#also the moment i entered the tag i got a message from a bot asking me if i needed help with anything

[aroaceamyrosearchive]

i went into the motivation tag but most of it is quotes about being in love and shit???

[votederpycausemufins]

more content for the SF series! (since the first one was Summoning Family and now it's Surprisingly Familiar). i can't believe it's chapter 5. and i'm not sure if i mean can't believe it's only ch. 5, or already ch. 5. you know, both is good!

Edit: iforgottotagpeople iforgottotagpeople iforgottotagpeople!!! @petrichormeraki and @helleborusangel forgive meeeee

“Let me take care of one thing before we explore the rest of the server.” Sense spoke up, Grian only half paying attention. “You can explore as you see fit, but I wouldn’t wander too far.”

As the redstoner walked away, Grian went the other direction for a few steps before stopping. “Are you going to keep following me around or what?” There was no immediate answer, but then someone appeared near Grian.

“Well, you look different than before.” Came an echoey voice from the figure who was greyed out and transparent. “What happened?”

“I’m from the past, but not the past here, so I’m not going to be able to fix whatever is wrong with you.” Grian replied, crossing his arms. It had already been explained that Grifter went looking for a new dimension to find alternate versions of his family since apparently the real versions weren’t the best. Grian didn’t fully believe it at this point, but Sense said Grifter would bring back some proof, which was a little worrying.

“There’s nothing you need to fix for me.” The ghost, because that’s all it could be, responded. “There is no business I have unfinished that you could finish for me. And that’s fine with me. It means I can help and explore with little worry, though I do like this castle.”

“Right.” Grian responded, unsure how to feel about the ghost. He already dealt with a few at school, some better than others, so he wasn’t exactly sure how this one would act. “Well, I would like if you stopped following me around.”

“Alright Grifter.” The ghost replied, and then left, going down a hallway before disappearing. Even with them gone, Grian still felt on edge, so he didn’t go far, just going back to where he had been left. When Sense did finally come back, Grifter was with him again, which finally helped Grian feel a bit safer again.

“Alright, so, I’ve talked with a few people to make sure they don’t cause problems as well as pick up some papers with information you might want to know. And you don’t need to worry about it getting damaged because it’s magically protected.”

“Your magic, or other Listeners?” Grian asked, which surprised Grifter. He looked over to Sense who didn’t look as concerned and quickly explained.

“I gave Grian a quick tour of the castle and explained some things along the way. About the magic from being a Listener. How Grian may still have magic but is also still considered in-training so his magic is much weaker. How you came here trying to dimension hop for Taurtis again and how that went. Things like that.”

Grifter smiled and gave Sense a kiss, which he used to quietly whisper a message to him. He then pulled back and made sure Grian definitely heard him the second time he spoke to keep up appearances. “Thank you. And he took it well? I mean… I- he does look a little…”

Grian crossed his arms. “I’m fine. I’ve got the basics which is already pretty helpful. If I can learn how to use magic, I might be able to use that when I go back and save Taurtis since obviously new dimensions are off the table again.”

Grifter raised an eyebrow and Sense elaborated. “So far he’s only hopped once and got rid of their second universe versions.”

“It would be complicated if there were two of us. I mean, it’s already complicated enough with you and me and we look pretty different, what with you being older and all.”

“Yeah, same sentiment when I got here.” Grifter agreed. “Essentially this place is all flipped around. I mean, dad here is Death instead of mom, the Sam here was good, The me- you- us here was like some sort of god and got imprisoned. Stuff like that. People see me and think I’m the one that got imprisoned, so they used his name for me, and I mean, it’s pretty close to Grian.”

“You really don’t mind?” Grian asked, making Grifter shrug.

“Well, either way the nickname is Gri, so I don’t mind too terribly much. And it’s better than… you know.”

Grian shuddered a little before Grifter started leading them all away, putting the small stack of papers he had into a bag and giving the bag to Grian. The teen took the bag and opened it up to look inside, finding the newly added papers as well as a bunch of pink things. Pulling one out, Grian was surprised to find it was a sword, and another a shovel. He put those back in and then pulled out some yellow carrots, which seemed to glitter as he held them in the light. “What is all of this?”

Grifter turned around to face Grian, walking backwards a few steps to see what was being talked about. “Oh, that’s a bunch of starter gear. I mean, normally it would be iron, but I doubt you wanted that, and I’m sort of in charge around here - long story - so I upgraded you to aetherite which is as good as you can get here. You’ve got a sword, pick, axe, shovel, and a full set of armor. I’ve also given you golden carrots and plenty of steak so you won’t be hurting for food. Also there’s a crossbow and plenty of stuff to load it with, like arrows, darts and fireworks.”

Grian nodded slowly, looking through the bag again. “Okay, can I like… get trained how to use these? I mean I sort of know how to use this stuff from, you know. But I mean, can I get a gun or something?”

“Oh of course!” Sense was the one to reply, putting down a shulker box. “What type are you after? Standard or more upgraded?”

“Handgun with plenty of ammo before reloading sounds best.” Grian said, looking into the box. Sense helped him find one that fit what he liked as well as ammo that matched, and then it went in the bag.

“I still think you should train with the other weapons to be safe, but gun still is better than umbrella.” Grifter commented, getting a look from Grian before he confirmed that, yes, someone’s main weapon of choice around there was an umbrella.

“Alright, now that you’re geared up, let’s get on with a proper tour!”

.

.

.

A good sized team entered into Helscraft, consisting of Mumbo, Grum (Jrum wanted to stay behind and watch Kokatori, but Mumbo thought it might also be some fear of getting stranded again), Doc, Tommy, Phil, Xisuma, and Paul. Wilbur and Techno also tagged along when they heard the news, refusing to let their brother disappear again. More of the hermits wanted to go, but with the two triplets refusing to take no for an answer and Xisuma not wanting to take too many people to hels at once, they didn’t really have room.

Xisuma attempted to get all of them to the main spawn island for the world, but that didn’t quite work out with everyone except him arriving there. That was soon followed by Grum taking charge and leading them through the world and to the foot of a black and yellow building, which he knocked on the door of.

A few minutes later, the doors finally opened to someone in dark red armor and a helmet with a much more standard design. “What do you want? I’m in the middle of something.” The person said, looking just at Grum at first. “Oh, it’s you. If NPG isn’t at home, he’s probably-”

“No. We need Xisuma back.” Grum spoke up, and this time the person looked up at the rest of the group and sighed.

“Honestly, I finally got him back here again and you’ve got to take him away immediately? Here I thought it was finally something to improve this… horrid week. What do you need him for anyway? Isn’t he just a chauffeur or whatever?”

Tommy was the first to respond, pushing to the front of the group. “Look bitch, we don’t want to deal with any more shit right now. Just hand over him and Grian so we can leave.”

Though the red tinted visor, Tommy could just barely see the hels admin raise an eyebrow. “Grian? My brother is the only one here from wels not in your group.”

“Wrong answer fucker! We know that Gr-” Tommy was cut off as something lowered from the ceiling. Everyone stared as a pink worm on a string descended from somewhere inside the door. It had yellow paper cutouts of a mask, cape and M decorating it, and it kept getting lower until it was eye level with Evil Xisuma, then lightly bonked against his helmet a few times.

The way the hels admin slumped slightly and his eyes stared back just showing how done he was with everything. “Would you excuse me for just one second?” He said, and then the worm started to go back up before EX grabbed it, trapping it in a fist, then yanking down, someone falling from the ceiling a moment later. “Get out of my house Phedaz.”

The helsmit with dark blue hair, matching pale blue skin that faded to black on his arms and pitch black eyes picked up the discarded worm on a string before scuttling off through the door on all fours, racing past the team after Grian. “What the fuck was that?!”

“Phedaz.” EX said in a bored and defeated tone. “He’s been doing that all week. I just wanted to torture my brother a little to blow off some steam, is that too much to ask?”

“When we’re looking for Grian, it really is.” Mumbo spoke up, making the Helsmit sigh.

“Well, Grian’s not here, only NPG. Not even Grifter is here, and he hasn’t been here for a day or two now. That being said, Sense did leave a few hours ago, likely to meet up with that bastard.”

“Okay, so where are they?” Paul spoke up, getting EX’s attention.

The hels admin stared at Paul before pulling out a potion of some sorts and chugging it. “I’m not sane enough for this right now. Go talk with Theseus will you? Come back here when you need to leave or whatever and I’ll let you have him.”

.

.

.

“Alright! And that’s about it for the tour!” Grifter said cheerily as he, Grian, Sense, and now the two hels bots arrived at the castle again. “Now as a reminder, you should do your best to stay away from any areas we did not tour just to be on the safe side. The one exception would be where Euro and Krys are staying, but it’s far enough away I wouldn’t bother, plus Silski always likes to visit and staying away from him in general is a good idea.”

Grifter was going to say more, but then Sense stopped walking. “Oh for fucks sake, he’s back.”

Grian looked over to where Sense was looking and saw someone vaguely familiar leaning against the castle wall. They wore a trench coat and a beanie that struggled to hold down their very puffy brown and grey hair and they also held a guitar, quietly strumming a few cords. “Hey, you’re back. Missed you at the show.”

Before Grian could ask any questions, Grifter stomped over to the person, followed by Sense who was getting out a weapon. “Off the property Wile.”

“Pay me.”

“I’m not paying you. Leave.”

The person, Wile, stared Grifter down for a few seconds before shrugging. “Nah, gotta pay me first. Anyway, here’s Wonderwall.” And he started to play the first few notes of a song. He didn’t get far though, because Sense walked up to him. He didn’t even use his weapon to attack, simply yanking the guitar from his hands and smashing it against the castle wall in one fluid motion.

