Amazon cuts Associates compensation

Amazon.com will cut Associates referral fees beginning in April. The new commission plan eliminates premiums for "direct links," but raises referral rates for affiliates bringing in more than 20 sales per quarter.

Amazon's Associates program -- called an "affiliate" program by many Internet companies -- rewards Web site owners who link to Amazon's site. When those links result in purchases, Amazon pays a referral fee.

In the past, Amazon has paid higher referral fees when Associates linked to a specific book or other product, and this resulted in sales. Web site owners who made most of their commissions from these "direct links" will probably earn less during the next quarter. Meanwhile, smaller Web sites who send Amazon untargeted traffic generated through banner adds or search boxes might see their commissions go up slightly.

When Amazon launched its Associates program several years ago, it paid a 15-percent commission on sales resulting from direct links. But as the company continued its practice of deep discounting, it has reduced affiliate commissions as well. Now the top rate paid to high-volume Associates will be just 8.5 percent.

But sellers of consumer electronics are taking the biggest hit. Under the new structure, electronics sellers will earn just a flat 4 percent, regardless of unit volume.

"While keeping the new rate competitive, this decision was necessary to maintain a healthy Associates program over the long term," Amazon said in a message sent to affiliates this afternoon.

Three keys to an affiliate program at your author Web site

Self-published authors know they can benefit from having a Web site. It's free publicity for your book. But did you know that adding affiliate links to your Web site will enable you to bring in more cash, without any extra effort?

A good affiliate program provides these benefits to your author or book Web site:

-- Extra cash for no additional work or costs.

-- Side income from customers who buy additional items with yours

-- Added perceived value in your site's content and service

I'll give a practical example of how this has worked on my Web site. A few weeks ago, I published this book review on a book directly related to my site's topic. My honest appraisal of the book was solid content for my audience. They understood I read it carefully along with competing books, and could assess its value to them.

In my article text, the book's title contains a hyperlink to Amazon.com containing my affiliate code. (Amazon calls this its "Associates Program" but everybody else on the Internet calls them "affiliate" programs.) When my readers follow the link to the book on Amazon and purchase one, I receive a referral fee from Amazon. The exact percentage varies from around 5 percent to 8 percent, depending on exactly how the customer did the transaction. In any case, in the three weeks since my review was posted, eight readers have purchased copies of the book, resulting in commissions of $6.23. And a couple of folks have purchased an additional book at the same time, resulting in a couple of additional commission dollars, for a total of some $8.50.

Of course $8.50 isn't earth-shattering. But the point is, it's additional income generated during the normal course of my business, with no extra effort or distractions. And as long as I leave my book review posted on my Web site, it will continue generating income, so long as people read it and then purchase the book.

No doubt these affiliate programs are good deals for the Web site owner, as well as for retailers like Amazon. The participating Web site sends Amazon qualified customers, and in turn Amazon splits part of its profit.

If you're a fan of Barnes & Noble, they operate a similar affiliate program, and I use links to it from my site as well.

This example, a book review, involved a bit of creative work. But there are other examples that require less time and effort. For example, let's imagine that you have an Amazon Listmania list including a dozen books related to your book's content. On Amazon's site, your list pops up as free advertising for people searching and browsing around in your book's topic area. In your list, you recommend top-quality books in the topic area (along with your own, of course!).

On your Web site, however, the Listmania list can help you in a slightly different way. You might display a series of thumbnail images of the book covers down the side margin of your site. You set up your site to take readers who click on the book covers to a book description on your site, or directly to Amazon's product page.

In addition to linking to specific books on Amazon's site, you can use other referral techniques as well. If you wish, you can also display Amazon banner ads supplied by its Associates program. This strategy enables new sites without big traffic to attract real, paying banner ads. You'll also be able to insert a search box on your site, enabling you to collect referral fees from readers who make a purchase after using your search box.

When a reader follows your link to Amazon, a 24-hour session is begun, and you may receive commissions for purchases they make during that session. In most cases you'll get around 5 percent, so if someone purchases a $20 book, your referral fee is about $1.

For more information on the Amazon program, see http://www.amazon.com/associates. There you'll find instructions for joining the program and the code you'll need to insert on your Web pages. And, if you need more advice about the Amazon Associates program, see their discussion board. Also, the book Amazon Hacks contains an extensive section on using the Amazon Associates program on your site.

