I’ve followed a few authors on twitter the other day, and almost every single one sent me an automated message asking me to check their book.
Seriously, I must’ve gotten some ten auto direct messages in a day.
One of them even said, “Sorry for the spam, but if you have a second, could you please check my book?”
I’m sorry, but I’m one to believe that you shouldn’t apologize for spam: Just don’t use it.
So I decided to be a do-gooder and sent a message to said author. He replied claiming it generated TONS of sales to him.
Remember when you were fifteen and your friends mocked you because you were still a virgin, and you said, “I’m totally not, in fact I have seen loads of penises!”
“Oh yeah?” Britney asked. “And what color are they, stupid virgin?”
“Hmm, green?”
Yeah. That was exactly like that.
I was super nice and told him, “Good for you,” and then we parted ways. But I highly doubt he makes TONS of sales with auto DMs.
Look, every respectable self-publishing venue advises against it. It’s a simple logic: Your auto message is spam.
Do you like spam? Of course you don’t. You know who also doesn’t like spam?
EVERYONE ELSE.
*Drops mike and leaves*
C.S. Wilde writes about fantastical worlds, love stories larger than life and epic battles. She also, quite obviously, sucks at writing an author bio. She finds it awkward that she must write this in the third person, and hopes you won’t notice.
C.S. Wilde 
I often wonder why the internet is awash with the same old advice to authors; it’s because some authors are so idiotic they need it ramming down their throats!
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Tell me about it!
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Now that’s what I call a closure!
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You go girl! Seriously, I just delete them anyway, why waste the time making them. Although I do not ever remember being asked how many penises I’ve seen. Boobs yes, penises no. LOL Loved the post. Just the right amount of angst for a Monday.
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Spam is spam, Sam I Am. I do not like Spam. 😀 BTW, I love the new gravatar!
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Much obliged, good sir : )
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Idiots, complete and utter morons!
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lol now, now, they just don’t know better.
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I got one from an author whose book I reviewed. I was like, “Um, I have your book. You sent it to me, remember? And I reviewed it, remember?”
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Oh that must’ve been super awkward.
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I didn’t write back to her. I just thought it was weird. I’m also new to Twitter and didn’t realize people could automatically send messages. Makes sense now.
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Spammers are like mosquitoes. They deserve no mercy and most be crushed into nonexistence.
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I hope “green” just meant you were fibbing otherwise your boyfriend at the time should really have seen a doctor.
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Reblogged this on Emily Arden, author and commented:
I never send auto messages for just this reason. What do you think of them?
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Thanks for the reblog!
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Nice column. I never use Twitter’s automated messages; I don’t even know how to set them up. Besides, why use Twitter when WordPress is better? Sorry to do this in a reply, but please take a moment to check out my book. It’s good. It really, really is. You need it in your life. I’ve run out of ideas, so take your favourite marketing phrase and insert here. And it’s NEVER advertised with automated messages.
Another thing I’ve recently decided I can’t stand are people with massive follower lists on Twitter who go on sites like Fiverr.com and say ‘I’ll tweet your book to my list.’ Unless you painstakingly go through that person’s followers, how are you supposed to know you’re going to reach your target audience that way? It might be cheap but it’s still a waste of cash – you’ve most likely created just another twitter message floating in the wind; it will sit nicely with the millions of others ignored on the bird-shaped spam factory. It’s a tactic mostly adopted by desperate authors with low sales. There are better ways of dealing with that problem.
I’ve never liked Twitter anyway. I’ve enjoyed reading Jonathan Franzen moaning about it. I only have an account because some of my readers like it, and it can be a useful way to communicate one-on-one, but as an advertising tool I’ve always found it useless. I continue to try it for the occasional promo but I’ve yet to see it yield results.
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