Okay, come in close. Listen up. Practice your conspiratorial whisper, because I'm about to tell you the true secret to social media marketing.

In the past few months, since realizing that I needed to step up my game, start and maintain a real internet presence if I wanted to be successful as a fiction writer, I've been a busy little bee. I've joined Myspace, I've created a page on Facebook, I've started a blog and been working my tail end off on Hubpages.

Basically I've been trying to do anything and everything to get my name out there and traffic generated on my behalf.

But man, it is slow. It is a slow going, painful process. I've been reading and learning a lot about how to blog successfully, learning the ropes of adsense and it's difficulties, and trying to hold up my end of the bargain--which means posting quality work daily. On both my blog and on Hubpages.

And hey, I didn't get into the writing business because I thought it would be an easy path to fame and fortune. I got into it because I love to write. It's my passion, and I'm not going to let a little work get in my way. Or a lot of work. Because you know what, I'm young and I have a very lame social life and I can sleep when I'm dead.

So I thought the key was work work work. And that's certainly part of it--but the difficult part is keeping your nose to the grindstone and keeping your spirits bouyed. Keeping your head in the clouds and your eye on the ball.

Which leads me to the real secret--perseverance.

First step to persevere: Stay Inspired. I've been writing a lot of hubs about staying inspired, mostly because it helps me stay inspired. Social media marketing, like writing, is all about the dogged pursual of your goals without paying attention to rejection, unless to learn from it. It's about a really blind sense of belief that what you're doing will work out eventually.

Second step to persevere: Keep Working. It's a time delay business, and the work you're doing now will show up in a few weeks or a few months (depending on what kind of work it is) and by then you'll be working on something else. You have to constantly produce quality work--work that befits your standards and your talent.

Keep going. Keep believing. Most of all, keep persevering.

My blog hit 100 views in a single day today. It isn't much, but it is a big step in the right direction.