Helping new and aspiring authors navigate the publishing wilderness

Librarything

April 2, 2012 By Amanda Taylor 1 Comment

Librarything is another one of the three biggest book social media sites. This is one of the bigger reader hot spots that provide authors with means to connect with readers and share their books with them and engage. Librarything has activities and tools than Shelfari, but it falls second to Goodreads.

How to Get Author Status on Librarything

After you create your general account, try to find your book or one of your books by using the “find books” function.
Once you find your book click on your name or pen name. After you click on the name, Libarything will ask “is this you?”
Click yes and then your request for author status will be sent to Librarything staff for approval.
Log in within a day or two to see if your request was approved. Once you are approved, you can begin building your author page and engaging in author activities.

Building Your LibraryThing Page

Building your page consists of putting books on your shelf, filling in your author information, and adding a photo. You may also put links to your website, blog, social media, and interviews. There is no limit to your number of links. Any function or group you are a member of will also display on your page. Your author page has several tabs of information about you that others can access as well. The home page keeps you in tune with what’s new on Librarything in general.

Author Activities

Author chat or interview. For established authors who have a big base, an author can participate in an author chat. This is not real-time, so the author can participate whenever, but don’t stay away too long. Newer or lesser-known authors can sign up for an interview instead. You start a new discussion thread with “Interview wanted with your name, genre”. The message will contain more information, but Librarything gives you all the information to include in the signup process. You’ll be contacted on your Librarything mail when someone wants to do the interview.
Early Review Program. You can sign up to be a reviewer or to give away ARCs (Advance Reader Copies) or books in the first six months of release. You must first enroll in the program to be able to participate. Once you register your book, Librarything will decide who will receive your books, but you are responsible for fulfilling the book orders. They will not send the books for you. Librarything checks that you take care of fulfillment and that the reviewers do their job.
Member Giveaway Program. To give away books you must sign up and have one of three credentials. Being a Librarything Author is one. You can give away physical copies or eBooks. You also determine how long you want to run the giveaway and how many are given away. People will request your book if they are interested. After the giveaway term ends, Librarything will determine the winners and contact you. They will give you the winner’s information for delivery. Again, you are responsible for the fulfillment. You are also asked not to do anything with the person’s contact information except to deliver the book. You can request for the winner to post a review, but they are not required to do so.
Extras. Fill out extras about yourself and your books. This is a nifty way to add more information about you and your books to share with the community and build intrigue. It works the same way as it does for Shelfari.

The normal stuff. Groups, forums, and discussions are all the same here. Participate in the ones that interest you. Make friends and be friendly. Putting up your books helps people learn about you and looks good to the community. Put up your favorites and books about hobbies. You can put your own reviews up for your own books, but you must specify you wrote it by saying “posted by author”. Finding friends is pretty easy since they have a “friend finder” tool where you can see if any of your friends from Twitter, Facebook, etc are members.

Do Not Do On LibraryThing:

The same basic rules apply for Librarything as they do for Shelfari and other forums.

Recommend your own book at all.
Hijack discussions.
Spam people.
Plug your book where it doesn’t belong.

Librarything makes it clear in its TOS (Terms of Service). If you do any of these things, your author status will be revoked and you may be kicked off the site. They have a lot of author activities and they have places and discussions where it is okay to promote your book. Librarything will point you in the right direction, so ask or look around. The people there are friendly and eager to help you with any questions you may have. They encourage you to contact them with questions, and help is not far away.

Next week we will explore Goodreads and all of its cool features and glory!

Why Do I Have to Have a Blog?

March 19, 2012 By Amanda Taylor Leave a Comment

As a newbie author I asked this very same question. I am not in the minority. I didn’t even know what a blog was to be honest with you. On my personal/book blog I have mentioned that I thought that a blog was a Dr. Seuss character or a monster. I have learned that many people don’t know what blogs are either.

Once I figured out what a blog was, why do I need one?

Everyone: publishers, authors, reviewers, etc all say I need a blog. Why? It’s a good question that has a lot of answers!

To sum it up in one sentence: It is a part of your author platform; it is THE or one of your landing pads all other roads will lead to.

After a while in the marketing stage you will find that a blog is a MUST HAVE and not optional. Not in this day and age.

Here’s another thought of mine: I have a website, so why do I need a blog? Another good question, right?

A blog can be used as a book website, some just use a website, and some use both a blog and a website. I use both. In my opinion having both appears to be more professional. A website is more static and a blog is more dynamic. A website is more professional and a blog is more casual. I spend more time on my blog (or both of them) than I do on my website. I plan on upgrading my book website later on down the road. The website and the blog can be linked together as a two way street. My book website has a built in ordering system and excerpts which I have hyperlinked to the book blog along with my other ordering links for Amazon and B&N on a page. I even included a hyperlink for people to request kindlegraphs (a topic for later). I have all my social media links on my ‘About’ page so people can locate me with a click of a button if they are looking for me on–let’s say–Goodreads. My website just as my Facebook Fanpage and Twitter. My new website will probably be updated with these links.

Here are some other reasons why blogs are required for your platform:

Events Blogs are required for you to participate in blog tours, interviews, blog hops, giveaways, etc, etc. This is THE place for this to take place. Your website isn’t going to cut it for these. You may lead people from the blog TO the website with a link, but they will visit the blog first. Interviewers will come by your blog and check out what you have written when you’re not looking. They may snag one of your posts for the interview if they like one of them. This has happened to me on a few occasions–it’s a good thing. Interviews can be displayed on a separate page for visitors to check out. All of these guys will ask you for your blog and website links. It looks good if you have BOTH! You WILL need both for a book launch!
Extras This can be about a book or about you. You can’t post this stuff on a website. This is a personal way for readers to get to know you and view samples of your writing. Also you can give people sneak peeks of your upcoming book while it’s in the works to peak interest. Do character interviews, write about a character–the list goes on! You can even write about where the idea of a book came from, what led to its creation, how you got into writing, etc. For my book blog I talk about my other hobbies and about where I live since it is interesting to my readers and because it plays a part of how my fantasy saga came into being. Beekeeping is the hot one. Since I began my writing career early I write about that. You can write things on your blog that are personal–but not too personal–without coming across as being sales-y.
“The Other Stuff” This stuff can be the other things rattling around in your head that you want to write about that you think is worth sharing that won’t find its way into a book (or could it later?). Since blogs have categories to organize your posts, you can put short stories, poems, essays, etc in addition to your other book related stuff. If you want to post reviews of other people’s books you have reviewed you can! Adding tags to the posts help then right readers find that particular post. Your blog provides you with more versatility. Your website is just a place for your books on display and or ordering. You don’t have as much personal info available to your readers–just your bio. That’s great for intros, but we are in a day an age where authors and readers are getting into a more interpersonal relationship.
The Social Media Highway Twitter, Facebook, Goodreads, etc can lead to your website AND blog. But guess what? These platforms have plugins to share posts from your blog in real time. Your website is just “there”. More people will probably come by your blog rather than your website. It’s great to have both and also cross link to your website from your blog(s). Make it a two-way street. People can share your blog posts easier than they can your website. Blogs have buttons on them so people can share with a click of a button. On Goodreads, for example, is a reader hot spot and they have instant access to your blog from the site if you connect to it. There are more plugs for blogs than to websites, but you do put your website in your profile. A blog is another form of social media. It’s where you can have much more to say.

Setting up a blog seemed really scary and hard at first, but it really isn’t. If you use WordPress or Blogger, you can start blogging in minutes. Set-up is step by step. It really is learn as you go. Have fun at it!