can delete the book at the bottom to add more text as needed. The villains are intentionally cartoonish.

https://www.pinterest.com/agentsofdisrupt/ultra-mod-a-story-told-in-parts/

[Lysmata Debelius]

Tom Wood (I didn't recognise you at first, new avatar picture?) I was curious about your question. I've been making similar pictures with quotes and wondering how to use them. Also pictures with extracts from reviews.

I feel very out of my depth with Instagram, I don't feel like I know the culture there at all.

[Tom Wood]

Tom Wood (I didn't recognise you at first, new avatar picture?) I was curious about your question. I've been making similar pictures with quotes and wondering how to use them. Also pictures with extracts from reviews.

I feel very out of my depth with Instagram, I don't feel like I know the culture there at all.

Yes, new avatar, and now another test. I'm trying to find something that works consistently across all the sites, so I apologize for being 'on brand' here while I test these. I'll go back to casual when I'm done. It's particularly tricky at Facebook where they put your avatar next to every post. Something that is too 'on brand' looks very spammy next to everyone else with their pics of themselves. At Instagram it may be okay.

I hear you about 'getting' the culture of Instagram (and Pinterest) so I figure the best way is to slowly wade in and test the waters. I think consistency is one strategy that seems to work, I just don't want to be a consistent nuisance!

[Lysmata Debelius]

Tom Wood (I didn't recognise you at first, new avatar picture?) I was curious about your question. I've been making similar pictures with quotes and wondering how to use them. Also pictures with extracts from reviews.

I feel very out of my depth with Instagram, I don't feel like I know the culture there at all.

Yes, new avatar, and now another test. I'm trying to find something that works consistently across all the sites, so I apologize for being 'on brand' here while I test these. I'll go back to casual when I'm done. It's particularly tricky at Facebook where they put your avatar next to every post. Something that is too 'on brand' looks very spammy next to everyone else with their pics of themselves. At Instagram it may be okay.

I hear you about 'getting' the culture of Instagram (and Pinterest) so I figure the best way is to slowly wade in and test the waters. I think consistency is one strategy that seems to work, I just don't want to be a consistent nuisance!

This latest avatar image is pretty!

[Tom Wood]

And yet another change!

This one works better because it references things that are in the books. The Instagram 'bio' can only be 150 characters, which coincidentally matches the character limit of an AMS ad. The combo of the avatar and bio at Instagram would be very similar to the combo of a book cover and the same text in an AMS ad:



ETA: Click on image to embiggen. I've only posted one test image and I already have followers? 

[Lysmata Debelius]

I did it! I did a bookstagram.

And I'm not feeling hell of a confident about it.

Things I learned today:
Better to put hashtags in the actual post, and not in the comments section. Apparently you're supposed to put your text description, then a line of five full stops in their own paragraph, and then the hashtags in the next paragraph.

.....

#likethat

And to find daily themes for hashtags, search for #bookchallenge

[Tom Wood]

Woot! 

Yeah, I've seen the dot separation between content and hashtags list.

[dgcasey]

I did it! I did a bookstagram.

And I'm not feeling hell of a confident about it.

Things I learned today:
Better to put hashtags in the actual post, and not in the comments section. Apparently you're supposed to put your text description, then a line of five full stops in their own paragraph, and then the hashtags in the next paragraph.

.....

#likethat

And to find daily themes for hashtags, search for #bookchallenge

Maybe I'm getting too old for social media anymore because no matter what I do, I can't get the text to do what you've done above. Mine comes out like this:

Inane block of text about my book. ..... #sillyhashtag #anothersillyhashtag

I also did some investigating and found that outofthebex is doing it like this:

More silly text about some product I don't need.
.
.
.
#hashtagsdownhere

I guess I'll need to do some more research and experimenting.

[Tom Wood]

More than you will ever want to know about hashtags at Instagram:

https://thepreviewapp.com/how-to-use-instagram-hashtags-17-golden-rules/

[Lysmata Debelius]

DgCasey you might find this useful (I'm assuming you're more comfortable on a desktop than a phone?)