Wile looked down at the broken pieces of his instrument for a moment before pulling out a second guitar and continuing the song. Sense yelled in frustration while Grifter pulled a few feathers out of his wings. Grian reacted more than his copy, wincing at what was likely painful, but the hels didn’t mind. He instead used the pulled feathers as knives, stabbing them into Wile until he dropped to the ground, dead.

“Oh my god! Is he dead?!” Grian yelled after the person didn’t move for a while.

“Yes and no.” Grifter replied, kicking the body to the side. “He respawns, it’s just his corpse stays with his shit in it. Seesee, would you be a dear?” Sense didn’t get a chance to react as Sefter walked up first and heaved the body over his head, then chucked it as far as he could away from the castle. “Hmm, well that works too I guess.”

Grian stared in the direction of Wile’s corpse before turning back to Grifter. “Who… Who was that?”

“Wile.” Grifter replied. “Essentially the Wilbur here. The only plus to him over Wil is that he mostly just sticks to L’Manberg.”

“Oh? Where’s that?” Grian asked. It wasn’t a place they really covered in the tour, but a few other countries had been mentioned.”

“Yeah, no. I don’t want you heading over there.” Grifter replied. “Sense, back me up here.”

Grian was a little surprised by Grifter calling the redstone by his name and not a nickname. “I know you said you’re… well you’re most likely over eighteen.”

“I am, but what does that have to do with it?” Grian asked, rolling his eyes slightly.

“L’Manberg’s a stripclub.”

That left Grian silent for a few seconds before he simply said, “Oh.”

“Well, now that things are awkward, I suppose you could meet some of the better parts of the family. They weren’t around for so long, they won’t be able to tell that past me isn’t past Grifter.”

“Who exactly is everyone here?” Grian asked, following Grifter as he started to walk off away from the castle again, Sense and the bots heading inside.

“Alright, I already covered Dad being Death.” Grifter started to explain. “Technically there’s another death which is his brother, but we don’t really cover him. Mom is named Krystina, or just Krys.” Grifter then gestured to where Wile’s body was thrown. “We already covered Wilbur and Wile. Instead of Techno, we have Euro, who mostly lives with Krys. Theseus is Tommy, and he’s moved elsewhere.”

“Why do I feel like there’s more?” Grian asked with slight hesitance.

Grifter shrugged. “Because there is. That’s just the bit you’re familiar with. Even though Wile’s a stripper, he is married to Sadie. Sadie has a kid named Fleur who’s a little older than you are right now. Krys also half adopted Silski, so technically that’s another sibling but I won’t count them. If you do want to, then they’re married and have a kid, but that’s not really important.”

“So… Sadie, Fleur, Silski, and two other people?” Grian asked, making sure he was following along. “Can I know their names just to be safe?”

“Yeah, sure, whatever. Silski’s married to this guy named Toob and they adopted a kid named Jane. Well, technically it’s ꄘ꒓ꂑꋫꁍꀭꆂ꒒ꁕ, but pronouncing that is a mess so they named her Jane instead.”

“Right… Do you have anywhere I can write this down?”

.

.

.

After what happened with Tommy before, the entire group was ready to attack if need be. Paul was the one to knock on the throne room door, willing to be the first line of defense. There was no answer at first, but footsteps from behind the door had everyone put their guard up. They all waited with bated breath before finally the large doors opened, and then Grian poked his head out.

Mumbo, Tommy and Grum all quickly recognized that it wasn’t actually the missing hermit, but the others were too worried that they reacted too fast. “Oi Grian, what the fuck was all that mate?”

After a moment, NPG pulled themself out of the hug Phil had trapped them in. “I am sorry for the confusion. I am NPG, not Grian. You came here not too long ago.” The robot then looked over to Wilbur, Doc and Paul. “Though you did not visit and I have not met you in person before.”

Tommy quickly spoke up and introduced people. “That’s Wil, Doc, and this guy’s named Paul. Grian kinda got kidnapped, so we’re back here looking for him instead.”

“Oh no! Did you check your old server again just to be safe?”

“Grifter’s the bitch that kidnapped him.” Tommy said, crossing his arms. “If he’s there, I’ll eat my compass.”

NPG nodded, then went back into the throne room and the group could hear him talking to someone that had Tommy’s voice. They stood there listening until NPG finally shouted approval for the group to enter.

“Well this is a surprise. I didn’t expect to see any of you again that soon.” Theseus spoke from his throne. He still was wearing his mask that looked like Dream’s, which made Tommy shudder a little as well as had Grum hiding behind Mumbo. “So, you’re after my brother. Hah, good luck with that.”

“You better fucking tell us something bitch!”

Theseus didn’t immediately reply to Tommy’s shout, instead handing off a paper to NPG, who happily took it and ran off. “Look, I haven’t seen him since he dragged me back to Dad. Technically he’s been here, but just stayed away. He’s admin of my old world now, so he’s probably stuck there. Sense also left recently, so I would guess he’s there too.”

“So, You’re saying we need to go through another version of the smp to find Grian?” Techno was the one to ask. “Ours was already pretty rough, how bad is this one?”

“Your creeper friend there is supposed to be Prof, right?” Theseus asked, his visible eyebrow raising in question.

“Yeah… he is.” Grum answered, peeking out from behind Mumbo for a moment. “Why?”

“Has he ever built a prison?”

“Well, he built Area 77 if that counts.” Mumbo answered, but Theseus just rolled his eyes. “I’m guessing that doesn’t count.”

“Oh definitely not. If what NPG says is right, it let people waltz right in.”

“Those were guided tours, man.” Doc replied. “And that’s just recent. I’ve done plenty of defenses back when we had the mycelium war.”

“Ooh, ah, defenses.” Theseus deadpanned. “Get real. Those aren’t what I’m asking about.”

“He’s asking about The Perd.” Paul spoke up. “Which yeah, he mostly built that himself.”

Theseus smiled and nodded, while everyone else looked confused, except for Doc himself and also Phil, who just looked stunned. “Wait, he’s the guy who made The Perdit-”

“Hey man, you can’t just go throwing that name around.” Doc spoke up, cutting Phil off. “The less people know, the better.”

Phil gestured to Paul. “And so he knows about it, why?”

“I was one of the testers.” Paul responded. “Really think I can’t get out of that vault of yours now?”

“We’re getting off topic.” Wilbur was the one to speak up. “Since this creeper guy has made that prison thing, is that good or not?”

“Very good.” Theseus replied. “Prof had to trap Grifter when he wasn’t an admin, so imagine what he’s doing as admin. Having your version of Dad is going to be good, but one of him is also better. And I guess also this guy here is good to have too.” Theseus added, glancing at Paul.

“What can you tell us about your old world.” Mumbo asked. “I’m sure even those from our version will be a bit lost since I can hardly wrap my head around this one.”

“Oh I could tell you plenty. I could say every little detail I went through in my years there. I’m sure plenty of it would be repetitive though, and I don’t really know what’s the same and what’s different.” Theseus explained. “But I can tell you what I do know.”

“And what’s that?” Phil asked, hoping that looking like the Phil here would help things.

“Well, when I was in that other place, your respawns were a fucking mess. Technically three respawns but it always depended on some shitty admin’s code.” Theseus stood up to make a point. “Instead You always respawn as long as you’ve got a place to respawn to. But if someone finds your anchor and breaks it, well, I wouldn’t die if I were you. Technically, there was more to it so Nightmare could try to get around his own rules, but it obviously didn’t work.”

“Is that it?” Tommy asked. “Lives are just done differently?”

Theseus rolled his eyes before sharply turning his head towards Tommy. “Well excuse me. If you haven’t noticed, I’m not the fucking admin over there anymore, bitch. Neither is Nightmare. I only knew about you having fucked up lives because of that thing there!” And he gestured towards Grum. “I don’t know your lives. I don’t know your world. So I don’t know what to fucking tell you that’s going to fucking help. At this point, you’re likely to know more than me!”

Everything was silent other than Theseus’ heavy breathing from yelling until there was a creak from the door as NPG came back in. “Is everyone okay? Thee? Do you want me to get Rusty?”

Theseus was still quiet, though he straightened his posture and his mask, then spoke. “No. I think I’ll be fine. Can you take these guys to Xannes? I’m done dealing with them.”

“Okay! I can do that!” NPG replied, and then he was leading the group out, being helped by threats Theseus was giving the group under the robot’s nose.”

When they returned to the admin’s base, he was disappointed to see them back so soon, but did allow Xisuma out of his ‘torture chamber’ - if it could really be called that - and let him take the team of people to the NSMP.

Xisuma took them into the other world and was suddenly glad his helmet was a filter. Tommy pulled his bandanna over his nose after gagging at the smell of the place while everyone but two of them reacted similarly. Since they had been there before, Phil and Mumbo knew what to expect. Techno also knew, but his sense of smell was enhanced from being a hybrid, so it didn’t help. And then while Tommy had been in the group before, at that point he had been replaced by Theseus and never actually went into the NSMP.

Not wanting to stick around in one place, the group started travelling, hoping for some sort of landmark that was more than just rubble and possibly someone nice enough to help them out.

But back on Helscraft, Xannes was upset the moment the group was gone, and a moment after that, he sent himself to the palace to meet with Theseus. Lightning crackled around him in his rage, pushing aside anyone who even stepped in his line of sight.

“Theseus!” He shouted as the doors to the throne room were broken. “What the fuck did I just send them into?!”

Theseus looked up at the admin. “The NSMP. Why? Did you somehow not?”

“Something intercepted them. I mean, I tried hacking them through the whitelist, so it should have-”

“That place doesn’t have a white list last I checked.” Theseus said. “Nightmare never gave it one. He made access public. There was just a little… test of sorts to get through first.”

