Q&A: Which social network is best for plugging my book?

QUESTION: I want to start promoting my academic book online. But how do older adults get involved in Web social networking? I have joined a couple of small groups populated with professionals from my field. But MySpace? Isn't that for kids?

ANSWER: I agree that MySpace might not be the most productive place for generating awareness of an academic book. Internet social networks are developing at a dizzying pace. In just the past few months, I have seen a lot of activity at three places:

• Gather.com. The membership here is older and more "bookish." The company is trying to make itself the "MySpace for books." I have published some articles there and gotten a lot of response. How many book sales have resulted from this is hard to say, of course. Experiment here. If Gather doesn't have a Group specific to the topic(s) of your book, you can start the group yourself and be the administrator.

• Ning.com. This site enables anyone to create their own social network without having any special skills or Web hosting. So a lot of niche networks are popping up here. You might want to search there and see if there's an appropriate network, or consider starting your own. It's free.

• Perhaps most important, Facebook has been growing like crazy. Originally the site was a network for college students but has opened up membership to the public. Supposedly they are growing much faster than MySpace and have a demographic much more suited to book buying. I haven't gotten around to opening an account at Facebook, but it's getting more tempting every day.
  

And remember, it's preferable to have exposure among a smaller, well-targeted audience than to have a bigger presence with a fragmented audience that isn't really paying attention.
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Steve Weber is author of Plug Your Book! Online Book Marketing for Authors