What Is Social Media Today: Benefits of Cooperation Among a Community of Writers

When I wake up in the wee hours to write, being alone is precisely the point.

The phone’s not ringing. None of my clients have started emailing or texting me yet.

In this quiet space I can focus on listening to my inner voice long enough to get words out of my head and into my laptop.

As much as I value this essential alone time, I also value the benefit of participation among a community of writers.

Wanting to be part of a larger group of people who do what I do is part of why I joined Tribewriters.com, why I have attended writer’s workshops like the ones organized by Tombird.com, why I’m a member of several Facebook and Google+ writing communities and why I enjoy going to lunch with fellow Amazon No. 1 bestselling authors like Maxine Taylor.

Although I’m an INFJ, the counselor in Myers-Briggs types with the same personality profile as Plato, Mary Wollstonecraft, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Dante Alighieri, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Agatha Christie, Charlotte Brontë, J.K. Rowling, Carl Jung and Leo Tolstoy, you don’t have to be introvert to be a writer.

You just have to be alone to get the writing thing done.

For example, Tom Clancy is an ESTJ, Ernest Hemingway was an ESTP, Paul Coelho is an ESFP, Salman Rushdie is an ENFP, Johann von Goethe is an ENFj, Sheryl Sandberg is an ENTJ and Mark Twain was an ENTP.

Here at www.whatissocialmediatoday.com, a large portion of our clients are authors working to build the audience for their books and businesses.

Just as the world’s largest living organism, Pando the Trembling Giant, is a 106-acre single male quaking aspen, although we writers look like separate human beings we are in fact individual living breathing exemplars of the writer archetype.

As individual representatives of this writer archetype – just like Pando the Trembling Giant – we thrive more readily if we adopt an attitude of cooperation rather than competition especially in this digital age of social media, Youtube, movies, video games and multimedia.

Just as overgrazing from deer and elk threatens the quaking aspen, so do encroachments from multi media threaten the existence of books and thereby our very existence as writers.

The more we learn to band together – to act as one living breathing organism – the more likely our profession will continue to thrive.

A win-win attitude – an attitude of figuring out how I can benefit more than just myself – has long been part of my personal success principles.

When fellow Amazon No. 1 bestselling author Ramajon Cogan and I started www.whatissocialmediatoday.com, we incorporated this philosophy into our program to help people win what we call the Game of Social Media.

Here are the 4 C’s of cooperation for writers: co-creation, counseling, cross blogging and cross promotion.

Co-creation. It started all rather organically, but when I first began having lunch with my good friend and fellow Amazon No. 1 bestselling author Maxine Taylor we started giving each other great ideas.

“Maxine, you’re the one to beat,” I joke, pointing out that she has seven Amazon No. 1 bestsellers to my four.

“Oh honey,” Maxine will tell me, “that’s just because I’m older.”

Looking back Maxine set the example for me of how to be a generous author.

At one of our first lunches, she handed over the names of her Twitter guru, her editor and her Amazon marketing lady.

As our friendship progressed, we would get together and discuss the books we were working on. Maxine gave me plenty of good advice and has interviewed me on her show more than any other radio show host.

As time went on Maxine asked my advice.

“What can I do to make more money?” was a question Maxine asked me that led to her producing a series of videos and articles that we collectively decided should be called the Trumpology report – astrological analysis of newly-elected President Donald Trump and his associates.

Soon enough Maxine asked me to do a series of medical intuitive readings about Donald Trump, Steve Bannon and Melania Trump with more to come. I wrote a blog about Donald Trump, another about White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon and yet another about first lady Melania Trump.

Maxine and I have also worked together to develop the idea for the next book she’s writing.

Here at www.whatissocialmediatoday.com, we set up new clients with other people in our program because we recognize that co-creation with peers is part of how we get ahead.

You talk to your buddy during our live webinars and you share phone numbers and emails to encourage each other along the way.

Counseling. My Facebook friend Torin Sarasas is working on his first book. From time to time, he will email me to ask for advice.

Although it might appear at first glance that Torin would be the person most likely to benefit from these interactions, any time we take our time to reflect on what exactly is that we do as writers and how we get better, we study our own process and in doing so actually get better at it.

My fellow author Indika De Fonseka was stuck one day so he reached out to me through Facebook messenger. I subsequently wrote a blog about how I stay inspired to write, called “3 Ways to Go After Inspiration Other Than with a Club.”

Because there are so many ways to get stuck we can all benefit from counseling from time to time and nobody has the life experience to give you the insightful advice you need like a fellow author.

At www.whatissocialmediatoday.com our members have reported to us how much they appreciate the support they receive not just from fellow authors myself Catherine Carrigan and Ramajon Cogan but from other members of our program.

Cross blogging. I regularly and habitually encourage other author friends to cross blog with me. My rule is I will post one blog for you for every blog of mine you publish on your website.

The benefits of cross blogging are legion.

My fans learn about your books, your business, your world view.

Your fans discover my books, my business as a medical intuitive healer and absorb my opinions.

This is the epitome of win-win and nobody spends a dime on advertising.

This could be a seed of viral marketing, especially when we develop networks of authors willing to cross blog as I have.

Here at www.whatissocialmediatoday.com we encourage our members to give us blogs they have written that we post on our main website and we encourage our members to write not only for their own websites but also for each other.

Cross promotion. When Lynne Cockrum-Murphy launched her second book, she had the benefit not only of the knowledge she gained in our program of how to market through the social media, she also had the community of fellow authors to support her.

Unfolding the Mystery of Self reached No. 1 in one of her categories on Amazon even before the book launch officially started.

By the time it was all over, her new book had reached No. 1 in not just one but three categories.

Our community has cross blogged with her, shared her book throughout our Facebook friends and Twitter feeds and talked to each other about working through the nitty gritty details.

Not only had Lynne built her own tribe – she had our collective tribes to empower her to reach an even bigger market.

Cooperate with us and win even bigger.

Putting all this together takes time and is part of creating a successful social media strategy.

We’ve got four ways for you to learn: