Does blogging sell books?

Does blogging sell books? This is the question every author who blogs wants an answer to. Well, I have my own opinion and I believe that the answer is yes, but not for the obvious reason of exposure.

 I believe authors who blog become better writers because unlike fiction, which requires the writer to immerse themselves into their imagination, blogging, which is mostly nonfiction, requires a different type of thought process. Blogging forces the fiction writer into another genre.

Blogging helps to sell books simply because it makes a better author of those books. If I stumble upon an author blog and I like the material the author blogs about I will take a look at the books they’ve written. I concede to the notion that the quality of blog posts indicates the quality of the manuscripts written.

Blogging allows the author to share daily updates of their works, engaging their readers into the process of writing the book itself. It allows reclusive writers the chance to interact with their fans without ever leaving the safety of their writer’s cave. Blogging sells books not because of exposure, but because it humanizes the author whose writing the books. It brings the writer’s soul into the mind of the reader and there is no better way of gaining a following than that.

I started my blog a few years ago and was delighted when I got my first follower. I remember when my page view counter hit one thousand and I nearly burst into tears of joy. I couldn’t believe that absolute strangers were interested in and reading my posts. Now, at well over a quarter million hits with an average page view of two hundred to five hundred hits per day, I find that I get as much pleasure out of interacting with my followers as I do writing my fiction. And at the end of the day it makes more people interested in the books that I’ve written.