Xannes didn’t like the sound of that. “What kind of test?”

“One that I’m sure they’ll get through. The question is how long it will take them. If they’re lucky? Hmm, maybe a few days.”

Xannes didn’t bother listening to more as he followed along the group he just sent ahead of him. He ended up in the same place the group did, in the spawn of the DSMP. And if it weren’t for the fact that Xannes could feel his hacking powers get limited, he would have thought it was the regular world. “Fine. I guess we’re doing this all the hard way.”

[universitypenguin]

What happened to u? U okay?

Hello!

First off, thank you for your concern. I appreciate it and I needed it after the past two days. To answer your question - I'm doing great.

I don’t have a lot of context about your question, but I’m guessing your concern is due to my recent blocking spree. A day ago, I went through my followers list and found some minors. I’ve previously seen smut fanfic writers concerned by underage people interacting with their posts. Until I had to block a few of them, I wasn’t aware how uncomfortable it would make me feel.

Since the blocking spree, I've had a lot of thoughts. I'm about to spew them everywhere. You might regret asking me if I was okay. Sorry about that. No one needs to read this whole manifesto about my rollercoaster of emotions the past few days. But in the interest of transparency, I'm posting this very long note.

What I want my readers to know is the following:

Tumblr is both a place for fanfiction and a social media site.

When I interact with followers and write explicit content, I have to be careful about what I'm saying and who I'm saying it to.

I don't intend to block or purge my followers in the future.

As long as I appropriately tag and put warnings on my work, that is adequate protection for my blog. Everything I write containing explicit content is tagged.

However, I won't interact with users who don't have an age stated in their bio.

There have to be boundaries, given the content of my writing. But I've also come around to the realization that I'm not capable of policing every interaction. Tumblr is a public forum. Minors following me makes me uncomfortable. But by the same token, my work is clearly labeled at 18+ and so is my blog.

There's a lot of explicit content out there for minors if you really think about it. In my high school freshman English class we talked about the book "The Color Purple." Believe me, that was explicit and we were only 14. Any minor with a library card and a Google browser can access a lot more intense content than what I write. I hope they're all being safe, but I can't have a melt down blocking spree again.

I'm not a cop, I'm not a parent, and what minors consume is down to them and the adult responsible for them. If I know someone is a minor I'll block them, should I notice they're trying to interact with me. Otherwise, I'm not purging my followers ever again. It's too much drama. I'd rather leave Tumblr than do that twice. I'm tired and I'm starting to work on my post graduate classes, I work full time in a demanding job, I'm in the process of editing my novel, and trying to keep up with my personal life. Quite literally, I don't have time to block. Writing fanfic is supposed to be my fun time. Let's keep it that way.

Due to the fact that some people I blocked were later unblocked after I took a closer look at their blogs, I'm posting a full explanation below. A quick summary is this:

After only writing for three months, I'd amassed 500 followers. On Monday I blocked almost 200 of them. Then I reviewed my block list and editing down some people who were prematurely blocked. [I assume the anon is one of the unblocked who had me disappear from their dash. Sorry!] This blocking thing isn't sustainable. In the future I'll run my blog differently as far as interaction goes in an effort to be responsible.

Continue reading for the saga of:

The Great Blocking Spree and Existential Crisis of an Erotic Fanfic Writer.

The Blocking Spree:

On Monday I realized a thirteen year old was following me and interacting with my work. This creeped me out.

*Commence blocking spree*

Then I realized how daunting my followers list was. I had 500 followers prior to Monday. That day I blocked about 200 people (some of them prematurely - more on that later.) So after the daunting task of trying to assume, to check bios for ages, to review blog content and determine the user's age, I was tired. Today, I even took a moment to reconsider if I wanted to use Tumblr. Because if all this is my responsibility, maybe I don't have the time or dedication to manage it. When I can be chill, I try to be. This attitude also affected by blocking. It contributed to me unblocking people. When I was doing the blocking spree, I'd give people with no age in their bio a fair shot by reviewing their posts.

I blocked some bot accounts, then a bunch of blank blogs, some ambiguous people who very well could be of age. For the first 100 followers I was pretty aggressive. Then my attention span dropped off and I was a bit more ambivalent. I realized I was doing a crappy job of moderating and wondered what the point was.

The point was that the thirteen year old interacting with my work freaked me out. When I found two sixteen year old followers, it pushed me to continue the purge.

So on I go, blocking. I'm so responsible for doing this, right? But my methodology is crap. What is context for being an adult? Someone had posted about budgeting advice. I thought the budgeting advice was too good for it not to have come from an adult. But my father's a financial advisor and to be honest, I could have given that level of advice at fifteen just from osmosis. Someone had pictures of themselves entering their marijuana plants in the Oregon State Fair. Okay, you've got to be over 18. I didn't block them. Someone else complained about their stats professor and I didn't block them. But in retrospect, one of my high school friends got permission to take college level math courses when we were seniors. She was seventeen when she had a stats professor. The thought circles back - what am I accomplishing here? Next, I went back and unblocked someone who ranted about her Tinder matches being 60 year old men. I wondered if their post was even real. I've lied on the internet before. Nonetheless, I persisted and worked through all 500 followers. When I was done I had 312 followers left.

Post Blocking Spree Existential Crisis:

I know that all the blocking in the world can't stop a teenager who wants to read smut fanfic. I'm not much for posting on social media and I'm not used to a lot of anonymous interaction online. Honestly, I got rid of my SM accounts during college when I felt it was wasting my time. This is the first time I've really use a social media site to post content since college. My twitter account is unused, my Instagram is for close personal friends only, and my TikTok is for mindless consumption of cat videos. (I've trained the algorithm to feed me only cat videos, it's great and I highly recommend it.) I don't post on TikTok, so I don't consider it full use, just lurking.

Okay, Alice, get back to the point....

Right, being anonymous on social media. My blocks are a fence and it's based on self identification from the blogs that follow me. I have little faith in underage consumers to out themselves. I have even less faith in their honesty or respect for an adult's boundaries. They're at a stage in life where they want to push the boundaries. Telling them no is all but inviting them in. I did my blocking spree because I was worried about backlash from someone's parents. But what reasonable judge would come after a fanfic writer? Come on. Logical thoughts but me emotional distress was still brewing.

Why I am the one responsible for who clicks the follow button on my blog? I've always clearly identified what I write and tagged my work as smut.

That thought snapped me out of my whirlwind of anxious thoughts. So I started looking into the laws. My regular work involves medicine, not the legal profession, so I was lost. I found some state level laws that made me glad I'd gone on a blocking spree. California and Florida have specific language in their laws about 'providing minors with explicit content.' But what exactly is that? What I researched applied to the following activities: co-writing smut fanfic with other people, sexting, roleplaying and online messaging.

I run a fanfic blog with limited interaction. I've never done an ask. I don't roleplay on here and I don't want to.

The blocks weren't personal. They were partly based on the awareness that Tumblr is an interactive site and a place that's had a problem with child pornography in the past. But I'm not the smut police. I suck at blocking, and I doubt I did a good job of purging my followers list. This is when it hit me that boundaries are only what I can enforce. They've never been about how other people relate to me, only how I relate to them. (Wow. I've never sounded more like my mother in my life...) After this thought, I started considering what actions I ought to take if I wanted to keep posting fanfic on Tumblr.

My Post Blocking Spree Clarity...

It's up to me who I interact with. I don't have to reply to every comment and re-blog, but I'd like to. I'm stuck between wanting to write for everyone and handling interactions on a social media site that's mostly anonymous.

The fact remains: I can't be the smut police because I suck at it.

What I've decided is that I'll make it very clear on my blog that this is an 18+ space where I publish erotic fanfiction. Smut will always be appropriately marked. I'm not going to interact with reviews, re-blogs, and messages from accounts who don't have their age in their profile. I won't include them in my tag list either. The internet is a public forum. Just as with publishing erotica, once it's out there online for download, it's done. As a ghost writer and an author, I don't control who buys my original fiction, which is just as spicy as my fanfiction. (Trust me, it's explicit. I once had a romance editor tell me I should dial it back on the smutty parts of a novel because "it's a lot of sex for a non-erotica market.") The key difference on Tumblr is about interaction. And that's something I can control. I can decide when I reply to other users. What brought me around to this was the realization that even after the blocking spree, I can't review every single like I get. That's an amount of time and mental energy that's beyond me. Just the past two days have been exhausting and sapped my will to write. Which sucks because I need to go write the next chapter of "Restitution" before tomorrow.

I think the reasons I went on the blocking spree are nuanced. The thirteen year old freaked me out. So did the other underaged people who had ages in their bios. But it also relates to my work. In my job I've seen some nasty child abuse cases. Early on in my career, when I was a 23 year old new hire, I was working on an autopsy for a child abuse victim who'd been murdered by their parent. It was so terrible and graphic, I had to ask one of my older colleagues to take the case. This colleague didn't like me. But she took one look at my face and took the file. She closed out the review without a question and never brought it up again to anyone. I was very grateful. Where I used to work (and where this incident took place) was a major city that holds the unfortunate title of being the human trafficking capital of the US. And something I learned working there was that most human trafficking victims go with their captors willingly. In two years at that job, I never saw one who'd been kidnapped from a dark alley like you see on TV. They were all groomed on social media and thought they were escaping their families (who were often overbearing, toxic, or dysfunctional) for a get away with friends. It was a fun adventure with their internet buddies, until it wasn't.

In retrospect, the underage interaction I found on my blog made me react because of what I've been through. The autopsy case kept coming back to me today while I was at work and I've finally untangled my emotions enough to figure out what caused my melt down. When I was blocking, I was feeling an anxious motivation that I know can only stem from the stress I deal with at my job. Don't feel sorry for me about this - I know my work in medicine helps a lot of people and it's a tremendously satisfying career.

