STACKED

books

Tips & Tricks on Blogging

|

Over the last three years — and maybe the last year in particular — we’ve been asked a lot of questions about the logistics of blogging and making it happen. We’re not experts, but we’ve learned some things that have worked really well for us (and some things that haven’t). To kick off our anniversary week, we thought we’d offer up our insights on keeping this a fun thing that we really like and look forward to doing. We’ve taken turns sharing our thoughts here, so sometimes you’re hearing from all of us and sometimes, just one of us.

  • You don’t have to review everything: We get this question a lot! We do not review everything  read, nor do we read everything that we get. Sometimes a book doesn’t interest us or sometimes we read something and don’t, for one reason or another, find it worth blogging about. It’s okay. We tend to take this philosophy not just toward the physical books that we receive or pick up, but we take the same approach with Netgalley titles.  
  • Read what you like: (Kimberly here) This is a little bit of a personal elaboration on the first point. Just as you don’t have to review everything you read, you don’t have to read everything you’re sent, either! This was a small revelation for me at first – I was a bit overwhelmed by the unsolicited books I got, and a bit grateful too. I felt that if someone was kind enough to send me the book, I should darn well read it! I feel differently now. If the jacket copy doesn’t interest me or I start reading it and lose interest, I put it down. If I request a book or pick it up at a conference, I’ll certainly read it, but if it shows up on my doorstep unannounced, I’ll give it away to someone who will enjoy it. There’s no need to feel obligated to read something you know you won’t enjoy.
  • Do what you want: This is our biggest thought on book blogging — there aren’t any rules about what you can and cannot do, so take chances. Write what you want to write. For a long time, we were reluctant to blog about “big issues,” thinking we should stay completely on topic with reviewing books, sharing book lists, and talking covers. But some of those “big issue” posts end up bringing about great discussion. They’re freeing and they serve as great reference points. More importantly, they help give your blog a voice. We’ve learned in the last year, too, sometimes being completely objective in blogging isn’t necessary. Sometimes talking about your own vulnerabilities or talking about the personal reasons why a book resonated with you is a good thing for both you and for people who read your blog. 
  • Promoting your blog: All three of us use Twitter, but none of us uses it solely to promote our blog posts. Kelly’s general rule of thumb (personally) is to have the blog post tweet out automatically when content publishes, and depending on what the content is, she’ll tweet it once in the morning, once around lunch time, and once at dinner time or later. And that’s generally when we see spikes in our blog hits. If there’s a post we really want to draw attention to, sometimes she’ll tweet it one or two more times a day. Same with Kimberly and Jen. But otherwise? We use Twitter to develop relationships and to discover new things. Sometimes Kelly uses Twitter as a filter for what articles are worth reading, worth looking at again, what blog posts she should spend some time thinking about. Sometimes Jen uses Twitter as an extension of her Google Reader, as other bloggers can stumble upon articles of note in blogs she doesn’t follow. Mostly, though, we’re just us on Twitter. If people want to read what we write via Twitter or they want to share it? That’s just bonus. Our thought is it’s more important to be yourself and let people learn about you/what you’re doing on their own terms than to force yourself on them. 
  • Exploit Your Resources: (Kelly speaking here) I hate e-reading, but I do it. (Jen piping in: I feel the same way, but eReading is often  much more convenient in certain situations, and often eGalleys are the only copies of a certain title that I can get.) It keeps down on having print books in my house, helps out the environment, and allows me to be much more selective in what I’m reviewing/reading/spending time with. Most people know about Netgalley already, but many people don’t know about another really worthwhile resource, which is Edelweiss. You can request review copies through Edelweiss, but that’s not why you should use it. You should use it for the simplicity of having (most) big publisher catalogs all in one place. I find this so helpful not only to know what’s coming out in the next 6-9 months, but I like checking them out and looking for what those big titles will be — and more importantly, what the midlist titles will be. The other thing you can do on Edelweiss is update titles with your reviews. I’m not sure the impact it has, but I do like copying those reviews on books I really enjoyed. It can’t hurt. Another thing I do is read a lot of industry news. Shelf Awareness has a great daily newsletter (they have three I read — the general one, the one for readers, and the “maximum shelf”), and Publisher’s Lunch is another daily read of mine. I also subscribe to a few of Publisher’s Weekly’s newsletters and School Library Journal’s.
