WORLD DOMINATION?!!! NO PROBLEM, LET ME GET MY CAPE…

So you’ve been asked to do a Facebook takeover for a fellow author or event? I know what you’re thinking and feeling—if you’ve never done one of these. It can be an intimidating proposition to say the least. What should I do? What will I say? Holy shit, I have to talk to people for a whole hour?! *cue horror music and bloodshed*.

Seriously though, it’s not that bad! If you know what steps to take, these events can be more fun than a barrel full of monkeys. (I’ve never had a barrel full of monkeys, I’m just assuming here). I’ve done more than my share of takeovers and with each one I gain wisdom on what it takes to make yourself a success during that 30 minutes or hours’ time.

I’d like to share my steps with you, to help get you over the takeover hump!! (You can thank me later)

STEP 1: What exactly are you selling here?

Books right? I mean, you are an author after all. So you’re there to hock books and shove words down the throats of readers, right? WRONG!!!! If this is your mindset, then you need to decline said invite to the party. You’re not there to sell books, you’re there to sell YOURSELF. Yeah that’s right, it’s your time to pimp YOU. Readers want to know who you are. They want a glimpse into the person behind the keyboard, so freaking give it to them. Sure, you could spend an hour posting links to your novels, tell them to like every page you have set up, but doesn’t that get boring after a while? YES IT DOES! Here’s a familiar scenario that everyone has certainly been in…You’re walking through the department store and BAM, you get sprayed in the face with perfume by some crazy lady at the cosmetics counter. She gives you 9,000 reasons why you need this junk and does everything but offer you sexual favors if you buy it. So you go home smelling like you’ve been in a brothel all day and have a bottle of fragrance that is a cross between eau de skunk and roses. She didn’t let you choose if you liked it, she shoved it on you and you felt obligated to purchase it. Same goes for books and readers. Readers are fickle, I know this because I am one myself. I want to make damn sure the book I download is going to be one I will enjoy. So post your links, show me a fun teaser, and back the F off for a bit. I don’t need a million reasons as to why I should buy your book. I am a human being completely capable of making decisions on my own. Moral of step 1…Let the guests have freedom of choice.

STEP 2: A picture is worth a thousand words!

When you scroll through Facebook what is the one thing that usually stops you dead in your tracks? Is it the story of Sally Jane’s 6 kids taking a bath in peanut butter? Or is it the meme of Batman twerking to a Justin Bieber song? Yeah, it’s the second one for me too. Human beings are visual creatures. We see the world in bright colors and love to grasp the spectrum of those colors through images. The good news, the internet it chock full of images, ripe for the picking! Harvest them my young grasshopper! Don’t just write a sentence about how the weather is where you live, go find a funny image of a half-naked chipmunk dancing in the rain. People will be hitting the like button like crazy. I put some sort of image with every single post I make. I search for something along the lines of my topic and I add in a photo. Facebook is like a black hole, things get lost in the blink of an eye. If you write out a sentence only and no body comments or likes it, well, it’s gonna fall to the bottom of the page, never to be seen again. *Insert crying kitty meme here*. So use the tools in front of you, Google Images is a wonderland of awesomeness if you’d just utilize it. So save images and memes to your desktop for the event. For those OCD and don’t want clutter on your desktop…well, I’d tell you where you can save them, but this is a happy place here.

STEP 3: Even actors have scripts!

Nah it’s not cheating to have a script ready! I certainly do. Before I even begin my takeover I make sure to have something in front of me to go by. Here’s my trick…I open a Word doc and write out my script for the event. I keep it open along with the event page and when I’m up to bat, I just copy and paste my lines. Now, I’ll admit, I do half improv and half scripted. Sometimes you need to just go with the flow and stray from the planned assortment of awesome you have waiting in the wings. But having the words right in front of you will take most of the stress away and let you enjoy yourself and your fans. Oh and be sure to go in and type ‘DONE’ in front of something you’ve already copied and pasted into the event. Trust me, I’ve been the ass of many jokes by re-posting my stuff by accident.

STEP 4: What? You mean I actually have to interact with these people?

