I must confess; I spend way too much time on Instagram these days. But, in my defense, how else is a broke girl supposed to promote her books for free? I find myself asking, though, “Is it really free?”
Free can mean a couple of things a) without cost or b) without restriction. Social media advertising is actually neither of those things. True it doesn’t cost anything financially, unless I choose to run an ad. But there is a price to be paid, intellectually and emotionally.
The intellectual price:
I pour a ton of creative energy into posts and reels that I would rather spend writing, or any number of other things to be honest.
The restriction:
Certain things please the algorithm, and everything else falls through the cracks.
The emotional price:
It’s disappointing when that content you worked so hard on goes out to all your followers and only yields a handful of interactions. But it’s so much worse when only 10% of them even get to see it!
The funny thing is, the pay off doesn’t even come in the form of book sales—well, sometimes it does. It comes from building a community. From lifting each other up and learning from one another. Honestly, it comes in small moments like this comment on my video of a little spider in my garden, guarding her eggs.
“Spiders usually give me the ick, but this felt really wholesome to me.”
A slight perspective adjustment is something I greatly enjoy both providing and receiving. People growing closer together instead of farther apart. So here’s another comment someone blessed me with.
“Maybe the people who you expect to be most supportive and proud actually are but they don’t express it the way you expect. They just know how wonderful you are and so expect nothing less than for you to accomplish whatever it is you set your mind to do.”
In case anyone else needed a slight adjustment, today.
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