There's a maxim out there that says, "If you don't toot your own horn, no one else is going to toot it for you." It could be argued that this is not the case, but it seems to me pretty valid. If I know someone personally, then it's probably not due to any efforts on their part to promote themselves. However, if I know *of* someone I've never met, it's very likely they took some steps to get themselves out there.
This self-promotion is reviled by some on Gather. Others are uncomfortable with it. For some it's just sad and embarrassing. It's the fodder of jokes, and there are entire Gather Groups that center around the phenomenon. And then there are those of us who find it necessary to seek out more than one or two comments for each of our articles. It doesn't seem worth it if almost no one seems to know you're doing it.
You could say a person's writing craft should rise on the merits of its content. This is what public radio producers thought for many years and so during those years the phenomenon of public radio was mired in obscurity. Once stations and producers started making a concerted effort to market their content - build audience - a much wider swath of the public became aware of what was there. It's a good thing that quality gets exposure. The downside of it is, with enough advertising, "Everybody Loves Raymond" can begin to resemble a true statement. (I do not love Raymond, though, and as long as that is the case, the show title is incorrect).
What sorts of self promotion on Gather do you find acceptable, deplorable or indifferent?
Bulk mail - Is it okay to use it sparingly? Should a person send out bulk messages to promote an individual article they wrote?
Sensationalism and controversy - Is it okay to rile people up when the resulting animosity towards your comments builds the comment count on your articles?
Articles about your writing on Gather. Is it okay to publish articles that direct people to other articles you've produced? What about re-publishing an article that has had no significant revisions?
Group invites - Is it okay to invite persons you don't "know" to join your group? What if those persons are new to Gather and might be put off by an online approach by someone they don't know? What qualifies as "knowing" someone on Gather?
Warm fuzzies - Is it okay to publish something that might appear designed solely to stimulate comments through cloying friendliness? Think of this as the opposite of the sensationalism and controversy mentioned above (though in a controversial post, you can also count on the avid participation of those who agree with you).
Commercial ventures - Is it okay for a small business (or a big business) to participate on Gather with the apparent aim of promoting name recognition and making sales? Is anyone who gets paid for writing on Gather a small business?
Commenting on your own posts - Is it okay to say thank you for every comment on your post? Should such responses be grouped as a single comment, or is a comment for comment ratio fine?
Posting 10 times a day - Is it okay to post anything that comes to mind? Does it seem like an attempt to always have at least one of your posts in the list of fresh material?
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Keep in mind that I'm not necessarily knocking any of these, though I do have my opinions. I have also done most of the things mentioned above, though some of them to a very mild degree.
Have I missed something? What other forms of self-promotion go on here at Gather. Are they okay or not?
Would you classify this article as self promotion? Why?
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Comments: 49
I don't get offended if someone bulk mails me or invites me to a group. I can always say no thanks. Generally I don't like it because sometimes things get by me that I find a lot later and makes me wonder what I might be missing all together. But that's just me. I notice people take offense to all kinds of odd things. But that's the way of the world, as it were.
I say find the way that suits you best and that you're most comfortable with. If people get their nose out of joint, don't include them in your mailings any more, etc. If they don't like what you wrote or the topic you choose, they can not read it and if they do and get annoyed, it's their problem. That's my philosophy.
When you connect to someone or join one of their groups, it takes a conscious effort to go into your preferences and turn off the email notifications that they or one of their groups has published something. So persons with a lot of connections and groups are likely to get a considerable amount of attention.
The other thing is that some writers are indeed very good and any attention they get is surely deserved.
On two different occasions, I have posted my grocery lists along with some commentary. Was it art? Was it journalism? Was it worth a hoot? I don't know.
I read somewhere (I think the writer's last name was Walsch) that if I say people shouldn't do something, they'll probably go on doing it anyway, and what I'm really doing is limiting what I permit myself to do (because, of course, I "shouldn't", or so I say).
I don't usually do it because I don't feel comfortable. But I have to say that I indeed promoted myself slightly a few times in my life.... (I don't usually get good results, though.... But I tried.) So, I think it's really a personal choice.
People that get angry, well... I guess I haven't done self-promotion as I haven't run into any, though the first thing that showed up on my screen when I joined was an invite to a group (which I accepted and am glad I did).
I "thought" the purpose of gather was to find people with similar interests and lots of things interest me, so that's maybe a problem I don't have. (yet anyways!)