I’ve seen it time and time again. A post is made, guests comment, and that’s it. The author fails to interact with their people! This is a huge NO NO. Like I said in step 1, the readers want to play along with you, they want to know YOU. So give the people what they want. You aren’t some posting robot, only there to throw things at the Facebook wall and see if it sticks. You need to talk to people. So make sure you keep on track of what is going on during your event time. If they ask you a question, answer it to the best of your abilities. If someone says something funny, reply with ‘LOL’ or ‘LMAO’. You don’t have to write a novel back to them, just show them you care by showing your face. Ask open ended questions. Things like ‘what is your biggest fear?’ ‘Who would you want to meet—living or dead—if you could meet anyone?’ even ‘where does everyone hail from?’ works as a good conversation starter. Stay away from religion and politics (unless it directly relates to the topic of your book). Offending people is a sure fire way to become a grade A Author Asshole. You don’t want to get into a fight with someone because you think the pope should dance to Gangnam Style on Easter morning. You practice safe sex, so put your brain condom on and think smart when it comes to interacting with people online. Sometimes words can be misconstrued in writing, so tread lightly when choosing your topics.

STEP 5: Free shit rocks!!!!

Who doesn’t love winning things? If you don’t, dare I say you are some sort of communist. Personally, I love giving things away, but that’s just me. You may be stingy and think that your books need to be plated in gold and kept under lock and key, but how they hell are you to gain new readers with that snarky attitude? You’re not. So stop being a douche biscuit and give things away! Offer a free E-book to a contest winner, gift a copy of a fellow author’s book to someone. It’s not like I’m asking you to give your first born child over for ritual sacrifice. Another thing that readers love is what we like to call ‘book swag’. It can be anything from keychains, bookmarks, coffee mugs or even an inexpensive piece of costume jewelry. Let’s face it, most authors aren’t rolling around in piles of cash. If you are, kudos to you, you clearly slept with the right person (ha-ha it was a joke. Lighten up.) So look around next time you’re out shopping. You might run across a cheap pair of pearl earrings that look like the ones your character wore in your romance novel. A reader would love to hear the story and possibly win those!

STEP 6: Time is money!

Yes, time is money. Authors realize this better than most. Every minute we aren’t tapping away on the keyboard is another book that isn’t getting published. So the lesson here is that if you are scheduled for an event, show the hell up for it! Tardiness is not acceptable. You are putting a strain on the author who will be up after you. You are shortening the time of everyone, not only yourself. If you think you might have a schedule conflict, contact the event coordinator ASAP. They can either move you around or find someone else to fill that time slot. Moral of the story is: Don’t be an ass.

STEP 7: How often am I supposed to post stuff!?

Okay, don’t panic! I’ve got this. Think of it this way, the more you post, the more your face is seen, right? So you want to find a balance between ‘sweet flow’ and ‘holy shit, is that the flash on the other end of this thing?!” Most takeovers will either be 1 hour or 30 minutes. This is how I do mine…

1 hour Takeover- 9-10 posts. This will be an average of a post going up every 6-7 minutes. It’s enough to keep the spotlight. You don’t want to try for too many more or people can’t keep up with you. If I see that one of my posts are becoming pretty active, I will hold off on one of my posts so I can interact more with my fans.

30 Minute Takeover- 5-6 posts. I try for 6 because that puts me at every 5 minutes posting. 30 minute spots are fast and furious, so it’s okay to post more frequently, people expect it. Beware though with a 30 min spot, it will buzz by very quickly. So don’t get up to pee or have a cig. Your time will be gone before you know it.

*Note*

Always have a ‘spare’ post waiting in the wings. You may not use it and that’s fine, but you for sure don’t want to run out of things to post. You’ll be wide eyed and in a panic to try and find something to say. A good spare post to have on hand is an “Ask me Anything” post.

STEP 7: You mean I have to play games? I hate monopoly!

No worries, the monopoly guy stays hidden for this one. One thing I adore doing during a takeover is playing games with fans! But there is that ever daunting task of figuring out what type of games to play. So let’s think about this shall we? We are authors, the creators of alternate universes, the makers of erotic love scenes, the Dexter’s behind the keyboard. Surely you have some creative cells left to think of some fun games to play right? Well the internet is your guide once more. Search and you will find! But I will provide you with a small list of games that I’ve found to work extremely well in getting interaction.

Takeover Games

Replace a word in a movie title with the word…’goat, bacon, boobs, etc.’

