Sometimes I am a fast adaptor or fast follower. I find out about trend, it interests me and I either accept it or I follow it. This was the case with Pinterest and Facebook. As soon as I tried them, I was hooked. Other times, I am ornery and I just don’t give a fuck and I ignore it. This was how I felt about (and still feel) about the billionaire/stepbrother/dinosaur as hero book craze. I don’t really get all the fuss. But that’s just me.
A few months ago, people began asking me to support their ThunderClap campaigns. I had no clue what it was. Initially, I ignored all the requests. I was usually at work when I received them and I didn’t have time to find out what it was all about. By the time I went home, I’d forgotten about it. But then a fellow writer (Lisa Marie Rice) asked me what I knew about ThunderClap, and I figured I’d better look into it since other authors were now seeing it as something viable.
For those of you who have no clue what I am talking about, ThunderClap is a social media crowdspeaking platform–you start a campaign (for a cause, your gig, your book, etc) and you ask people to help you spread the word. In return, you help them spread the word about their campaigns via your social media networks. You set a deadline and you aim to reach a certain number of supporters by the deadline. With a little luck and perseverance, you will get your supporters, word will spread and thousands of people will find out about you and your campaign–and you hopefully will get some new followers and make a few sales while you’re at it.
So now I am trying ThunderClap for the first time. Yesterday, I set up a campaign for Maybe Forever and so far I’ve got 44 out of 100 supporters. I’ve got nine more days to reach my goal. Once I finish writing this post, I will return the favor to the people who’ve supported my campaign. If I’m lucky, by May 15 (the official release date for Maybe Forever) I will have reached thousands of potential readers and hopefully some of them will be intrigued and will have pre-ordered Maybe Forever.
Who knows? If I am really lucky, ThunderClap could help Maybe Forever become my breakout novel. A girl can dream, right? In the meantime, I’ll keep working on my near-future/SciFi-esque love story (working title: Under the Milky Way).
How many of you have tried ThunderClap? Drop me a line and let me know how it went for you.
