Steve Jobs stepped down as the CEO of Apple on Aug. 24, 2011, and if you read the news on Twitter first, then you also saw the millions of tweets thanking him and feeling sad at the news of his departure. Think about that for a minute: we, the people,...

The explosion of social media in the last few years has brought with it a whole slew of social media applications and tools designed to help publicists deliver and monitor better results. As I have written before, I think social media has been a huge help for publicity....

Here are seven steps to developing a digital marketing blueprint. Many people skip the first four, but these first few steps are the crucial difference between success and failure. I have also uploaded slide presentations to help you along.

1. Assess Your Situation - This first step is...

There are six essential elements for successful digital marketing and when used together they make for a powerful combination. Each element is important on its own, but when you use all six together you will see a strategy that is effective, scalable and long term.

• Website -- A professional website...

It is not uncommon for me to get business e-mails at 6:30 a.m. or 12:00 midnight. Until recently, it was also not uncommon for me to answer them. However, this year for my birthday I've decided to give myself the gift of balance.

We live in a culture of...

With over 15 years of experience in online marketing, I can say without a doubt or any reservations, that developing a personal brand online is crucial to your success as an author.

Personal branding is new to all of us, but its importance is growing exponentially. So the question I...

Anyone who works in the book industry will tell you it's the people that make our industry so amazing. Everyday I work with publishers who are generous and smart and want to do right by their authors. So when I started working on a piece on marketing tips for authors,...

As the needs of our clients increase and FSB expands to serve them better, I find myself looking to hire people. However, this year, my approach is very different. As we are working on branding authors on the web, I am looking for people who can demonstrate that...

Recently, two Hewlett Packard scientists developed an algorithm that projected movie sales with 97% accuracy based on Twitter chatter alone. Inspired by this and other recent social media studies, my staff and I decided to conduct some social media research of our own to see if Twitter chatter...

Good Books was founded in 1979 by Merle and Phyllis Good in Pennsylvania. In 2010, they published The Mayo Clinic Diet which became a #1 New York Times Bestseller, but the Goods are no strangers to success. In December 2000, they published the first Fix-It and Forget-It Cookbook, which was...

With so much excitement and hype surrounding Twitter, I decided to look for concrete examples of social media success in book publishing. I interviewed two different publishers to get their take on how engaging on Twitter has benefited them.

Twitter requires an investment of time and resources, so the first...

I have a confession to make: I was not an early adopter of Twitter. To be honest, I didn't get it. I didn't get the language. It seemed like a string of links to even more things I had no time to read. It felt overwhelming. LinkedIn and...

Social media has given us great ways to protect and build our digital reputations. Today we have the ease of searching conversations, the ability to set alerts to help us monitor our names, the constant availability of learning opportunities and more ways to communicate and interact with others. All of...

The role of publicists has always been to promote the public image and reputation of people, products and businesses. It is their job to develop a strategy, shape a consistent message, work with the media, and create exposure. This job has never been more important or multifaceted than right now....

On March 18, 2010, Susannah Greenberg organized a panel for the Women's National Book Association on Book Marketing Online. She invited some of the people in book publishing who are engaged in digital marketing, and it made for an interesting discussion. The panel was open to questions throughout...

"Markets are conversations," said the authors of The Cluetrain Manifesto and it is still the number one thesis on their Web site. Social media allows you to have those conversations. When I wrote a Blog on Huffington Post called "It's 2010: You Really Need to be...

Real Time Web was coined to describe online activities in real time -- from status updates on Facebook, to microblogging on Twitter to uploading photos and videos on other social media sites. With the ease of mobile devices like iPhones, this type of communication has grown tremendously in 2009. Now...

According to eMarketer, Facebook users have reached 350 million worldwide. Together they are creating a community of savvy consumers, connecting with friends, family, co-workers and acquaintances to share advice, information and yes, recommendations.

I wonder then why so many publishers and authors are still not on Facebook?

Social media sites began...

From many years of promoting books online, the one thing I know for sure is that each book has its own sales trajectory. Some start selling right out of the gate and reach great heights, others take the scenic route and sell steadily for years, and yes, there are some...

This Thanksgiving, along with all the blessings in my life, I will give a special thanks to all the fabulous book bloggers on the Web. If you find yourself wondering why, you are simply not paying attention.