World, Writing, Wealth discussion
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Friend request: cool, annoying or neutral?
I have no barriers to making new friends. It is one of the things I really like about gr. The camaraderie is gratifying in a way that has nothing to do with sales or marketing, for sure.
I've noticed you can't really shoehorn people here. I'm following a thread on another group about what you love/hate in books and just about everything someone loves, someone else hates and vice versa. some people are going to love if you send them a friend request, others are going to feel bothered. I know it's not strong for the marketing aspect of writing, but personally I don't fish for "friends." Just like with Twitter and Facebook, if you want to be friends, I'll happily friend or follow back. I just don't want to be that guy that puts everyone off with the constant requests.
I love friend requests :) I add everyone. It has helped me discover lots of books I would never have otherwise heard of, and I enjoy following authors and their blogs on here. I usually only send requests to members who have posted that they want to add more friends, but on occasion I will see someone who has very similar interests to me and I will send a request, hoping it doesn't bother them too much ;).
On facebook I only accept people I actually know in real life, but on GR I accept anyone who wants to be on my friends list. The reason for this is that on facebook I share a bit more personal stuff, for example a concert I've been to, which people could use to find out where I've been on that day, and thus know which city I'm currently in, etc., whereas my GR "friends" can only see what I'm reading, but not what else I'm doing.
I have asked very few people to be my friends on GR, but those where people I actually really wanted to follow, and get updates about their books and groups and reviews. I have made them my 'top' friends, and I have regular contact with them via discussions in groups. Everyone else sent me a friend request and I usually accept, because maybe they want to keep up with my comments just the same way I want to keep up with the people I chose, so I reckon I'll let them.
Agree. I'm rarely on fb but I'm on gr every single day. Fb is more personal while gr is all about books and writing. I accept all friend requests on gr - I don't care if your cat knows how to play the piano but I hate the thought of possibly missing out on my next great read.
What does this have to do with writing, publishing, or promoting?
I'm all for friend requests as I love getting to know all different kinds of people. Like Tara said, the camaraderie is gratifying in a way that goes beyond sales or marketing.
I've never added someone as a friend (I'm kinda like this everywhere) but I'll always accept. Feel kinda rude if I don't. Hmm. I reckon that GR is a bit like FB, though, where you've only actually talked to 10% of your "friends"... *shrugs*Hugs,
Ann
P.S. - The only time I'd unfriend someone is if they friended me just to ask for something. I'm a bit anal-retentive about manners and shizz. But even then, I'd probably just let it slide *more nonchalant shrugging*
in social media, i'm more issue- and subject matter-driven rather than social. i don't really care if your dog ate your hard drive on which your ms was stored the night before it was due to your editor. maybe that's why i'm a fail on twitter and wattpad. otoh, that's why i participate in this group a lot--we bring up a lot of issues.similarly on GR, i like following someone's reviews/books rather than their activity. i rarely make friend requests and then only to other writers, so far. i can count my friend requests on one hand. that is reflected in my 34 friends.
however, some authors want to collect a whole slew of friends. how effective is that for publicity?
even though GR has that element, it seems to me that facebook, twitter, wattpad seem to rely heavily on the popularity contest as a driver for participation and virtual success.
i always accept b/c you can always sort by top friends and following, which is what i do.
Interesting, I see that most gladly accept friendship requests, but wouldn't usually take the initiative in their own hands.As most of you experienced, I, in my turn, do proactively befriend people -:)
interesting postfacebook is exclusively for people I know in real life or would potentially meet in real life. It is my private portal with my friends and I don't mix it with my book work. In fact, a lot of my friends don't even know I write.
twitter and goodreads is for book talk and connecting and making pen pals and being super social.
I used to send friend requests on goodreads to people I send messages to in relation to a post and I would accept all friend requests.
I used to follow people on twitter that connected with me in one way or the other eg if they liked a post I tweeted or retweeted me or something else
However, for the last week or so, I have been trying something else. I have been strategically following more people on goodreads. My number of friends is over 300 at the moment (a growth of 100 in a matter of say 2 weeks). I have only started the same approach on twitter.
