The other day, someone forwarded me an email because the original sender had wanted to contact me but hadn’t been able to find my address on my Facebook page. That original sender even included a link to a blog post about how authors should be approachable.
My initial thought was an affronted, “What? I’m totally approachable. Why were you looking for my email on Facebook of all places instead of just Googling my name, which would take you to this blog, which not only has a contact page but a big green contact button that stalks you down the side of the entry as you read?” Naturally, all I wrote back was a “thank you.” The customer is always right, after all. (I also added my email address to the “info” tab on my Facebook fan page, which is what I hope people will stumble across, rather than my personal page where I mostly B.S. with my tennis buddies.)
Anyway, I didn’t think much more of this “approachable” thing until this weekend, when I was catching up with some of the folks who had left comments on my blog recently or who had linked to one of my posts. If I have time, I try to comment back or thank someone for linking to my site.
Well, I ran into a few blogs where a) comments were turned off, b) I couldn’t find the button to press to leave a comment, or c) I couldn’t leave a comment because this option was only open to members of Webs, Livejournal, etc. and I don’t have accounts there. There was another blog where I almost said forget it and left because I failed the Captcha twice.
Outside of the blogosphere, I’ve run into authors who protect their tweets (so only followers can see their comments) and others who keep their Facebook pages private (that’s fine, but at least consider putting up up a public author fan page).
Here’s the point: little things like that might leave a fan with an impression that an author is unapproachable. No comments or contact page might imply, “Oh, this author isn’t interesting in talking to me. Well, maybe I’ll just check out another author who is….”
Now, as an author myself, I know that the way your blog is set up may have nothing to do with how friendly and approachable you are (if you’re like me and making do with a free template, it’s not always easy to get all the features you want on there). And I’ve certainly had days (weeks) where there’s just too much going on, and the social media stuff is the first thing to get dropped by the wayside — with email a close second (I always answer emails about my books, but I sometimes have to put the questions about e-publishing and book promotion to the side; sorry guys — triage and all that).
Though we’re all busy, I think it’s important to make an effort to be approachable in our various online venues. Sure, most of us have jobs and families, and there’s only so much time in the day, but the fact of the matter is people prefer to do business with people they like.
When you’re a bestselling author with bazillions of fans lined up for each new book, you can probably be a hermit or a snob, but most of us aren’t there yet. We’re at a point where one reader can matter.
One reader can become one of your 1,000 true fans and someone who talks up your books to other people, thus helping you establish yourself as an author (and, as you might imagine, someone who takes the time to look up your site and wants to talk to you is exactly that kind of person). You don’t want to alienate those readers simply because they’re not able to get in touch with you.
So, what can we do to be more approachable online? Here are a few suggestions (and I’m open to hearing more in the comments, because, hey, I’m still learning all this stuff too!):
Tips for Being Approachable Online
- If you blog, make it easy for people to comment — Your readers will tell you what they want to see on your blog if you let them, and you’ll get more traffic by writing posts folks are interested in. If you’ve chosen to make it difficult for people to comment because you’re worried about spammers, ask yourself if that’s really a problem or you just perceive it might be. I get more than 5,000 visitors a month, and I don’t have any trouble with spam because the Akismet WordPress plug-in captures all of it. I believe even the free Blogger blogs are pretty good at detecting spam on their own, so consider if you really need to add an extra step and make readers punch in squiggly letters just to leave a comment.
- Put your email address or a contact form on your site where it’s easy to find — It’s your call which you want to use. I’ve heard from folks who think a contact form is impersonal, but I think it makes it super easy for someone to get in touch without copying and pasting your email address. Also, it makes it easy for me to pick out emails that originate from this blog, since my ContactMe plug-in uses a distinctive header. I get a lot of junk email for work, so that one feature is very useful for me.
- Set up alerts, so you know when people have contacted you — If you signed up for Twitter, Facebook, G+, LinkedIn, and everything under the sun, but aren’t very active on all of those networks, email or text alerts can let you know if you have a new message waiting on one.
- Put your contact information and/or your webpage/blog/Facebook/etc. at the end of your ebooks — This one is on my to-do list. I think I’ve just got my website at the end of most of them now, but it makes sense to add email and numerous options for getting in touch. Chances are, the moment readers are most excited about talking to you is right after they finish your book.
All right, those are my suggestions for being more approachable online. Do you have any to add?
Those CaptcHa things are really irritating sometimes! I think they’re more something to put on free offers to make sure people don’t bot them that something to put on your blog.
One other thing is, and this one might be controversial, to keep your blog kind of positive. Sometimes I read author blogs and they’re always talking about people, fans, other authors, that they don’t like. If all I hear is how you don’t like these things, then I’m going to get the sneaking suspicion that you don’t like ME. Then again, you should write whatever you want… but remember that you’re selling something and you don’t sell something by telling people that all your fans are stupid, other authors suck, and the publishing industry is a racket and people who read books from it are stupid. That makes your readers a little sad.
Sarah, that’s a great point! When bloggers rant about things they don’t like, I think it’s easy for them to come across as arrogant or just unpleasant. I’ll have to remember that when I’m sneering at Facebook’s layout. 😉
I think I’ve done a couple negative-ish blogs, but I tried to make them light hearted and funny so as not to offend anyone, and I tried hard to now insult the author. I think it worked out since nobody got mad at me for insulting Edward Cullin, some of the fans laughed at me and commented positively. I think it depends on the approach.
But when it’s blatantly negative, you are right. It’s uncomfortable.
I turned of my captch-whatever thingie. It’s just annoying and I don’t get spammed, so why bother? I have my email addy in very easy places to find, and I’m open on FB.
