100 Days Social Media Experiment: The Results

All this week I’ll be releasing a five-part series about the results of my social media experiment. 100 Days: Turning Off the Lights on Social Media kicked off the series in early April and I’ve been blogging about my observations here and there. Now that I’m drawing this experience to a close, I’m happy to share my conclusions and results.


When I first started this experiment, I had no idea how much social media played a role in my life as an author and a friend. I was frustrated and overwhelmed, because I felt obligated to use the tools and be connected at all times. I didn’t realize how much of a perceived burden this connectivity was until I wrote this article entitled Hunting Down the Value of Social Media on SFWA.org and had a frank chat with my friend Matt Forbeck.

After being in e-commerce and online marketing for so many years, Matt had pointed out I was hyper-sensitive to certain sticking points. So, on a surface level, I was getting really annoyed with day in and day out personas of people I knew that were trying to present themselves in a different light to get visitors or clicks. Remember, I travel in many creative circles, so it’s not just “one or two” friends and acquaintances that place a lot of value on their web presence. It’s — quite literally — hundreds.

While I have “unlearned” something often preached about in online marketing — the idea that there are best practices and one must not (typically) deviate from them — at the time I was more opinionated than I wanted to be and, without realizing it, I was really angry with myself about that because I’ve always prided myself on being fair. If anything, this experiment has allowed me to return to my core philosophy: do what works for you.

I’ve made my peace with rampant self-promoters and exaggerated personas, in part because I didn’t see the micro-trends and the near constant “fails” for a few months. The sheer lack of critical comments, opinion and feedback from hundreds of people allowed me to simply…be. The voices in my head returned, my writing is back to the level where it needs to be, and I’m taking calculated risks with my work.

Once I realized that my frustration with social media was the real reason why I felt compelled to stop using it, I dug a little deeper. I wanted to know whether or not it had any real, tangible value to my website or my work.

    Three Questions I Wanted to Know the Answer To

    1. Did getting off of social media hurt my book sales or my chances for publication?

    No.


    2. Did getting off social media hurt my website traffic?

    No.


    3. Did getting off social media kill my social media presence?

    No.

This week I’ll explore these answers and questions more in depth. I’ll also be talking about ways I’m going to manage my social media presence since I’ll be back online more regularly on Wednesday to prevent that feeling of obligation from ever happening again.

If you have any questions or comments about this experiment, feel free to post them and I’ll try to address them this week.

Thanks for being such a valued part of my readership!

July 11, 2011
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100 Days Experiment of Social Media Silence is Almost Over!

So it’s almost been a hundred days since I’ve been off of Facebook, IMs and Twitter for personal use, and…

…it’s about time.

It has been an absolute chore trying to connect with friends, readers and fellow gamers outside of these tools. Some people are only accessible via Facebook. Others rely on one tool or the other.

Not to mention, both Facebook and Twitter upgraded their messaging system. Now I get e-mails every time someone mentions me on Twitter, re-tweets a link, likes me on Facebook, etc. I even got a message that sounded a little creepy from Facebook, like Hal from Space Odyssey: “Monica, your friends are waiting.”

Last week I logged in to do some maintenance, and over the weekend I broke my silence with a single word: beer.

While I probably won’t be using the tools as much as I have in the past, a hundred days was a long time to conduct this experiment. I’ve learned a lot since I’ve been offline but, in the end, my conclusion is the same as my assumption: it’s just a tool like any other.

The interesting thing, is that getting off of social media has allowed me to do away with some really bad habits of mine. Like whenever I saw a “fail” meme, I felt obligated to uncover the real story instead of just blowing it off. Or when I noticed a blatant falsehood or incorrect piece of data, and felt it was necessary to help the person out — whether they wanted it or not. (You know, because no one is wrong on the internet… ever…)

The funny thing is, I’m finding that the less I know the better I feel and the more focused I am. I turned off Google Alerts and I’ll be turning off notifications, too. While I don’t (won’t) do away with social media completely, I feel I’ve finally got a grip on what I want to use the tools for.

And the best part? I no longer feel obligated to use them.

Less than a week and a half to go! Oy! In the meantime, I’m going to take a break from blogging this week so I can focus on my vampires.

‘Till then!

July 4, 2011
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[My Guest Post] Hunting Down the Value of Social Media at SFWA.org

It’s been almost forty-five days since I turned off social media, and this experiment has taken on a life of its own. One thing that’s happened, which was not what I had expected, is that my hiatus has turned into a period of self-discovery and growth.