For book authors, Amazon's affiliate program is a solid choice for three reasons:

-- It's one of the oldest, best-performing and most reputable affiliate programs on the Internet. When you're putting your reputation on the line, you want to use a good affiliate program.

-- It's particularly effective for referral sales of media products such as books, audiobooks, and videos. Anyone accustomed to purchasing merchandise online is familiar with Amazon.

Four ways to become known as an 'expert' on your book's topic

As they say, "information wants to be free." And one of the best way to promote your nonfiction book is to give away information -- become known as an online expert in your topic.

The benefits of expert status are enormous: you may be frequently quoted in industry and trade publications devoted in your field, cementing your credibility.

Internet users are constantly searching for information to solve problems. And the people who are searching for free information are prime candidates for buying even more of that information from someone recognized as an expert.

You can build your reputation in three main ways:

-- Post question-and-answer content on your blog or Web site. Take the best questions you receive from readers and post them on your Web site or blog, along with your answer. Or compile them into an FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) section on your site.

Offer book excerpts or sample chapters available as a PDF download from your Web site. If you have a quality book, your audience will find you this way.

-- Participate in online discussions. Answering queries on message boards and e-mail lists dedicated to your topic will bring more visitors to your site.

Be sure to add a three or four-line "signature" to the bottom of your posts, including your Web address, blog title, and current book title. Don't post purely promotional messages, as these won't be seen as helpful.

Post comments on blogs related to your topic. Most blogs allow you to include a link back to your site in your comment. Invest the time in providing useful, thoughtful commentary, and you'll bring some new visitors to your site.

-- Syndicate your content. Market yourself as an expert on sites such as EzineArticles.com. Web and e-zine publishers run your content, along with your short biography and hyperlink to your site at the bottom. This can bring new, qualified visitors to your site, and the free service can be much more effective for you than online advertising.

Republication of your content enhances your visibility because of the resulting backlinks to your Web site. You can also set up a profile page on eZineArticles with your photo and links to all your syndicated content.

-- Go pro-active and seek media interviews. No need to hire an expensive public-relations firm, join a service like PR Leads, which provides you a daily list of reporters looking to interview experts in your field. You send the reporter an e-mail introducing yourself and the type of information you can provide.

This type of approach is much more effective than pitching your story to reporters at random. Reporters assigned to work on specific beats, however, need to talk with experts like you to give their writing credibility. Using a service like PR Leads, you can let those reporters know who you are how to contact you.

Subscriptions to PR Leads cost $99 a month, and if it results in a few media interviews per year to cement your profile as an expert in your field, it's well worth it. One good mention in the media can pay off more than an infinite number of press releases.

Why I'll never shop at Best Buy again, nor will anyone in my family or circle of friends

I recently purchased a DVD at my local Best Buy. I liked Best Buy because it's big and has good selection.

When I got home, I peeled the cellophane off my DVD case and was surprised to find no disc inside the case. "That's really weird," I thought.

But I wasn't worried. I figured I'd just return the package to Best Buy in exchange for a copy of the DVD I'd bought -- or a refund.

"No," the manager told me. Best Buy would not give me a refund or a DVD.

"Why not?" I asked, in astonishment.

Because I had opened the DVD case, and DVDs aren't returnable after they've been opened, the manager told me.

"Even if there was nothing inside the package?" I asked.

"That's right," said the Best Buy manager.

Until recently, I purchased about $8,000 worth of computer, music and video products each year at Best Buy, and my family maintained two charge accounts there. And my extended family shopped at Best Buy too.

We've all closed our accounts at Best Buy. We don't like to shop at stores where we're not trusted.

And I've made sure that nobody else in my extended family shops at Best Buy anymore, either. And if you're reading this, I hope you'll stop shopping at Best Buy, and tell all your family and friends to stop shopping there as well.

Targeting non-bookstore channels to pump up your sales

The dream of every author is to have their work displayed in bookstores nationwide. But brick-and-mortar book retailing is a dysfunctional industry, and can work against your success.

Since the Great Depression, bookstores have operated as consignment businesses. In the 1930s stores didn't have the cash to stock their shelves. So publishers provided books in the hopes they'd receive payment later, and it's worked that way ever since.

Very little space on bookchain shelves go to new authors. And if your book gets space, it will have just a few months to prove itself, then it's shipped back to the publisher to make room for a newer book. Bookstores return about 35 percent of books to publishers every year, many of them damaged or shopworn. Most of the stocking decisions at the big bookstore chains are made by a few buyers at company headquarters. The shrinking legion of independent bookstores sometimes feature books from local authors, but this isn't a strategy to move many book.