The way I look at it is this, before anyone accepts a friend request from me on goodreads or follow me back on twitter, they would have cast their eyes on my profile and decided they would like to hear from me. For each person that does that, that is one more person that wouldn't have heard about me at that time if I hadn't.
What has been the results of this so far? A few bloggers on twitter have requested copies of my book Abiku: A Battle Of Gods to read and review and a couple signed up for my blog tour.
I think social network is there to make connections and you cannot make connections if you do not reach out to people. Isn't that the whole point of people asking authors to have a platform?
Abiku is my first paranormal book. I had no already established connections or fan base in the genre and as at this moment, it is on the shelf of 17 people to be read. I think it is down to me simply adding people who have shown an interest in the genre.
As a marketing strategy, it is all a game of numbers
On twitter, I have about 2000 followers. each tweet has an impression of anywhere up to 200 (so 10% of my followers). engagement varies but fluctuates between 1 and 5%. This is basically 0.5% of my total followers who engage with my post.
I wish I realised this early in my journey . . . twitter brings in the most about of visitors to my website but the percentage is still low.
The beauty of goodreads I have now seen with this book is that my book has now been entered on specific shelves which the other's weren't
I feel like I have digressed too much, so I'm gonna go bed. forgive any typos
Segilola wrote: "I think social network is there to make connections and you cannot make connections if you do not reach out to people. Isn't that the whole point of people asking authors to have a platform?As a marketing strategy, it is all a game of numbers..."
Some sound observations, which I can second with my own experience!
What's your attitude? How often do you offer your friendship/accept that of others? Does friend request convey any connotation: of maybe someone looking to sell his/her book/promote some service -:)?
Nik wrote: "while others write off-putting warnings on their profiles and add separating questions in front of possible friend seekers. Yet many others seem indifferent."Heh, that's me. It's because after the first five or so years, 99% of the friend requests I get are authors I've never heard of, and never interacted with, and therefore have no interest in.
Ok, 99% is probably slightly overestimating, but of the past 15 friend requests I got, I accepted 2, and one of those is an author - but I liked their reviews before I found their books. The other 13 are a) all GR authors except for one - and that one person has nearly 2k friends on a 2 month old account, and b) I've never interacted with them in any way. I know this, because I don't decline the ones I don't accept, I let them sit in limbo. I learnt the hard way, that the spammy authors will just resend it immediately if I decline them. I clean them out every few months when they've given up or gotten banned already. Still that's an 87% fail rate on friend requests, which admittedly isn't 99% but it's pretty damn high.
The point of friends here on GR for me, is to curate my reviews on book pages, so if you're not writing interesting (to me) reviews, I don't see the point. Perhaps that is rude to other people, but hey, why should I have to use social media in any fashion other than what works for me?
I don't need to be your friend to interact with you on a group, have a conversation in PM, or even to like you plenty well enough though!
If someone sends me a friends request, I ask them to answer one question: "What do we have in common?" If they take the time to answer, then I'm usually going to accept. I'm here to connect with other readers and see what they're reading and thinking, and there are some great people here. If I feel that someone is befriending me only because they want to sell me something, I'm disappointed. As far as asking, I occasionally do ask if someone says something that resonates. So, my answer is "cool."
I accept friend requests after checking to make sure they have a profile and books or that they have made interesting co!ments. GR has trolls like FB of people who are looking for something other than books. I have made friend requests of some authors whose books I read, some members who are in the same groups and I accept those requests (Like Star Trek). I usually compare books and ratings to get a feel of if our tastes are compatible. I dont have time to keep up on the feed of books, reviews, etc..
I send them out when something the person seems to share the same interests as me or they make solid comments on here. I accept friend requests if we are in same groups or they seem genuinely interesting.
I usually accept friend requests IF the person shows something of themselves. My view is it doesn't cost me to accept, and I don't want to turn down potential readers. I accept many of them won't take any notice of me, and some, especially on FB have no real purpose in sending the request other than to get a number or friends, but if that is their purpose, so what? If may accepting makes them feel a little better, all to the good. If it makes no difference to them, or it makes them feel bad, why did they send the request? Either way, it makes no difference to me.
