Alrighty, so as I continue down the path towards actually getting pages online, I've started to think about how to get the word out. And from what I've gathered here and everywhere else I turn around, is Facebook and Twitter seem like some of the best ways to do this. So, what's everyone's opinion on this? Do they work? Do you use your own Facebook page or a group or a fan page...what best? Do you use your own Twitter account or have you set up something unique to your GN?

As a second part to this whole big ball of discussion... what types of plugins are you using on your blog to integrate everything? What works well and what doesn't? (I know Jason recently posted about thing on his blog, but I'm curious what other people are using)

Any thoughts, tips or general discussion would be helpful!

I won't speak for everyone else here but I use Facebook and Twitter (and to a lesser extent my DeviantArt journal) to alert people that there is new content on the website or other Carpe Chaos news. I also use Twitter (only) for super small updates to let people know we're active and always working on stuff. People on Twitter like it when you tweet a lot.

I don't think Facebook or Twitter will help you "get the word out". I think they are best used to keep fans you've already acquired engaged and informed about the latest happenings with your project.

As far as plugins I don't really use any. I have a Google Buzz account that just hooks into my DeviantArt and Twitter, but nothing installed on the site. Just simple button links.

Thanks CarpeChaos. Good to hear what others find is working.

To clarify, by "get the word out" I guess I mean get the word out to people who are already acquainted with it. So my intent would be to use them to pass along information about updates or something.

I'm on DeviantArt as well. I'm still trying to decide how to use it for my GN.

I use all 3. I actually began my GN on deviantART, which was a good way of getting it to the attention of (and get feedback from) a bunch of people from the start. I mean my watchers, but also because of the way the site is, you can easily acquire new followers by bringing attention to yourself in various ways (involvement, getting featured, word of mouth, if you're lucky a DD, etc). Even though the comic now has its own website, I still post pages on dA, though I encourage people there to join my mailing list for chances of extras.

On FB I have a Page. I formerly had a group but FB's done a lot of retarded changes lately, I think they want to push Pages and drop groups, or so it looks. For instance, it became impossible for me to include a link to my latest page in a message to all group members, as it was marked as spam. By what twisted logic they got there I don't know, but long story shot, I dropped the group and moved to a Page, which I find a lot easier to work with. I also believe someone will "like" a page more readily than they will join a group, which has a commitment aura to it.I don't send updates, because (another retarded FB thing) you just don't get notified when you get an update, they're entirely useless. Instead I post statuses with my news, links to new pages, teaser sketches, and the like, and always encourage people to join the mailing list for special treatment.
My FB page is set up so that whatever I post there gets tweeted. Not indispensable, it's almost better if you do this manually so you can control the message in the tweet, but I would forget half the time so it works for me. I don't have a separate twitter account for the comic: it seems much more enjoyable for everybody if I use my own account for it. It's also better marketing: people who follow me for my twit wit (TM) get exposed to my updates. I experienced the value of it when I started being followed by a bunch of Lebanese people just because I'm Lebanese, or because they know some other of my work, and they discovered my GN through my tweets and started actively spreading the word through no effort of mine. This is a continuous process now and I doubt it would have been the same if the GN was represented by a separate, impersonal entity. My belief is, if it's your GN, you as the author are important to the reader. Stay close to it!

This was overlong but hope it gave you a few ideas

Thanks for the insights Cedarseed. I've started a FB "page" that'll I'll try to use once I start posting pages. I've also made the decision to use my own Twitter account and not something specific to the GN. Your point about the author being important to the reader is an excellent one! I think that's one thing that the whole online GN community really has going for it - that connection to the author is almost as important to the GN as the art or the story (at least I think so for the GN's that I follow).

Anyway, as I get further along with things I'll post some more things here. My next big challenge is to find a way to integrate everything (my site/blog, FB, Twitter and DA). If anyone has any tips that would be awesome!

Finally something that I'm not embarrassed to post about!

First off, I use about 25 different social gathering places... But I only update via Hootsuite, well and facebook but that is for a different core of followers. All of my posts at twitter, plurk, gather, and where ever else come from one social plug in site. It takes everything, say, I post at @sirkeystone on twitter and through Friendfeed posts it to all of the others, including facebook, myspace, bebo....

I can also set it up (and have for my four blogs for my other work) to aggregate the RSS feeds of my blogs to the other sites as well.

But as was stated, the updates are only going to appeal to those who have already found you or are looking for the type of content you provide. Also, when dealing with social sites as with dealing with fans offline (don't forget I'm partial manager for our band too), you have to stay on a personal level with the people you are talking to.

This gets extremely difficult when someone strives to get as many followers as possible. More than 2,000 on twitter is over doing it. More than 200 (friends) on FaceBook is getting close to the edge. Now for a page, go for it, the more the merrier, but as far as person friends don't over do as they will loose interest as soon as you quit making them feel like somebody.

