My Notes on Social Media as the Centre of Publishing

Social Media as the Centre of Publishing

I don’t remember when social media stopped being an add-on to publishing and started feeling like the centre of it. It didn’t happen overnight. There was no announcement. No clear shift. It just slowly became obvious that books weren’t travelling the way they used to.

They started travelling through people.

Earlier, a book moved through bookstores, reviews, recommendations, word of mouth that took time to gather. Now, it moves through reels, posts, captions, comments, and algorithms. It moves through faces and voices before it moves through pages. Sometimes, it reaches readers before it even fully exists in their hands.

And I don’t say this with bitterness. Just observation.

These days, when a book is about to be published, the first question often isn’t only about the writing. It’s about presence. Does the author exist online? Are they visible? Do people already know them, trust them, feel something toward them? Publishing no longer begins at the book. It begins at the profile.

I’ve heard authors say they were asked to be active on social media even before their book found its final shape. Not because their writing wasn’t strong enough, but because discoverability now depends on familiarity. Readers want to know who you are before they decide whether to read what you’ve written.

Trust has changed its address.

It used to live in institutions. Now it lives in individuals. In relatability. In tone. In whether someone feels like a person you could listen to for a while. The book becomes part of that larger relationship rather than the sole reason for it.

As a reader and reviewer, I find myself caught in that shift too.

When I talk about a book online, I’m not just talking about the text. I’m also part of the system that decides how far that text travels. My words don’t just describe a reading experience. They influence visibility. Reach. Timing. Even perception. And once you realise that, reading starts to feel different.

Not less sincere. Just more layered.

Social media has become the place where writing and marketing meet so closely that it’s hard to tell where one ends and the other begins. Authors are no longer just writers. They’re communicators. Readers are no longer just readers. They’re reviewers, promoters, amplifiers, sometimes even gatekeepers.

And the work has multiplied.

Writing the book is no longer enough. Explaining the book matters. Showing up for the book matters. Keeping the book alive after publication matters. A story now has to survive not just on the page, but in a feed that refreshes every few seconds.

There’s a quiet exhaustion in that.

I think about books that need slowness. Books that unfold gently. Books that don’t announce themselves loudly or resolve quickly. Books that ask you to sit with them before deciding how you feel. These books struggle online. Not because they aren’t meaningful, but because they don’t perform urgency well.

Social media rewards speed. Publishing often needs patience. That tension sits at the heart of everything now.

What makes this complicated is that social media isn’t the villain people sometimes make it out to be. It has opened doors that were firmly shut before. It has allowed indie authors, marginal voices, niche stories, and experimental writing to find readers they might never have reached otherwise. It has made reading feel communal again in a world that often isolates us.

People are reading together. Talking together. Discovering books collectively. That matters.

But it has also centralised power in subtle ways. Attention decides survival. Algorithms decide visibility. Trends decide taste. A book can be brilliant and still disappear quietly if it doesn’t fit the moment.

And so, everyone adapts.

Authors learn how to show up even when they’d rather be writing. Reviewers learn how to speak in ways that travel. Readers learn which books are worth their limited attention based on what keeps appearing. Publishing becomes a choreography of visibility.

Sometimes I wonder what gets lost in that process.

When writing is constantly introduced through personality, does the work get a fair chance to stand on its own? When marketing begins just weeks before release, are readers being rushed into relationships they haven’t had time to build? When everyone is asked to speak loudly, who listens for the quieter voices?

I don’t have answers. Only questions that keep returning.

I know that social media has become unavoidable. I know adaptation is necessary. I know stories need carriers now, not just covers. But I also know that something about reading feels different when it’s always being prepared for sharing.

There’s a part of me that misses when books arrived slowly. When discovery felt accidental. When not everything needed a strategy. At the same time, I recognise that nostalgia doesn’t solve the present.

So maybe the real work now is balance.

Letting social media be a bridge, not the destination. Allowing books to be visible without being flattened. Creating space where writing leads and marketing follows, even if imperfectly. Choosing, sometimes, to speak about a book quietly, knowing it might not travel far, and being okay with that.

Social media may be the centre of publishing now. But it doesn’t have to be the centre of reading.

Books still do their deepest work in private. In silence. In the space between a reader and a page. Everything else is just how we try to bring others into that space.

And maybe remembering that is enough to keep us from losing the plot entirely.

This blog post is part of ‘Blogaberry Dazzle’ 
hosted by Cindy D’Silva and Noor Anand Chawla in collaboration with Cerebration – Think with body, mind & soul.