Publishers want to get books out there and fast. The faster people start talking about a book, the more likely it is to succeed. Digital marketing is nothing new. Allowing internet bloggers to take part in digital marketing is nothing new either. People love to talk about books, and with the internet, bloggers can reach thousands of people on many different platforms. Publishers love to use blogs as a marketing resource, and book bloggers love to review books.
In the past, and still today, publishers send out physical advanced readers copies of the books to bloggers and other reviewers in the hopes of receiving a great review. However, if the amount of ARCs given out wasn’t all that huge, publishers must be more selective about who they send the ARCs to. Digital advanced readers copies have removed some of this selectiveness.
With the rise of digital ARCs and blogger book reviews, Blogging For Books has become more important than ever. Blogging For Books is an automated system that can give advanced readers copies to bloggers quickly. Owned by Crown Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House, Blogging For Books allows readers to easily request the book they want to review. The best part? You get a free book! As long as you actually have a blog, of course. I simply signed up with my Tumblr blog. Then, after answering a few simple questions, I was ready to pick my book. All Blogging For Books requests is that you write an honest review.
Bloggers can review more than just fiction and nonfiction books, too. Blogging For Books has nine different categories that bloggers can choose from including fiction, nonfiction, faith, cooking, comics, and more.
According to Publishers Weekly, “The Blogging for Books site was created in 2009 by WaterBrook Multnomah and, after growing substantially, was redesigned in late April. Crown said that since the redesign 1,300 review copies have been requested through the site, and more than 30,000 reviews have been created.”
Kate Rados, director of community development for Crown, said the website has a dual purpose, to “increase reader discoverability of Crown’s upcoming titles and to provide bloggers with the ability to more efficiently receive only the books they are most interested in reviewing.”
What do you think? Will you be creating a blog soon and review a few books?