Now, contrary to everything I said here. Pick one or two sites and stick with it for the duration just because of that over-doing principal. Besides, as I recall we artists aren't supposed to be social animals, right?

Oh, and while it says that it handles feeds from dA, I'm not sure how well FriendFeed picks up and aggregates that feed to other sites. I haven't posted much from dA in a number of years...

{edit}

Ok never mind I don't see dA listed anymore. They do have 58 services though, and I was certain that dA had an RSS feed from the journal... But then that was back when Jark ruled the roost...

{/edit}

It took me a while to figure out how I wanted to integrate everything, too! I leave dA out, though. The site is too bewildering for outsiders and I never link to it from other places. For me, what happens on dA stays on dA, LOL. The center of everything is my GN's own website, and the interactive part of that is the blog. I only really need to update the blog. I then post a link to the new post on the FB page, and it automatically gets tweeted. In addition, I set up the blog so that when I make a post, it gets emailed to me, images and all. I simply resend that email to my mailing list (if I need to change anything for email purposes it's a quick fix).
So basically I only have to worry about the blog, and FB/twitter/mailing list are taken care of with almost no extra action on my part.

Hmm that is a pretty good point about dA, Cedar. I never thought about it like that.

Maybe that's why I haven't been very active on dA in the past few years (well since jark got booted to be honest). No one I knew even wanted to try to mess with it, and then they erased half of my brother's pixel art gallery for supposedly imparting infringement. I know for a fact, that my brother did no such thing. He made everyone of them from memory and used Microsoft Paint to do them. (He just blows my mind sometimes.)

Anyway, that is a good plan. The blog should be a focal point.

I really like your idea about the email. I'll have to look into that (if I get popular enough to even have a list LOL).

Too bad dA could not have become more like reverbnation for artists... Press kits, revenue sharing from the ads, widgets for viewing posts, mailing lists, street teams, fan management, showings (gigs), opportunities (chances to put your name in the hat to play at festivals... change that to a chance for a booth at a comicon...), and it goes even deeper when you add premium services. Like keeping up your Zazzle/Cafepress store(s). yeah, if only...

Much as I enjoy dA, there is nothing professional about that site and the people who run it have no field credibility at all, and seemingly little art experience in the first place. Hence they are developing it in directions that suit their fancy and their fantasy about what the art world is like, and not in any way that can foster true professional-oriented growth. So personally I've resolved to enjoy it for what it is, and look elsewhere for my more serious needs.

This reminds me that there's an article about the CEO of dA in this month's Entrepreneur magazine. I skimmed it when it came in for my boss yesterday, but I may ask to read it over lunch today--for pure curiosity's sake. I do agree that it's very unprofessional, but I don't think it's the professional crowd that they're concerned with targeting. Even if they like to pretend otherwise.

The fact they pretend otherwise is the problem. If they just admitted to themselves and to the site that this is all just for fun, there would be less angst and disappointment.

That is a very valid point.

Cedarseed - It's funny you should say this about DA. I recently just removed my DA button from reMINDblog because I felt like it was pointless. Very few people from DA want to goto my blog anyway and I never really liked DA in the first place. I still try to repost my pages on DA to keep growing DA fans but I don't really think it's professional or helpful to your personal blog. The bigger reMINDblog gets the less I want to spend time on DA anyway.

Jason, I would agree with you. If your presence on dA is mainly for your GN's sake, then that presence is much better invested in a specialized, professionally-looking site like your blog and the way you organized your "peripherals". Also because the dA population, as you noticed yourself, tends to want to stay on dA and resists the networking that pervades the rest of the net. Inversely, I'm quite sure first-time visitors to it never want to come back again unless they themselves want to start posting their work there. One can get much out of dA, but that requires massive amounts of investment into the site and it just doesn't necessarily suit everyone's purposes.

So I started another thread about Twitter (go read it and come back), but I thought it might be worthwhile to go back and revisit this old topic and see what people think.

I've been posting pages for almost five months now (so don't think I'm an expert), but from what I can tell, Twitter seems to be working best for me. DA seems like its own little world and I'll keep posting stuff there because it interests me at this point, but Facebook is just not for me. I don't use Facebook too much myself, so maybe that's why. Twitter on the other hand I've found really works for me personally. I tend to send a lot of text massages with friends and family anyway, so tweeting isn't too much of a change in routine or anything. I can also do it from my iPhone really easily, so I can do it whenever I think about it.

The other thing I've started doing is posting "work in progress" which maybe gives people a reason to follow along. I think it adds to the whole community thing - which it me is one of the reasons I really got into Twitter in the first place.

Is anyone else using Twitter in an interesting way? Care to share?