I'm like Lizzie - I check their profile to make sure they're not a scammer. I've had a couple from obvious scammers - they tend to have no books on their profiles, but they've somehow managed to gain quite a few friends, and have participated in no groups.
And what's your attitude? Do you friend people/initiate/accept/profile-check? :)
Hey, Nik, Thanks for reviving this thread. To answer your original question (Message 1), is it cool, annoying, or neutral, I would say it could be any of the three.
I will gladly initiate or accept friend requests from people I know, people I have engaged with in discussions on GoodReads, and the occasional random request where I have no idea how the person decided to friend me. I have occasionally experienced some angst when I cannot find anything useful on the person's GoodReads profile.
I am decidedly neutral if, after accepting the offer of friendship, the person makes no additional attempt to converse over whatever it was they felt we had in common to begin with.
I generally only become annoyed if it becomes apparent that the person was only friending me in an attempt to solicit me for something (pay for review, editing services, etc.).
I have met some very interesting people here on GR as friends. I don't want thousands of friends just for the sake of it. I want a managable number I can interact with.So adding new people or deleting them is an ongoing process.It certainly helps to have common reading interests and the compare books option is very useful.
Nik, what's your policy on accepting friend requests? Do you ever send a request?
Will somebody help me?May I please ask a for s help here?
I do accept friend requests as long as the person has some kind of the same book interests as I do. The only ones I usually do not friend are people that do not read the same type of books that I do. I usually use the book comparison feature to see how close we are in reading material. Also I will not friend people that have more friends than books, because that means they are just out to get as many friends as possible and that they have no interest in reading. Some people use this site as if it is facebook and they are just out to see how many friends they can get. That is not what this site was intended for so I will not add those kind of people to my friends list. So that is what the "follow" feature is for if they want to go that route. :)
Shaikh wrote: "Will somebody help me?May I please ask a for s help here?"
What's up? How can we help?
I'm sort of picky with accepting people who have more friends than books. I don't accept accounts that are fake, spam or just seem troublesome. I love to interact with people to create some fan theories, understand characters, critically think about what could have been right or wrong in books or generally just read reviews. It gives me new perception of different things. I don't care about popularity. So I choose friends likewise.I do have a question before sending invite and that's asking about their favourite character. It gives me new characters and books to search upon. It's fun.
I don't restrict myself with adding only friends who have similar tastes in books like me. I want to find out about books irrelevant of their popularity. I want to extent my ability to read different books. Sometimes I end up enjoying books with lower average rating. Some of my all-time favourites are the books that I wouldn't have picked up if it were not for my friends.
Thanks for the reply ScoutI shall be happy so If someone would help me to transcribe these lines into stander usage of English..
I shall be happy so...
It is only three in the clock we will definately rich there by the time you don't be worry about it ,don't get in to the hasty we will reach there by the time ,so
You got so earlier here
Shaikh wrote: "Thanks for the reply ScoutI shall be happy so If someone would help me to transcribe these lines into stander usage of English..
I shall be happy so...
It is only three in the clock we will..."
Shaikh, you're posting in the wrong threads. You need to make your own thread in the appropriate area. Then perhaps someone will assist you. What you're currently doing is effectively interrupting a conversation.
Perhaps post here: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/group...
I accept friend requests from people I 'know' on Goodreads, and also others - after I've checked their profiles.
Goodreads is primarily for readers therefore for authors (we are readers too) there is another concern on friend requests either offering or receiving. Of course I want readers to be interested in my books, but is this as a friend or a reader/reviewer. If I ask to be friends is this construed as pushy by a reader especially one that has a reputation for reading a lot of books and reviewing them?No answer just another consideration. In general I am very reluctant on any social media to add friends - Linked In etc; however on Goodreads I have tended to be more open - trying to weed out spammers and hoaxers at the same time - again less an issue on Goodreads than other platforms
I actually like to make friends with authors. They are creative people and I admire that.There are quite a few authors in my GR friend list and I enjoy their reviews too.
