The Building Blocks of Your Marketing Strategy Step 5: Choose Your Channels

Sep 6

How do you come up with the elements of your content strategy? To figure out your Five Ws, you’ll need to do some work that will include determining your goals, finding your key topics, thinking through your target audience or ideal reader, and more.

Note that building your content strategy does not begin by creating content. In fact, we won’t even get into actually creating content until the next section, because before you do so, you have to know what you’re creating, why you’re creating it, who you’re creating it for, and where and when you’re posting it.

Choose and Set Up Your Channels

Once you start creating your content, you have to share it somewhere! Now it’s time to decide which channels you want to focus your marketing efforts on — and it shouldn’t be all of them! Everyone should have a website. But determining your other content channels will depend again on your goals and what you’re trying to achieve, as well as where your audience spends their time and what’s the best use of your time.

Website

Everyone needs a website so that prospective customers, readers, and patrons can find you online and learn more about you. Because many people aren’t on certain social media platforms, it’s not enough to stake your presence on, for example, your Facebook business page or an Instagram account. You want to make it as easy as possible for people to find you on the general web. Having a website also allows you to control your story and what information you release to the world.

What to Include on a Website

What should you have on your website? It doesn’t have to be complicated, and a three- or four-page website might be enough for your purposes. Here’s what you need:

For authors: A homepage (ideally promoting your newest release), a book or publications page, and an About page with your bio. Also have a way to contact you (through a form), follow you on social media, and sign up for your newsletter. You can certainly add more pages, like a blog or a book recommendations page, but make sure you have all of the above there first.

For bookstores or other literary businesses: A homepage, a way to browse your inventory and order online, an events page, your location, and an About page telling your story. Also have a way to contact you (through a form), follow you on social media, and sign up for your newsletter. As you increase your services (membership, signed editions club, etc.), you can add additional pages, but make sure you have all of the above there first.

Literary orgs, festivals, and non-profits: A homepage, an events or services page, an About page telling your story, and a page on how to donate or support your organization. Also have a way to contact you (through a form), follow you on social media, and sign up for your newsletter. You may also include a page about how to get involved with your organization or a blog that helps tell your story and impact.

Once you build your website, your content will typically remain pretty static going forward. You may update it occasionally with news or event information. Otherwise, like in the case of a simple author site, once you build it you likely won’t need to touch it for a while.

What You Need to Create a Website

You may think you just need to start building a website and you’re all set. But there are actually three necessary elements you need to make sure your website works: the address, the house, and the property.

A domain name (the address): You need to purchase a domain name for your website, which is essentially your online address. KentLiteraryMarketing.com and LiteraryBoston.com are domain names I purchased, which is how people can find my websites. You can purchase a domain name from GoDaddy or other sites that sell domains (which may also be available through your website builder or hosting provider), and then link that domain name to the website you build.

Choose a domain name that is straightforward, professional, and that tells the world who you are and what you do. If you’re an author, have it be your name, or your name with “writer” or “author” added at the end. Always look to purchase a .com domain extension as well, or .org if you’re a literary organization or non-profit. Try to stay away from non-traditional domain extensions as they may lower the perceived professionalism of your website.

Website builder (the house): Next, you need a way to actually build your website, which is the house in our scenario. There are a number of different options out there that range from easy-to-use WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) interfaces — where you can essentially drag and drop elements into a page, which will appear the same on the final site — to website builders that require a lot of HTML and CSS coding.

Squarespace is a great website builder that’s very straightforward and offers built-in domain purchase and web hosting (I use and prefer Squarespace). Another popular website builder is WordPress, which does require a bit of knowledge to use, and doesn’t have built-in hosting or domain purchase. Wix is yet another popular website builder that features a WYSIWYG interface, and also allows users to build a basic website for free.

Website hosting (the property): Finally, you need a place to host your website on the internet. Think of this as the property that the house gets built on. Bluehost is a popular hosting provider. Who you purchase your domain name through or who you build your website through may also have built-in or added-on web hosting. For example, you may use WordPress as your website builder, use BlueHost as your hosting provider, and purchase your domain name from GoDaddy. Or you can have Squarespace take care of all three!

Google Indexing, Ranking, and SEO… Oh My!

