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[Ep 219]\n\n\n\nWhether you\u2019re interested in increasing blog readership or building a freelance writing business\u2014and especially if you\u2019re pursuing traditional publishing\u2014you\u2019ll want to connect with readers.\n\nYou\u2019ll want to reach people who are interested in your stories and ideas and appreciate how you present those ideas as a writer, in your unique style, tone, and personality.\n\nThat\u2019s the basic idea of platform. In fact, I define it like this: platform is all the ways you, as your author brand, reach and retain ideal readers.\nPlatform Size Affects Opportunities\nJane Friedman says in her book The Business of Being a Writer:\n[T]he size of your platform will affect how easy it is for you to earn money or bring opportunities to your door. Editors, businesses, organizations, and other potential benefactors will be more likely to consider you if they've heard of you, seen evidence of your work in the market, or otherwise become familiar with you through online or offline interactions. 1\nOn a proposal, you list the number of Twitter and Instagram followers you have and the size of the audience at your last speaking engagement. You want those numbers to be substantial, even impressive. The bigger the platform, the better, in terms of being able to bring opportunities to your door.\n\nBut it\u2019s more than numbers; in fact, numbers mean nothing if your readers aren\u2019t feeling a sense of kinship with you as a writer or a sense of connection with your prose.\n\nSo, as you build a platform, remember each number you present to a publisher represents a human being. The metrics you present are people\u2014people interested in what you have to say and how you say it.\n\n\nBuilding a Far-Reaching Platform Through Social Media\nContrary to what you may have been led to believe, your social media presence is not in and of itself your platform. You have a range of options available to reach and retain readers.\n\nAnd yet\u2026\n\nAnd yet social media offers powerful publishing and distribution tools in the palms of our hands\u2014available for free! It levels the playing field, allowing a homeschooling farmer\u2019s wife who lives in the middle of nowhere to engage with readers in the same spaces as major book publishers and magazines.\n\nWith the click of a button, our words can reach the ends of the earth! Isn\u2019t that amazing? We can leverage these apps to connect with readers and raise visibility as a writer worldwide, building a meaningful, substantial, far-reaching platform over time.\nThe Best Platform-Building Efforts Call for Real Human Interaction\nConnecting with readers doesn\u2019t require marketing savvy or publicity know-how (though that can help). Many of the most effective platform-building efforts simply call for honest, real human interaction: a pleasant email; an earnest comment responding to someone\u2019s article; a card mailed to someone we meet at a conference; a retweet with an encouraging note.\n\nFind simple ways to engage with readers, then expand and experiment over time, because, as Jane says:\nIf you\u2019re committed to pursuing a career primarily focused on book publication, then you\u2019ll be faced with the challenge of staying competitive, current, and discoverable in a shifting digital landscape; of having the right tools to be effective and in touch with your readers; and of developing strong partnerships to help you market and promote your work.2\nCommunity Support\nThere\u2019s another opportunity to increase our reach as we build our platform, and that\u2019s through online communities. Because so many of these groups and organizations are online, connecting with these readers overlaps with social media efforts.\n\nThese online communities can look different. Some are paid membership sites and others, loose collections of friends around a theme or activity. Whatever shape or format they take, the healthy outlets serve as an excellent way to connect with writers and readers. These communities offer mutual support and celebration for every new succes...