Extract of an article by author Maria Murnane on the CreateSpace Community Site:

When it comes to author blogging, there are two questions I hear more than any others:

1. What should I blog about?
2. How can I get people to read my blog?

Regarding the content of your blog, that’s up to you. For the most part, I like to blog about grammar, book marketing, and the writing process itself, but other authors take a more personal approach and share details about their daily lives. Those who write nonfiction often blog about the topics covered in their books to present themselves as experts. For example, the author of a book on personal finance might blog about the best way to prepare taxes, while a cookbook author might share yummy new soup recipes for the cold winter months. A general rule of thumb is to provide interesting, helpful content…

According to Goodreads, the site has over 55 million members worldwide. That’s a lot of readers. It doesn’t take much to understand why nearly every self-published person comes to the conclusion that they should be promoting their books on the site.

It’s a sensitive issue, and one that has changed a little since the original Goodreads was sold to Amazon. I notice more ways that Amazon and Goodreads use each others’ opportunities. Amazon now enables you to do giveaways… Goodreads has been doing that since it started. Goodreads now has an extensive list of marketing opportunities that it promotes to authors, which look like things in the Amazon school of marketing to me, but are nevertheless valid and valuable opportunities – so take them.

In researching this post, I was surprised by things I knew about but didn’t know about. I knew about giveaways, I’d seen themed months, and I…