  • Read how you like: (Kimberly here) I hate e-reading, so I don’t do it. For some people, such as Kelly and Jen, it’s the lesser of two evils: you either read the book electronically or you don’t get to read the book at all. For me, reading a book on a screen is so unpleasant that I’d just rather not read it. I feel this way for a variety of reasons: I need to curl up with a book in order to become engrossed in it, and a computer doesn’t let me do that (I don’t own an e-reader); I need a page that isn’t backlit because it gives me a headache; I need the feel of the pages in my hands; and so on. This all may sound a bit backward or like I’m just echoing one of those annoying people who says “Oh, but it’s just not the same,” and it is a little bit of that. But I will tell you that part of the reason I love one of my favorite books is because of the way it smelled when I first cracked it open, so there you go. In this way, e-reading is something that I believe impacts my assessment of the novel in an unfair way. If I read your book in book form, I’m more likely to enjoy it, and I want to give every book I read a fair shake. Because of that, it’s important to my blogging that I read the book in print. But I think my point here is that no matter which side of the fence you fall on, it needs to work for you.
  • Be “on” even if you’re “off”: A lot of times people ask how we keep ideas flowing or how we come up with things to write about. (Kelly talking) Mine is pretty straightforward: I not only give myself periods of time during the week to brainstorm, but I always have a notebook around me (or maybe my favorite — I keep my email open to write up draft emails). Whenever an idea strikes me, I write it down, even if it’s completely undeveloped. If I read something that gets my mind going, I make a note of it. And this goes along with the last point: keep your eyes peeled for what’s coming. It’ll help you figure out if you have something to say. Jen: I work similarly, even keeping a pad of paper next to my bed to jot down notes that may occur to me before bed or first thing in the morning.
    • Staying organized and motivated: I think I’m lucky in that I blog with two ladies I love working with and with whom I share a lot of similar beliefs. We keep each other motivated, and we have a system where if someone’s too busy to write something, someone else will pick up the slack. (Jen adds that Kelly and Kim were quite accommodating during my blogging maternity leave!) It’s not a big deal. If you’re curious about logistics/the behind-the-scenes stuff at STACKED, here it is: usually on Friday, we email one another and decide what days we want to claim for our own posts. Then we write them and schedule them for whatever days we claimed. We don’t read one another’s posts before publishing them and we don’t usually run topics by one another (unless we’re brainstorming). Once in a while we’ll ask for someone to read something we’ve written to make sure it makes sense or is well-written, but otherwise, we tackle our own ideas on our own. As far as personally, I tend to write my week of posts on Sunday mornings, carving out a few hours early in the day. It takes the pressure of writing something the night before, for me anyway! That’s not to say I don’t blog during the week; I’d guess I probably blog a little bit of something every single day, even if it never actually makes it to a final post. It keeps me fresh and keeps me engaged and passionate. Jen: I tend to plan out on Friday what post(s) I’ll be writing the following week. I used to write them up on Sunday morning, as Kelly mentioned, but now, with a baby, it’s more that I fit in in when I can find the time! Kimberly: I blog in bits and pieces throughout the week, usually in the evenings after work. It’s rare that I sit down and write an entire post in one sitting. I like to jot a few sentences down, let it percolate, and then come back to it.
    • Maintain control: It’s our blog and no one else’s, and we make all of our decisions through that lens. We don’t worry about participating in the latest or greatest promotions, even if we feel pressure to. We allow ourselves to make review decisions based on our feelings and on nothing more objective. Does it mean we might miss out on traffic? Sure. But we blog because we enjoy doing it, so we’re going to do it the way we want to do it.
      • Build and cherish relationships: Something I never expected with blogging was actually developing some pretty meaningful relationships. Part of making this happen is putting yourself out there, going to events, introducing yourself to people. Part of making this happen is being a good member of the community and taking the time to talk back to people who talk to you (and I will forever be grateful Blogger finally let us have threaded comments for this very reason). Part of this is conversing on Twitter, promoting other blog posts, and sharing ARCs. Part of making this happen is having a voice and being less-than-objective in what you do. In exploiting your resources. In doing what you want to do. In being on even when you want to be off.  In being passionate. You don’t have to make your world your blog, but sometimes your world gets richer because of the relationships you make through it. One of my big rules of thumb about this, though, is keeping those relationships separate from the blog, unless it’s necessary to mention it. Why? Because they matter more to me than content. My friendships are more than a book or a blog, and I know that those with whom I’ve forged real relationships with feel the same way. I feel lucky everyday having found this community, but I feel more lucky in having established relationships that help make me a better person.