If you join a group that you eventually find is not for you, you always have the option of getting out of it. And if you met one person in that group that you really like and get along with, love their writings, then it wasn't a waste of time.
I have several groups, but I actually don't even know how to promote them, so I'm OK with not doing that, and also OK with others promoting theirs - what *personal preference here* want is to send out lots of invites to other groups that I have no idea what they're about, just go get more members for my groups as that doesn't make sense to me.
In my other "life" I'm a volunteer Moderator for a huge site, and I'm not even going to name it as it doesn't matter here, and one thing we do is "not" allow nasty posts to other members as feelings do not need to get hurt.
But that's there and this is here, so everywhere is different, different people, different interests and that's all good, as you can find on here, if you look (I'm not too good at that part yet) groups that truly share your interests and thoughts that you can easily interract with.
I guess I don't actually know what "shameless self promotion" is. But whatever, and I don't love Raymond either! LOL, I think it's up to the individual and if you get invited to a particular group, there's a no, thanks button you can always click on. Right now as I'm so new, if people invite me, I tend to always accept for how else am I going to meet others? Great writing, by the way,
makes one step back and think!
What do I mean by directed? Fit your action to your audience. If you are going to use a tactic like bulk mail to promote something, make sure it's a topic that appeals to most people. If you are writing an article with a common theme draw back to previous articles.
And on that note check out my article:
*toot* So You Wanna Be A Gather Star? *toot*
By the way, my book is called LIFE, DEATH AND OTHER TRIVIA, Outrageous Observations of a Wicked Old Broad" and is available at www.lulu.com/RuthDickson or through Amazon. (Just thought I'd throw a little promotion out there...couldn't hurt, right?
My personal opinion, most things sent to my mailbox and articles that say nothing more than "go look at what I did over there" are not cool. Unlike many others, though, I do approve of inserting links to our own articles in the comment thread of someone else's article. I believe this is fair because the reader has already read and commented on the current article, so if you have an article relevant to the topic it is appropriate to say "hey, you might also like this". That isn't an intrusion since the reader didn't have to open a message or article to see it.
Motherhood aside, I admit that I do some self-promotion on Gather. I don't do mass mailings (I did it just once, but that was desperation.) but if I read an article, and I have written one on a related subject and I think it will add to the discussion, I will post the link in a comment.
As far as subject matter is concerned, and seeking tons of comments, I say whatever turns you on, do it!
Good piece.
I just published my first bit of self promotion here. It's pretty mild by Gather standards (all I did was ask for a rating on a book review at the top of the review). I don't have any patience with or respect for point-whores.
And as my brother once noted: "You have to be pretty limber to toot your own horn."
I'm still picking myself up off the floor after that one, Kevin.
Scott, I was hoping some others who have written on or experimented with promotion would comment. Thank you.
Ruth, "Shameless Self Promotion" as I understand its usage here on Gather, means "without shame", no matter who comes along wringing their hands and muttering, "Shame."
Sandy, you have sage advice about promotion. Also, the topic of links was one I failed to mention in the original article, so thank you. I link like crazy. It's a little distracting perhaps, but if someone wants to know more about what I have to say, I want them to have that option. I also link liberally in my posts to other articles of mine, but also articles by others, Gather features, etc. I do disapprove in general of a link that takes the reader off Gather. I'm not really uptight about it, but I think we have plenty of content to link to right here in the community.
Bert, I too have used bulk mail very sparingly. I can think of only one instance, actually, when I emailed my entire network to set up a birthday surprise for Janie. It worked like a charm, but I wouldn't do it again unless it's something important like that. I'm not saying I dislike others doing it, but I would like Gather to design the delete email process so it took as few clicks as possible. Maybe a delete button next to each email.
John, thank you for weighing in.
Thank you also for providing some perspective on "point whores". That's a hoot, and I agree with Bert about the limberness comment. Priceless.
For myself, although I enjoy connecting with people through my articles and images or theirs, I prefer to spend my time polishing and refining what I write to satisfy myself rather than currying favor.
Good and timely article.
I too used to write just for myself, thinking it would be nice if maybe someone would find it after I died and do something with it. Since then, I've seen so many valuables sold for pennies at estate sales - while personal papers were just tossed in the trash. I didn't want to keep my world a secret, and that's a major reason why Gather is important to me.
bulk mail - It feels a bit needy when I receive it. I always open it, but generally don't care about the subject matter. There is also no good way to tell why I am getting the mail, so it's a good idea to put the purpose of the email as far up front as possible - in the subject line if possible.