Google is the most used and most powerful search engine in the world, where people go every day to find information that’s valuable to them. So you would hope that your website would be findable by people looking for you. There are plenty of resources out there if you’d like to take a deep dive into how Google’s search engine, indexing, and ranking machine works, but here are the basics:

Once a website is published or made public, it becomes findable by Google, who is constantly crawling the web.
Once it finds your site, it’ll analyze what your site is and put it into its search engine (like listing it in the yellow pages).
Google also looks at your site and ranks it based on the site’s “authority,” which includes, for instance, the quality of your content and how many people link to your website.
More “authority” moves you up the list in ranking.
Google uses keywords to match searches with relevant websites or pages — someone types in “literary fiction” and it brings up all the websites that feature the keyword “literary fiction.”
Search engine optimization (SEO) is the practice of making adjustments or tweaks to your website content so that you’ll rank higher for certain keywords or searches. If your website features the term “literary fiction” across a number of pages, it’ll essentially rank higher than a website that only mentions “literary fiction” on one of its pages. In 2024, Google made significant changes to how it ranks pages, and will no longer “reward” websites packed with fluffy content just so they can rank for a keyword.

My two cents? Focus on meeting your audience where they are, getting in front of their eyes, and building relationships with them instead of waiting for them to maybe type the right words into a Google search and find you. Often your audience doesn’t know what they need (and certainly won’t search for it), and it’s up to you to share it with them.

A Blog

Another content channel is a blog, or weblog (yes, that’s the original term). When blogging started in the early 2000s, it was a vehicle for sharing personal thoughts or essays on a website or a dedicated blogging site. Today, companies use their blog as a major channel of communication to their customers, showcasing who they are, what they do, and how they solve problems. And individuals can use their website’s blog or blogging sites like Medium to grow audiences around their thoughts, insights, and opinions.

How to start a blog

A blog is simply another page on your website — and website-building platforms like Squarespace have specially designed blog pages that organize your content neatly and easily. Or, you may start a blog on a third-party site like Medium. Before you start blogging, make sure that you have a strategy for your blog. As we’ve talked about above, you’ll need to do some planning around what your blog will focus on, who it will speak to, why you’ll work on a blog, how it will align with your business goals, and how often you’ll post. You’ll also need to think about a distribution plan as well: how will others learn about your blog posts?

For example, if you’re an author, you can use your blog to write about your novel, how you wrote your novel, what areas of research you conducted, book recommendations, your favorite bookstores, or other things from your literary life that would be interesting and bring value to your audience. Again, your blog posts should focus on your key topics from above. You can certainly blog about your favorite coffee, your recent travels, or other miscellaneous topics, but they won’t attract an audience interested in who you are and what you do as an author.

Bookstores, literary non-profits, or other literary organizations can use their blog to write up reviews of recent events, showcase author interviews, highlight work they’re doing in the community, make book recommendations, talk about their mission, or other topics that would bring value to their audience.

To blog or to newsletter? That is the question

Today's spike in newsletter popularity and functionality has given rise to the question, “Do I need a dedicated blog or can my newsletter content essentially be my blog post?” The answer is, of course, it depends on the intention of your newsletter.

If your intention is to send a newsletter out with a self-contained article on a topic that can teach or inform, you may not need a blog, or you can add a “newsletter” section to your website that functions as the blog. Similarly, if you write a blog each week and post it to your website, you can take that copy and send it out as a newsletter. This can work well for authors or individuals.

However, if you use your newsletter as a wrap-up of news and events, or a vehicle to showcase lots of information about your business or non-profit — that is different than blogging. So you could write a blog on your website, and then feature those posts in your newsletter along with your other content.

Social media

Social media has created incredible opportunities for anyone to connect with and grow an audience from around the world, for free. Today, 64% of the world uses social media, according to Statista.

But they’re not just using it for entertainment. Over 5 billion people, or 62.3% of the world’s population, were on social media in 2024. In the US, internet users ages 16 to 64 spend an average of 2 hours and 18 minutes on social media per day. 76% of users have used social media to search for or discover new products and brands (like books, bookstores, or literary businesses). 69% of users have made a purchase based on something they saw on social media (like a book!). 65% of users say they feel more connected to a brand (and I would say, a personal brand like an author, too) that has a robust social media presence.

This means that once you start posting content, you’re not shouting into the void. There are plenty of users who are looking to connect with and follow authors or literary organizations they can connect with.

However, social media can feel the most daunting to those who haven’t used it a lot. And too often, folks in the literary community jump past why they should be on social media and the benefits of social media right to, “My publisher told me I have to do this, so…”

Why should you use social media as a major part of your promotion plan?

