What are others saying about your book?

oh my fabulous!!

Google alert is awesome! I pretty much had a good handle of where my name was out in the wide world of the interweb, and then one day I got another google alert and I expected it to be the same old stuff. Not so! My publisher had released a press release and suddenly I was everywhere on the net. It was such a crazy moment! And I totally wouldn't have found out about it for a while had I not signed up. Okay this is starting to sound like an ad:

"Sign up with Google Alert! It changed my life!" Toothpaste, sycophant

haha--i love it!

Thanks for the tip!

Thanks for sharing that tip. )

What a great idea!

GREAT tip...thanks!!!

Another grateful recipient of your tip.

Thank you so much. I just went and signed up.

ditto for me. Thanks!

Oh, this is awesome. I'm trying to track my book that just came out.
Tri

great idea! Thanks for sharing. I also monitor my web traffic.

Thank you for sharing - I've just signed up.

lisanevin said:

great idea! Thanks for sharing. I also monitor my web traffic.

Click to expand...

Lisa, how do you monitor webtraffic. Can you show me here.

Thanks,

Barbara

I just posted some info on a new thread, hopefully I won't anger people for mentioning here (briefly)
Short answer, depends on your internet provider. If you use godaddy then I can help, I use them.
type your url with /stats on the end.

Barbara- since you are using a free web provider, I'm not sure you'll get this option, but ask, never hurts.
For those using godaddy web hosting, you receive a free traffic monitoring or you can upgrade. I upgraded. I love it!

I'm on Google alerts with my name. Unfortunately, two or three other guys with the same name are always popping up. And one surreal blogger who has my name in a sentence in an otherwise incomprehensible blog. I wish I could get rid of the guy.

Maybe I should create one just for the name of my latest book.

popmuze said:

Maybe I should create one just for the name of my latest book.

Click to expand...

Do that. I get hits on my book title all the time from my Google alert.

I'm quite sure I don't want to know what anybody is saying about any of my books. I toss them from the nest -- fly baby birdie fly! -- and if they hit the ground, well, too bad. I just keep making more. Haha!

Thanks for the tip. I just signed up too.

Google makes each writer happy. Vanity publishers make each writer happy. Agents make each writer happy. Everyone makes everybody happy. A perfect world of total happiness....

....Does any one seriously believe in adds over here?

Google makes each writer happy. Vanity publishers make each writer happy. Agents make each writer happy. Everyone makes everybody happy. A perfect world of total happiness....

....Does any one seriously believe in adds over here?

Click to expand...

I think you misunderstood what the original post is about.

Google Alerts is simply a tool that sends you an email whenever a particular phrase appears somewhere on the web - so you can keep track of when your name (or project's name) gets mentioned.

It isn't advertising .. just a handy tool.

Mac

I bet there will be not only alerts but also a lot of Google spam too.

Anyhow, does it matter what others think of your book? Some people are envious, some are wicked, and why should I know what they post to web? Normal, average readers usually buy and read books silently. Sometimes they post some reviews to their websites or blogs, but far not all of them. You will never get any objective truth about people's opinion.

Thus, no Google can help you, if you want to get the folk's opinion. For example, people write different thins about the books of mine. Some of them are bad, others are good. Whom should I believe?

Google won't make you happy...

No, Google may not make you happy but it could make you better informed, which is usually a Good Thing.

So, what shall I do when being informed by Google? Imagine Google has informed me about some crushing criticism on my book. Do I have to revise my literature work and upload the new text to the internet-stores? What if next day Google tells me that people like the previous text but dislike the new one? Shall I have to replace the new text and upload the old version again?

I'm just trying to tell you that knowing the people's opinion is not so good for authors as commonly accepted. No writer can possibly please ALL the readers. I shall not write books better if I know that "mister so-and-so" dislikes my writing and posts some bad words about me to his blog. I write books for those who like experimental fantasy. They are my readers, and I know their opinion without Google.

If Google really wants to help beginning writers, poets, artists, musicians etc., they can launch their own project to be a nice alternative to Lulu.com or other services of that kind. Why not create a free self-publishing? It's a nice buisness idea. I'm going to establish such a firm in my town, why not?

As for me, I stopped searching for different articles and reviews on my books. I know that there are some stuff on web, but I don't really care. Better to spend my time writing new chapters or visiting some forum when having a rest (this very forum, for example).

By the way, during a couple of days I learnt many useful things at Absolute Writers, much more important things than any search system can provide me with.

I wish Google were not just a search system. There are a lot of such systems on the web. The Google programmers are, no doubt, very gifted and able to make an internet-market.