Sensationalism and controversy - in the early months of Gather we had a fellow who consistently ticked everyone off, and was subsequestly the most "popular" person on Gather. It still goes on, but I think there is less buy-in. People are more savvy about not rewarding offensiveness.
I have published a couple indexes to my writing on Gather, and started a group so others could do the same thing. I don't know what I'd do without my index . . . These sorts of posts are what I had in mind, and while some don't like them, I think they don't have to read them.
With group invites I was recently a bad boy. I invited hundreds of people to join my Groups, and hundreds of people did. Unfortunately, when you go to invite people en-masse like that, things are set up so you can only invite newcomers. There were apparently complaints, and when the Gather staff explained why I shouldn't do it, I agreed and from now on I'll only invite my network. There is one exception; if someone lives in Colorado I have every reason to believe they'd want to be in the Colorado Group.
Warm fuzzies - Several times there have been "I really love you all" type posts, and these attracted some rather pointed criticism. I didn't mind it myself, but there didn't seem to be any content.
I do not like to see large businesses operating on Gather. I think it has the potential for making users cynical. There are a few Groups that seem to be promoting a product or cult. Nothing's perfect I suppose.
I think one comment in response to a comment made on a post is fine. My only reason for believing that is it's my rule of thumb. More comments by the author than by readers looks bad (to me).
My only concern about a user posting multiple times a day is that in makes the less frequent posts by others zip off the recently published list. It would be nice if a person could have some confidence that their post would be visible for a few minutes before being swept away.
I'm a big fan of linking. I like it in comments and posts and don't think it does any harm (except to the extent that it distracts the reader who doesn't know why the words are in blue).
I do this probably more than most people do. When criticism of the practice started, suggesting that this was just a way to inflate the comment count, I combined reponses to many people in one comment.
I have had people tell me that they appreciated the fact that I responded to their comments. I will continue to respond. The main reason I am here on Gather is to learn. I can learn from other peoples' writings, and I can learn from comments to my own pieces. I cannot learn from reading my own articles, but I can from the dialogue that follows. I will not stop responding to comments on my own pieces. The dialogue is one of the great joys I get here.
Hence, should I republish some of them?
Should I revise them first, even though no revision is really necessary?
Would republished 'how-to' articles be perceived differently than a republished poem or other work?
Or, should I create a new article, with some lead-in text, and then a link to the prior article? Would this be considered 'bad form'?
I am certainly not interested in self-promotion, but in providing a service to the Gather community.
Any opinions?
In my opinion, if you have articles people would find useful and are not likely to find unless they are republished, then you should republish them. If the information is current and accurate why would you revise it? I don't think a new article with a lead-in and a link would be necessary, although I can't see a problem with doing it that way. Thank you for asking.
Bert and Ron I agree with both of you. Communication is an interactive process and responding to others is a natural part of communicating.
I'd rather have just one copy, so I am partial to a temporary article with a link back to the original, with a note saying "please make your comments there as this link is temporary." The problem with that is it needs some sort of explanation as to why you are bringing attention to it again. For a how-to, that's pretty easy (it's being provided again for newcomers who missed the original).
Republishing the article in its entirety has the advantage of not looking out of the ordinary at all. No one would know it wasn't being published for the first time. We should be so lucky as to have some nolife out there keeping track of all our articles and when they were posted : )
Again, I really can't see the argument against republishing, but I'm looking for any objections now, because I could be wrong and if I am, I'm all for personal growth. I'm all ears. Anybody?
Here's a sore point, and at the risk of prodding at it with a dirty stick, here goes. However well intentioned, the "I'm outa here" posts and bulk emails generate a lot of comments. It's usually centered around a squabble between two or more Gather members (or a member and Gather staff, or so the member says). I don't follow sqabbles, and any time I hear about one, or an appeal for my support, it smacks of attention getting down the line of holding one's breath. "Breathe, honey, please breathe" = "Oh, please don't go." It's a bit harsh for me to say that, but it's my reaction and a writer may want to know - should they care about impressions they make - that it comes across that way to more than one person.
Converse of this is to publish a good article and to see whether it gets noticed on its own merit. I have come across several outstanding articles on Gather, which have just a couple of comments. As in real life, nobody will make efforts to find merit on Gather if it is hidden under a bushel. Good and bad stuff, both have to compete vigorously for attention. This first line of battle everyone has to fight irrespective of the quality of writing. Once a writer is fairly well-established, then onwards life might become easier for that writer. People will connect to that writer and will eagerly look forward to read that writer's articles.