Our Saga's Resolution & How I'm Going to Deal With This In The Future...

- - - - -

In post block clarity, I offer this conclusion:

I'm writing on a public forum. My work is appropriately tagged as smut. In the future, I will also use the tag #no minors to help with filtering. I've always asked underage people not to interact. And on a public forum, what more can I reasonably do? Going forward I will only interact with those who have their age posted in their bio. But blocking sprees and policing every interaction isn't feasible.

I'll review how I'm going to run my tag lists as well. I need to think it over and let my followers know my decision as to if I'll continue using them. Because tagging is definitely interaction and my current tag list was not screened at all. *face palm*

Finally, to my readers who have blank blogs or don't have an age listed. I respect your right to privacy and I'm careful with my personal information as well. But I've also had an uncomfortable two days. If you've lasted through this venting session until now, you must understand that I'm upset by underage interaction. I'm setting my own boundaries and going forward, I'll own my side of the internet. No interaction from me, unless I know your age. Full stop - no exceptions. I think it is reasonable for me to suggest that you leave something on your blog that signifies you are not a minor, whatever that may be. Someone who I didn't block that stands out in my memory had a bio that said "90s baby." It was simple, direct, and left no doubt they were over 18. No age reveal and not even a name. If you put something like this on your blog it'll help explicit content creators feel more comfortable about their interactions.

I went on a spree this Monday and I admit to being heavy handed and aggressive about pruning followers. I had an emotional reaction due to work stress and I didn't think things through logically. I'm relieved for the chance explain myself and set new boundaries that I'm capable of sticking to in the future. But remember - the block button is on my side of the screen. At the end of the day, you might be unhappy with me for the block, but it's my button, it's my blog, and I'll use it as I see fit.

Thank you for reading.

[dabblinginmarvel]

Searching for a Dinosaur at the Museum

Request: Hiya! Can I please request an imagine where Steve Rogers falls in love with a nerdy, sweet, innocent, short (I’m 4ft 10 1/2in btw LOL) Kindergarten teacher (I’m also a kindergarten teacher😂). They meet when she takes the kids on a field trip to the museum (the one that has all of the Captain America and Bucky stuff), they talk a lot and he asks her on a date + he introduces her to the Avengers as his girlfriend + Steve being soft for the reader + sweet kisses, cuddles, and hugs.💜

Plot: You and Steve meet in the Smithsonian as you take your class on a tour to learn about heroes and you two develop a relationship.

Blog Tag: @kpopgirlbtssvt

A/N: Hm, yeah, this got longer than I had anticipated. I also altered the prompt slightly. Happy Valentine’s Day!

Warnings: None, maybe mildly unedited.

Word Count Total: 2030

Long Imagine #25

Title: Searching for a Dinosaur at the Museum

Field trip days were some of your least favorite days of the year. Anymore, it was hard to get chaperones, with everyone off at work or just plain unavailable.

Sure, you didn’t have to schedule them, but some of your units benefited from the educational experience they provided. It was all for the kids, after all.

You looked up at the display on the wall, not paying a lot of attention to it since you had come through two days ago for educational purposes, instead thinking of the enormous NCIS news you had learned last night while watching the show. You were pretty excited about what had transpired to the point that you accidentally bumped into someone behind you when you backed up a step.

“Oh, dear, I am so sorry!” You spun around and found yourself looking up into the blue eyes of a tall, broad-shouldered man. He was wearing a ball cap pulled low over his forehead.

He smiled. “Oh, don’t worry. It’s okay, I wasn’t looking where I was going, anyway.”

You at him, eyes squinting a little in thought, then they widened when you realized who it was. “H-hi.” You stuck out your hand.

“Hello….” He shook your hand.

“Y/N.”

“Y/N. Nice to meet you.”

“You, too.” You grinned. All too soon, the smile faded and you remembered your job. “Oh, shoot, I can’t stay long. I have something to take care of. I’m sorry.”

You took off seven feet to your small group of students admiring the Bucky Barnes exhibit. They were pointing at the pictures.

“Miss Y/L/N! What does this say?” one of your students yelled.

“Joey, please remember our indoor voices.” You looked up at what he was pointing at. “This word is endured.’ It means it was something he lived through.”

“And this?” He pointed at another word, but his voice was quieter.

“Liberated means freed.”

Monica raised her hand. “Why does that number say 1916 and his birthday say 1917?”

You frowned at the inconsistent data. “That is a good question. Someone may have made a mistake.” You knelt in front of her. “You made a good catch today. When you find something like that in a museum, it’s always good to question that. We can go speak to someone that works here and find out before we leave.”

“You mean you don’t know?” Alexei asked and crossed his arms over his chest.

“That’s right. I’m not afraid to admit that sometimes even I have to ask questions. Adults are still learning, too. A good student learns from life along with their teachers. Can you do that?”

Alexei pursed his lips, then nodded.

“Good. Thank you.”

A clearing throat came from behind you. “If I may answer your question?”

It was the man. Steve.

“Steve, these are a few of my kindergartners. We’re learning about real-life heroes.”

“Bucky would be flattered.”

“You’re included in that, Captain.”

You glanced at the kids, their eyes wide and you knew you had split seconds before one of them made a noise. “Remember, inside voices.”

“It’s Captain America!” Joey squealed, bending at the knees and squeezing his eyes shut along with his fists.

“And he can only talk to you if you stay quiet!” you raised your voice by two decibels. The kids stopped chattering, but stayed antsy. “Now, what is James Barnes doing with two birth dates?”

Steve’s smile didn’t falter as he glanced at you, then the kids. He knelt in front of them.

“Bucky pretended that he was a kid that followed the rules, but he lied on his form when he was drafted. It was easier to lie about a birth date when no one was paying enough attention.”

“It says he enlisted, too.”

Steve shook his head. “He was drafted.”

You thought for a moment, then raised an eyebrow at Steve. He stood and his eyes looked confused. “We will have to talk more later about this. I want my students to do reports on heroes and I am sure at least some of them would love to talk about Captain America and his best friend.”

Steve’s mouth upturned in one corner. “I’d be happy to help your students.”

You didn’t miss the faces your students traded between each other. “Alright, kiddos, feel free to keep exploring this exhibit.”

“Are you getting his number?” Alexei asked.

“We have to get that information for your projects, don’t we?”

The kids dashed off to the costumes exhibit, which was five feet away.

You smiled again. “Thank you. I see we have a lot to learn from you, should you be willing to talk about it.”

He dug around in his pocket and you eyed the children in your care. It was much easier on a quieter museum day like today to watch the kids.

“I don’t want to keep you from the kids, so could I get your number?” Steve asked.

“Sure.” You typed in your number and hit save. “I will see you later.”

He waved back when you waved over your shoulder at him.

It took an hour before the children were back on the bus back to school and another half hour after that before all of the kids were being picked up by their parents.

Alexei was the last to be picked up and he turned to you, a frown on his face. “Did we really see Captain America today?”

You nodded. “You sure did.”

“Will we see him again like we did today?”

You looked up, thinking. He looked up, too. When you responded, you told him you would ask Steve Rogers if he would be willing to visit the class and a grin grew on Alexei’s face. His mother showed up and Alexei ran to her. They both waved at you, which you returned.

When you returned to your classroom, you pulled out your phone. Two text messages were waiting for you.

- Hey, it’s Steve, I hope I’m not disrupting your class, but here’s my number.

- Steve again, when you get this, would you like to meet me at Torri’s by the museum? I’ll pay for milkshakes.

You smiled and texted him back, asking if he meant today.

- I’m sorry, Sam decided to ask for me. I was going to wait a couple of days. But if you would like to, yes.

You practically beamed and agreed to meet him there in a little less than an hour if he was willing. Most of that extra time was used to do end-of-class checks. Quick as you could once your tasks were completed, you gathered your grading folder, purse, and lunchbag. The door got locked behind you and you walked to your car.

Steve met you at the little mom and pop shop just as you got to the door. He opened it for you with a smile and you followed him to the counter, offering to pay out of courtesy, and then to a booth with your shakes.

“So, you’re okay with this?” you asked, stirring it with your spoon. It had been established in line that this wasn’t supposed to be a date, but more of helping the kids. While both of you agreed to it, you still felt a little empty about it.

“Yeah. Are you?”

“Yes. But I meant you’re okay talking about this?”

He nodded and readjusted his milkshake by spinning it around on the table with the tips of his fingers. “Yeah. first I want to ask what that face you made in the museum was all about.”

“I was just thinking of my grandfather.”

He leaned forward.

“The army had a history of screwing up not only the health help he got, but his records.”

“What did they mess up?”

“Oh, you know, information about his wife, his service records….”

“Service records?”

“Yep. They got those wrong. I worry Bucky may have gotten the same treatment.”

Steve thought for a moment. “It could have happened. Maybe he didn’t lie.”

You shrugged, then sipped your milkshake.

The two of you spent the rest of the evening going over some questions for the kids - it was all basic details, like getting Bucky’s exhibit correct. By the end, he had also agreed to come in and talk to the class.

The class talk ended up being a success and most kids wanted to do their report on Steve or Bucky, to the point you had to randomly assign heroes to kids to be fair.

Steve kept in touch with you and you both grew increasingly closer over the next two months until Steve asked the question.

“Would you like to meet my friends? They keep asking about you.”

“Oh, do they now?” you asked slyly. He wrapped his hands around yours.

“Yes. Would you be up for it?”

You nodded. “I would be honored.”

He took your hand. You bit your lower lip in a smile.

