God no. That way madness lies. So many authors have stuck their noses into discussions where they weren’t expected or wanted because of this. Google reviews, if you must. But ignore everything else unless you want people to loathe you.

And I guess different publishers have different contracts.

Most e-books are contracted for 1-3 years. And afterward, they are no longer available for purchase.

The rest, excellent.

I blogged for a couple of years, but pretty much gave it up as just too much of an energy/time sink. I still post on the Special Edition blog on eHar about twice a month, but coming up with topics even that often can be a challenge. I truly admire writers with a natural gift of gab who always have something to say, and who don’t find blogging a chore. I don’t, and I do, so I don’t anymore.

I probably update my website four times a year — one major update when I get a new contract (and consequently have news of note!), then smaller ones to add new covers, blurbs, excerpts along the way. Since I don’t do booksignings/enter contests, etc., updating once a month would be pointless. I’m just not that active.

I also gave up my MySpace account a few weeks ago — just wasn’t working for me, on many levels. I do Twitter, however, and am on Facebook, both of which I visit several times a day. The “spit out a random thought” updates work perfectly for me, and I get far more interaction on FB — with a captive audience now approaching 2000 “friends” — than I ever did on my own blog. I’m not at all heavy-handed with the promo (since I find blatant, constant promo a turn-off, I won’t inflict it on others ), but I’ve discovered that the random, humorous life-observation is a great conversation starter. Conversely, the way FB’s set up it’s easy to also comment on other people’s statuses (stati?). It’s easy, fast and best of all a two-way street. FB = total WIN for me.

I will admit that, for me, Twitter is more about chatting with my fellow writers. At this point I don’t really use it as a promo tool.

However, there’s also a lot to be said for a writer visiting romance-friendly sites where readers hang out and taking part in the conversations there…as long as she’s genuinely contributing and not worming her way into the convo just to hawk her book. Really bad form, that. Leave your url, and readers who like what you say can look up your books at your website.

Building a relationship with potential readers is about a lot more than simply nagging them that you’ve got a book out. The good news is, the blogosphere is teeming with all sorts of relatively stress-free, enjoyable ways of doing that…as long as the writer doesn’t spread herself too thin, or hang out on sites just because she thinks she needs the exposure.

Think quality, not quantity.

That said, this is still something I struggle with. When I first went “2.0″ I raced around joining far more nets than I could possibly hope to maintain. It became an overwhelming chore that I dreaded. Now I focus on a few I enjoy and it’s far easier.

For social networking on-line, here’s what I’ve learned-

1) If you don’t enjoy it, don’t do it. Your lack of enthusiasm will show and backfire on your career.
2) Don’t spread yourself thin. Better to have one hot blog with tons of traffic than boring, rarely used blogs, MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, etc…
3) Don’t get too fancy. Makes pages slow to load and often irritating for readers who are tired, busy, and trying to wind down from a long, hard day at the office or diaper changing table.
4) Be honest, but be polite. If you can’t keep a lid on your tempor, find a way to connect with readers which isn’t so immediate and uneditable.
5) Know your readership and meet them where they are. If most of them hang out on Facebook, for example, you should too.
6) Respond to email within 24 hours, if at all possible.

Whatever you do, always remember ***when you connect with one reader, you’re also connecting with all their friends.*** If you want that reader AND all her friends to buy your book, you’d better make sure it’s a ‘love connection.’