So self promotion is a fair game. I would like to call it simply "Promotion" and delete both the two derogatory prefixes of "Shameless Self". There is no need for a conscientious writer to have a stiff-nosed attitude towards promoting one's own articles by indulging in the cardinal sins that you have listed. If you do not play by the rules of the game thinking that those rules are beneath your standard, you risk being an non-entity.
Every action, however, has a thin line of transgression that is hard to demarcate, hard to define; if you overstep it, your action becomes foul. You have to survive, yes. But, sincerity and being true to one's own self is the basic rule that governs an honorable conduct.
There may be a few who transcend beyond all these petty games, whether good or bad. They write for the sake of writing. They are least interested in their articles either being read or being commented. Perhaps they get buried, unsung and unmentioned, beneath a huge pile of garbage.
One more thing that I notice is the disproportionate articles to comments ratio. The regular commentators are a small fraction of such a large community of 20,000 or so Gatherites. That is why a large number of articles writers have to scramble for a small trickle of comments by using all possible tactics. If the habit of commenting becomes widespread every article is bound to get its fair share of comments.
Down those same lines, I think it would be nice to have numbers available to a person, showing them the number of comments they have made, and what percentage of those comments were made on the writing of others. It would just be a useful tool. I know if I saw my own ratio, I'd probably be horrified. In fact, I can hardly think of a higher quality way of promoting and networking than reading and making intelligent comments on the writing done by others.
Can you guess what it is?
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Add some l♥v to your Gather comments. Learn how here.
For example, I can envision your use of a similar 'signature line' to emphasize the map to your posts, which would be very appropriate, and even appreciated by many members that otherwise would never know of its existence.
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Shhhh.... Find out about Gather 'Cheat Codes' here.
There is a very simple technique that can be used to program multiple signature lines into a one or two-stroke key sequence on your keyboard.
I currently have 15 different variations available. Some of them point to Gather owned groups and articles, as well as the work of other members. I plan on changing these periodically as new relevant content is generated.
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Dial-up User? Learn to speed up your Gather experience here.
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Gather Group Owner? Learn techniques to manage your group here.
I am not sure what I think of the concept. It could be viewed either as a useful service or advertising but I do think it is a creative solution to your dilemma.
At Gather, the only way (as I see it) to be read is to comment on others, make groups, invite people to join, invite connections. I can't do all those things and write too.
My article (and I don't blame people for calling such an insert as this blatant self-promotion) called "How Many Points Can You Rack Up?" written on Aug 31 talks about these very things.
There are people like Sandy who say go ahead by all means put links in your comments, it's useful to me. And then I'm sure there is the other school of thought. Myself, I'm just trying to learn the lay of the land here.
I see nothing wrong with listing relevant articles at the bottom of your article, if you have some. And I sometimes list other people's comments and articles.
Speaking of that, I too, can hardly wait to see what Kevin will come up with to repromote his articles. I have gone a long way to trying to bring Kevin's and other people's helpful articles into the forefront, but if I don't blatantly promote my Table of Contents Member Resources, they won't get seen. (http://gatherinterests.gather.com).
As far as the blatant (I am overusing that word, I know there's a better one) self-promoters, there is, of course, your article/group, Ron, Map to Posts (http://whowrotewhat.gather.com) where people can look at some people who are serious about organizing their work and presenting it to the public, as well as my group Gathering Stars (http://memberslist.gather.com) which is basically a member introducing themselves, their articles and the best of Gather as they see it.
Huh! Aren't I terrible? :)
Cami
Kami, thank you for your long, thoughtful comment.
Kelly, you can invite anyone you want, but if you want to send bulk invites to a lot of people, without regard to whether you "know" - there's that ambiguous word again - know them, then the invite screen organizes all the names you pull up by most recently joined.
and here's the link to Member Resources which Kevin critiqued and thereby egged me to do better. It's the best idea I could come up with to keep the help ideas on top.
Even so, unless I spend every day promoting this group and inviting new members I don't know how it can become part of the awareness of 22,000 members.
I'm not in the income bracket which can afford a Bermuda cruise or spend hours on Gather everyday. I hate to see my idea go under because it is a good idea, but I don't see how I can prevent it.
This is exactly what you're saying I think, Ron, promote or die. You either go forwards or back, you can never stand still.