This was benificial for someone like me who is new to net galley. I am enjoying it but this answered so many questions for a new reviewer like myself

Thanks for all the recent guides, Netgalley! I appreciate the help and support for your users, especially those of us who are long-term and always looking for ways to improve!

I found this guide to be very helpful. I am always looking for ways to improve my reviews, especially for audiobooks; so I especially appreciated the pointers for reviews, The examples provided were clear. The entire guide provided for a quick read and it was packed full of helpful information. Thank you @netgalley for providing this.

This is a much more thorough updated and revised version of the Book Advocate Toolkit. I appreciate that there are links to request tips, information about using the NetGalley Shelf App, and links to resources. They also explain the feature known as "the orange pencil", and what to do if you DNF a book. I also see that there is a Social Media Toolkit coming soon, and I am really looking forward to that!

Thanks NetGalley/We Are Bookish!

Not sure how to use NetGalley? Fear not. The book advocate toolkit is here!

I love NetGalley but have made many newbie mistakes upon requesting and reviewing ARCs from some of my favorite publishers. I like the layout of the newly revised guide making it easy to navigate topics of relevance. I found the embedded YouTube and NetGalley links providing additional in-depth help and content to be extremely useful. My favorites are the review tips, FAQs, and Do’s & Don’ts. The table of contents will direct you to a section of interest or it can read straight through it in less than 1 day if not 1 hour.

This is an excellent toolkit. With only 31 pages, it’s short and concise with helpful visuals on every page. I would highly recommend this to new users on NetGalley. Wish I had downloaded and read it sooner!

Thank you for this excellent resource, especially for those new to NetGalley. Thank you NetGalley for this advanced copy.

Love this guide! I’m new to reviewing and this was exactly what I needed to help with my bio and reviews. I will be using all the wonderful information to redo my bio to be more specific and offer the information publishers are looking for.

This is extremely useful. Even though I have used NetGalley for years I found some new and helpful information. I am going to keep this saved on my computer so I can consult when needed.

This was a nicely organized toolkit with actionable tips! I appreciated the links to longer articles to learn more about each recommendation. I especially appreciated the tips on how to write a critical review. Looking forward to the social media toolkit!

This article really helped me to get a better understanding of how NetGalley works which was very helpful since I was in hard time trying publishers to approve my book requests, now I feel more confident to ask for request knowing the multiple tips and tricks this article provides.

As a newer NetGalley member and reviewer, I found this extremely helpful! I wish I knew about it a few months ago when I first joined so I could have ensured I was at the top of my game from the start!

Very helpful and succinct advice for creating a successful profile on Netgallery. Thank you for the helpful advice.

The newly updated and revised NetGalley's Book Advocate Toolkit resulted in a thoughtful and very user-friendly update to this essential beginner's guide for new reviewers. I found a few items that were either new to this version, or improved upon from the previous version I read. I love how clear this toolkit is and all the really helpful links to further resources, blog posts, and the knowledge base. All the links I tried worked perfectly for me. This is an absolute must-read for anyone new to book reviewing and/or new to NetGalley.

Super useful information that will definitely help a lot, thanks for providing this guide! I highly recommend it to anyone who has recently discovered the site and is confused about how to proceed :)

Great resource with tips and tricks on how to get the most out of NetGalley and how to write reviews.

This has a ton of great information and advice and o n how to be successful on Netgalley. Also included is a diagram of navigating the netgalley website.
Very informational!

I decided to take a direct and straightforward approach to reviewing the 2024 ToolKit, as I've spent a lot of time being very frustrated with Netgalley and publishers since I started back in 2021 and over the last year I've met and talked to so many people who have experienced the same feelings, have dropped out because of those feelings, are afraid to sign up because of those feelings, are lost as to what to do once they come on here, authors who are afraid to sign up here, and people who just don't understand the purpose of Netgalley in general or think it is contributing to the issue of stolen books.

So as I read through the 2024 Advocate ToolKit I simply wrote up notes as they came to mind. Yes, this is probably going to come across as brisk and maybe brash, but I think some things need to be said.

1. While I love the new "About You" section, it's very bare bones and doesn't match what publishers have told me about the section in the past. I have a thought that maybe Netgalley should reach out to different publicists that work with Netgalley and ask for some of the things those publicists look for on profiles that we readers may not think to put on there. For example: Goodreads stats. One publisher told me I should put down how many titles I've read, how many I've reviewed, and my average star rating. I also think Netgalley should publish a tutorial on how which social media stats to look for on each app/website and where to find them, because just like Netgalley has different user types so does sites like Instagram.

2. While telling us readers what publishers are looking for via the Book Advocate Toolkit is great, there is information out there telling us different that Netgalley may not be aware of. Someone claiming to work as a publicist came into the Netgalley Reviewers group on Facebook within the last three months or so with screenshots that show they don't actually see our "About You" section at all when they are looking for early readers. I have one or more of those screenshots saved, but they only show pure numbers and basic stats like birth date and reader ratio. This is just to let it be known there is disinformation and crosstalk out there about what is or is not available for publicists to see when they are searching for readers.

3. Note: The Weekly Checklist also lets you know if books you have submitted a Wish for have become available for review. This is not stated in the Toolkit.

4. If you're going to assert that potential readers can search by ISBN, it would benefit everyone to state how many digits the ISBN number should be since there are two different ISBN systems.

5. Your FAQ is misleading and will give new members false hope. You're presenting a best case scenario when it's most likely publicists are working off of some algorithm that tells them which sort of readers to pick. I have a 60% reader ratio and rarely get turned down (let's face it, Berkley turns down just about everyone). I've seen members with 90% reader ratio get turned down for titles I get approved for. Some publishers don't have approval preferences on their profiles at all. Some publishers don't even have their own pages because they're a smaller imprint under a larger imprint. Some publishers don't even tell you why they rejected you.

6. There needs to be a section on the times when you don't initially get access to a book but then it becomes "Read Now" and then you can access the title. I forget what circumstances lead to that miracle, but it needs to be talked about. The issue of being declined for a title in any way and then not being able to access it as a "Read Now" title also needs to be rectified. It shouldn't be a double standard that one group of people who didn't have access to a title can then suddenly access it when it shifts accessibility.

7. There should be a section in the Toolkit that explicitly states how simply reiterating the summary of the book from other websites or the back of the book is not a review.

8. It's nice to see information on when to post your reviews in the ToolKit.

9. It would be nice to see a section in the ToolKit about how prioritizing your mental and physical health is okay and a valid reason to DNF titles. I've seen so many fellow reviewers who are afraid to DNF when they are ill or experiencing mental tribulations because they're afraid of how it'll be perceived, and no one should fear prioritizing their wellbeing over book reviewing.

Newcomers and long-time NetGalley-ers alike will find this guide helpful with how-tos, tips, and reminders for making the NetGalley experience optimal and engaging.

I've been a member of NetGalley for many years and have seen really helpful changes and new organizational options on the site come about. I'm always open for tips on ways to do it better and have more helpful tools at my disposal. The NetGalley's Book Advocate Toolkit was a review for me with not so much new info as reminders of what is available. I can see it being a good resource for those who are new or haven't had much chance to explore their options.

I liked the detailed graphics that pointed out what the description was saying and the bite-sized bits of information that made it an easy guide to read. Quick read in 30 pages.

All around good help and a gift to those utilizing the site.

Thank you so much for providing such a fantastic toolkit for us reviewers! Although I've been using Netgalley for about 10 years now, I still find these toolkit so helpful and informative!

This was really helpful! I've been a reviewer for a few years, but it's always a good idea to update skills and knowledge. Thank you!