Wanna do better at social media? It can be boiled down to two sentences.

Like less. Share more.

Share and share a like lot

It’s very simple. You Like when you should Share, and you Favorite when you should Retweet.

First of all, get into the proper headspace. As a webcartoonist, you’re on social media for one reason — and one reason alone. You’re there to promote.

Your Aunt Mildred is on social media to post pictures of her nieces and to take quizzes that tell her which Deep Space Nine character she is.

You can do all of that (if you choose), but the primary reason you’re there is to promote.

And branding is a huge part of promotion.

Branding

Branding tells the world who you are. A good brand should have a headline and several sub-heads. In other words, there should be one theme that develops around the things that you post about yourself (and your comic). And, secondary to that, there should be several other themes.

What’s my brand?

HEADLINE

• Webcomics pioneer — I’ve been doing this thing successfully since the very start of webcomics

SUBHEADS

• NSFW comics creator
• How-to author
• Podcaster
• Father
• Geek/Pop-culture commenter
• Comic-strip aficionado
• Comics mentor
• Patreon pioneer
• Self-publisher
• Philadelphian
• And so on…

All of the above combines to create my personal brand. Is it accurate? Yes and no. All of the above are truthful, but my presentation of them is decidedly one-sided.

For example, if you follow me on social media, you’re going to hear a lot about my successes. I’m going to post positive stuff all day long. You’re going to hear much less about my failures and shortcomings. Is that because I don’t experience them? Hell, no.

It’s because I know why I’m on social media.

And it ain’t to tell you about my failures.*

*Unless it’s in direct aid of sub-head #2 above.

So what?

So this: Liking and Favoriting are nearly invisible acts.

Sharing and Retweeting are highly visible acts.

If you want to reinforce your brand, you need to do so visibly.

Why?

Beyond simple branding, this boils down to one core concept: The Three Cs of Social Media. Social media is about Content, Commercial and Curation.

Sharing and retweeting? That’s straight-up Curation.

Along with reinforcing my brand, Curation enables me to slide in more Commercials.

AND, since my Curation is MUCH more likely to generate engagement, when I DO post Commercials, they are FAR more likely to be seen by a larger number of people — because social-media favors people who make engaging posts. Go back and look a the number of Likes and Share those branding posts earn.

And that’s important to me because I know why I’m on social media.

Now…

Look at your own social-media feeds.

Do you know why you’re on social media?