As it turned out, you met them after you held a Valentine’s party for your students. The drive was nice and you both had a lot to talk about. When you entered the building, you were startled by the welcoming party. All of the team had come to meet you two inside.

“There’s your girlfriend!” Tony Stark yelled. A smile grew on your face as Steve blushed.

“Is this old man bothering you?” Tony continued, causing you to giggle and shake your head. Everyone greeted you and introduced themselves before you moved into a common room. Drinks were brought in on robots and you could tell it was Tony’s invention, these server bots. You made eye contact with Steve and he rolled his eyes to you.

“Y/N, were you searching for a dinosaur in the museum?” Natasha asked and tipping her head in your direction. Steve opened his mouth to protest, but you cut him off.

“Not originally. It seems he found me.”

The team laughed.

“Steve, if you lose her, I’ll take her.” Natasha held her glass up in cheers.

“Would you guys stop, I haven’t asked her out yet!” Steve blurted out.

That caused everyone to fall silent and you turned to him. “Excuse me, yet?”

Steve looked down at his glass and swirled the water. “Yet.”

You waited for him to continue, but he didn’t. “Is there a place to talk alone for a moment?”

Steve gestured for you to follow him and as you left, you heard chatter behind you. You both turned a few corners and were finally far enough away from the team that hopefully your conversation would give you privacy.

Steve chewed on his lower lip before speaking. “I’m sorry about them.”

“Don’t be. I was already under the impression we were dating. They weren’t the only ones who had the wrong impression.”

His mouth dropped open in shock. “I-I’m sorry, I didn’t know. I’m not used to the way dating is today. I thought you went out on a few dates before you made it official.”

“Before? Yet? Steve, when were you planning to ask?”

He shrugged. “I almost chose yesterday, but I didn’t want to make it seem like I chose yesterday because it’s Valentine’s Day week.”

“I wouldn’t have minded if you had asked because of Valentine’s Day.”

He stood up a little straighter and it made him so much taller again. “Really?”

“Really. Steve, would you like to go steady?”

“Aren’t I supposed to ask you that?” He smiled bashfully.

“Well, you haven’t done it, yet. So I’m asking.”

“Yes. I want to go steady with you.”

A male voice (Tony’s, you would later realize) yelled from around the corner, “It’s about time!”

Steve’s face crinkled with frustration and you took his hand to calm him. Slowly, he turned back to you. He took your face in his hand, brushing your cheekbone with his thumb. You closed your eyes and smiled.

Gently, he pressed a kiss to your forehead and your mouth opened slightly, wanting more than just a forehead kiss.

He must have noticed because the next thing you knew, he was kissing your mouth just as tenderly. The hesitation from him didn’t worry you and you kissed him back.

- - -

Masterlist on blog!

Permanent Tag List (please alert me if you change your username, want to be tagged for only one character, or if you want to be untagged): @abbybills22, @breezy1415, @coffeebooksandfandom, @cxptain-americaa, @deceivedeer, @dreamer821, @everything-but-the-not-natural, @elxrini, @fangirling-equestrian, @feelmyroarrrr, @hellomissmabel, @httpmcrvel, @iamwarrenspeace, @kudosia, @m4df4n, @marrvelle-fics, @mindlessnerd89, @ms-cellanies, @mylittlefandomfanfictions, @princessleah129, @space-helen, @susiejustsusie, @tea-with-loki, @thisismysecrethappyplace, @wired-girl @wkndfrvr, @wxnchestervevo (tag list is open!!)

Strikethroughs are blogs I can’t tag.

[bhintatta]

Omegle Tales

Thanks Kartik for A2A

Qurantine proved to be the the the reason which made Omegle, once again the go to site for bored ones around the globe.

Warwrick Maths Professor- I expected this guy to be some teenage nerd, it’s not that common to find people with interest as ‘maths’. I opened up with Maths is gay, this guy didn’t say anything. I tired to seem smart by throwing some words like ‘you know complex analysis and group thory huh’, fella replied with ‘lol, who doesn’t’.

Later he mentioned he’s a professor at Warwrick University, he was realy into maths and entered college when he was just 17 (I did the same but I’m dumb). Ahter this basic introduction we talked about 3Blue1Brown, Numberphile, ZachStar (Major Prep) and other similar ones. Especially about 3Blue1brown’s video in which he plots the graph of COVID-19, algorithm and his approach.

Later he explained a better algorithm, he helped his students to design at University. I didn’t get most the things he was talking about but I kept humming along, pretended like it was obvious ‘yeah, that one is better hmmm’.

I got bewildered in buzzwords which I dropped earilier to look not complete outsider from the mathematical realm.

In the end he asked ‘You wanna keep in touch?’

Damn, that was a shit load of ego boost.

We talk about Modi on discord sometimes (okay, once).

E-Thot

After getting tired of bots spamming me to join their discord servers and “M27 horny” incel fellas, I changed my interest tags and bumped into this fellow Indian warrior who was in search of SeXtiNg. Then I reavealed that I trolled him becuase he was getting virtual BJ from a straight guy. #Mr.Prankster

This guy could feel the resentment and fear of dying virgin from my replies, he turned out to be omegle equavalent of Actor Varun Pruthi for me.

After some deep conversations like asking about my dick size and reason for being virgin, he gave me a proposal I couldn’t turn down. He turned sherlock mode on and started planning how we would execute this mission impossible 7.

It was time to explore my feminine side, I became his bi-sexual friend and he added me into a group chat and introduced me to this nymphomaniac. The dots started to connect, everything was connected, my dick size became my identity.

Objectification of women was an alien concept for me but now it wasn’t.

The first text popped up in chat ‘Do you suck a lot of dicks?’

Yup, that’s how the mafia works. I tried to ignore gay vibes and defended my masculinity by proclaiming myself as “Top”, followed by ‘squiddle my diddle’ to elucidate my intentions about what I was looking for.

I tried to act like a player and DM’d her, expecting some lame reply. Still I don’tknow why but she started speaking french, I mean c’mon. I can’t even speak english properly and you are flaunting your french. But I didn’t say anything, she was enjoying pussy-privillage.

Hardly two minutes passed and she sent ‘show me’.

Okay, that was quick, even our Indian boys don’t ask for bob-pics this much fast. *Incoming video call* adrenaline and cortisol nibbas rushed into blood, anxity bar was full . What if there’s some guy just trolling me or it’s a scam where she’ll record and blackmail me. I’m aware that no girl would want my nudes when they have unlimited supply of unsolicited dick pics but still I was scared and declined the call.

Now my friend cum pimp messaged and assured that there’s nothing sketchy. I was determined to see those majestic boobies for which I was lured into all this

I muster up the courage and call her and surprisingly she picked up immediatly, A dark screen shows up, my speculations were about to be the reality, I was sure that now someone from other side will say ‘chutiya bnaya’ laughingly and flash his penis before hanging up the call.

I had a sigh of relief when I heard her. Just like that Naughty America intro, her whispring voice ran a wave euphoric tingling in my whole body, the stress which was piled up earlier vanished. It was nothing less than ASMR voice, never thought my name could sound this much sexy.

She said: Show me now.

I was confused for a moment, show what? I wasn’t a salesmen who will just reach out to his bag and grab a full fledged erect penis to show her. I mean yeah, we go around popping random boners at un-expected places but this was just way too fast.

Things don’t work like this, at least mine doesn’t.

After explaining her about my need of visual stimulation to raise the bar for her, we did something (not going to explain).

As I explained earlier, she had a luscious voice, everything she said was arousing and surely it served its purpose. But she also wanted me to do dirty talk and *moan*.

So here I was saying Oh yeah (….) in my Punjabi accent which sounded something like “O jeh, phakk it bebi”.

Somehow she was okay with it and later swithched to Hindi for obvious reasons. Later she expressed her desire for a dominant male to treat her like a slave, call her all the cuss words one can imagine. All those hundreds of hours spent in watching BDSM were going to pay back, I started articulating my ideas for the script which will make me look like a chest-thumping alpha male.

It was showtime, I started shooting blend of swear words originating from both Hindi and Punjabi lexicon.  My delivery was flawless, each gaali filled with emotions, my accent added inroduced a whole new dimension to it. She was awestruck, probably after witnessing my command over the art of profanity.

At this point I almost forgot what the actual fuck we were supposed to do, my inner toxic-tenager was ragging to destroy the opponent like it used to do on facebook in good ‘ol days. My erection was gone, I was sitting there in front of camera, holding my flacid shlong.

I’ve to admit she was very supportive, even after all this she didn’t leave. She giggled when I apologized for all the mess, and decided to revive the fallen one.

She came up with this idea of using a pen to visualise as mine and proceded to give virtual BJ. To make things more realistic she decided to add an extra aspect of sound, which sounded something like this- “dok-dok-dok-dok”.

I was trying hard to control my laugh but then out of nowhere she said ‘Chod bhen ke lode’.

At that moment I lost it.

After laughing like an retarded chimp, I was certain that she will say fuck off and block me but again, she proved me wrong. She did call me immature but wasn’t mad,

[occupyscifi]

Procedurally generated empathy

It was after a hard night of doxing, hating and botnet swatting that Harley James awoke annoyed the find that despite her best efforts the girl she hated more than anything in the world except cancer  hadn’t yet killed herself

“I mean, she should have done it by now” she gassed to her girlpals as they rode to school on the self driving bus. All of them had dressed in their matching KillerPorn themed co educational onesies as dictated by Harley  “we’ve been attacking her for months. Like actual, real, months”

“even Betty Hardwicke had hung herself by now” sighed Anastasia Kirkpatrick, her fingers twitching as she navigated an ancient sim on her e-glasses with a vacant expression on her face. In front of them on the bus assorted nerdboys were suffering through the various stages of puberty. Behind them the cool kids acted like they didn’t live in the safest society on earth “I dunno what we need to do”

“go nuclear” grinned Harley, paging through the options on her e-glasses. In another viewing window the poor victim’s social media history was waiting, ready to be dissected and weaponised against her. It was a treasure trove of hatefuel- endless threads of do goodery, of loving the wrong memes at the wrong time. Of cringy gawk and unintentional hilarity. It wasn’t possible to even look at the girl’s life without instantly hating her so viscerally that Harley could quite happily have torn the girl apart with her bare hands. Luckily she didn’t have to. The hungry AI’s of the post google age were practically begging her to ask them for help. It was the work of a moment to do what they wanted “let’s see her survive this” said Harley, tapping in the air as she selected the girl’s fate.