Even for the sales you make, bookstores can take three to six months to pay -- or longer. And sometimes they'll return a portion of your books to lessen the amount they owe you.

Most bookstores won't even bother with individual publishers or authors anymore, they work only with distributors. Why forfeit a big chunk of your profit to a distributor or waste time driving from bookstore to bookstore trying to hawk books from the trunk of your car?

Publishing for bookstore distribution is a high-stakes gamble. The problems above is what happens when things go well. What about a disasters, such as your distributor going bankrupt? Your books can end up in a remainder house, selling for pennies on the dollar, with you receiving nothing. This can wipe out an author or small publisher.

You might not realize that 50 percent of book sales are made through so-called "non-bookstore" channels. A growing percentage of sales occur here -- in grocery stores, warehouse clubs, specialty stops, libraries, mail order, book fairs, airport stores, book clubs, museums, and home-shopping services. Selling directly to these niche markets, you can avoid returns and distribution discounts.

A valuable guide to targeting non-bookstore markets is "Beyond the Bookstore: How to Sell More Books Profitably to Non-Bookstore Markets" by Brian Jud.

Even if you're successful with bookstore sales, you don't want to ignore the lucrative opportunities of non-bookstore channels. Lots of adult Americans haven't been in a bookstore in years. Exploring these alternative channels will help you get your book into their hands.

Three great reasons for book authors to blog

It's pretty much a given that a blog is a great tool for authors -- as self-promotion, or in building buzz and publicity for their books. Here's three more good practical reasons for blogging:

Blogging generates more content for you.

Whether you're responding to e-mail questions from readers or simply commenting on the issue of the day, writing regular short blog posts generates automatic content for your future books, or for updating your existing books.

For example, I get e-mails every day from people who've found my e-mail address on my blog or in my book. I answer each message promptly, and this writing inspires great content for my blog. I reproduce the e-mail exchange as a question/answer on my blog, which is easy to write, and fun to read (when done well). I rewrite the original question for clarity and brevity, and I don't include any information that would identify or embarrass the questioner.

Blogging builds a feedback loop

Your blog readers will pepper you with comments and e-mails, providing a clear window into the thinking of people involved with your blog topic. You can analyze the results by viewing logs of which Web posts are read most often. You'll know exactly where you've hit a nerve, and which of your posts fell flat. (To see where the action is on your blog, I'd recommend MyBlogLog, which provides you with a daily list of which of your posts is read most often, and which links on your site get the most clicks). Two other great free tools for tracking your site are StatCounter and Google Analytics. The Google tool provides the most details, but you have to wait a while to see the data, the other services are real-time.

Blogging is simple.

Every author knows they need a Web site. Why not make it one that's interactive and easy -- a blog? Some of the best content on my blogs comes directly from the energy of my readers. If you want a blog with an involved readership, allow readers to post comments. Even if you receive only a few per week, can make your Web site appear as if it's a heavily trafficked, popular place. By contrast, if you operated a forum or message board on your Web site, you could have hundreds of visitors per week and it would still appear as if little was happening. Host a forum on your Web site only if you have many thousands of active readers each week.

This is not to say you should allow any type of comments on your blog. I "moderate" my blog comments, meaning that I must approve each message before it's actually posted on my site. The vast majority of comments I receive are relevant and well-written, but there are occasional nonsensical or spam comments, which I like to delete before they appear on my site.

You can reduce the program of spam blog comments by using "word verification," if your blog software includes it. This way, users must retype the characters they see in an image before their comment is forwarded. This prevents software-generated spam comments.

Above all, you should remember to blog early and blog often. One of the big advantages of blogs is that search engines believe they have "fresh" content that changes frequently, and thus blogs rank highly in search engine results. Ensure the freshness of your blog by posting at least a few times each week.

Google allows publishers to sell online access to their books through Book Search program

Google is allowing its "Book Search" partners in the United States and the United Kingdom to sell online access to their books. The initiative sets up a titanic battle with Amazon.com, which is also developing a program enabling publishers to sell online access to books.

In a March 10 e-mail to publishers already participating in its Book Search program, Google pitched the new initiative as a way for publishers to "earn more from your books."

Google says it will split the revenue with publishers, but it isn't yet saying what percentage publishers will get. Google is asking publishers to sign up for the program now, but undoubtedly publishers will be leery before Google says exactly what the terms will be.

