How To Write a Social Media “How To” Book

After reading every social media book, I realize one can never have too much of this good thing.  Wish I could contribute my own, but alas lack time for toming.  So I encourage you to.  Herewith some “how to” tips, that you yourself might join the SM immortals.

1. Gandhi that ” ‘do.” Recognize that content is secondary.  Of far greater importance, focus on the right look.  For that all-knowing mystical air that pulses from the cover shots of renowned SM authors, don horn-rimmed glasses and shave your head.  According to industry statistics — the same ones reporting that if Twitter users were a nation, the planet Jupiter couldn’t hold ‘em even stacked shoulder-to-shoulder — three out of four SM authors are bald and wear big black spectacles. Key pointer for your photo shoot: If you wear glasses, take ‘em off  for a coupla shots so things look  fuzzy — lets you experience how readers react to your prose.
2. Dig the Dogma, Drink the Koolaid. On content, be sure to ooze “trust,”  “make your own game,” “build an army,” be “one of us,” do it all for “free,”  and repeat, “it’s all good.”  Don’t waste time trying to be original, just say what all the rest do.  And if ever you find yourself far from your laptop, wandering alone and confused, bereft of the Social Media Commandments left home by the toilet, just drop by any New Age church for a free pamphlet on their doctrine — The content’s identical, and I suspect, the very gold mine most SM pundits pilfer for ideas.
3. Beat Googlemania to Death. Never mind that no other major company has ever succeeded by aping Google’s business model, throw in examples of obscure automotive, retail and airline start-ups that provide “zero cost” products and services and burn through investors’ capital, partying like it’s 1999.  Whoopee — dot.com 2.0!
4. Drag Out Those Anecdotal Chestnuts.  Who can say he tires of reading about Monty Python challenging the public to stop pirating and start paying something for their videos, or of Radiohead begging fans to pay anything for their CDs, or the musician who made more money than Monty Python and Radiohead combined, or than he himself ever did from his music, just by blogging about the airline that broke his guitar? Not I, even though the point of these tales eludes me.  I could read them again and again, and do every time I open a new social media book.
5. Writer’s Block? Then “Recommend.” No better way to fill white space when you grow weary of copying others.  Prominent SM authors flesh out thin ideas at least 30% this way.  Seth recommends Mitch who quotes Chris who defers to Julien who raves about Seth, who went home early to finish “The Four Hour Work Week.”  Each agrees on the others’ brilliance.  When they figure out where they’re going, could even be a movement.

Don’t delay, start writing your social media book today.  Anybody can, and does.  I could go on and on singing the praises of the authors, but then I’d sound like one of these books.

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