It took double maths, a French lesson and an impromptu fire drill before Harley got the ping she had been waiting for.

“oh yes, girl” she cried, high fiving Anastasia and earning a rebuke from a teacher whose only qualifications was that he’d agreed to be paid less than a security guard for doing effectively the same job “read it and weep” she swiped the message to her gasping friends and surfing the wave of laughter as it came “threw herself under a train this morning!”

As the laughing and cheering rang around the gym hall Harley reflected that it was probably a good thing that the girl she had driven to suicide was not someone she knew personally. Or indeed someone who had ever existed at all.

It had started when computer technology had reached the point where it could crate convincing fake faces. Algorithms in the early part of the 21st century had been able to create convincing unreal pictures of people from data sets very easily. Then it was just a short leap to creating convincing video fakes, and the porn industry collapsed overnight as celebrity fakes flooded the world. This was followed shortly by movie studios  re-creating digitally every actor since the golden age of Hollywood and ruthlessly using plotting algorithms  to create a nearly infinite spooling reel of movies. Of course ninety nine percent of the went unwatched, not least because passive entertainment was as popular with a late 21st century audience as epic poetry would have been to a 20th century one. People wanted interactivity, they wanted to be part of the story. They wanted to vicarious thrill of being able to shape a narrative themselves, or indeed to destroy it.

Which explained the creation of the fake social media profile industry. This had first been spawned by advertisers who realised that paying real people to shill their products wasn’t as nearly as cost effective as just creating fake people who could be relied on to loyally boost a brand without ever going off script or being caught doing something they shouldn’t that might reflect badly back on the brand. They could be relied upon to sell the quasi dictatorial services offered by the social media companies who had realised what they craved wasn’t bringing people together but rather trying to control their every waking thought

Thus the ad industry created entire fake lives, flooding social media with people who had never  existed, families and towns of people who had never lived. All of them culled and mixed from the petabytes of data greedily hoovered up by various social media companies over a near century of recoded behaviour. However since most real humans lived off the ad revenue gained from shilling on social media in order to pay for basic goods like food and shelter there wasn’t any tangible difference between the product placement by humans and by algorithms. If anything the bots were a little less clumsy or needy. This was hardly surprising as having ad revenue was often the only thing staving off malnutrition for a hefty section of the population.

So for a while  it looked as if the noble experiment in fake people had been nothing more than an esoteric and depressing  philosophical / art project, when a bored researcher in the bowels of a silicon  valley content farm discovered something. Fake people generated as much hatred as real ones, if anything they actually engendered more.

“so what I was thinking” recalled the researcher, now raised up into the light and allowed to use the various playrooms and chic amusements given to only the hallowed princelings of silicon valley “is that people online love to hate other people, and we as responsible social media companies” the researcher had paused to allow her bank account to swell that little bit more with some good old company loyalty coin “have spent time and efforts to stamp out abuse, with little real success. So I concluded  essentially that jealously and cruelty must be an innate  part of human nature, and rather than trying to eradicate cyber bullying and online abuse we needed to redirect it. In this case to the fake people we had created”

The system was an instant success. Freed from the guilt of knowing they were destroying the lives of innocent people hordes of teenagers and the elderly flooded their hate mail towards the fake people generated by AI. Indeed the fake people now created were aimed at causing the maximise self righteous rage in all good thinking folk.  Trumplike hatemongers incited the left whilst snowflakey woke types enraged those who leaned right. For teens like Harley it was even easier, since all she ever wanted was to turn the tidal waves of jealousy and insecurity she felt into anger and hate.

In response to allegations that the social media companies were in effect encouraging hate crime the algorithms were adjusted to have the fake people respond realistically to the abuse they received. The fake people demonstrated real emotions, showing at first concern and then as the abuse increased gradually spiralling into depression, self harming and suicide. However instead of being a sobering reminder that victims had real feelings and spurring empathy in the abusers it only made them try even harder. Hence girls like Harley priding themselves on driving into suicide as many fake computer people as they could, safe in the knowledge there would never be any consequences. Or at least that was what Harley thought.

 The story of the fake girl’s suicide buoyed Harley through the rest of the deadly dull day. It got her through the chemistry class where, due to some even more dull political dispute between brands, they only learned about the properties of hair care products. It also got her through the bus ride home with her pals as they desecrated the social media site where the fake bereaved relatives left fake messages for their fake deceased daughter. If any of the practice had been designed to provoke empathy in girls like Harley then it had failed utterly. All it had done was make her glow with power and pride, a feeling that lifted her and took her out of her anxious little existence for a little while. As if she floated above the mere mortals she shared her life with. It was a feeling that lasted until she entered the echoey hall of her parents house and the ticking of the housekeeping bots, and the silence welled up and she felt very much alone. Alone with only her self hate, her anxiety and the crushing knowledge that she would never, ever be happy.

But this was a familiar feeling, and she had the cure in her bedroom. Gratefully she sank into her chair by the window, pulled on her comfy VR integrated onesie and prepared to find her next target.

“maybe some posh girl?” she mused as her skin felt the tickle of social media updates “or, like, an old fashioned hate crime?” they had been studying the golden age of online racism at school, in the days when social media companies had naively believed that the internet savvy user would be free of any prejudice beyond which operating system they used. Harley had been practising her anti semitic meme skills, and was pretty sure she could stitch together a decent conspiracy theory blaming any number of religious or ethnic minorities.

However all thought of whose fake life she would really ruin next was driven from her head when she flicked on her social media profile and saw what had happened.

“the fuck?” she exclaimed, scrolling through the various walls, feeds and posts that made up the ecology of her online presence. A place that should have been a carefully curated garden of bright flowering selfdom now ran riot with dangerous weeds “what happened?”

Harley scrolled through her feeds, feeds that should have shown posts she was tagged in that were mostly just bad recursive memes now in their second generation, or shout outs from her friends – both real and virtual. However now they were awash with poison. Every picture she had posted came tagged with its own tirade of abuse from dozens of different users. Her videos detailing the more dull aspects of her life had been spammed by messages, links to takedowns of her and threats so varied and bizarre that Harley wasn’t even really sure what they meant.

“oh, you dumb bastards” she said, feeling a surge of triumph run through her as she paged through the endlessly negative comments. The user name and ident tags of her abusers glowed red and she felt the throb of gleeful, righteous rage “you dumb, dumb bastards” she looked at the comments, at the ridiculously  over the top hurtful things that they were saying “I guess you don’t know a little something called the User Protection Act” with that she swiftly highlighted all the usernames that had abused her, and copied them to the User Protection Bureau “well, you’re about to get schooled, bitches” she hit send with a laugh “as in actual prison sentence banned from social media kinda schooling”

The User Protection act had been brought in shortly after the appearance of fake people, for the simple purpose of preventing actual real people being harmed online. The thinking went that since fake people could now take the brunt of the rage hate of humanity any real human facing abuse should have some legal protection. Thus the User Protection Bureau was set up, dedicating to protect real people from virtual hate. The Bureau itself was simple a semi sentient  algorithm  that you reported hate speech to, and if the user was found in breach of this law their social media presence was erased  until they had shown sufficient remorse. If this did not work the every hungry US prison system was happy to take people to work off their debt to society. But  since for many people it was their only source of income  online discourse had become considerably more polite, and few people ever needed to be told twice.

Unfortunately the bureau’s rules only applied to real human users, something that Harley was about to discover.

“what?” she said, when the User Protection Bureau Avatar appeared in front of her and smilingly told her that no action would be taken “but I am a real person” she waved a hand at the hate screeds that were defiling her social media presence “and I really, really am angry and upset about all this”

“you are real!” said the avatar cheerfully, as if she was congratulating  Harley on the observation, or perhaps even the state of being. The avatar was a genderless being in Harley’s virtual view, its face combining the caring and yet stern façade required for representative of what was left of the Federal government  “but unfortunately  the other user are not. All these comments are written by non human individuals”

“what the heck?” said Harley, looking at the abuse being levelled at her “you mean these were all written by fake people?” her forehead creased in thought “I guess that’s why they keep calling me a murderer” she looked again “hey, since when have fake people started abusing real ones?”

“well, its not my place to say” beamed the avatar “but I suppose if they can be attacked like real people, then they can do the same to you” the avatar seemed to be peering over Harley’s shoulder “and I have to say, they do really learn fast. Wow, that is some really nasty stuff!” the avatar made to vanish.

“hey!” shouted Harley, still sitting in her onesie in her room.  “what are you going to do about this? How do I stop it?”

“I don’t know” shrugged the avatar “how about you be a better person?”

“you useless dumb shit piece of software” yelled Harley losing her temper “you’ve got one fucking job…”

“now remember Harley” said the UPB  avatar “if this starts to get you down you can always talk to one of our counselling bots…”

“get me down?” said Harley “seriously? As if I’m going to let a bunch of computer code and crazy ass algorithms tell me how to feel. It ain’t nothing I can’t just ignore”

 It was precisely seventy two hours later that Harley climbed onto the roof of the school gym and made her way to the edge, ready to end her life by jumping off it.

