First I would like to say thank you to all of Puppets and Stuff for the warm welcoming.

My Story:

I recently started a sock puppet blog called www.checkinginwiththecharlestons.blogspot.com for a school project at California State University East Bay.  The project is for students to get familiar with blogging and social networking.  But anyways, I chose to blog about sock puppets, however, I have no experience with the puppet community or industry.  Working with the sock puppets has actually been very fun and I think I would like to keep the blog going outside of class.

I was wondering if you could suggest any websites, facebooks, twitters, I should associate myself with in order to get the word out.  

Will you be using different story lines for the puppets, or basically what you are doing with them now. You might want to consider Blogtv http://www.blogtv.com and start a live broadcast show perhaps interviewing people around town on different topics of interest. Once you get established you just link to others websites. I think you are off to a good start just change things a bit.

Sock version of  the show "Dirty Jobs" or something along that line.......... or a talk show.

Billy D.

You can try the other puppet community: http://www.puppethub.com. Surprisingly enough, there's not a lot of crossover between who's on there and who's on here.

Well facebook and twitter two excellent choices. Both Billie's and Na's suggestions are very good also depending on the direction you want to move with this.  The important thing is if you are going to connect up with these other sites, is to stay active on them.

Shawn is right about staying active.......................... I use to be more active. My goal was to be on page one when I searched "SS Puppets" Na keeps very active updating her website and keeping involved in different areas of puppetry. You can pretty much do a search for most anything puppet related and you will see her website.
If you stat active the Bots will pick up on it.


Billy D.

Na keeps very active updating her website and keeping involved in different areas of puppetry. You can pretty much do a search for most anything puppet related and you will see her website.
If you stat active the Bots will pick up on it. Billy D.

Whilst this is true, it doesn't work for quite like what you explain. The reason my site comes up in most puppet-related searches is because I post content designed for that search: ie. someone searches for free patterns, I post stuff on freebies. I tailor my content to suit the search. Getting visible on searches is quite easy if you're posting 'generic' stuff, but for the most part, an individual's blog isn't generic, but rather personal. It's probably better in this particular case to try to make connections (and a personable and interesting style of writing that people can connect with) amongst interested puppeteers or theatrically-minded people.

I can guarantee you most of my site traffic are drive-by viewers who never come back again. A blog on the other hand should develop a following, people who are interested in the story of your antics/life. Behind-the-scenes stories, explanations of how you did things, photos, etc. are what most people are interested in reading and will be what they come back for.

Na is correct. While it is true that links to your site on other sites can help you some in search engines the content is really the important thing. Keeping that content fresh and new is also important. Not only does it create a following that well come back and visit again search engines like "active" sites.