Blackbird Publishing

When you create a new Facebook page, the URL will look something like this.

https://www.facebook.com/The-Beneath-the-Waves-bundle-432987423709780

And here’s the custom URL to the same page. beneath.the.waves.bundle is now the page’s username:

https://www.facebook.com/beneath.the.waves.bundle

You can set up a username for any page – your author page, a book page, your publishing press’ page, etc.

The username will appear below your page’s name and image in the left-hand sidebar.
 
 
 
 
 
 

Why create a username for your page?

• It’s a lot easier to remember something like “beneath.the.waves.bundle” than “The-Beneath-the-Waves-bundle-432987423709780”.
• It looks nicer. 🙂
• Your page becomes more likely to show up in searches because of the way Facebook indexes information.
• The URLs fb.me/your.username and m.me/your.username will be created. For example, http://fb.me/beneath.the.waves.bundle takes you directly to the Beneath the Waves bundle’s page, but http://fb.me/The-Beneath-the-Waves-bundle-432987423709780 (which uses the non-custom URL) does not – it just takes you to the main Facebook page.

Prerequisites

• You have an existing page.
• You’re an admin for this page.
• The page does not already have a username (since it can’t be changed once set).

If you look around for other instructions, you may see comments saying your page needs to have 25+ fans before you can create a username. This may have been a requirement in the past, but I’ve successfully created usernames for several pages with less than 25 likes.

How to set up a custom username

IMPORTANT: You only get one chance to set a username. If you don’t like the one you selected, you can’t change it. So think through what you want ahead of time, and make sure you don’t accidentally make a typo!

• Go to your page.
• Click the three dots under your cover photo, then select Edit Page Info.
• An ‘Edit your details’ window will pop up. Click on ‘See All Information’ at the bottom of this window.
• In the About section, click on ‘Select a Username’.
• Enter your desired username. If it’s not available, you’ll get a warning message.
   
  Username restrictions:
  • 5-50 characters long
  • Can only consist of alphanumeric characters and periods (dashes are not permitted).
  • Can’t contain generic terms or extensions, like .com or .net.
  • They’re not case-sensitive, so while you’re welcome to always type in lower/uppercase, both will work when someone types in the link to your page. The different case letters will, however, appear the way you entered them on your page (your username will be displayed at the top of the left-hand sidebar).
• Click ‘Create username’ to save.
   
  
   

If you get an error message saying “This page isn’t eligible for a username.” try creating the username with another Facebook account. For example, you could give a friend temporary admin access to your page, have them create the username, then remove their access.

Important note

Facebook can remove your username because of inactivity. It’s unclear what ‘enough’ activity is 🙂 so just keep this in mind.

Reference

Facebook’s help page on creating usernames

   

There are several simple things you can do to customize your Pinterest profile to emphasize you as an author.

Prerequisite

You have an existing Pinterest account. This can be either a personal or a business account.

Steps

• Log in to your author profile, then go to Settings.
   
  
   
• Click on “Profile” on the left-hand side, or scroll down a little to get to the Profile settings section.
   
  
   
• Your name should have been stored when you created your account. You can modify it here if you’d like.
  If your account is set up as a business account, the field name will say “Business Name” – but don’t let that confuse you. This is where your author name goes.
• Select a unique username, which will be displayed in the URL for your Pinterest profile page. Remember that your readers will see this, so make it something that can easily be associated with you.
  In my case, I chose “jamieauthor,” so to get to my Pinterest profile page you’d type https://pinterest.com/jamieauthor.
• Enter a short biography, or whatever text you deem appropriate, in the “About you” box. Note that this text is limited to 160 characters.
• If you’d like to enter your location, it goes in the “Location” field. Note that this is a freeform text box, so if you enter “Planet Earth” that’s exactly what will be displayed on your profile page.
• Enter your website. If you click the “Confirm Website” box, Pinterest will provide you HTML text that you can add to your site which will allow you to see what pins people save from your website, and will add your logo to any pin that comes from your site.
• You can choose to showcase up to five boards, which means those boards will be displayed at the top of your profile page. One board will be displayed at a time, and the boards are automatically displayed in rotation.
   
