The Blog Book Tour

An article in today's New York Times discussed the concept of visiting blogs to build buzz for your books.

What is it? Instead of scheduling readings in book stores locally and nationally, authors arrange to send exceprts or take questions on various blogs related to the concept of their books. Some authors give "live chats" or video interviews.

Blog readers may comment and ask questions.

Building buzz with bloggers is free (though some bloggers charge publishers) yet it can be time consuming. If a blogger's audience is invited to ask questions, they actually do - and they want their questions answered or else the author may be reprimanded in the blog's comment section.

Some also question how many blog readers actually buy the book.

Yet building buzz with blogs makes sense, especially if you take the time to target the blogs most suited to the theme of your book.

Have you had success with building buzz on blogs? Share your success using the comment feature.

Comments

[tarot boy]

using the blogosphere to promote any kind of product is a smart move this days... that's for sure!

[Sibylle Barrasso]

Marisa, you nailed it: blogs are a great way to build buzz, but coming up with a series of inspired blogs is time consuming. It's a trade off between promoting the new book that's just coming out (DARK WATERS, in my case), or putting the time and effort toward writing a better next book. With publishers expecting a book a year nowadays, it's makes writers' already busy schedules all the more hectic.