Thursday, May 10, 2007

Advertising on Virtual Communities


The latest issue of Christian Retailing reports on yet another alternative to the Internet communities such as MySpace and Facebook.

Some of you already use
ShoutLife, a Christian community site. This new one is called Lights Together, which launched just last week. Lights Together takes a different approach by allowing the forming of “Webchurches” that will create “virtual congregations.” The site will enable churches to build their own Web sites, which will allow their members access to Lights Together. “Instead of coming in as individuals, they can come in through their church,” said Larry Carpenter, senior vice president of Send the Light, which is handling advertising sales for the site.

Lights Together has gone after sponsors for its site. Tyndale was the first Christian publisher to sign on, although their sponsorship was promised only for the site's beta testing period. LT will be announcing other sponsors soon.

Both ShoutLife and Lights Together provide new Internet sites for advertising within the Christian community. And it looks like the kinds of advertising will only expand with time. For example, in addition to national advertising, Paul McLellan, president of ShoutLife, says his site is implementing a geographic-based advertising program. In this program a local Christian bookstore could target its own clients.

Of course, as far as ShoutLife goes, advertising for books, music, etc. can simply come through establishing your own Web page. I recently put up my own ShoutLife page, but other than that, I've spent little time on the site. Too busy finishing a book right now. I asked the ACFW loop about folks' experiences with ShoutLife, and they were very positive. However, not all you BGs are on the ACFW loop. If you have a site and would like to give us the link, please do. And let us know how your experience with ShoutLife is going. Do you like the community? Do you get traffic? If you're an author, do you have any trackable data that shows it has helped book sales? If you're not an author, why do you have a ShoutLife page? Have you connected with people as you expected?


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Ransomed Dreams by Amy Wallace on blog tour this week.

6 comments:

Christina Tarabochia said...

My link is www.shoutlife.com/christinaberry and I've had a blast. Donna Fleisher encouraged me to join so I did because she was in the military and she could beat me up if I didn't.

As a "pre-published" author, I'm trying to make connections, promote name recognition, and have a little fun in the meantime.

Amy Wallace said...

ShoutLife has been a ton of fun and a great procrastination device to avoid working on marketing. ;-)

My link is http://www.shoutlife.com/amywallace

It's also been a great place to connect with other moms, writers, and homeschoolers and just chat about life and God~ minus the hassle of baby-sitters or long drives. I love the blog especially because I write shorter on there than my regular blog, and it's more immediate feedback too with the guestbook conversations and shoutmail.

Thanks for linking my CFBA tour! I know you're super busy, but since I've been compared to you in a few reviews it'd be kinda fun to hear what you think. ;-) My body count isn't quite as high as yours though.

Rebecca LuElla Miller said...

I just joined this week--heard some chatter about it on the ACFW loop ... LOL

My addy is http://www.shoutlife.com/rebeccaluellamiller

Becky

Anonymous said...

Might want to check out MyChurch as well

Karen said...

My ShoutLife page is www.shoutlife.com/solshine7 - I don't use the site much, mostly to check if I have messages once or twice a week. I prefer MySpace though.

When I first joined ShoutLife loads of people sent me invites to be friends without any kind of message stating what we have in common besides being Christians. So if you're into collecting a bunch of random friends, then go for it. But that's not my style.

If your goal is to reach out to just Christians then ShoutLife seems like the place to be. But MySpace and Facebook.com are the places to reach out to everyone else. I've connected with some cool indie bands and filmmakers through MySpace.

Bottom line: ShoutLife has its purpose, but MySpace fits me better.

Dineen A. Miller said...

Hey Brandilyn,
I made the jump into Shoutlife about week or so ago. I experimenting with "pre-marketing." ;-)

http://www.shoutlife.com/dineenmiller