Today authors have a powerful tool for connecting with readers and marketing their book to a worldwide audience: the Internet. And now it’s easier and cheaper than ever to build an effective author Web site that will serve as a grassroots marketing engine for your book.
Begin thinking about your author Web site long before your book’s publication date. And if at all possible, do this job yourself instead of outsourcing the job. Your Web site can serve as a valuable connection to your readers, and an outside Webmaster will only obstruct this connection.
Where to begin? Here are some basic elements you’ll want to consider:
– Artwork from your book’s cover
– Author biography
– Content related to your book’s topic
– Press Room with announcements of your book, links to reviews and writeups, and suggested interview questions
– A Blog
– Links to purchase your book, either on your site or e-tailers such as Amazon and Barnes & Noble. (The more choices you offer buyers, the better.)
– Reviews of your book.
– A free newsletter (or e-mail subscription to your blog). The useful thing here is that many potential readers won’t make a decision to buy the first time they visit your site. A free newsletter or blog enables you to keep in contact with those potential readers. Chances are, the fifth time they hear about your book, they’ll be ready to buy.
– Contact information for you, such as an e-mail address. Some of the best content ideas for your site will come from visitor inquiries. If you publish a blog on your book’s topic, questions from readers can spark great content. Here’s an example of reader-prompted content from my own “Selling Books” blog.
Next, take a look at some professionally designed author Web sites for recent popular books. Consider the most effective elements and how you might add them to your own site. Here are some of my favorites:
Freakonomics by Levitt. I like the clean, spare design — a refreshing change from most Web sites. Across the top of the page are links to book reviews, articles, the author’s blog, contact information, and a button for buying the book. On the left is a menu of public appearances, where to get book-related merchandise like T-shirts, and a plug for the author’s e-mail newsletter. This site appears simple, yet covers many bases — for example, many folks misspell the book’s title as “Freakanomics.” No problem, Levitt (or his publisher) also purchased the domain name of the misspelling, and traffic going there is seamlessly forwarded to the correct domain.
All Marketers are Liars by Godin. Again, a refreshingly uncluttered design. Everything on the home page fits exactly, no scrolling required. But the visitor is just one link from an array of content, including the author’s popular blog. More than perhaps any other author, Godin displays generous samples of his book, and in one case (Unleashing the Ideavirus) posted the entire book as a free download. The strategy worked — the book was downloaded zillions of times, and the resulting buzz generated sales of the book.
Like many authors, Godin has a separate site for each book, and each of those book sites links to his blog.
“Manhunt” author James L. Swanson’s site features a slick video tour of the Abraham Lincoln memorabilia on display in his home. Certainly this is a high-budget project, but niche authors can add a simple audio file to their site for compelling multimedia on a low budget. Check out the audio file on author Lissa Warren’s site. It’s merely a short tape of her reciting the basic marketing pitch for her book, but the undeniable authenticity and passion in her voice comes through. After one listen, visitors know they’ll benefit from reading her book.
Lest you think a Web site is too complicated, here’s a site by seven-year-old prodigy Adora Svitak, who has written more than 300 short stories. Surely if a seven-year-old can do it, we adults can too.
Where should you start? Just a few years ago, building a Web site was a mind-boggling challenge for anyone without advanced computer skills. But now most Web hosting companies have pre-built templates where you can quickly post some text and images online without having to program anything. A typical starter package is offered by Yahoo, which allows you to design your own site using a simple wizard for less than $9 a month.
These days free hosting options are available also. But if you’re serious about this for the long-term, you’ll want to register and maintain your own domain, so that the links to your site you accumulate over time will remain with you.
Many authors are blogging these days, and here’s a list of top author blogs as rated by The Internet Writing Journal. A wider array of blogs – both professional and not-so-professional — can be viewed at Authors’ Blogs.
It may seem a big challenge at first, but in the long run, if you have an active hand in the design and development of your site, it will be easier for you to improve and change the site as time goes along. If you do hire a designer to design and maintain your site, make sure to obtain your login name and password. Otherwisee, if your Web designer quits or leaves the business, you might be stuck without a way to update your site.
If you’re thinking about hiring a top flight design team that works especially with authors check out this site.
One thing to keep in mind about author Web sites: The ones that spark book sales aren’t all about the author. Instead, they’re about what the author (and their book) can do for the reader. All of the fanciest, high-tech bells and whistles won’t mean a thing if the reader doesn’t see what’s in it for them.
Also, graphically rich and beautifully designed sites aren’t necessarily effective because they aren’t search engine-friendly. If you want free traffic coming to your site, it must have fresh content that can be spidered by Google, Yahoo, and the other search engines. Your keyword placement and density will determine how effective a marketing tool your Web site will be.
When you begin your Web site, think first of what your end goal will be. What sort of content and information do you want people to get from your site? How will people discover your site, why will they come, and what will they do when they reach it? Think all this issues through, and this will guide your site’s development.
When should you launch your site? There’s no rule saying you must wait until your book’s publication date. Launching your site beforehand will enable you to fine-tune the site based on visitor feedback. In fact, many savvy authors now launch their site a full year or more before their book is finished. Publishing a blog on your book’s topic will get your creative juices flowing and let you see which topics prompt the most visits and interests from visitors.
