Let's Talk About... Social Media

I'm the first to admit I'm not especially social media savvy. I've had a Facebook for years but have never found all that much interest in it. If you were to look at my profile, you'd see I don't ever post on it and I only like book pages to keep up to date with bookish news. Normally, I log on and look at what people post without liking or saying a single thing.

But, when I started a blog I knew I needed to maintain a slightly larger profile on social media. So I've got a Twitter, a Facebook page, and everything in between. And while I really try on Twitter to interact with others, some days are better than others for me, and there are still spans of time when I don't tweet anything aside from post announcements for days. The same goes with the Facebook page. I go through spells where I post a lot there, but for the most part it simply acts to display new posts here. The only social network that I really interact on, like, at all, is Goodreads. But there I'm acting less in my blogging identity and more as myself.

Here's why I think I'm not so good at social media: As friendly and effusive as I am in person and in discussion, I'm pretty darn shy. I'm generally not going to walk up to you and strike up a conversation. I'm awful at small talk. And I feel much the same online. It's one thing for me to write a post up for the blog and post it. It's another to tweet at someone I've never talked to before and hope they'll reply. (This is why I love the people who tweet at me first, even just a reply to something I've said. Seriously, y'all make my day and I loveeee you.) So even when I'm reaching out to people in the role of "blogger", I'm still carrying this baggage of being unsure. Even so, I love having conversations with people on Twitter. I love how easy it is and how easily accessible it makes people, especially authors.

The gist: I'm shy and scared to talk to you first, but I love to talk. I even feel awkward commenting on blogs I rarely comment on or have never commented on, but I'm really working on the commenting. :)

How engaged with social media are you? I know many people find it integral to their daily life--is this you? Do you feel awkward in those interactions like I do?