At first it had been a joke, seeing all the fake people getting so angry at her.

“dude, they’re ridiculous” she said, scrolling down the comments whilst she and Anastasia were meant to be doing Yogalates in the school gym “as if I’m going be all sad cause ‘Chad_KroegerRULES69’ calls me a heartless fat bitch who deserves to die of Herpes”

“and this one” chimed Anastasia, looking at the feed as she completed a flawless downward dog. It helped that her parents had been giving her a cocktail  of vitamin supplements so potent she was practically an Olympic gymnast “says you’re so ugly your parents should have strangled you at birth, can you imagine? And it says your nose is way too big and…” she trailed off, unable to make sense of the fact that Harley’s face had gone red. For a moment Anastasia thought it might be the strain of the Yogalates, after all the virtual teacher was buffering again mid stretch and hadn’t told them to breath for several minutes. Last time that had happened three junior high students had been hospitalised. It was only after several seconds that she realised that it was because Harley was trying not to cry.

“they’re just fakes” said Anastasia quickly “like you said, bunch of computer code and shit. Why would you care what they say?”

“because they’re right!” Harley had howled, bursting into tears and running out of the hall. The virtual teacher strobed for a moment and called after her. Except instead of using her real name she called her fatty.

“I can’t believe there aren’t any laws covering this” sighed Harley’s mother, having been informed by the school of what was happening. However as most of the school staff were of course themselves virtual algorithms they didn’t seem terribly sympathetic. Indeed the virtual Principal had called her a whore of satan, but that might have just been his Christian preacher programming glitching again.

“s’ok mom” Harley had said in a small voice “I guess I deserve it, after all I kinda dished it out…”

“no, no I won’t hear of that” said her mother, the pair of them sitting at the kitchen table. Behind them the food fabricator hummed as it emitted the aromas of home baking, without actually baking anything. The bread substitute it would eventually extrude would look and taste like the real thing, but would take more calories to digest than it gave in return.  “You’re a super star Harley, you’re a girl with a real heart of gold. That these software sons of bitches are attacking you is just cause they’re jealous. They’ll get bored of it soon, just you wait”

Twenty four hours later even her mom had to admit that last part was not true.

“they ain’t got nothing better to do” she had said, sitting on the edge of Harley’s bed whilst the girl herself hid under the duvet inhaling ultra absorbent kleenex “they just exist to make snark and pick holes in other people’s lives. Imagine dedicating all that time and energy into being so nasty” she shook her head “what kind of creature does that?”

“I do” snivelled Harley from under the duvet. She hadn’t been back to school, not since the incident in yoga class. Not least because most of the school software wouldn’t let her anywhere near the gates without loudly announcing she was menstruating, or by digging out from the archives less than flattering yearbook photos that by rights should have been long erased “I did, I mean… that was all I did. Bully and pick on people till they lost their minds and killed themselves”

“oh, but they weren’t real people, were they?” her mother responded, patting the duvet in concern since her daughter hadn’t emerged from under it for several hours.  If it wasn’t for the smart material she wore in her onesie then she’d have started to stink “they were just software. Not real at all”

“they seemed real” said Harley “seemed real when I was ragging on them. Felt like they were real people when I treated them like shit, and it feels real now that they’ve all turned on me”

“well, maybe that’s your answer” said her mom, stroking the duvet in a way she’d seen moms do on old TV shows “if they’re like real people you could appeal to their better nature. Try being honest. Say you’re sorry. That you’ve changed. That you’ll treat people better from here on in” her mother smiled “I’m sure even a bunch of software would understand a sincere apology. I’m sure it will make things better, if nothing else they’ll respect you more”

“you think?” said Harley, her tousled head and tear stained face emerging from under the duvet.

“darling, I’m sure. Sometimes an apology is the best thing”

It wasn’t. If anything it made things even worse.

“I mean, I don’t know what she’s playing at” confided Anastasia to her closest subscribers as she walked about school the next day. The thousand or so followers she had guaranteed perfect discretion to, unlike the tens of thousands of other global viewers she shared most of her every waking thoughts. In an age where the average Chinese teenager could pull in a million hits for little more than wearing a short skirt Anastasia didn’t even register “apologising? Admitting that she was wrong all those times she drove those software people to kill themselves? That isn’t like her” she paused as several of her subscribers pointed out that there had been many, many times that Harley had said sorry in the past “okay, she does say sorry. But only in, like, a tactical way. A situation like this you never say sorry. Oldest rule in the book is never to show weakness. Whatever you’ve done, no matter how bad, you double down on it. accuse your opponents of doing what you’ve done. Go low when they go high. Play the man, not the ball” she nodded to herself, her mother was a leading member of the church of Trumponomics and had taught her well “I just don’t know what she’s going to do next”

She was answered by a scream from the campus in front of her, several girls in the grade below her pointing up to the roof of the gym. Anastasia squinted up into the bright light and saw a figure up there.

“well, I guess that answers my question” she muttered, and began running. All of her talk of PR strategy  was forgotten. Her best friend was going to end her life.

Harley had been up on the gym roof before, but only to film a mock suicide piece to make fun of some virtual boy they had bullied to death. However this time instead of mockingly singing the theme from Frozen (the steampunk live action version, of course, which Harley and her mother both considered the definitive best one) she was going to go ahead and end it all. She wiped the tears from her eyes, stepped up to the edge of the roof and took a deep breath.

“I’m sorry, okay?” she muttered, barely loud enough for the floating beecams around her to pick up and livecast to everyone in the world “I thought it was okay to pick on people cause they weren’t real. I didn’t realise that it was me being mean because I feel bad about myself and I’m lonely. I thought it was harmless, but it was making me into someone I’m not. I don’t wanna be that person no more. So I’m not going to be” with that she lifted her foot, ready to plunge herself off the roof.

“well done” said a voice behind her “you’ve passed the test”

Harley whirled around, nearly losing her footing on the roof and almost falling  to the school yard below. Behind her floated the avatar from the User Protection Bureau, its impossible face so carefully imperfect that it was beautiful

“what?” said Harley, squinting in the light. The avatar only existed in her e-glasses, but had come under its own power “what test?”

“why, the empathy test” beamed the avatar “you passed it. you showed you were a real human being, with real feelings and the capacity for change”

“but… what? How?”

“you suffered the online abuse you used to dish out. You did what they did. To no avail. So you were going to end your life. That’s how we know you are sincere in your apology”

“you….you did this to me on purpose?” said Harley, shock showing in her face

“I am sorry” trilled the avatar, in a way that suggested apologies were for other people “we had to intervene more seriously. We tried showing you what happened to another being when you drove them to the edge, but that didn’t do anything because they were only virtual. And because your generation has become desensitised, like the previous one did growing up watching Youtube beheading videos  or Epic Deadly Fails. It wasn’t enough to watch someone hurting to make you feel real empathy. You had to go through the pain yourself. Do you understand now?”

Harley nodded miserably, feet right on the edge of the school gym roof and an open mouthed crowd gathering below. There wasn’t a single one of them that would forget the lesson, not one who wouldn’t feel like Harley did.

“now, remember you still have friends” the hologram gestured to Anastasia, who had burst out onto the roof and hugged Harley tight, pulling her away from the edge “and that every life matters, whether it’s real or virtual”

With that the avatar smiled and vanished. With it all record of the online abuse vanished too, the legions of angry software people melted away. Harley’s social media profile now resembled a perfect garden of harmony and supportive uplifting commentary. Gratefully Harley fell into Anastasia’s  arms, who lead her from the roof into a corridor. The door closed, cutting off the floating beecams that had been livecasting the event.

“oh, oh honey what were you thinking?” whispered  Anastasia as Harley clung to her “doing something like that….to think that you needed to…..” she swallowed hard, the image of her best friend plunging to her death would be etched on her mind forever. The idea that someone close to her could feel so bad they could only think of ending their lives, well that was if anything even worse.

“I was thinking I could get a hella sponsorship deal” said Harley, wiping her eyes and stashing away a small vial that caused the tears in the first place “and go on a full spectrum  repentance tour. The way I figure it I can milk maybe six months out of this empathy for others shit”

“umm, what?” said Anastasia, watching Harley morph from a wrecked and broken figure into the girl she knew, admired, but really never liked “you knew this was a test?”

“course” said Harley as they walked towards the stairs. The police were waiting at the bottom, but for no other reason than to take selfies and loltag some meaningless phrases about all lives mattering “I mean, you don’t think I just decided to through myself off a building? No, I carefully researched how to take my own life? Well every time I did I found out that someone from the Bureau always turns up to try and talk them out of it. Course it doesn’t always work because some people really, really want to kill themselves” she added, her face looking quizzical. Even now she couldn’t quite understand why people wanted to kill themselves to try and make themselves feel better. They could always just take out their feelings of resentment and self pity out on other people.

“so, like, you faked this?” said Anastasia, not sure whether to regard this as an excellent career move or proof of what she had privately suspected, that Harley was a psychopath “Why?”

“you know, bots can do a hell of a lot of things” said Harley, checking in her e-glasses that her makeup was smudged just so “but they can’t fake being sorry like a human being can. I’m gonna work being a recovering suicidal teen so hard it’ll put me through college” she smiled, her teeth bright white and her eyes artfully red and teary “thank the lord for online abuse”

[clarencenicholsonata]

The Comprehensive Guide to Effective Social Media Marketing

The buzz has well and truly died down.

The years in which I wrote "Top 10 Strategies to Get Facebook Likes" or lines like "social media is the future of marketing!" are in the past.