      Stay tuned the rest of this week to get to know the ladies behind STACKED . . . but maybe not in the way you’re expecting. We’re taking you back to our high school selves, our teen experiences, and what we were reading back then.

      It’s our anniversary — come celebrate with us!

      |

      Three ice cream cones to celebrate our three year anniversary (that’s one for each of us). It’s hard to believe what started out in as a little idea has turned into such a huge thing. I think I speak for Kimberly and Jen when I say that blogging has changed our lives in a very, very good way. We’ve not only been able to talk about the books we’re reading, but we’ve also met incredible people, made great friends, learned about the book world, and maybe most importantly, we’ve had fun. I know I look forward to doing this.

      To celebrate three years we’re going to share our tips, tricks, and lessons learned from three years doing this. But maybe more fun, since we DO blog so much about YA fiction and the teen world, we’re going to give you a glimpse into our high school selves. You’ll not only get to see what we were into and what we looked like, but we’ll share what we were reading back in the day.

      And of course, no anniversary would be complete without a giveaway as a way to thank everyone who takes the time to read what we write, but those who comment, who share, and who continue to motivate us in doing this. You help make this fun.

      Naturally, we picked a pair of our favorite reads so far this year. Two books we’re more than thrilled to talk up and down as stand outs. We’re giving away a pre-order of Courtney Summers’s This is Not a Test (teaser-reviewed here) and Pete Hautman’s The Obsidian Blade (reviewed here). Two books, two potential winners, but you’re welcome to enter for both. The books will be purchased and sent via The Book Depository, so it’s open to anyone who can receive books from there. Winners will be picked May 8.

      We hope you enjoy what we have to share the next few days and thank you so much for making this little blogging thing so much more than just a little blogging thing.

      Competition, Envy, & The Fine Print

      |

      The last day or so has brought a great amount of fodder for blogging. The more that came up, the more these things felt connected and the more I knew I had to say something.

      I’m a fine print reader. I’m one of those people that does read the contest rules and regulations for anything. I read through all 100-some pages of my mortgage before signing the dotted line, and I had no problem calling my realtor and lender for every single question I had. I like to know what I’m getting myself into.

      So last night, when I checked out the contest going on by GoodReads and the Independent Book Bloggers that gives book bloggers the chance to win a free trip to BEA (including airfare, hotel, and convention access), I read the fine print. And I tweeted about being a little nervous reading the fine print for this contest because it mentioned that the sponsors could use my entry, including my post content, without credit or compensation. There are any number of reasons this makes me nervous, but I ran the wording by someone who is savvier about legalese than myself, and I was informed this was fairly standard wording. Except — she couldn’t see what I was seeing. The terms I copy/pasted to her weren’t the ones on the website. In the few minutes between mentioning something on Twitter (and having a couple other people mention it), the terms changed. I’m not going to talk about what they say because that’s been addressed right here.

      Honestly, they’re not that different than any other contest terms. The thing is, so few people READ the terms that when you do read them and see something like that, it’s jarring and makes you stop and think a little bit.

      After thinking about the way the terms were now laid out, I decided to go ahead and enter the contest. I’d love to head to New York City and BEA for free. I love the networking aspect of the event, even if the show floor does little to nothing for me. As soon as I hit “submit” on the entry, though, I began to feel weird about doing it. I scrolled through a number of the other entries, and I began doubting more and more my decision to enter.

      The contest is set up in two rounds: the first allows anyone to vote through their favorite blogs. Starting April 10, bloggers can campaign to earn votes, and the top 15 entries in each of the four categories will then be judged by a panel on a number of criteria, including writing quality, analysis quality, design, tone, and reader impact.

      In short: it’s a popularity contest to start, followed by a real evaluation.

      I sat on my entry for a few more hours, thinking about the work involved in promoting my blog among the other hundreds of YA blogs that entered. I sat on my entry thinking about having to spam my readers and my Twitter followers and whoever the heck else I could think about to vote for me. I sat on my entry looking at the other bloggers who have far greater followings than I do.

      I took my entry out of the contest.

      The only thing I could think about was the impending drama to come from this sort of set up. I’ve mentioned before that I don’t think that the things which come up in the blogging world are necessarily drama, and addressing it that way belittles some of the legitimate issues worth talking about when it comes to blogging. But I’m not going to lie: my chest got tense thinking about how my Twitter and my Google Reader will look starting April 10 as people begin begging for votes in this contest. And why wouldn’t people try to get them? It’s a free trip to BEA and to NYC.

