Publishers and authors alike used to talk quite a bit about Goodreads, the social cataloging website for book lovers. It was a great place for discovering books, authors, book clubs, book discussions, and more. Thus, it made perfect sense for us authors to set up our author-profiles there, request reader reviews, conduct book giveaways (which used to be free), and otherwise be active on the platform.
But after Amazon purchased Goodreads a few years back, and — in addition to introducing a number of bugs — made questionable decisions like limiting communication between authors and readers, monetizing features that were previously free, and severing Facebook logins (which locked a lot of longtime users out of their accounts), the site lost a lot of its appeal. While I’ve continued to encourage our authors to have a Goodreads presence, I haven’t hyped the website as much as I used to.
This begs the question: Does Goodreads still matter?
The answer is YES.
Here’s why…