Getting started »

When I first joined social media many years ago, I had no idea the impact social media would have on networking and relationships. With the knowledge I have now, I would’ve definitely made better use of the early days.

This was during the days when Myspace was the most popular site and we adults were trying to market ourselves in the midst of teenagers trying to date and artists trying to promote their music.

At that time, I was a freelance writer and entertainment blogger with an “idea” for a book. I hadn’t yet published a novel, but I knew that it was something I wanted to do.

My focus was different then. I was casually blogging and trying to figure out how I was going to weave my idea for a story into a full manuscript. I knew that I needed to engage my audience, but I’d never seen anyone do it to know how to do it for myself.

My participation on Myspace was really from the perspective of fun and not business. So while I did market my blog, I used the site as most others did, perusing pages, reading questionnaires (remember those?) and browsing photos.

It was only around 2008 when I migrated over to Facebook, I quickly realized the potential of social media.

And THAT was when I started taking social media seriously.

The rest as they say, is history…

Tomorrow I will discuss how my interaction on social media sites changed. In the meantime, how has your attitude towards social media changed since the days of Myspace and the earlier social media sites? What were your early experiences? If you had a book, were you using social media to market it? Were you setting the groundwork for your novel? Please share in the comment section below.