Your audience is there already and looking to find you
It’s free
It provides the opportunity to connect with like-minded people from all over the world in one place
It allows you to be creative in what and how you post — something us literary folks do well already!
It’s a vehicle for sharing what you’re passionate about
Less daunting and more controllable than networking in person

The best social media platforms for authors

Instagram: The literary community’s presence on Instagram is strong! Instagram is a visual-based social media platform — photos, graphics, and video — that allows authors, bookstores, and literary organizations to showcase who they are and what they do in a variety of different ways. Create a graphic with your book cover and quote. Film a behind-the-scene video at your bookstore. Share photos from your book festival events. There are limitless possibilities and creativity to share on Instagram. Most people across age demographics use Instagram, which is why it’s such an appealing platform. (I use it as my primary social media presence, and have grown a pretty great audience there.)

Threads: Run by Meta, Threads appeared in 2023 as essentially a Twitter replacement. While mostly a text-based medium (though you can post images and video), Threads is a conversational platform where it’s easy and expected to have back-and-forth interactions with other users. The great thing is that it’s full of writers and literary folks, and the Threads algorithm will fill your newsfeed with authors and other literary folks looking to connect! The age demographic for Threads seems to be Millennial, with some Gen Z and Gen X, though a recent flood of new users may be shifting that demographic.

Bluesky: Bluesky came on the scene in 2024 as another Threads/X alternative. At the end of 2024, it’s gaining traction in the writing community, but we have yet to see if it becomes a fully fledged social media platform.

TikTok: A short-form video platform, TikTok has a huge presence of writers, readers, and “BookTokers” who use their creativity to share book reviews and recommendations, create skits and scenes from books, share behind-the-scenes videos, and more. TikTok’s influence is so impactful that older books featured in recent TikTok videos from popular influencers have made it back on the NYT Bestseller list! Before you embark on TikTok, you need to be comfortable being on camera or filming video, and be familiar with the TikTok “style” as well. The demographic for this platform is primarily Gen Z, but there are plenty of Millennials and Gen X users there, too.

Facebook: Still the most popular social media platform in the world, Facebook was one of the original platforms created for people to connect with others around the world. Facebook users create text-based posts that can be augmented with photos, videos, or links, can post short-form videos or Stories, and can post a variety of content like other platforms. Users can also create event pages, create and join groups, sell goods in a marketplace, and more. However, while the most popular social media platform, many younger users are moving to Instagram, Threads, and TikTok, leaving older demographics on Facebook.

YouTube: Featuring long- and short-form videos, YouTube is actually one of the largest search engines in the world, and is a platform where people go to learn about all different topics. There’s less social engagement than other social media platforms, but YouTube gives authors, bookstores, and literary organizations the opportunity to showcase what they do through video, educating and bringing value to their audience. YouTube provides an opportunity for users to cross-post videos as well from TikTok or Instagram, increasing their audience size.

LinkedIn: The social media platform focused on career and professional development, LinkedIn is another option for literary folks, yet is not often considered a platform conducive to literary connection. However, authors, booksellers, and other literary organizers can connect professionally on LinkedIn and use it for networking. And you can always post to LinkedIn or repurpose content there as an additional social media site that can help you connect to potential new audiences.

A word about Twitter/X: Once upon a time, there was a platform called Twitter, where all the literary folks congregated — so much so that our little area of Twitter was called “Writer Twitter.” I really grew my following for Literary Boston on Twitter, beyond any other platform. However, after Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter, changing the name to X, the platform has deteriorated to the extent that most of the writers and literary folks left for other platforms. The good thing is that they all seemed to migrate to Threads! If you’re looking at social media platforms to use in your marketing efforts, this is the only one I would recommend bypassing.

Newsletters have been around for hundreds of years keeping individuals updated about topics and events. In recent years we, of course, have seen the rise of digital newsletters sent via email (and you likely have a number of them in your inbox right now!). Newsletters have quickly increased in popularity recently because it’s a content channel that you can “own.” The idea is that instead of growing your audience on a social media site where algorithms or site governance can change on a whim, having a list of subscriber emails means having a direct line of communication to your followers. Once someone gives you their email address, you own that, even if your followers get wiped out on social media tomorrow.

