Later this year I’ll have a book to get out into the world. I already have several short stories to share. Given that it’s 2015, I could no longer put off learning to express myself in 140 characters or less. I could no longer deny the world the opportunity to give my every thought, word, and deed thumbs up or thumbs down. The time was nigh for strangers to see pictures of my every meal.
I almost felt guilty for having waited so long.
Since my primary motive for joining social media wasn’t to stay in touch with friends but, instead, to promote my writing, I had a lot to learn.
For starters, I needed to post often. On Facebook. On Twitter. On sites I’d never heard of. And not just anything. My posts needed to be interesting, visually pleasing, and succinct.
Assuming I could find enough content for all those posts, they had to be timed to reach as many people as possible. Their text needed to fall within a certain number of characters. Repurposing other people’s posts required adherence to still other norms. And I shouldn’t use too many posts for self-promotion.
But wasn’t that why I was there?
Otherwise, why would I consider paying to broadcast my page or boost my tweets? Or even buy followers, something that seemed laughable until I read about the social proof principal. Followers begat followers. If I didn’t already have enough of them, new ones were unlikely to jump onto an empty bandwagon. Maybe buying some to get things started wasn’t so laughable after all. But was it ethical?
Those and many other questions unanswered, I took a deep breath and dove headfirst into the social media frenzy.
No sooner had I done so, than I encountered an even more daunting question.
Who was Matthew Félix?
I like to think I know myself fairly well. But how much of myself did I want to share? And how should I go about it?
Repeatedly I was told to find and emulate a well-known personality with similar interests and objectives. At the same time, I was advised to take a fresh, unique approach to ensure I stood out in the crowd. Overlooking the ostensible paradox, I started by following other writers, travelers, and people interested in spirituality. In no time, my Twitter stream was flooded with ads for self-published e-books, the best deals in every city on every continent, and so many inspirational quotes that I fell into a deep depression.
I couldn’t help but think everyone was preaching to their own respective choirs. Was it actually possible to build a readership this way?
The verdict still out, slowly but surely my online presence began to take form. Along with it, so did a horrible truth.
It was bad enough that overnight I’d gone from having nothing to do with social media to asking everybody I met to not only like but follow me, too.
It was infinitely worse to discover I was no different from anyone else.
I loved being liked.
Every time I got a notification, my heart lit up. Each time I had a new follower, I felt that much more alive. Whenever someone commented on or shared something I had posted, my entire worldview was validated. It wasn’t long before I was hitting the refresh button on my browser every chance I got.
A month to the day into my social media experience, I’m still hitting refresh. Thankfully though, as the novelty has worn off, the obsession has subsided. That’s not to suggest I’ve figured it all out or come even close to tapping into its full potential. I haven’t. Not even remotely.
But like by like, follow by follow, each day I’m getting a little closer.