To share our enthusiasm of all things literary we are also using various types of social media to further our mission. Simply put; “Portland Book Review will connect people through books.”
To reach those people is the tricky part. We are always trying to find a way to do just that. We have our print edition at various locations throughout the Portland Metro Area. You can find it at your local library and various other distribution points.
We also have the webpage that links readers not only to books but various literary articles and events, plus, an online version of Portland Book Review print edition and the archived editions as well. We have archives of all the reviews we have done with guest writers, tips on writing and insights from various authors. You can peek behind the curtain and put a face to the name of the reviewers and you can do a search of the reviewers past work. As you may have seen, our reviewers; “the work horses of the enterprise”, have varied life experiences and come from all walks of life but we all have one thing in common: the love of the literary world.
The world is dynamic and ever changing; but not our goal of reaching people through books. We have a Twitter presence that speaks of our latest reviews and literary events. This is a great medium for those people that have a number of websites they go to but not enough time to visit them all. These people can check their Twitter feed and get a good summation of what’s new or has been added to a site they can cherry pick and get the information without hunting for it from the site’s front page.
When Twitter first came out, I thought it a joke. I couldn’t wrap my brain around it. At some point my 60 watt bulb lit up (the energy saving type) and I discovered through my varied interests, I can follow NPR’s “This American Life”. I would have never found the website Upworthy.com. I would not have communicated with poets from Ireland and fellow bloggers/site admins and members of the kitten jugglers guild.
With our Facebook page we can look back and see our readers/visitors and get feedback on our reviews, you can get links to the writers of the book you enjoy and glimpses of what they are working on. Like Twitter, you can see when and where the local literary events are taking place.
We have another media outlet in are quiver of arrows Pinterest. As you may have noticed this past mid-July we started introducing Quotes and Images interspersed with the reviews and updated the literary links. To give readers not just book reviews but a place to find literary links on books and writing. With Pinterest, you will find these colorful and thought-provoking images in one easy to get to repository. We may do the same with the quotes. Time will tell what social media outlets we will use and what works for all of us; the reviewers, readers, authors, publishers and web monkeys like myself.
At the top of every webpage is the social mediums we use. Give them a look and get a better encompassing look of Portland Book Review.
Namaste
Web Monkey
Michael Johnson