Similar to social media, a lot of literary folks hear “You have to start a newsletter,” yet have no idea where to start. Again, the first place to start is with why you should start a newsletter:

You want to build an audience you can speak to directly
You have value you want to share or something you want to teach
You want to cultivate your expertise and increase trust
You want a direct way to sell a product or service to an engaged audience

The next thing to consider is what you’re going to write about and whether will it be sustainable. For a writer, that could be sending out a newsletter each month with a writing tip, a story about writing your book, a teaser from your novel, or a short essay about a topic you research when writing. For a bookstore, it could be a weekly newsletter highlighting new releases, recommendations, and upcoming events. For a literary organization or non-profit, it could be a monthly newsletter highlighting the work they do, telling stories of their impact, and making a call for donations.

Remember to always deliver value to your audience to keep them engaged and wanting to actually open your newsletter. If you’re an author, sending out a newsletter telling about your book’s story, themes, and research, or sharing helpful writing tips delivers value and will be interesting to your audience. It’s then much easier to have them click a preorder link because they’re already engaged. However, sending out a newsletter that’s not on topic, doesn’t deliver value, and just seems like an “I wrote this just to get something out” newsletter won’t hold attention.

When it comes to frequency, you should ideally be using your content in general and your newsletter specifically to stay top-of-mind with your audience. One newsletter every few months won’t achieve that. Neither will infrequency, like sending a newsletter out weekly for a month, then not sending one out for two months. Your audience should look forward to receiving your newsletter because it’ll inform them, contain something interesting, help them out, or help educate them about a topic.

Choosing a newsletter platform

There are a number of different newsletter platforms out there to choose from, with all different types of functionality. The “go to” newsletter platform for authors today seems to be Substack — yet it has its pros and cons, and is not typically used outside of the writer world. Other platforms like Mailchimp (which I’ve used for years), Kit (which I just started using), Beehiv, and Flodesk offer different features and functionality, like being able to automate responses or sequences, or to segment audiences so they can receive different messaging.

Legal stuff

A few notes about some of the legal requirements around newsletters. First, all newsletters are required to comply with anti-spam legislation and must include an address in the footer. This may not be an issue if you’re a business, but if you’re an individual, you may be hesitant about this. However, newsletters do allow you to use a PO Box, which is a handy and safe option. Additionally, all newsletters are required to have an opt-out link, which your newsletter service will typically add for you automatically. Finally, it’s legally required that you get the consent of people who subscribe to your newsletter. Those who sign up for your newsletter are perfectly legit. However, it’s illegal to add people to your newsletter without their consent — which means you can’t add everyone you’ve ever met to your newsletter. They have to sign up themselves (or, you can sign them up if they tell you in person they want to be on the newsletter). And yes, if you’ve been added to a list you never signed up for, you can report it.

Podcast

While we don’t focus too heavily on podcasting here, it’s another content channel you can use to raise awareness around what you do related to a particular theme, topic, or issue. For example, if you’re a romance writer, you may start a podcast interviewing other romance writers about their work. If you’re a writing teacher, you may start a podcast giving short teachings on writing craft. If you’re a literary non-profit that focuses on raising childhood literacy, you may start a podcast interviewing experts in the childhood literacy field.

What a podcast can do is not only provide value through education and entertainment to your audience. It can help position you as thought leader in your focused area. If someone is looking for an expert on romance writing, they may look to you because of your podcast. If they’re looking for an expert in childhood literacy, they may look to you because of your podcast.

By taking an approach to your podcast where you interview guests, you’re also building relationships in your industry. Those relationships can then lead to other opportunities to get your name out there, like collaborating on future projects or being recommended by your guest to others. Your guest will also promote their podcast interview with you to their audience, getting your name in front of new people, too.

A podcast also gives you lots of content to use on other platforms. For example, if you interview an author, you can distribute that interview through the usual podcast channels. If you record a video interview, you can post that to YouTube. You can take clips and post them to social media. You can take the transcript and post it on your website. Or you can take the transcript, turn it into a blog post or newsletter, and send it out to your audience.

However, starting a podcast takes much more lift than simply posting on a social media platform. For a podcast, you’ll likely need to invest in equipment like a microphone or camera, subscribe to a recording software like Zoom or Riverside.fm, book guests or prepare content, record and edit that podcast, and then upload it to the various podcast platforms. However, the investment is likely worth the price.

In the next step, we’ll look at how to pick your content formats.

Hi! I’m Jessica, and I help literary businesses, organizations, and authors build and execute their marketing strategies. If you'd like to learn how to do this 👆, come work with me!

Jessica Kent