The Art of Social Media- A Book Review

I think its pretty clear that by now, whether you’re promoting a business, a product, or yourself, social media is near the top of what will determine your success or failure. There are countless articles, websites, and even ‘professionals’ eager to advise you, although there’s no one quite like Guy Kawasaki. Guy Kawasaki along with co-author Peg Fitzpatrick have created the ultimate guide book for any question or concern you might have while trying to create a successful social media platform for yourself. This book is called The Art of Social Media- Power Tips for Power Users.

This book is jam packed with more than 100 tips and tricks to help you become successful on all social media platforms. Whether you’re looking to improve your own social media platforms or a business or employers, their main focus throughout the book is to guide you through the steps of building your own foundation, amassing your digital assets, going to market, optimizing your profile, curating content, attracting views and followers, and integrating social media with your blogs and websites.

Now, I mentioned earlier this was a ‘guide book’, please do not confuse that with a book for ‘beginners’. This is definitely not a beginners hand book. If you plan on reading this book, make sure you know a thing or two about social media already or you will not benefit from it. Guy and Peg have actually come up with a quiz for their readers to take before they begin reading the book, to ensure the reader is at a comfortable enough level with digital media that they will actually benefit from it. I highly recommend doing the quiz before reading or you will not be able to fully take in what Guy and Peg have to offer!

The first few chapters of the book are all about optimizing your profile and how to get followers, which might seem like information you already know, do not get discouraged. Keep Reading! Guy dives into tips and tricks that will help you create a profile people will WANT to look at!

One point that really stuck with me after reading the book is that social media is all about Trial and Error. What works for me and my business, might not necessarily work for you, but you might have a few tips that work for you and have given you a lot of success in your business. Guy really recommends experimenting with posts and content and building from those results. Guy also believes that you don’t necessarily always have to post your OWN content. He believes its important to have 2-3 of your own posts per week, but spend time the rest of the week re-posting content your followers might benefit from. He also lists a few sources he uses for reposting stories- some of these include Alltop, the ‘Whats Hot’ section on google, Trending topics on Facebook, and popular pins on Pinterest. You want to keep your viewers interested, so provide them with content that will appeal to them!

I definitely recommend reading the online version over the paperback version. Guy and Peg have inserted various links to different articles and websites throughout the book that will benefit the reader, although if you read the paperback version these links aren’t as easily accessible!

Overall, this was a fantastic read and I highly recommend it for anyone who is looking to expand their social media platforms. It may look like a quick and easy read because its only about 100 pages long, but this took me weeks to finish! It is packed with so much information, I found myself going back and highlighting different sections, rereading my favourite points (which I will writing about in another post- so stay tuned for that!) and telling everyone I knew about the different tips and tricks I was learning everyday. So do yourself a favour and get your hands on this book, I promise you will not be disappointed!