SB Sarah posted today about two of the things I seriously dislike… myspace and people over charging authors for shit.
After I read the post I thought… hmmm didn’t you just rant about myspace? No, never fear I am not gonna go all book bitchy on you and think I hold claim to all internet topics. For many reasons, one being I have common sense and two being I never posted about it. BUT in grand sybil form… it was in draft. There was a post on Alison Kent’s blog back in Feb. What? It is still timely.
Kent quoted, author Mari Mancusi from the comments she made in Alison’s very pro Myspace post the day before. Now one thing to state first Mari does write YA. So there is prolly a shit load of fans to be found there.
Romance? I just can’t see it. But just about every good point Mari made had me nodding my head going yes! That is why I hate myspace! And yes I know you authors are prolly nodding your head and going yes! That is why I LOVE myspace.
To take it point by point from my reader point of view:
1) It’s very simple to update and add multimedia to. I’ve even done webcam videos talking directly to readers.
This could be good but two things people need to remember – DON’T have AUTO sound. Not on anything. Do not have your fave song start to play when I click, do not have your vid start, do not have your nifty trailer start. If I am at work (which a hella lot of blog hopping goes on during those hours) I do not need some website screaming – worker screwing around.
Same thing goes for the blinky, blinky. If you have to ask if a picture or icon has too much glitter – it does.
2) It’s all based on six degrees of separation so you can easily discover new authors just by playing follow the profile.
This is one I don’t get. Really at all. If people who are selling something, which authors clearly are, randomly ask me to be my friend… I think spam. If it is something I signed up for, something that fits in with what I have blinking on myspace page – maybe. Just random person popping in asking, hey can I be your friend, uh no thank you. None for me please.
3) It’s very easy to do push marketing – sending bulletins to all of your “friends” instantly. (Not everyone who checks out your website will sign up for your mailing list, but if they friend you on MySpace they’re instantly on your list.)
For grins, lets say I had a myspace site, if I started receiving spam from all the authors I ‘friended’. You would be the first ones marked off my to be bought list.
4) It’s a two way street – your readers post comments on your page and you comment back on theirs. Then all of their friends who go to visit their page will see your book cover (if you use it as your default pic) in the comments section. Curious, they click – and voila! come to your page. These are people who would have never known about your regular website.
Lets think about romance book covers for a second here. Okay… A. MySpace is a high teen playground, what the fuck are erotic romance authors doing there then? And I would HOPE they aren’t using their covers. B. Some covers are lovely and a GREAT selling point but many are not.
And beside the kids who has that kind of time?
5) You can find readers yourself by doing searches and adding friends instead of waiting for them to find you.
I don’t see how this is any different than blogs, live journal or whatever. And again, if you have that kind of time you aren’t updating your website or blog enough. That makes readers cry. The ones that don’t have to ask their mom’s for money to buy your books.
She ended her comment with:
In romance it seems so much of the time we’re marketing to other writers cause those are the ones directly in our circle of online friends. MySpace is the first really effective tool I’ve found to introduce my books to complete strangers.
I admit I checked out about ten or so myspace sites that February day. And you know what I saw… a whole hella lot of authors, friended on authors myspaces pages. I counted five people who weren’t readers I knew of, authors, publishers or bloggers. Soooo I don’t see it but I didn’t check out any Young Adult Author sites, so maybe that is different for them.
Do you have a MySpace page? Because the bulletins thing isn’t like spam. It sits unobtrusively at the bottom of your home page and you can check it or not. I like that. But just an FYI, I have some romance authors as “friends” on mine, but I never check their pages or bulletins.
I’m with you on the music thing. I don’t need to get busted at work for playing around.
However…..
MySpace got a bad rep when it first started, but believe it or not, the user base is HUGE and it’s not just your average teen on there anymore. Everyone is on MySpace. A great friend of my mother’s, who is totally non-pc savvy, has a MySpace page. About 3/4 of my graduating HS class is on MySpace. The fan potential there is huge now.
Not to say I actually like MySpace, because I don’t have time for all the crap, and I don’t feel like it’s as “intimate” as blogging, but it’s only going to get bigger.
Just my 2 cents.
God no and I can’t see getting one. I don’t think it will continue to grow much more. It was so built on being an open format, like wordpress here, it is trying to move to a ‘closed’ format. Where Friendster? whatever the fuck is moving to an open one.
Meaning nifty plug-ins people make won’t work on myspace. At least they are trying to go that way, I haven’t looked into it more since it hit the news a few weeks ago.
And there is an interesting piece Teddy Pig posted over at SB:
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/securityfix/2006/07/myspace_ad_served_adware_to_mo.html
So who knows… but I still have great hate for myspace so my view could be bad 😉
I’m not saying MySpace is all that AND a bag of chips, but I do think a lot of people have underestimated it.