How to build an author Web site that sells your book
Today authors have a powerful tool for connecting with readers and marketing their book to a worldwide audience: the Internet. And now it’s easier and cheaper than ever to build an effective author Web site that will serve as a grassroots marketing engine for your book.
Begin thinking about your author Web site long before your book’s publication date. And if at all possible, do this job yourself instead of outsourcing the job. Your Web site can serve as a valuable connection to your readers, and an outside Webmaster will only obstruct this connection.
Where to begin? Here are some basic elements you’ll want to consider:
– Artwork from your book’s cover
– Author biography
– Content related to your book’s topic
– Press Room with announcements of your book, links to reviews and writeups, and suggested interview questions
– A Blog
– Links to purchase your book, either on your site or e-tailers such as Amazon and Barnes & Noble. (The more choices you offer buyers, the better.)
– Reviews of your book.
– A free newsletter (or e-mail subscription to your blog). The useful thing here is that many potential readers won’t make a decision to buy the first time they visit your site. A free newsletter or blog enables you to keep in contact with those potential readers. Chances are, the fifth time they hear about your book, they’ll be ready to buy.
– Contact information for you, such as an e-mail address. Some of the best content ideas for your site will come from visitor inquiries. If you publish a blog on your book’s topic, questions from readers can spark great content. Here’s an example of reader-prompted content from my own “Selling Books” blog.
Next, take a look at some professionally designed author Web sites for recent popular books. Consider the most effective elements and how you might add them to your own site. Here are some of my favorites:
Freakonomics by Levitt. I like the clean, spare design — a refreshing change from most Web sites. Across the top of the page are links to book reviews, articles, the author’s blog, contact information, and a button for buying the book. On the left is a menu of public appearances, where to get book-related merchandise like T-shirts, and a plug for the author’s e-mail newsletter. This site appears simple, yet covers many bases — for example, many folks misspell the book’s title as “Freakanomics.” No problem, Levitt (or his publisher) also purchased the domain name of the misspelling, and traffic going there is seamlessly forwarded to the correct domain.
All Marketers are Liars by Godin. Again, a refreshingly uncluttered design. Everything on the home page fits exactly, no scrolling required. But the visitor is just one link from an array of content, including the author’s popular blog. More than perhaps any other author, Godin displays generous samples of his book, and in one case (Unleashing the Ideavirus) posted the entire book as a free download. The strategy worked — the book was downloaded zillions of times, and the resulting buzz generated sales of the book.
Like many authors, Godin has a separate site for each book, and each of those book sites links to his blog.
“Manhunt” author James L. Swanson’s site features a slick video tour of the Abraham Lincoln memorabilia on display in his home. Certainly this is a high-budget project, but niche authors can add a simple audio file to their site for compelling multimedia on a low budget. Check out the audio file on author Lissa Warren’s site. It’s merely a short tape of her reciting the basic marketing pitch for her book, but the undeniable authenticity and passion in her voice comes through. After one listen, visitors know they’ll benefit from reading her book.
Lest you think a Web site is too complicated, here’s a site by seven-year-old prodigy Adora Svitak, who has written more than 300 short stories. Surely if a seven-year-old can do it, we adults can too.
Where should you start? Just a few years ago, building a Web site was a mind-boggling challenge for anyone without advanced computer skills. But now most Web hosting companies have pre-built templates where you can quickly post some text and images online without having to program anything. A typical starter package is offered by Yahoo, which allows you to design your own site using a simple wizard for less than $9 a month.
These days free hosting options are available also. But if you’re serious about this for the long-term, you’ll want to register and maintain your own domain, so that the links to your site you accumulate over time will remain with you.
Many authors are blogging these days, and here’s a list of top author blogs as rated by The Internet Writing Journal. A wider array of blogs – both professional and not-so-professional — can be viewed at Authors’ Blogs.
It may seem a big challenge at first, but in the long run, if you have an active hand in the design and development of your site, it will be easier for you to improve and change the site as time goes along. If you do hire a designer to design and maintain your site, make sure to obtain your login name and password. Otherwisee, if your Web designer quits or leaves the business, you might be stuck without a way to update your site.
If you’re thinking about hiring a top flight design team that works especially with authors check out this site.
One thing to keep in mind about author Web sites: The ones that spark book sales aren’t all about the author. Instead, they’re about what the author (and their book) can do for the reader. All of the fanciest, high-tech bells and whistles won’t mean a thing if the reader doesn’t see what’s in it for them.
Also, graphically rich and beautifully designed sites aren’t necessarily effective because they aren’t search engine-friendly. If you want free traffic coming to your site, it must have fresh content that can be spidered by Google, Yahoo, and the other search engines. Your keyword placement and density will determine how effective a marketing tool your Web site will be.
When you begin your Web site, think first of what your end goal will be. What sort of content and information do you want people to get from your site? How will people discover your site, why will they come, and what will they do when they reach it? Think all this issues through, and this will guide your site’s development.
When should you launch your site? There’s no rule saying you must wait until your book’s publication date. Launching your site beforehand will enable you to fine-tune the site based on visitor feedback. In fact, many savvy authors now launch their site a full year or more before their book is finished. Publishing a blog on your book’s topic will get your creative juices flowing and let you see which topics prompt the most visits and interests from visitors.
Related posts: