Despite its increased popularity in Latin/South America, Myspace is no longer the no.1 social networking site in the United States having just lost their place at the top of the rankings in the past ten months to Facebook. Their market share has shrunk so dramatically they even laid off 30% of its workforce in June. 

So should you create your own space on Myspace? 

Myspace is great for certain niche markets such as the entertainment industry.  That’s why their login page always features celebrities, burgeoning rock bands, comedians and upcoming movie releases. It’s also a cheap alternative for unpublished writers to create a buzz/name for themselves before they sell their first book without shelling out any money for a full blown website. 

(a hunky comment from author Paige Tyler) 

I had  a Myspace profile for 2 years now despite my love/hate relationship with social networking and the site’s weakening visitor numbers.  My reason for my Myspace loyalty?  Well, it’s easier to add or find friends on Myspace compared to Facebook because Facebookers are much more selective when it comes to accepting a friendship connection or joining a fan page.  

Hmm…I wonder if its because people don’t want to junk up their pristine profile page with something or someone they personally don’t know or don’t really like? Or maybe it’s because they don’t want to expend the energy trying to keep up with people they don’t talk to on a regular basis.   I will admit the latter is one of the main reasons I only have 27 friends on my personal FB page.  And all of them are either family or really, really close friends who I speak to on a daily basis.  None of them are former high school or college classmates or people from my job or within the writing industry.

(a little Valentine’s Day humor from author Lila Dipasqua)

Sorry, I went window shopping. 

Despite Myspace’s tanking numbers, I don’t have any plans to abandon my  Myspace profile.  I’ve found Myspace is another great way to promote who I am and hopefully sell books because according to my free Myspace tracker MixxMap, my profile outpaces my website in not only page views, but monthly unique visitors by a whopping 125%. 

(a nice pick me up from a myspace friend)

I also don’t want to give up my homepage because of the amount of people, almost 2,800, I’ve befriended and the relationships I’ve developed with many of them.  I also like to use my profile to re-engage readers by inviting them to off site chats or special events on the Scribes Unleashed Yahoo Group, promote my back list and current releases, increase my visibility on the search engines, simply receive a morality boost from readers who’ve enjoyed my books. And the hot hunk comments aren’t bad either;p

(a sweet birthday wish from a reader)

Which brings me to the crux of social networking.  Like any other profile/website, if you aren’t actively using it, it’s nothing but a static web page.  And everyone hates going onto a person’s profile they haven’t logged into since 2005.  In a nutshell, the more you use Myspace the more SEO value you’ll receive from it. So how can you use your Mspace page to promote myself as an author or promote my books? 

Here’s a few tips:

*Seek out groups and communities that are interesting in reading or books and join them.

*Post your book trailer in the Myspace Video section which will further your reach

*Friend people who share an interest in your product or service.  Just don’t go out willy nilly and just add anyone.  Add people who are readers and not just someone who wants to become “Myspace popular”

*Post, post, post.  Keep your profile page current with news about upcoming releases, special promotions with your publishers,

*Direct people to your other networking sites, publishers, and official website. 

*Use your blog to give potential readers a taste of your writing. 

*Read other people’s Myspace blog’s and leave a comment.  You never know who’ll come and visit and be curious enough to visit your profile

*Post comments on other’s Myspace profiles.  I can’t tell you how many people have requested my friendship after doing this. 

Okay, now that you know a few Myspace SEO basics, I have to warn you that Myspace can also be a time drain.  Trust me, I found this out the hard way! So, to save you time and heartache, I would sign up on ping.fm so all of your status updates and blog posts can be sent out all at once with one easy click.  I have about 30 social networking/bookmarking sites signed up currently for my 9-5 job. 

If you need help gathering friends, you can use a paid application like Open Adder  or Friend Blaster Pro or a any number of free ones out there.  These applications are great for finding people who match your ideal reader.  Remember its quality not quantity.  An added bonus of these applications is their ability to distribute comments and messages to all of your friends without you having to post the same message hundreds of times.  Unfortunately, they can’t invite people to special events you’ve planned.

So, whether you decide to use Myspace or abandon it, just remember like any social networking site, you have to use it or you’ll lose it:) Which reminds me, I need to roll up my sleeves and do something with my new Facebook author profile:(

Who are Myspacers?

• 51% are male
• 64% don’t have a college degree
• 58% are 18-34
• 61% are Caucasian and 24% are African American
• 44% Have incomes of 30K-60K

statistics provided by Quancast

 Stay tuned for ”How to Squeeze More Out of YouTube!”