Whether you’re a self-published or traditionally-published author, you are no doubt engaging in marketing your books. One effective way to accomplish this is by blogging regularly on social media sites. However, recently, a number of writer “groups” within those sites have put a kibosh on posting a blog with links that take the reader back to your website, ergo, your books. In other words, no self-promotion.
I can understand this . . . to some extent. But what if you’re trying to make a point about the craft of writing? Can you not use your own writing to emphasize the point? After all, whose writing do you know best?
What about the research you’ve done? Why did you choose a particular location, or a particular time period in history? Can you not reference your own writing to enhance the reader’s understanding? If I discuss how I researched the forensics of fire in 1911 for one of my books, wouldn’t it be helpful to use a bit of background from it to clarify?
There are many self-promo groups on Facebook and Google + and you can post links directly to your books without feeling guilty. But what about sharing your own experiences or knowledge about writing? How you created your characters, developed your plot, built in tension and conflict. Why you choose to write in the past or the future. Who your target audience might be. How do you write a blog like this and never mention examples from your books?
A second concern regarding posting blogs: When a site administrator asks you not to post a link to your blog, the alternative is to cut and paste the blog directly onto the site. Frankly, I think this looks tacky and much less professional than sending someone to the blog page on your website.
Let’s give the readers some credit. If they choose to read your blog, they can click on the link and read it. No one is forcing them to browse the website any further. Certainly no one is forcing them to purchase a book.
I would love to hear what you think. Please share your thoughts.
It is a bit like the idea of becoming a famous artist only when you are dead. There is no way you can benefit from your work after you are gone.
But to answer the question you asked,the idea of vested interest comes into play, and return on investments. Someone who has created a blogging site may have spent out large sums of money to get it up and running. They may even have made a huge loss on the site.
The fact is they must want to get returns on their investment. So in order for them to make money back from their investment, they may try to restrict users of their site from making a profit by linking back to their own web site.
Hence you may be force down the route of having a paid advert on their web site. However some of these sites allows you to measure how effective your advert is, and allows you to test to find the most effective advert. For example pay per click advertising is a commonly used method so you would need to ensure that once a person has landed on your web site that they will see the value in buying your book.
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Warm regards
MGA
Author
“The Art of Gratitude”
Good ideas here, MGA. I will think on them.
If I read an article by an author I always like to have a look at what they’ve written so I always gladly click on a link to their blog and/or books.
I wish more readers were like you, Peggie. Thanks.
I can understand your frustration. It made me think about all the blogs I read that discuss the topic of writing and publishing on a regular basis. I do have to admit the main blogs I read for writing info do not refer back to the author’s personal books or writing. They sometimes refer to other books as examples, but not their own. Perhaps they have had the same experience you did? Thinking more about this topic, I’ll admit that I think it does come across as more professional if you can stay away from using your own work as example – and it creates a blog that will be relevant for years to come and to many writers who may not write what you write. The idea of a blog is to share info – and the side benefit is that a reader may wander onto other pages of your website from your blog – where they will see your books. Which makes me say that if a Group doesn’t allow you to post a link to your blog, but instead wants you to post the entire blog – I’d find a different group to share with.
Thanks, Indy. I agree with you. Personally, I’ve had this experience with only one group but from readers’ comments, it clearly is an issue.
I’m like Peggie, I like clicking on links from people who write clear comments. I find it fun and satisfying to find content that way. I do understand that having people promote themselves on your blog is annoying. I have a blog and I have found that there are quite a few people who spam comment or promo comment in order to have people click over to their blog. I don’t mind when it’s relevant but I find it rude when the link has nothing to add to the actual conversation. I suppose some groups don’t want to bother moderating, and simply take the approach of halting the opportunity for that sort of commenting. It seems lazy to me. Like Indy said, not a group I’d want to be in.
Thanks, Celina. I appreciate your comments.