Google Alerts

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The pic above reminds me of Yoda and Beauty! Want to guess which one would be Yoda and which Beauty?

Sometimes I feel like that when google alerts arrive in my inbox. I set them up for my name and book titles, so I'd know if someone was talking about a book out there and I could pop over to their blog to thank them. After using alerts for a few years now, it hasn't quite worked out that way though which shows where I fall on the totem poll of romance authors.

Google alerts on my name fall into one of three categories (unless I'm on a blog tour then I'll get notices to those stops):

1) Links to my own blog
2) Links to a pirate sites
3) Links to reviews

The first are worthless. The second forces me to fill out take-down notices and alert my publisher when I have time. The third can be good or bad depending on what's said, and I tend not to click on them because I have and regretted it.

Google alerts on my books include all three of the categories with my name, but a lot more, too. I'm never sure what might show up in my inbox even though the string of words for the search is in quotes.

Whenever an alert for Memo: The Billionaire's Proposal arrives, I know it'll be totally random and maybe even a little weird. That book title never fails to bring alerts to economic and political articles and essays. I'm sure my hero from that book, billionaire Drake Llewelyn would laugh at some of them.

If the Ring Fits... brings alerts for a Harlequin Special Edition with the same title as well as many wedding blog posts. There's even a blog with that name.

This morning a fun one came across for my current release It Started with a Crush. The alert had nothing to do with my book, but it's a cute play on words. I'm a romance author and I love weddings so this brought a smile to my face! Check out this "It Started With A Crush!" on Wedding Photo USA with photos from D Coleman Photography.

Hope you have a nice Thursday!

Husband Material

I noticed a spike in my blog traffic yesterday, so I checked my referrals. The typical ones for Crossfit (Elizabeth, Filthy Fifty) and "Ben Barnes smoking" were there. But I was surprised to see "Husband Material by Melissa McClone" there, too.

My first thought was hmmm, I never wrote a book by that title, and then I remembered! Not a book. An online serial read! But that had been a few years ago. Why would it be coming up now?

So I went to my beloved google. Turns out Mills & Boon has re-released the story on their website! Though I'm wondering why my google alerts never picked it up. Click here if you never caught Husband Material the first time around. Only chapter one is out right now. If I remember correctly, there are eight chapters.

Anyway, I'm so glad the story is out there again. The setting is New York City. It's a boss-assistant romance and my heroine is, well, not exactly thin. She enjoys food, especially chocolate-iced donuts with sprinkles for breakfast! The hero prefers maple bars. Needless to say, I had fun writing the story and eating lots of donuts for research.

What's your favorite kind of donut? Bet you can guess mine!

Blogs

I read an article on Death by Blogging at Sarita's blog yesterday. I knew blogs were popular, but I had no idea people were making a living, well, blogging. That just boggles my mind. Anyway, it got me thinking about blogs and how people find them.

I use google a lot. I've found some great sites that I wouldn't have normally discovered if I hadn't followed links. I decided to see check how people ended up here. I went to my sitemeter account and checked the search terms used by the last 100 visitors to my blog. (That's all I can track.) Here they are:

Melissa McClone (2)
Ben Barnes smoking
Annelise Robey Jane Rotrosen Agency
Mothers Addicted to Irish Dance
Filthy Fifty Workouts (2)
Melissa 7
Clubsport Flashpass
Harlequin Special Treat
Crossfit Michael
Crossfit Good for Climbers?
Disney Princess rain gear
"broken arms" blogspot family

Interesting. Only two people were looking for me. One was looking for my agent. The others, especially the Crossfiters were probably surprised when they ended up on a romance writers blog!

How did you find the blogs you read? Do you google and follow links?

And has everyone discovered Google Reader? As usual with anything technology related, I was late to the party, but Marianne and Dru explained how it worked and I love it! So much so I want to add more blogs to it. Any suggestions?