How to post to instagram from a desktop computer https://www.hopperhq.com/blog/how-to-post-to-instagram-from-pc-mac/

This means you can edit images on your computer (put text on them etc) and upload them directly.
If the little upload button doesn't appear at first, just refresh the page.

If you use chrome, you can also just right click > Inspect to get to the buttons shown in that description.

[Lysmata Debelius]

More than you will ever want to know about hashtags at Instagram:

https://thepreviewapp.com/how-to-use-instagram-hashtags-17-golden-rules/

Thanks!
Useful. I'm still struggling with how many hashtags to add. More than 3 seems so spammy 

[Tom Wood]

Here's another article about how to post from a desktop computer:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/tjmccue/2018/08/30/how-to-post-on-instagram-from-pc/#2096740516a2

"Important Note: If you do not see the plus (+) sign at the bottom, as you do on this screen, simply refresh the browser window (F5 on a PC keyboard) or the reload button to the left of the address bar. This usually reveals it for the times when it does not appear instantly."

I always have to hit F5 as the last step to get the controls to show up. (US, Chrome browser)

[Tom Wood]

... I'm still struggling with how many hashtags to add. More than 3 seems so spammy 

Bex, referenced at the start of this thread, sells a course about how to use Instagram and also offers free advice. She recommends using all 30 slots for hashtags. Here's a typical post from her that shows her hashtag list (click photo to enlarge):



Bex also recommends posting at least 3-5 times a week!

https://www.instagram.com/outofthebex/

[Lysmata Debelius]

So, no surprises, but using all 30 hashtags makes a dramatic difference to how many people see and respond to a post.
Just did my first bookstagram with all 30 hashtag slots used, and immediately got far more likes than I got on any other post so far.

[Tom Wood]

So, no surprises, but using all 30 hashtags makes a dramatic difference to how many people see and respond to a post.
Just did my first bookstagram with all 30 hashtag slots used, and immediately got far more likes than I got on any other post so far.

Congrats! I don't mean to be a nit-picker, but you probably want to know this if you intend to cut/paste and re-use that hashtag list. The hashtag for #bookstagrammer is malformed - there's a space in the wrong place.

[Lysmata Debelius]

So, no surprises, but using all 30 hashtags makes a dramatic difference to how many people see and respond to a post.
Just did my first bookstagram with all 30 hashtag slots used, and immediately got far more likes than I got on any other post so far.

Congrats! I don't mean to be a nit-picker, but you probably want to know this if you intend to cut/paste and re-use that hashtag list. The hashtag for #bookstagrammer is malformed - there's a space in the wrong place.

Oh poop!
Thanks! I'd never have noticed that and would have copy pasted it all over the place. Well spotted.

[munboy]

This is slightly off topic but did anybody else get bored scrolling through those pictures. They were all basically the same image. I was expecting book pictures in different areas. Bed, reading nook, hammock, camp chair, beach blanket. That would have been interesting, not just the same bed, same coffee, different donut.

[Lysmata Debelius]

I gather that some bookstagrammers try to create a signature look for themselves so that their images will be recognisable in the stream of everyone else's book posts. I think that is where the same pillow, different donut comes from.

[Tom Wood]

It's not even a different donut. Look closely and you'll see the same food items re-used across long periods of time. They are either perfectly stale or plastic/ceramic. I'd love to see the behind-the-scenes pictures of the staging.

ETA: I had my Instagram page linked in the graphic of the Kokopelli in my signature. When I tapped it on my phone, it completely borked the Instagram phone app. I had to reset by erasing the data history/memory. Not sure why, but perhaps it didn't like being linked through an image that is itself hosted on a different site. Link removed.

[dgcasey]

Bex, referenced at the start of this thread, sells a course about how to use Instagram and also offers free advice. She recommends using all 30 slots for hashtags. Here's a typical post from her that shows her hashtag list (click photo to enlarge):

One of the things she goes over is to make sure there is a separation between your caption and your hashtags. That's why her's look like:

caption
.
.
.
# hashtags

When a reader gets to that separation they know they've come to the end of the usable post. It appears this is something the users of IG have grown accustomed to, so I don't think many of them look at it as spam. I'm trying to step up the number of hashtags I include. Sometimes I struggle to find 30 good ones to use.