Coincidentally, I had a nice email from a reader today starting, “As you’ve made it so easy to contact you I thought I would!”
I love hearing from my readers and think it’s great that they should take the time to write to me. They will only not hear back from me fast if they’ve mistyped their email address and I can’t work out what it should be.
Re blogs, word verification is bad, but moderated blog comments are a considerable disincentive to leave a reply.
Definitely, Lexi! We probably all need less of that stuff than we think (moderation). I think mine holds a comment for approval if there are two or more links in the body, just because that’s usually someone pimping something, heh.
Very good post indeed! The first thing I do when I find an author I really like is google them, usually because I love to do interviews and giveaways.
I have found a few authors that are very unapproachable online and it is sad. =(
Thanks for the info!
You’re welcome, Bonnie! Thanks for commenting. It’s always a shame, too, when it’s just that the author isn’t aware that the default settings they’ve chosen for their blog just aren’t friendly. One of my favorite authors blogs on MySpace, and I’d like to comment on her posts, but I’m not willing to make a MySpace account just for that.
Great post, Lindsay!
Another thing may be to check old places where you authors may have appeared as blog guests, done book tours or interviews in other authors’ blogs. Sometimes fans may have commented there with questions or what-not, and they may feel a tad abandoned if their favourite authors don’t reply at all. I don’t know if it’s possible to keep track with everything, especially when it’s done and dusted, but googling oneself may at least take you to trails of most popular sites where you may have appeared, and of course can have invitations to visit your website or facebook fanpage at the end of every interview.
Just a thought 🙂
Good point, Lydia. I know I’ve done some interviews and guest posts, and I’m usually good about checking comments for the next day or two, but then one tends to forget about it. I suppose, on blogs that have the feature, you could subscribe to comments for those posts, so you get updates.
These are all great points for a writer or even someone who becomes poplulr with their blog.
Thanks for sharing.
The captcha and other stuff is unnecessary. Both blogger and WordPress do very commendable jobs at keeping out spam. I make it easy. Easy is best. Does that make me easy? lol Nevermind. A whole ‘nother topic.
And follow people back. On Twitter it’s sometimes tough, because they can be bots. But you can always unfollow. I don’t usually follow companies, but do follow back people. There’s a site I use to weed out folks not following me back. Some I follow anyway. The more info you have coming in, the more you can seem knowledgeable by RT’ing those tidbits. It’s truly impossible to follow somebody’s tweets on Twitter unless they put your name in the message.
So our twitter conversation has an editor contacting me. I’m wary of getting what I need and not too little. I suppose this is a concern for most writers. Any tips?
Mary, I never would have guessed you were that easy… 😀
I’ll email you about the editors (you might be interested in using one of the ladies I’ve used), but, in general, check out the website (if they’ve had a professional site done and they’ve registered a domain name, they’re probably serious and do this as a full-time job). A lot of editors will offer to do a sample edit (maybe X number of pages for $25 or some such) and that lets you see if you like their style. They’ll typically deduct that fee from the total price if you decide to go with them.
Nice tips, Lindsay. I especially agree about the suggestion regarding turning off captcha and not moderating comments. WordPress & blogger catches most spam, and it’s easy to delete the spam that sneaks through anyway. I tend to comment on more than half the blogposts I read, and the interaction is part of what I look for in blogs. If it’s difficult for me to leave behind comments or I don’t know when they’ll ever be posted, I’m less likely to visit the blog next time.
@Sarah C: You make a good point about author blogs being positive. I follow a few candid & personal blogs from authors I like, as they detail the highs and lows of epublishing. I enjoy it when they’re candid about the experience, but being negative of other authors (especially other indies) is IMHO bad drama-bomb material. Also, authors that speak about traditional publishing in angry tones will narrow their blog’s appeal. I like debating the merits and drawbacks of different business models and stuff, but when authors are way too extreme (e.g. calling all trad-published books crap)–that will limit the blog’s appeal. Even readers who love ebooks and indie books read trad pub books too. Discussion good, anger bad.
Thanks, Frida! Yeah, sometimes when I see those captcha things on a blog with no comments, I have to reign myself in to keep from saying, “Psst, you’re not popular enough to have to worry about spammers yet.” I’m not sure that would be appreciated though. 😛
Two things. First, you have a new cover on Encrypted since the last time I was here. Looks very cool.
Which leads to my second point – my problem is with a lack of integration for following blogs “powered” by different companies. I use blogger, which has a really convenient way to follow blogs you like, as long as they are also on Blogger. WordPress blogs tend to look better, but when I use the methods provided to follow, they drop off my radar unit I stumble anthem again. The subscribe-by-email option is no good if you like to sample a lot of blogs. I’d love to have a better way to keep track.
Thanks, ST!
Yes, I think all these blog companies want to do their best to keep you in *their* circles. You can host your blog on Blogger/Livejournal/Webs/etc. but then we’re going to make it hard for you to talk to those fiends who aren’t also on Blogger/Livejouranl/Webs/etc. 😉
I think it’s easiest to use a feed reader if you want to track a large numbers of blogs across platforms (I use Google Reader, and it’s pretty easy to just skim the headers and see what’s new and interesting).
I turned off the captcha on my blog after several much more popular people than myself on Twitter kept saying how annoying it was. I turned them off expecting spam, but I haven’t had any at all. I have had a couple comment and run types just promoting their own agenda after a generic comment, but I don’t have an insanely popular blog, so I’ll gladly respond to those too, lol.
checking my facebook page right now, lol. Like you, I didn’t think of making sure my email was there
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