It’s a good idea for authors to keep track of what’s being said about their work on the Internet, or what’s not being talked about that should be discussed. New tools are always being developed and there are two I’ve found beneficial.
As Google continues to increase its dominance, most writers are probably familiar with “Google Alerts”. The alerts are e-mail updates on a certain topic, be it a developing news story or information on your latest book or you, the author.
The second site is “Who’s Talkin” a social media search tool, again monitoring the blogs, reviews, articles, etc. regarding your latest work or activity. Of the two, www.whostalkin.com currently works better than Google Alerts. Here’s why.
If I enter “Catherine Johnson author of Shades of Darkness, Shades of Grace” as a Google Alert, I receive every alert containing any one of those words. So I can get a completely unrelated alert regarding Catherine Watson, author, simply because it matched my first name. The same is true of the title – I receive matches for any book title having any of the words in the title.
Using the same information, Who’s Talkin’ appears to synthesize information better providing more relevant results. For example using Who’s Talkin’ I’ve discovered blog post regarding Shades of Darkness, Shades of Grace in French and Spanish, and discovered my own postings written on topics relating to the novel disseminated across the web.
Both options are a good way for authors to monitor the Internet activity their work(s) are generating.
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
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