If you’re a writer with your own website, you may be wondering if social media is worth it. Can you actually get readers from short attention span apps like Twitter, or photo-focused apps like Pinterest and Instagram, or are they just time-sucking distractions? Read on to learn how to boost your author website traffic and find more readers.
Find author website traffic that turns into readers
My social media profiles have sent me a bit of author website traffic last year. I’m a writer, so I focus on text like flash fiction and links to longer stories, even though most social media users are far more interested in pictures and video. Even though my social media numbers aren’t huge, this analysis should benefit other writers who are interested in trying a similar social media traffic strategy.
So, how many clicks should you expect from social media? The amount of author website traffic you get depends on how many people see your message. Unless you’re paying for ads, that means your reach depends on the number of followers. Here are the conversion rates for each platform from the past 12 months. Think of the conversion rate as the chance of any individual follower visiting my website.
- Reddit: 55.83%. Most of this traffic comes from my subreddit r/ShortSF, Despite spending more effort on Reddit than any other social media platform, this isn’t nearly as high as Facebook.
- Tumblr: 21.00%.
- BlueSky: 2.56%. The platform is only a year old, and I expect this number to only get higher as people flee X/Twitter.
- Pinterest: 1.43%. I don’t post to it nearly as often as the others. Even with my minimal effort, I don’t think writing works very well on this platform.
What about engagement? Out of all my author website traffic, who is actually reading my stories after they click?
Tumblr and Reddit are tied, followed by BlueSky, then Twitter, then Pinterest. Despite all the clicks, Facebook is all the way at the bottom. Judging by the average amount of time users are spending on my site, I would say that Tumblr, Reddit, and BlueSky are where most of my readers are on social media.
So, what’s the best source of author website traffic? If you happen to be a writer with a website where you post jokes and science fiction stories, and you like social media, it looks like Reddit and Tumblr may be your best shot for finding new readers who actually stick around and read something. Remember to occasionally post photos and/or video as well. Multimedia does better than stories on every social media platform, because reading takes more effort than moving your thumb slightly to click a heart.
Of course, your mileage may vary. You might have lots of character art to post, which would do great on Pinterest. You might love posting inflammatory political opinions to get BlueSky riled up. You might be part of a secret cabal of Reddit power users who upvote each other every afternoon. You might be a young person who doesn’t have my anxiety issues and does really well with video. Just remember to keep tabs on your social media traffic so you don’t waste time on a strategy or a platform that isn’t working. You don’t want to waste time that would be better spent writing.
Also, if you don’t actually enjoy using social media, the traffic generally isn’t high enough to make it worthwhile. You’re probably better off focusing on bringing in traffic through SEO.
In my experience, most author website traffic comes from Google. If you want to try a search engine and SEO-focused strategy instead of social media, an SEO plugin like Rank Math or Yoast SEO is a good idea, as well as a Google Analytics or other analytics account. These will help you track how well you’re doing targeting search engine traffic.
First, focus on ranking for your author name. I had to compete with a similarly-named scientist, but they aren’t really concerned with marketing or SEO, so it wasn’t too hard to take over the first SERP. After that, Google a big, competitive term like “science fiction novels” and then target terms from the “People also ask” section. Ranking for smaller, related terms eventually helps you rank for bigger, more competitive terms. For example, I saw a boost to my ranking for “science fiction stories” after I posted my article “Was Frankenstein the First Science Fiction Novel?”
Whether you’re pulling in loads of author website traffic from social media or not, make sure you have a mailing list. Build your own platform. You don’t want to become dependent on the social media visitors from one site, only to have it get bought out and ruined by an idiot billionaire.
Some good things to put in your newsletter include:
- Blog post excerpts and links
- Sales/deals
- Links to book giveaways in your genre
- Research for your next piece
- Character background pieces
- Reader questions/surveys
- Book reviews
- Your reading list and photos of your TBR pile
- Books recommendations, especially books similar to yours
If you want to see what I send out, you can sign up below. I usually send a newsletter out on the first Monday of every month.
However you get author website traffic, the most important thing is to keep at it. There are readers out there waiting for a book just like yours. Help them find it. You’ll be glad you did.
Did I miss anything? Is there a social media network that works better for you? Let me know in the comments!
