A few weeks ago, an author friend of mine was preparing a proposal for his new book. He called to ask me what social media stats he should include. In other words, what would be meaningful to prospective publishers? This is a great question.

Agents and publishers are looking for authors with meaningful platforms. Most look at specific social media stats as a proxy for this. These stats include those specifically related to blogging, Facebook, and Twitter.

Although I’ve been blogging since 2005, I still feel like a newbie, sometimes. For years, I’ve wondered, “Why is nobody reading what I’m writing?” Maybe you’ve asked the same question.

I’m beginning to discover the answer. It has to do with community.

As a blogger, I love getting comments. This is one major way in which blogging is different from all other forms of writing. You get near-instant feedback. This is tremendously gratifying, but it can also be a challenge to keep up with them.

Over the last six months, I have seen my average number of comments per post double. This has been due, I think, to four reasons:

I follow more than 200 blogs. I am often asked, “How do you do it? That would take me forever!” It would me, too—if I tried to visit all of these blogs daily. But using an RSS Reader, I can stay current by spending less than 30 minutes a day.

In this post, I want to show you how to set up Google Reader and then use it to keep up with your favorite blogs. This is not a post for “power users,” though even they might pick up a tip or two. It is intended for novices—people who are not even sure what RSS is.

Whether you like it or not, people are talking about you, your brand, or your organization online. Right now. Do you know what they are saying? Do you like what they are saying?

As I have outlined previously, one important component of a social media strategy is building an “outpost.” This is a sort of intelligence agency or “listening station” that allows you to monitor online conversations. Anytime someone says anything about my company—or me—online, I know within minutes.

This morning as I was running, I listened to Episode 99 of the Catalyst Podcast. It was an interview that Brad Lomenick did with Charlene Li, author of the new book, Open Leadership.

One thing in particular grabbed my attention. Brad asked her what has changed in the last two to three years in terms of social media. She said,

It’s inevitable. If you are successful as a blogger, people are going to steal your content. You’ll wake up one morning to a Google Alert, notifying you that your name was mentioned on another blog.

Great, you’ll think, I love free publicity. I also know that “inbound links” help increase my search engine rankings.

I find myself increasingly speaking on the topic of social media. I’m not a guru or an expert, by any means. I am just a practitioner who is learning through trial and error.

Yesterday morning, I presented my company’s experience with social media at an event sponsored by Vanderbilt’s Owen Graduate School of Business. I presented three social media examples: (1) blogging, (2) twitter, and (3) user-generated product reviews.

I began blogging in April 2004. (I actually began writing articles and posting them on my Web site in 1998, but that was before we used the term “blogging.”) Since that time, I have posted 344 entries. At an average of 800 words per post (which, for me, is conservative), that is 275,200 words—almost four 256-page books.

During this time, I have learned a good deal about blogging. I’m sure I still have a long way to go, but I thought I would summarize what I have learned so far: