If you’re in Ontario and blog about books you’re going to want to be a part of this group, The Ontario Blog Squad. Jen from Lost in the Library explains how the group got started:
I’ve been blogging for over a year and although reading and reviewing are an integral part of that process, so is social networking. You can ask most bloggers, about the necessity to have a presence on twitter or Facebook (sometimes both). Not only is it a way to increase traffic to your blog, but it’s also a way to connect to others who have the same passion as you do. Who understand those seemingly insurmountable to-read piles. Who squeal at cover reveals, and book trailers, and author sightings and signings.
There is a large and popular book blogging presence in the States, they even a have a yearly Blogger Conference and I felt that surely we could have the same presence in Canada. What better way to connect and network than in person?
I announced on Twitter, this past summer that I was going to plan a blogger meet-up and asked for anyone interested in helping to contact me. I was hoping for one or two and was pleasantly surprised at the seven amazing bloggers who stepped up to help:
Liz from Midnight Bloom Reads, Nicole for All I Ever Read, Angel from Mermaid Visions, Christa from Hooked on Books, Jackie from My Ever Expanding Library, Wendy from A Cupcake and a Latte, and Mel from He Followed Me Home, Can I Keep Him.
We started meeting online, picked a date, called ourselves The Ontario Blog Squad, created a logo and a website and things just started rolling. We were overwhelmed with the publisher support and when tickets became available and then were gone in a couple of days we were astounded at the response. Over the next several weeks we planned and then were able to finally meet in person the morning of the event to put together the final details and get the “goodie bags” generously donated to us by many publishers together.
On Saturday November 5th 2011, at the Duke of York in Toronto, 38 Book Bloggers came together for an afternoon of food, drinks, book talk, networking and finally a chance to meet each other. It was wonderful to have so many book lovers in one place! Our hope is that this will be the beginning of a supportive network of friends. We hope to have a larger venue next year so we can accommodate more attendees, authors and publishers.
For more information about the event visit us at http://ontarioblogsquad.blogspot.com/
Jen