      This leads me to talking about the bigger issue, which is envy. I sort of addressed this in my post about blogging stats and how it’s important to remember you’re doing what you’re doing because you’re passionate about it, whatever the reason behind it is. It’s hard to remember that sometimes, though, especially when you’re so eager to be a part of something big.

      Being a part of a big promotional event is neat. It feels like you’ve been chosen because of something that makes your blog special and unique (even if sometimes it’s simply stats). When you’re not selected to be a part of something, it feels like you’re not good enough. It’s easy to find yourself envious of those who were picked, and it’s way too easy with social media to not only find yourself obsessing over who did get to be a part of something, but to also find yourself lamenting and devaluing your own work because you weren’t. Where one blogger gets something exciting — whether they asked for it or it just happened — another one doesn’t. It’s not fair, and there are going to be feelings on both sides of the equation.

      I invited everyone to read Sarah’s post about this topic where it comes to the In My Mailbox meme because she hits it perfectly. While I do think In My Mailbox has a genuine and good purpose behind it, it does get people worked up quite a bit.

      I’m not comfortable begging people to choose STACKED over another, equally worthy blog. I’m not comfortable, either, when we’re given an opportunity — one we may not have chosen to be a part of but were instead selected to be part of by some reasoning beyond our knowledge — and people find themselves judging us or themselves as more or less worthy. Because the truth is, we’re all here doing something good and we’re all doing something different.

      Even though I’ve pulled my entry for the BEA contest, the anxiety of it hasn’t left me because I know there will be hurt feelings all over the place. It’s the same kind of hurt people have when they don’t get the latest ARC or promotion. What makes it challenging to keep doing what we’re doing with camaraderie and without the hurt feelings is that we ARE all working toward a common goal (spreading the word of great books) and sometimes, the rules and decisions are ones completely out of our hands. The decision makers don’t always take the implications of their contests or their promotions into consideration before they put them out there.

      And the thing is, they don’t have to.

      It’s our responsibility as bloggers to stand up and choose whether or not we participate. It’s our responsibility to decide whether or not we’re going to let ourselves get anxious or nervous about them, too. It’s our responsibility to speak up and speak out.

      We blog because of the freedom it allows us. The only way to keep it free is to remember we have the right to say no thanks and we have the right to step out when we’re not comfortable with how things are going.

      That’s the fine print, and we get to write it ourselves.

      Spreading the love: Blogs I’m reading

      |

      Over the last few weeks, I’ve been in the process of cleaning out my feed reader and weeding out the blogs that aren’t active anymore, that don’t suit my interests anymore, or that otherwise don’t merit my daily attention. I probably subscribe to a healthy number of blogs, but I haven’t subscribed to many new blogs in a long time. I put a call out last week on Twitter for help and got some responses, but part of the challenge is that you don’t know what I’m reading and enjoying.

      In a way to spread some blog love, as well as a way to solicit some new reading suggestions, I’m sharing a handful of the blogs I love reading. Not inclusive, not a full representation of everything I read, but more of a way to talk up some of the blogs maybe not everyone knows about. These are blogs that are strictly book blogs (so the library blogs that do a lot of reviews I read aren’t included).

      I’m not the best blog commenter, despite being a big blog reader, but these are among my always-reads and the ones I hope someday to be a better commenter at. Also, these are all full-feed blogs; as prickly as it sounds, I can’t read blogs that aren’t full-feed. I am trying to get better about it, but it does make me less excited about content if I have to click on a new screen. 

      Feel free to leave links to any other blogs you’d like to share. I am open to reading most book blogs, as long as they’re well-written, don’t rely on memes (one or two a week is fine with me as long as there is other content), and the reviews are thoughtful (length doesn’t matter). I’m not a vlog watcher.

      These aren’t in any order.

