Guest post by Willie Handler, author of two satirical novels, The Road Ahead and Loved Mars Hated The Food.

Editor’s Note: There’s a thriving writer community on Twitter. If you plan to promote yourself as an author, mastering this platform is a must. This post assumes you’re starting from zero, but feel free to skip ahead if you already grasp the basics.

I had no clue what Twitter had to offer writers until I sat down for coffee with one of my writing buddies. I was using Twitter but didn’t really understand how it could help me as a writer. She gave me some Twitter basics but when I sat down and began to closely examine the platform, the light went on. Since that coffee date about three years ago, my followers have jumped from about 400 to close to 9,000. Let me explain what I learned and how I expanded my followers. What is Social Media? Social media includes a wide range of networks and apps that allow you to set up social networking. They help individuals, professionals, celebrities and businesses connect and share with peers, clients and other people with similar interests and backgrounds. There are hundreds of social media apps and new ones starting up every week. Each app provides different functionality but there’s a lot of overlap.  Many in the writing community are active on social media. The most popular networks are Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Tumblr, WhatsApp, Snapchat, Pinterest, L…

Source: Twitter for Writers 101