In romance it seems so much of the time we’re marketing to other writers cause those are the ones directly in our circle of online friends. MySpace is the first really effective tool I’ve found to introduce my books to complete strangers.
This is actually true. I think you’d be surprised at the number of authors who now have MySpace pages and who have gained a tremendous amount of readers from it.
As for the MySpace going to a closed format, I don’t know about that. I do know they just recently added some new tools, including a “private” mode for your page. Which means you have to be my friend to see my MySpace page.
Again, I’m not a huge fan of it. I mostly have it to keep in contact with my younger brother, who’s away at college, and a few HS friends I wouldn’t talk to otherwise. But I think it IS a great marketing tool.
Oh, and something I forgot to mention….
I’m with you 100% on the covers. I don’t think romance or erotica authors should post their covers on their pages. There are too many young kids on MySpace these days.
I think Myspace is just the ‘thing’ right now. But I do know a decent amount of adults/romance readers who are on there. So it’s not all kids.
And parents have to be aware of where their kids go, but I’m not going to expound on that.
I dont’ have any desire to do a myspace page. There’s a group one for the vamps and scamps authors and we get a decent amount of interest from it, but I think I’ve seen the page four or five times tops.
I already maintain three websites & three blogs. I don’t need myspace on top of that.
Yes, I have a myspace. Do I do much on it? Not really. I got it to keep my college friends up to date about me and to just have something kinda fun to play with. But I don’t do much on it and I don’t plan to do more on it than I already do.
I’m not a huge fan of the layout or the functions of MySpace, but I have gotten messages from at least ten readers that they found me through other authors’ MySpaces, and tried my books because of that. So mine has been beneficial, and really not that much work after the initial setup.
But then, I probably don’t comment and go around friending as much as I should, which might be a bigger time drain and more work (but maybe a better payoff, though).
Not a myspace fan either, besides not having time (same with too many blogs for me, too, lol), I don’t like that anyone who wants can send me an invite, no moderation. I know of people who get messages from creeps, don’t want to waste my time with it, and it is known to have spyware on pages. I know of two adults who tried to set up over there and ended up with a virus.
Now there’s something new like it, bebo – not for me, either.
I know many authors are now using myspace, and if it ups their newsletters, good for them, though that doesn’t necessarily equate to sales.
See this must be an age thing because I can stand the preciousness and angst I find on MySpace. I always thought this was due to seeing my kids, nieces and nephews pages and associating it with teenagers. Interestingly, the 20-somethings have all dropped their MySpace pages and are all blogging now. So I’m wondering if it’s reached a saturation point.
Ummm, that was supposed to be can’t stand the preciousness…etc. Oh, and until I saw MySpace listed on some authors’ websites it never occurred to me to look for an author on MySpace.
MySpace used to be like this pristine white beach with lots of hot, single guys who were looking for Mrs. Right. Since then, the busses have shown up and the tourists have staked their flashy umbrellas all over the sand. The men, once innocent, have grown jaded and wise to these harlots that have invaded their space. So the harlots, instead of trying to hook up with the men, decide to hang out with one another instead. Everyone thinks the beach is great fun, but no one’s accomplishing the original goal of getting the hunk on her blanket.
There are just too many authors on MySpace now to make it an interesting way to market a book. What used to be edgy and cool marketing is now par for the course. Also, so many people use MySpace ineffectively–targeting only other authors instead of the millions of potential readers.
In any case, MySpace is still good for marketing for teens. It’s their territory, after all. I don’t have to troll for friends–I just put my MySpace address in the backs of my YA books and they find me. I have over 3,000 “friends” and no, most of them are NOT other authors.
Teens like the interactivity of commenting and having a “real life author!” write back on their page. (They are not yet jaded like adult romance readers.) Honestly, I have a beautiful regular YA website, but no one ever goes to it. For teens, it’s still all about MySpace.
I mean, did you ever join a fan club as a kid? MySpace is the new fan club. You find your favorite author, band, whatever, and you friend them. Then you get updates when they have a new book or are going on tour, whatever.
I haven’t seen the same success with adult romance. In fact, I didn’t even bother to do a MySpace for my upcoming Dorchester Shomi book Moongazer. I just don’t think adults are as into the medium. What kids think is “cool” is completely annoying to them.
The erotica thing has been a problem for me. Erotica authors constantly try to friend my page. I have no personal qualms about people writing it, but please don’t friend me and post comments on my page that link back to erotic material. I have many, many 11 year olds that visit my page. I do not want to be responsible for introducing them to adult material.
MARI (who specializes in writing books where readers need to ask mom for money to buy them!!!)
I initially held your opinion but I’ve since changed my mind. I know I’ve reached new readers that I wouldn’t have without MySpace.
The biggest issue for me is that it can be a time sucker. Have to be careful about that. I try to multitask and do it while I’m watching TV.