Make a happy song sad… ‘Flabby-instead of Happy by Pharrell’

Caption this pic

Find me a hilarious meme

Post the 13th (or whatever number you want) photo in your camera roll

Post a pic of your dream guy (Works great for romance takeovers)

What’s on your bucket list (Tell them something on your list too, it shows them you are in fact a human with hopes and dreams)

Now, this is a short list of the ones I use, I have an entire arsenal at my disposal. So use those creative juices for something other than killing people off and making them drink a thousand cups of coffee in your books.

STEP 8: Stop trying to keep up with the Joneses…

We are all different, so don’t compare yourself to the author that did the time slot right before you. If you sit back and say ‘uh, I can’t do as well as he did’ then chances are, you’re going to blow it and suck balls. You have one chance to make a good first impression, don’t stub your toe because Penny came on and rocked out her hour ahead of you. First of all…YOU’RE NOT HER!!! So suck it up buttercup. You didn’t get pushed out of the same womb the other author did, and you didn’t share your mac and cheese all through grade school with them. So stop trying to be like them. BE YOURSELF! Some will love you and some will hate you. You cannot control how others feel. But you can control how you handle yourself. So when it’s your time to bat, grab that hunk of wood, take a few practice swings and aim for the parking lot. If the balls fouls, then you rear back and hit it again until you have a homerun you can cheer for. You won’t be perfect on your first attempt either. I stumbled over myself like crazy during my first one. I wasn’t sure which way was up and I literally made shit up as I went. But I’ve learned that the best offense is a good defense.

STEP 9: It’s not the end of the world…is it?

I can assure you that it is NOT in fact, the end of the world. Doing a takeover is a small blip in the space time continuum. Yes, you will have sweaty palms, you’ll feel like you’re going to pee your pants, and yes, your children will choose that hour to behave in a manner that is only fitting for zoo animals. Chill the hell out. The people on the other end of that takeover have lives too. They know that children act crazy, animals poop in the floor, and that a human needs to potty every now and again. So you need to relax. They don’t expect you to exude perfection, but they do expect you to exude confidence. Even online I can tell if someone is less than confident in what they are posting. It’s not pretty. It’s the equivalent to a plane going down in flames. In fact, let me give you an example of confidence vs. non-confidence…

Example 1 Non-Confidence Posting: Hi, I’m C.D. Taylor. I write romance books. How are you today? Below are the links to my social media sites. I hope you check them out.

Example 2 Confidence Posting: Happy Hump Day peeps! I’m known by 2 names in the book world, C.D. Taylor for my steamy romance and Taylor Dawn for my awesome urban fantasy. I’m excited to hang with you guys for the next hour. So let’s say we play some games, talk some books and cause some trouble?! If we crash the internet…I’m blaming it on you guys! Below are my links if you wanna stalk me when we’re done here. So let’s get this party started!!!!

You tell me…which one would you want to stick around for? The decision is easy for me. I want the person who inspires excitement in me, someone who clearly wants to have some fun for the next hour!

STEP 10: FUN? What is this FUN you speak of?

Imagine you’ve just gotten off work, you log into your Facebook account and see that you joined a party you’d forgotten about. You’re so damn tired, but you really want to see what’s going on. You click in and find that all there is, is links to buy books….BORING!!! Yeah, I’d be visiting my good friend the pillow. If I join something, it’s because there’s an opportunity to have fun. I want to laugh, joke around, and be stupid…yes I said stupid. That’s what your fans want. They don’t want an hour of someone saying ‘blah blah blah books, blah blah blah my cat, blah blah blah’ they want to have genuine fun. My motto has always been ‘Life is short, pull the stick outta your ass’. It’s a good motto to live by. But don’t steal it, it’s mine! So when you plan your takeover, put yourself in the shoes of your fans. What would you want if you logged into an event? Some stuffed shirt giving you the Gettysburg Address? Or some crazy fun person offering you a chance to caption a meme with 2 hamsters, a half dressed man and a goat?! I’m going for the goat, all the way, baby!

There you have it, my steps for a successful Facebook takeover! This may help some, and some may push it to the side and say ‘EW’. But that’s okay. This won’t be for everyone. But for those who don’t have a stick up your ass, I really hope this will inspire you to go out there and sign up for some takeover spots. I know you have the creativity to do this, otherwise, you wouldn’t be writing books in the first place. I wish you the best of luck in your quest for Facebook domination and if you need me, you know where to find me….Facebook, Twitter, Email…hell, I’m freaking EVERYWHERE!!!

Peace, Love and Pages

C.D. Taylor/Taylor Dawn