Friday, June 22, 2012

Essential Twitter Hashtags for Authors, Readers and Publishing Industry Professionals

By Jordan Dane


Twitter can feel like screaming into the void until you get a feel for the Twitterverse. If you tweet using a link to your blog post or website to draw traffic, you can check your blog or website stats to track the traffic from that link. Using Twitter in the right way can enhance your promo, but if you aren’t maximizing your tweets with hashtags, you’re not being as effective as you can be. That’s a waste of your precious time that you can’t afford. Here’s why:

It can take time to build Twitter followers. You can have 100 followers, but if you understand the use of hashtags, you can get beyond your followers to a much larger online community. By using the Hashtag symbol #, you can connect with readers, tap into people following a particular topic, search for the latest in a book genre, look for industry advice or read about book recommendations. Even if you have many followers, by using the right hashtag, you can target your post to a specific audience that’s looking for what you have to tweet about.

Hashtags can also be used to promote a certain product brand, like #Kindle or #Nook. It can also be used to tap you into certain experts, like #AskAgent or #AskEditor. A fun way hashtags are used is punctuation to a joke or use of sarcasm, like tweeting ‘Snooki did another beach face plant #awkward.’

To keep up with the latest in hashtags or look up ones you don’t understand, go to #TagDef. Below is a really good list to start with hashtags geared for authors, readers, and industry topics.

Target Other Authors
  • #AmWriting
  • #AmEditing
  • #BookMarket (Every Thursday, 4 PM, ET)
  • #IndieAuthors
  • #LitChat (Every M/W/F)
  • #MemoirChat (Bi-weekly Wednesday, 8 PM, ET)
  • #WordCount
  • #WritersLife
  • #WriteChat
  • #WriteTip
  • #WriterWednesday (or #WW)
  • #WritingParty
  • #WritingTip
  • #YALitChat

Target Book Genres
  • #RomanceWriter
  • #SciFiChat
  • #KidLitChat
  • #RWA (Romance Writers of America)
  • #ACFW (American Christian Fiction Writers)
  • #MGLit (Middle Grade Lit)
  • #SCBWI (Society of Children’s Books Writers and Illustrators)
  • #MemoirChat

Identify Industry Information
  • #AskAgent
  • #AskAuthor
  • #AskEditor
  • #GetPublished
  • #PromoTip
  • #SelfPublishing
  • #Publishing
  • #EBooks
  • #IndiePub (or #IndiePublishing)
  • #BookMarketing

Goals Setting Specifics
  • #WritingPrompt
  • #StoryStarter
  • #WordAThon
  • #Creativity
  • #WIP (work in progress)
  • #1K1H (write one thousand words in one hour)

Target Readers
  • #FridayReads
  • #BookGiveaway
  • #Giveaway
  • #Kindle
  • #MustRead
  • #Nook
  • #Ebook
  • #LitChat
  • #StoryFriday
  • #MustRead


After this Twitter Tutorial, I thought it might be fun to launch a Twitter FollowFest on ADR3NALIN3. If you are interested in building your Twitter Followers, list your twitter link below on the Linky Tools link. Anyone wanting to do the same can auto-follow those on the list we’ll create. Get to know other authors or readers who love YA.

Support your fellow Twitter travelers.

ENTER your TWITTER account by clicking the ENTER HERE link below. Post your http code so others can follow you.

8 comments:

Jordan Dane said...

My twitter acct is:

http://www.twitter.com/JordanDane

Or if you're on twitter, use @JordanDane

Jordan Dane said...

Apparently Blogger has automatic Spam filtering which won't allow links back to Twitter. Because of this, the Twitter Followfest I had hoped for will be harder to do, but not impossible for you Die Hards.

Look me up on Twitter. I follow back, unless you ask me for money.

Kris @Imaginary Reads said...

Great post. It really helps to know which hashtags to use. It took me a while to figure out the essentials, and here you have them all in one neat post!

For the twitterfest, you could have people type out their twitter username or use linky for people to submit links. It makes them nice and clickable too.

Ilsa said...

Hey, love this. Thanks!

Jordan Dane said...

Hey Kris--Thanks for telling me about Linky Tools. I added the code to this blog post, but haven't figured out how to make it SHOW. I'll get it. Thanks for sharing. Glad you like this list.

Jordan Dane said...

Ilsa--Hashtags are IT, baby. Now if only I can get this twitterfest going. It works in Wordpress, me thinks.

Jennifer Archer said...

I think I added mine correctly, Jordan. It shows up next to the other two you posted! Great idea! And great post.

Jordan Dane said...

Good idea in theory on the twitter followfest, but we need others to link to. We already follow each other. :)

I did one of these on wordpress at Indies Unlimited. Very successful.