Today, I talk about the impact this experiment has had on me and my work. Here’s a quote from the article:

So far, my hiatus has had a profound impact on me in ways I’m still discovering. I feel like I’ve left the schools of fishes swimming in and around one another and have sunk to the bottom of the internet ocean. When I was using the tools, I was more in tune with the world around me and knew what trends were popular and what jokes were not. I knew what books were being released, connected with long-distance authors and friends more easily, and had a lot of fun. Now that I’m not, my focus is on me and my work, which has pushed me into several new directions. — SOURCE: Hunting Down the Value of Social Media at SFWA.org

If you’re curious about my 100 days experiment and want to read an in-depth take on this hiatus, I encourage you to read Hunting Down the Value of Social Media at SFWA.org and share your comments.

May 16, 2011
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On Facebook Contests

Yesterday, GalleyCat released an informative article about how Facebook is restricting contests on author pages. The reason why I wanted to point this out to you is to let you know that while this is not a new initiative, they are cracking down on this. Facebook first introduced contest rules restrictions back in November 2009 and they evolved a year afterward. Not following their guidelines will get your page canceled without notice. Why?

BlogHer has a really good article from 2010 called Keep Your Company and Your Blog Out of Trouble: The Scoop on Facebook Contests that examines what this means from a liability perspective.

So what is new? Two things: a release form and the further clarification has to be hosted on a tab or an app. What’s happening now, is that the popularity of Facebook (and the fact that it’s free) has caused many authors to flock to the tool. This time around, the changes in this policy are an amalgamation of what already existed.

What’s the bottom line? I would keep the new guidelines in mind. As I’ve mentioned numerous times before, you always take a risk whenever you use a tool you don’t own. While many free tools are highly-trafficked, in part because they’re free, you might want to consider looking at what you do have control over — your own website — first.

If you are looking for places to run contests besides your own website, there’s several excellent sites out there devoted to readers that would love an author’s support. I know Facebook is important to a lot of people, but there are other ways to reach your fans, too.

if you operate a contest, create content, or use functionality on a site you own,

May 13, 2011
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Day 25: Face Yourself

One of the biggest lessons I’ve learned from going dark, is that there’s a lot I can learn by talking to other people about their experiences with social media. This time, that insight comes from Ann Voss Peterson who recently conducted our local writer’s workshop about characterization. Ann and I were talking afterward about social media, in part because she has co-written a thriller novel with J.A. Konrath entitled Flee and I was wondering what she was doing to promote it. We were talking about my 100 days experiment and I mentioned I’ve noticed a positive impact on my writing. She said something to the effect of: Well, of course. Because you wind up facing yourself.

Ever have one of those moments where everything starts swirling and you wind up in a scene from Mortal Kombat?

Yeah, okay. I did.

What does that mean? Face yourself. Shutting out social media means turning the mute button on two types of voices. First, you turn off other people’s voices that sing/yell/whisper across your screen. By doing so, though, you are automatically shutting off a second voice. YOURS. The one you use to interact with people on these tools. Which is not the same as your author’s voice, but a separate one. (And before you ask, I view blogging to be yet another voice.)

Just how profound is this? Well, I feel understanding what this means is crucial to self-promotion, time-management and good storytelling. After all, if you don’t have any words on the page, then you have nothing to revise. If you have nothing to rewrite, you have no manuscripts to polish. If you don’t have any finished manuscripts, then you don’t have any stories to submit or hand in for your deadline.

Sure, every writer is different. Some can write fast; others not so much. Still others have no problem pounding out the words, connecting with people, and making it all work. For me, though, I need to have a foundation. I have to figure out what time I need to process my work, to wrap my head around my story, article, etc. I need to listen to “the Monica voice.” To do that, to listen to that crazy girl, I had to tone down the number of voices and have a care to what she’s saying. The more voices I jam into my head, the less I can hear my gut instincts. My inner girl o’ awesome.

Is there some truth to this? That in order to be a better writer you need to face yourself?

For me? Yes, yes it is. Many other things have changed for me during this lights out period, because I wanted that silence to work on other goals. I feel like this simple phrase (“Face Yourself”) sums up not only why I needed to do this, but also solidifies what is happening all around me as well. More on that later!

About 100 Days: From April 4th to July 13th I’m turning the lights off on Facebook, Twitter and IMs for personal use. Read 100 Days: Turning off the Lights on Social Media for more information. You can also read the 100 Days post archive.

April 29, 2011
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