  
   
• Click on “Save Settings,” and you’re done!

   

An Amazon Author Page is very easy to set up, and requires little to no work to maintain after the teeny, tiny amount of time you spent setting it up in the first place.

Why have an Amazon Author Page?

Your Author Page lists all of your books in one place, making it easy for someone who likes one of your books to find other things you’ve written.

You can also add a biography, link to your blog so that previews of your blog posts are displayed, and add videos, photos, and events.

Once your Amazon Author Page exists, your name will appear as a link to your Author Page on any title you’ve published or participated in.

Readers can also find your page by searching for your name in the Books or Kindle Store categories – both your books and your Amazon Author Page will come up in the search results.

Prerequisites

You’ll need a regular Amazon account to sign up for Amazon Author Central. You can use your personal account, or create a new account that you’ll only use for your author persona. If you don’t have an account set up, or if you want to create a new one, you can create one during the steps below.

I created a separate author account so that I could keep the different mes separate, but it’s totally fine if you want to have only one account.

Steps to create your Amazon Author Page

• Go to Amazon Author Central.
• Click “Join Now.”
• Sign in with your amazon.com account credentials.

  If you don’t have an existing Amazon account, select “I am a new customer” and create one.

  

• Enter the name your books are published under. A list of books will be displayed. Select your books from this list.
   
  If no books are displayed, but you have one or more titles published on Amazon, you can search by title or ISBN.
• After you select your book(s), Amazon will send a confirmation email to verify you’re really you.

Notes

• If you write under more than one name, you’ll need to create a separate account for each name.
• Every time you publish a new book, it should show up automatically on your Author Page. If it doesn’t, follow these steps to claim your title on Amazon.

Reference: Amazon’s help page on Setting Up Your Author Central Account

   

If you have an author blog, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t associate it with your Amazon author profile! Plus it’s super easy and quick.

• Log in to Amazon Author Central.
• author page.
• Click on ‘add blog’.
  
• Enter the RSS feed for your blog.

  In my case, my URL is http://jamieferguson.com/feed. The URL to your blog’s feed may be in a different format depending on how your website is set up.

Previews of your blog posts should start appearing on your Amazon author page within 24 hours. They’ll be in the Author Updates section, along with any videos and/or images you’ve uploaded. If someone clicks on one of the preview images, they’ll be directed to that post’s page on your website.

   

Just because you have an Amazon Author Central page doesn’t mean your page appears on all of the amazon.xx domains. But don’t panic! This is very easy to fix.

There are multiple Amazon.xx domains, but not all of them offer Author Central. This can and will change over time, so you’ll need to keep an eye on which domains do provide this option.

Here are the currently available Amazon Author Central sites.

• United States
• United Kingdom
• Germany
• France
• Japan

Consider creating a profile on each of these sites.

Note that you don’t have to use the same content on each site, so if the French version of your bio contains a catchy French idiom, you can use that on your French profile and leave it off your German profile.

What to set up

• Create an account with each site if necessary.
  Your existing Amazon Author Central credentials may work on the various international sites; if they don’t, you can create a new account for that country.
• Your biography.
  You can use Google Translate, or another translation program, to convert your existing page’s biography to the desired language. If you know someone who speaks that language, it’s definitely worth confirming that the text translated correctly.
• Configure your social media feeds for each site. Check the allowed feeds, and adjust your settings accordingly. For example, one Amazon site might not offer integration with your author blog, even if the others do.
• Make sure to look at what content has/has not copied over. For example, my titles appear on my amazon.in author page, as does the video I posted recently – but my blog does not. Don’t assume something is/isn’t there – verify it.

(Note that India does not yet support Amazon Author Central pages – I just found it interesting that the video was there, but was not on my UK profile.)

Why set all this up?

You can have readers across the world, not just in whatever country you live in. Take advantage of this – and help your readers find you!!! 🙂