We're now in the era of "Teens Are Leaving Facebook like a Sinking Ship" and lines like "Wait, Google+ is still around?"

Does social media still offer a platform for business growth?

Can you take advantage of Facebook's 2 billion users without paying for Facebook Ads?

Can you utilize Instagram's high user engagement and demographics to drive brand awareness or, dare I say it, final sales?

This article will take an in-depth look at the most effective strategies behind five leading social media marketing objectives.

Table of Contents (Click to Jump)

Organically Generate Engagement

Build a Community of Prospective Customers

Build Positive Relationships

Drive Brand Awareness

Drive Sales

Effectively Use Social Media to Organically Generate Engagement

We've all heard the "woe-is-me" story of how, back in 2014, your organic reach was 20%, and now you're lucky to get 2%.

And we feel for you, we do.

But let's get over it.

Facebook isn't going back to the gold ol' days, and your business can't neglect the world's largest pool of prospective customers in one place. So let's move on and get what we can get.

Here are 3 Effective Strategies Proven to Boost Organic Reach on Facebook and Instagram...

#1. Use Live Video:

Video continues to hold sway on Facebook and Instagram with an average of 300% more engagement and 12x shares than text and image posts (combined!)

The reason behind this is simple: Facebook wants to rule world. That means competing with Whatsapp for messaging, Google for advertising and (most importantly for us) YouTube for video.

For more on marketing with Live Video, check out "How We Used Facebook Live Video to Grow Organic Reach 300% (+ 3 Bonus Case Studies)."

#2. Repost Proven Content:

Check out your Facebook or Instagram Insights to determine which of your previous posts did the best. Then, redesign and repost. Consider that even your top posts ever only get seen by (maybe) 10% of your Fanbase. That leaves you 90% who haven't seen your awesome content and are likely to be just as engaged as the audience was when you first posted.

Top Tip: If you have specialized content that’s more likely to be of interest to a specific type or demographic, use the Audience Optimization tool to choose a more friendly audience for that content.

#3. Post Engaging Content:

The Top 5 Post Types to Try…

Create "Tag a friend” posts

Create a quote Post

Create a "Remember When?" post

Be timely (always consider what your audience is already thinking about: holidays, sports, current events, TGIF, #Mondays, etc)

Other people's content (be selfless!)

Related Reading:

For more on this subject, check out "75 Can't Miss Tips: Build your Business with Social Media," "52 Facebook Marketing Ideas" or "200 Instagram Photos: Examples, Ideas & Resources for Your Business."

Effectively Use Social Media to Build a Community of Prospective Customers

The best way to grow your social media Following with people who have a chance of buying from you is to run a social promotion. There's just no getting around it. Here's why…

Provided you give away a prize related to your business (your product, a giftcard, etc) the only people who will enter your promotion are people interested in your product. This is way better than random Fans, some of whom are likely bots.

A promotion not only gives you new Fans and social engagements, but also gives you the contact information of those Fans. This enables you to email them and encourage a sale down the line.

A promotion is the only strategy in which you can still require people to Follow your company on social media (not Facebook, but Instagram and Twitter) in order to enter.

Here's an example of a simple Facebook promotion giving away a 6-month supply of health bars:

Place your promotion page on a Facebook Tab, and drive traffic to it from your website (with a welcome mat), your newsletter, Facebook Ads and organic postings. Ads, your welcome mat and posts will drive new traffic, while your newsletter will engage with existing customers and get the ball rolling with sharing with their friends.

For a walkthrough on creating a Facebook marketing campaign, check out my article "How to Build a Complete Facebook Marketing Campaign from Start to Finish."

Top Strategies to Get More from your Social Media Promotion:

1. Use Bonus Entry Incentives to Boost your Reach:

This is especially important if you have a large subscriber base. You'll get a lot of your entries from that, but want those existing customers to share with non-customers. This will get you more social media Fans (who you don't yet have) and the contact details of people who haven't yet bought from you.

2. Use a Leaderboard to Incentivize Sharing:

People are competitive at heart. Creating a leaderboard within your campaign is an effective incentive to get your entrants to Share.

3. Use Facebook Ads Effectively:

Facebook ads are a powerful way to drive traffic to your promotion. When optimized, you can generate new Fans and prospective customers for only around 50 cents.

Related Reading:

For more on this subject, check out "How to Use a Fan-Only Promotion to Turn Followers into Leads," "How to Create a Successful Sweepstakes (A Complete Guide for 2017)," or "How Bhu Foods Drove 35% Online Sales Growth: A Social Media Strategy Example."

Effectively Use Social Media to Build Positive Relationships

Many businesses correctly believe that social media is a place to build relationships with your prospective and existing customers. And it is.

Something lesser-known (or at least less frequently taken advantage of) is the fact that social media is also a great place to build relationships with other businesses as well.

Just as a social media promotion offers a lot of opportunity for your business to drive new Fans and social media engagement, so does a social media co-promotion offer an opportunity to generate new contacts and prospective customers.

Here's an example from a co-promotion Wishpond's running with Samcart:

Top Tips for a Social Media Co-Promotion:

Reach out to a business that has the same target market as you. The strength of a co-promotion is in the other business connecting you with their audience. If their audience is made up of pre-teen girls, and your business sells mufflers, your relationship won't be all that valuable.

Be equal partners in the promotion. If you're giving away a year's subscription to your software (valued at $1,088) be sure their half of the giveaway is of equal value.

Establish how you're going to share the work and the success. If you have a design team and landing page builder, be sure the other business writes the copy. Or, if they're slightly larger than you, offer to do all the work if they'll just contribute to the grand prize.

Save yourself time down the line. Once you've run a single campaign, use its success as a case study for your future outreach. You can also duplicate the campaign landing page and use it again (with some changes, of course).

Related Reading:

For more on this subject, check out "A Behind-the-Scenes Look at How We Generated 1,263 New Leads (With a Little Help from Our Friends)."

Effectively Use Social Media to Drive Brand Awareness

The best way to drive awareness on social media is probably "cost-per-impression" Facebook Ads. When they're well-designed, it's possible to show your brand name to more than a thousand Facebook users within your target demographic for only a few bucks.

But we're not diving into advertising in this article, so I'll fall back on the second-most-powerful way to drive brand awareness…

Influencer Marketing.

Influencer marketing is a tried-and-true strategy to get your brand in front of someone with a bit more heft than your business - someone with a few hundred thousand followers or (if not that) a lot of respect. Getting in front of them often means you get in front of their network, and that network can (as it did with us when we got a Facebook share from Mari Smith) make your servers crash...

Here's a snapshot from a Forbes article focused on Shane Miller, an artist bringing in 40% of his sales from Instagram marketing:

Miller’s ‘aha’ moment with Instagram came when he reached out to Instagram influencer Ruthie Lindsey, a friend with a large following in March 2017. “She had 90,000 followers and I asked if she’d trade a painting for a promoted post,” he says. “When we met up she brought a friend who had 1.2 million followers with her, and he liked my work and ended up showcasing it on his feed.”

Here's a step-by-step walkthrough for an optimized influencer marketing approach:

Identify a list of individual influencers, or brands, who have an audience larger than yours. Be sure their audience is the same as your target market (getting Justin Bieber to retweet you is only great if your target market is 13-year-old girls).

Determine the best way to start the approach. Engage with them on social media (follow, retweet, etc). Comment on their blog articles with intelligent questions.

Hit them with the outreach. Email or direct message with a specific request for feedback (not sharing, quite yet). Create a piece of content which they would be legitimately interested in (research to be sure they've written or talked about that subject before).

If no response, prompt them again with a "just wanted to make sure you saw this" email.

Continue your follow-up until your moral compass is awakened and you have to stop.

Related Reading:

For more on this subject, check out the "Reach Out" templates and section of "19 Proven Email Marketing Templates We Use to Sell, Nurture, Onboard, and Reach Out."

Effectively Use Social Media to Drive Sales

After all, what's the point of a million Fans and 10 milion impressions if nobody ever buys from you?

Social media is still a viable platform to drive sales, but not without a bit of thought.

There are several effective strategies for using social media to drive sales...

Turn Fans and social media users into contacts through contests, in which you require an email address for entry. Then use email to turn those contacts into sales.

Use the Facebook Shop (a tab that can be added to your Facebook Page) that lets you display and sell products. The coolest part of the Facebook Shop is that Facebook doesn't take any cut of your sales.

Use a "click to buy" tool on Instagram (like Curalate or Have2HaveIt) which enable Instagram users to quickly and easily buy the products displayed in your Posts.

Use Facebook Live Video (the easiest and most reliable way to boost organic reach on the Facebook platform, currently) to offer educational videos which also sell your products. See below for an example from Safeway.

Related Reading:

For more on this subject, check out "How to Use a Fan-Only Promotion to Turn Followers into Leads." Alternatively, check out "Instagram Posts that Drive Sales."

Final Thoughts

Hopefully this guide to effective social media marketing has given you a better idea of how to better-utilize the platforms you're already on.

The fact of the matter is that the glory days of easy social media marketing are likely over. As each platform has gotten bigger and their organization more corporate, opportunities for massive awareness or sales are harder and harder to come by.

But that doesn't mean that you can't still drive results from the hundreds of millions of users, it just requires a bit more thought, and a bit more commitment.

If you have any questions about how your business can get more out of social media, don't hesitate to reach out in the comment section below.

Related Reading:

Social Media Marketing Plan: An 11-Step Template

How to Build a Complete Facebook Marketing Campaign from Scratch

75 Can't Miss Tips: Build your Business with Social Media

How to Create a Marketing Campaign (That Actually Drives Sales)

55 Foolproof Ways to Get More Instagram Followers

15 Awesome Examples of Instagram Posts that Drive Sales

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