I am curious what kind of material prospective readers find interesting on an author’s blog. My favorite authors range from not posting anything for months or years at a time, to talking about their health issues, struggles with getting themselves to write, or about the books of other authors they are reading. None of these seem appropriate for a new author trying to interest new readers, so I am curious what else you have seen that would be interesting, particularly for the blog of a new author without an existing following. For example, in my case, I’ve been toying with the idea of writing up some of the research I’ve done for my book, or of talking about hobbies, trips abroad etc.
None of these seem appropriate for a new author trying to interest new readers
Ok, so your goal is to draw readers in with your blog?
My first suggestion is to survey the blogs of authors. Not the ones talking about their health issues, or how they took the cat to the vet. The ones that have a blog with a following in its own right. The ones who treat their blog as a Product, just like their books and stories are Products, instead of a place to vent and put idle thoughts.
The patterns I’ve seen–and maybe you’ll see different, running in a different circle than I do–are as follows:
- Author blog solely as a source of info for upcoming books. Basically, the only posts are, “Next Big Book is set to come out August 23, Preorder here!” and “Still working on Next Big Thing”. And if there’s a silence, you get “I know it’s six months later, but STILL working on Next Big Thing” just so readers know you didn’t croak. This doesn’t drive traffic per se, but it’s a “professional” presence, and useful for readers who only wants to make sure their favorite author hasn’t kicked the bucket and is still producing new work.
- Author who has genuine journalist skills and is able to leverage that by talking about topics other than their book in an interesting way. MOST fiction writers do NOT have this skill, and many of the fiction authors with successful blogs like this established their ability to write in a journalistic fashion and draw an audience prior to releasing a book. John Scalzi, for example, was a film critic for AOL and has journalism chops, which he leverages to make his blog interesting completely independently of his fiction career.
- Authors who make “the author” a character in its own right, and treat the blog as a sort of performance where they write as the Character, and not themselves. Lemony Snicket is an author who is a “character”. Gail Carriger also seems to perform a persona, both in photos and things like book signings where she dresses up as a 50s housewife, and when she writes blogs with a florid, irreverent tone. Chuck Tingle–I’m not sure if that’s just how he is or if he is performing a character, but it’s such a unique persona that it doesn’t matter, it works exactly as it would if he were performing a Character, and he draws a following because of that.
TL;DR:
- Professional blog with regular updates to the status of next book, and nothing else. Probably won’t drive traffic exactly, but is genuinely useful to fans.
- Develop your journalism skills and run your blog like a small magazine or newspaper, applying professional writing standards to what you post when it comes to your topics
- Use your fiction skills to utilize The Author as a Character in their own right. So your blog is basically a theater stage and you never drop out of character.
There’s probably other “types” out there, but these are the patterns I’ve seen that resonate with me as being “professional” and well put-together.