      • Crunchings and Munchings: Aside from their savvy and thorough reviews, I am digging how they’re writing book lists (and book/film lists) on different topics. They’ve got a great voice. 
      • That Cover Girl: If you love covers at all and you’re not reading Capillya’s blog, get on it. She not only talks covers, but she has neat features spotlighting the cover designers talking about their work. She’s also interviewed a number of authors about the cover process.
      • Inkcrush: I like not only that she’s Aussie and exposes me to a ton of Aussie titles, but her reviews are thorough and thoughtful. Her short reviews, though, are just as good, and they’re to the point.
      • Reading with My Ears: I love posting the links to Lee’s reviews during for AudioSynced, but anyone who listens to audiobooks needs to read this blog. She knows exactly what she’s talking about when it comes to the good and the bad side of the listening experience.  
      • The Readventurer:  These girls are among my favorite GoodReads reviewers to read, and they have an excellent blog together. What I like best is that it’s a wide variety of books being reviewed, and that it’s not all reviews — and they’re not afraid to talk audiobooks, either. The pairing of a song with a book review is unique, too.
      • Someday My Printz Will Come: I know I’ve talked about this one before, but this blog is so good at the in-depth, textual analysis I love reading. They’ve also just added a third blogger, Sophie, who served on last year’s Printz committee, so I expect this great blog is just going to get better. 
      • The Midnight Garden: I’ve been reading the GoodReads reviews Wendy writes for a long time, so that she and two fellow GoodReads power users have a blog excites me. Again, this one has thoughtful reviews and fun features that make it a must-read.
      • YA Love Blog: Sarah’s a teacher, and the way she writes her reviews is very reflective of the fact she works with teens. I love that perspective, and I love how she has her students interview the authors for her interview features. 
      • The Book Smugglers: I’m pretty certain most people know this one, but just in case you don’t — they write some of the most thorough and honest book reviews around. I like to read what they write on books I’ve been hearing a lot of buzz about, as well as the books I review myself because we either agree whole-heartedly or we’re on completely different sides. I love that! I don’t like to read blogs where I agree on everything said. 

      This isn’t at all exhaustive, as I’m also a regular reader of about twenty other blogs, including this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, and so forth.

      Hope this filled up some of your reading holes in the blogging world, and now I’m eager to see what you’re reading (and enjoying).

      Books, Reading, and Pinterest

      |

      If you spend any time on social media at all, you know that Pinterest has captured the attention of a lot of people. It’s even had an entire series of posts written about it up at readwriteweb (read through all of the links — Pinterest grabbed a lot of attention over at rww). Tracey Neithercott’s talked about how she uses Pinterest for writing inspiration, while Whitney over at Youth Services Corner has talked about using Pinterest for youth programming idea inspiration. Oh, and a little news site called CNN’s talked about Pinterest being the hottest website of 2012.

      I stumbled upon Pinterest last summer and used it as visual bookmarking and little more. I made up boards for recipes I wanted to try, boards for program ideas I’d like to try out at the library, some DIY stuff for myself, and more. I’m very much a visual person, so actually being able to SEE all of these bookmarks visually excites me. You can install a pinning button right onto your browser, so when you open up a blog post with a recipe that interests you, you can click the button and pin it without having to toggle between a number of different tabs.

      Being that Pinterest is a social network, you can follow people whose pins interest you (and you can choose to follow specific boards of those people, rather than everything they pin). You can also choose to browse through the things everyone using Pinterest has pinned.

      Pinterest thrives on the principle of discovery — the whole purpose of a site like Pinterest is that it leads to spontaneous finding of things you didn’t know you were looking for. It’s similar to how if you wander into a library and stumble upon book displays. You’re browsing without a clear goal in mind, and you’re picking up things along the way you didn’t know you were looking for. This is fundamentally different from, say, Google, where you have to actually use the site with a goal in mind. You’re not going to stumble upon a recipe or a youth programming idea without first putting a specific keyword search into Google, but on Pinterest, you can. Whether or not you know it, the internet’s moving more toward this discovery model of information retrieval, and sites like Pinterest are doing a good job making it happen.

      For a long time, I avoided putting any of my own stuff up at Pinterest. It felt totally self-indulgent to create boards about, say, my book lists here at STACKED or create boards about books I love. Pinterest never seemed like a site about me, and I’m always on the fence about self-promotional stuff. A few months back, I discovered I could see what other people on Pinterest were pinning from the blog, and it was amazing to see people were actually saving things from STACKED (anyone who runs a website or blog can find out too — just swap out stackedbooks.org from that link and input your own site address). You can also see on your main Pinterest page what items from your own boards people have “repinned” onto their boards.

      I’ve watched people like Leila use Pinterest to develop boards about book awards and book lists and link to their relevant reviews, and I started thinking about how Pinterest boards about books reminds me visually of a book display. Then I got to wondering what the potential spread of pinning books could be, given that all the things I pin will move to the main page and anyone who uses Pinterest can see these things. It was time to test this out.

      Not everything I read ends up being blogged about here, but everything I read I do record on GoodReads. When I end up writing a review for STACKED and it posts, I head over there and link it. I decided in my grand experiment to use my personal GoodReads reviews as the pins.