Scout wrote: "Nik, what's your policy on accepting friend requests? Do you ever send a request?"Yes, I regularly accept friend requests. I sometimes check in "people" section recent reviews to see who's online and send friend requests to people with the sole purpose of inviting them here. I send friend requests to those that put their pic holding wine or beer, as we are likely to find common denominator, people from "exotic" locations, as I find it interesting to hear how things are in Mongolia, Trinidad & Tobago or Antarctic or even just having a hearty smile on their profile page :)
If I find an interesting review and the profile seems agreeable,I send a friend invitation. They have to be active users,though. No point in making friends with someone who logs on to GR after months.
Philip wrote: "Goodreads is primarily for readers therefore for authors (we are readers too) there is another concern on friend requests either offering or receiving. Of course I want readers to be interested in ..."I do accept requests from authors as long as they don't force me to read their books. I had some bad experiences regarding that matter. I'm cautious but not pessimistic about it. It's a sad thing to be honest. I mean, some of the authors would genuinely like to be friends with other readers but the other small percentage of authors have created subtle mistrust among the readers.
Hope that doesn't interfere whenever you want to have new friends.
I have less than 10 friends. I have had requests, but I ignore those who don't have many books listed and barely anything in their profile. Those that do have books, I check to see what we read in common. It doesn't have to be a high percentage; I am mostly interested in trying to figure out the cause of the friend request. I don't spend a lot of time on the computer. I can't say that I have had any conversations with people in goodreads. Most of my interaction is through the threads. If someone active on those threads sends a friend request, I accept those.
I have made very few friend requests myself, and those have been authors. Mostly though, I will just follow people instead of making friend requests.
I have some Goodreads friends I've now met in real life. One of my groups has meet ups. Our last one was in February. We swap books, take a mystery book, (for a hat draw) and chat and eat lunch. It's just lovely.
I have never met any of them in real life.That could become a bit unpredictable.Some have posted YouTube videos,and a few are so different from what I expected.
I am not really that antisocial, I probably have closer to 40 friends. Some are the result of Star Trek. Some such as W. it was Star Trek, but when I checked his books, he is also a John Grisham reader. A couple are friends that I also had on Facebook. Generally, my friends on FB don't match the same profile of what I look for on goodreads. I ignore a lot of friend requests on FB too, because my post are all public. Part of the whole I gave up on internet privacy long before FB started providing choices. Long ago when it was dial up, I was in a Divorce Chat group. We did several meetups. I married one of the guys and 12 years later we were divorced. But, no one was how I pictured them from what they "posted" from the other side of the computer screen. Even those I was in telephone contact with, did not match my image of them when we had a meet up.
Lizzie, ha, ha. Just for the record, I look like my GR photo, albeit with a little less hair now. ;)
And there are some whose photos are from their younger days while they are actually much older.
I have met with one GR friend we have turned into very good friends. We live very close to each other and it just happen we hit it off. I am in touch with a second GR friend that lives nearby and we were trying to arrange a meet, but the virus got in the way. As a standing rule, I am neither for or against meeting people. It depends on the situation and I need to learn about them through their writings before I think about meeting them.
As for accepting friend invitations, I pretty much accept all unless it is obvious there is some problem.
I look nothing like my photo :-) I think I do need to begin adding to my books read list. I read a lot, just don't take the time to add the books to my profile. I occasionally review books if they make an impression on me, but haven't done a lot of that lately, either. I've been lazy. I only ask one question of those who make a friend request: What do we have in common? I'm always interested in the answer. I'm not really concerned with having lots of friends, although I do appreciate the ones I have.
G.R. wrote: "Lizzie, ha, ha. Just for the record, I look like my GR photo, albeit with a little less hair now. ;)"Back in those days, we couldn't even put up photos. Couldn't google a person and find out anything about them. It was risky, but i admit the chatroom was fun.
After the comments about profile photos, mine does look like me, but it is 6 years old. So I uploaded a new one that is from last July. Yes, my photos of me usually involve my car. The rest of the time, it's pics of me and the now 4 year old granddaughter.
What's your attitude? How often do you offer your friendship/accept that of others? Does friend request convey any connotation: of maybe someone looking to sell his/her book/promote some service -:)?