I’d do it again in a heartbeat, too, and here’s why. BookTok is a much more radical and controversial place than the BookStagram community. If you know me, you know, I’m the Instagram gal and not really versed in the nuances of TikTok at ALL. But, I’m over there trying to figure it out so I can help authors across all of their content marketing instead of just the areas that light me up.
Over one weekend, I posted a TikTok meme that I thought was hilarious. You can see it (and all of the very mad comments) here. In essence, it was directed at authors and said “Your face when you realize AI isn’t all bad & can actually help you market your books.”
The wording here is important.
1.) “Isn’t all bad” implies that not all AI is good, meaning, I’m not a fan of using AI for absolutely everything. This is important and consistent with a lot of people in the online creation community. We know that using AI for CREATION is not the best — it’s taking other people’s creations to create something for you. I don’t use it for image creation or to write the book I’m currently working on. Instead, I use it to assist in bringing my own ideas and creation into something that is tangible. More on that later.
2.) “Help you market your book.” If we break it down, I’m targeting authors and we are talking specifically about marketing, not writing or even editing their books.
The reason I pull out these words is because they were right there on the video. Then, my caption said, “I’m just out here making sure you’re not afraid of the robots and know how to employ them to your advantage.” It was a very tongue in cheek caption. It was fun and it totally fell flat on TikTok (but not on Instagram. It was neither here nor there on Instagram.)
I didn’t go on TikTok for the rest of the weekend until I saw that I had over 100 notifications and was like WTF is happening?!
Somehow thanks to the algorithm, my video had reached people who weren’t my target audience and they were big mad. At first, I was trying to understand their point of view. I asked questions, I explained that it’s specifically for marketing and mostly to organize your ideas and work with the algorithms, which are powered by AI. But by what felt like the 25th BookTok comment with most of them just saying, “No” I thought that they were trolling me. So I started to jokingly reply asking if people are afraid of robots, etc. That made them more mad.
I was thinking two things during this whole BookTok experience.
1.) They’re helping boost my post and account with engagement, so thank you very much. Even though it was reaching people that were not my target audience, I was still seeing some author likes and favorites and follows.
2.) This is fascinating. I’d love to know more on their positions and if they are qualified to speak on the topic outside of being a reader. Does all of BookTok feel this way? A few people kept saying, “In the industry.” While using AI is controversial in the publishing industry with traditional publishers taking a harder stance, there are quite a few trusted resources that have talked about how to use AI in the changing industry. (Here are two articles I found very interesting).
So with my endless curiosity and journalism brain, I was responding and asking for feedback and even replying on someone who stitched me. This apparently again made them more mad. But it did give me some great insight. These are readers in Gen Z. They’re passionate about sustainability and are outspoken about world issues that are important to them. They weren’t willing to listen or understand what I was trying to say, but it was a great learning experience for me with authors who are targeting Gen Z readers.
Important Takeaways from All of This
- Nuances are always everything and who you reach might not be your target audience, especially on BookTok.
- Algorithms, like BookTok are powered by AI and that’s why using AI tools to enhance the algorithm is important for smaller authors.
- You need to keep in mind that there is a vocal group of readers who won’t read a book if they know that an author has used AI in any way – organization, marketing, etc.
- Traditional publishers are taking a hard approach on AI, so keep that in mind if you’re looking to get traditionally published or picked up.
- ChatGPT isn’t really AI like we think and most people who are not in the tech industry don’t understand what it means.
How Do I Use AI?
I predominantly use AI to work the algorithms, asking ChatGPT to optimize content I’ve written to enhance it for particular algorithm reasons (engagement vs views), organize my ideas and content that I’ve created, schedule my posts and streamline graphic creation in Canva.