      I created three book-related boards: 2012 Books Read, Favorite books (must reads), and YA Booklists. The first two lists relied entirely on my GoodReads review links, while the final list was made up of the book lists I’ve made for our “Display This” series. With each list, I linked to a cover image and wrote a very short blurb about each of the books I included — I literally wrote the title, the author, and a quick reaction or thought on the title (if it was in the favorite books category). There is space, of course, to write a lot more about each of these items, but my goal was simply to see what kind of immediate spread these pins would have and whether it was worth pursuing this down the road.

      After less than an hour, let me just say I am impressed.

      This is only a snapshot of the activity other people have had with my Pinterest boards, but take a look at it for a second. In under an hour, my pin of Courtney Summers’s This is Not a Test garnered 10 repins and a number of “likes” (which, I’m not entirely sure what that DOES in Pinterest, but there it is). None of the people who repinned that pin are people who I follow or who follow me. My pin of Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood captured 5 repins in the same time frame, and about 75% of the books and book lists I pinned were either repinned or earned a “like” from people with whom I have absolutely no relation. In under an hour. You don’t see that kind of response on a site like GoodReads because GoodReads, unlike Pinterest, is more dependent upon the search method of use. Your friends can see what you’re reading and reviewing, but not ALL of GoodReads can as easily as ALL of Pinterest can. The ten pins my original pin of the Summers book refer only to my original pin; it’s possible and quite likely that those ten people encouraged ten more pins, increasing my reach much, much beyond my own pin.

      Let me repeat: in under one hour, the books I pinned into three different boards captured the attention of Pinterest users I have no relation to whatsoever. They found my pins through the main Pinterest page, and they were interested enough to save them and comment upon them. Now they’ve saved a link to not only a book cover, but also they have a link to my book review. I’m able to drive interest not only to the material at hand (the book), but also my own commentary on the material at hand.

      I’m going to say that I expect these things to spread further over the next day or two, the next week or two, the next month or two, and they’ll continue to spread as long as people continue to use Pinterest as a tool of spontaneous discovery. If my goal as a book blogger is to spread the word about books (and simultaneously get people to read my opinion on these books), then I’m sold on the two seconds it takes to add my reviews to Pinterest, as well as the other places I post them. I’m reaching an entirely new and different audience — one that doesn’t necessarily engage with book blogs — and I’m able to pique the interest of new readers. I’m already thinking about the possibilities when it comes to things like the “So You Wanna Read YA?” series and how pinning those posts onto Pinterest can lead new readers to YA books (because it targets many of them specifically).

      For what it’s worth, Pinterest is invite-only, but it’s easy to track down people who can hook you up with an invite — I’ve apparently got an unlimited supply as an early adopter. It’s a potential time suck in terms of finding content, but that’s the entire point (and it makes me smile when people talk about spending all day on Pinterest because that’s the entire principle behind a web discovery tool like it). There is a lot of junk to wade through on the site, especially if you wade through everyone’s pins, rather than just those pins or boards of people you follow. But you can make this site work for you and for the books you want to promote.

      Rather than leave you on that note and encourage you to think about using it if you’re into books, I’ll give you some straight up ideas for how to use it. Why not develop a board of your favorite books? You’re creating a content-controlled favorite list and it makes it easy for other people to find potential “best” books and repin for their own sake. Why not develop book lists on specific subjects? I could see the value in having it become added or enhanced content for a blogger or as a way to gather material for a blog post. I’m toying with developing a series of boards about contemporary YA fiction that feature specific thematics (to go along with my database project). Whether or not people follow the boards wholly, there are people who will still find new books through the pins.

      You could pin books that feature certain cover elements that are all the same (sad girls in pretty dresses, the almost-kiss face, covers that are all yellow, etc). You can pin books that pique your interest from other bloggers and generate interest that way. You can take a page out of Leila’s book and pin your reviews of award-winning books or use Pinterest as a way to keep yourself on track in different reading challenges or goals. You’re not only reaching your followers on Pinterest; you’re reaching potentially everyone who uses the site. Another bonus — at least in my experience — is the setup of Pinterest also seems to make images appear higher within the Google image search algorithm, meaning you may also be reaching people via traditional search methods.

      If you’re on Pinterest, I recommend spending a little time thinking about how you could use it to further spread the word of good books. And if you’re not on Pinterest, I highly encourage you to consider it, whether for personal pinning or for the ability to discover a wealth of new things. I think the potential ability for not only bloggers, but authors and publicists, to utilize the service is wide, as well. All it takes is a little time and creativity.