"It's like Google is saying to book publishers, 'Give us all your properties, and when it's convenient for us, we'll let you know how much money you'll receive,'" one incredulous U.S. publisher said Friday afternoon.

Because selling online access to books would cannibalize sales of paper-bound books to some degree, Google seems to be promising publishers that it will deliver more impulse purchases than brick-and-mortar bookstores. And the program seems to promise better profit margins for publishers, freeing them from printing and distribution costs. For example, most publishers currently earn just 45 percent of a book's retail price, with the rest being split among bookstores, wholesalers, and distributors. Usually author royalties account for just a small fraction of that 45 percent.

Users of Google Book Search, previously known as "Google Print," will be offered online access to the books of publishers who sign up for the optional program. Publishers can choose which books they want to offer, and can experiment with the price.

Publishers can enable the feature now and set their prices, but since the program is still in development, Book Search users won't have online access to titles just yet.

"We'll be updating our Terms and Conditions for the Google Books Partner Program to reflect this new offering," said the message from Google's Book Search staff. Sometime in the next few weeks, publishers will be asked to review the amended terms and conditions form when they log into their accounts.

Google has more information posted here.

Publishers with questions or feedback can contact the program at books-support@google.com.

Top three mistakes rookie authors make in marketing books on their Web site

Today every author knows they must have a Web site to help sell their book. But most new authors make three dumb mistakes while trying to market their book on their site.

Insisting the customer buy on your Web site.

Most authors try to sell directly to the buyer on their Web site, figuring they will reap the full list price of the book. That's fine -- IF that's how the buyer wants to purchase the book. But most would rather buy from an online store they've heard of, not an individual. So if you want to sell your book effectively, offer as many options as possible.

How? Offer an affiliate link to your book's product page on Amazon or Barnes & Noble. If you're a self-publishing author and set a short discount (say 25 percent), you can earn the same money by letting Amazon sell your book, plus you don't have to fill the orders.

You can reap some additional rewards through affiliate sales. I earn about $15 a day in additional Amazon affiliate commissions from folks who followed my site's affiliate link to Amazon and decided to purchase additional items in the
same order. So in those cases, I earn a lot more money than I would have earned by selling the book on my own Web site, plus I don't have to handle the customer.

Static Web sites.

Unchanging Web sites are another boneheaded practice employed by most authors. I've had a lot of success
promoting my book through my blog, and it's easier than maintaining a regular site of static pages. (It's also easier than trying to sell books using Google Adwords, and cheaper.)

Offering no content.
Authors can improve their Internet marketing efforts tremendously simply by adding a bit of free content. Offer your first chapter, table of contents, and index in a free PDF that visitors can download from your site. It's a no-brainer -- if you're trying to sell a book outside a brick-and-mortar bookstore, the buyer has to have a sense of what they're buying. I know I get a tremendous amount of buzz and sales from that (I offer my first three chapters).

Many authors are leery of offering a free PDF of their first chapter online. "My goodness," they say, "What would happen if people forwarded the chapter all over the place?"

What would happen is that you'd get a bazillion dollars' worth of free advertising, and the sales of your book would get a serious shot in the arm!

Blogging your way to more book sales

Should you be blogging? It's a no-brainer. Any author who isn't blogging to promote their book is ignoring a big slice of readers and book sales.

Blogging is one of the major marketing trends of this century, and it's a tailor-made for authors. Writers are natural bloggers, and their audience is natural blog readers.

Blogs are the easiest, cheapest, and perhaps best way for authors to find a following and connect with readers. Blogs are personal, and readers feel special when they gain access to the author's space.

For most authors, the free buzz you can create with a blog will bring you a wider audience and more sales than all the advertising you can buy -- assuming you have money to burn.

I began marketing my first book, a self-published niche nonfiction book in November 2005. For the first two months, I spent $4,000 on Google Adwords to bring readers to a Web page describing my book. I was horrified to discover that hardly anyone who clicked on my ad bought the book. The Google ads didn't result in any book sales -- on my site, on Amazon.com, or anywhere else.

Then I began writing daily posts to my blog related to the book. Immediately, I noticed lots of "free" traffic from Google search results (from people searching for words that happened to be in my blog posts). Suddenly I was getting more "free" traffic than I had been able to buy through advertising. And I was buying all I could -- I placed Adwords bids on literally every word in my book's index.

Most importantly, I noticed that the people who came to my site through "free" search results got much more involved with my content -- they would scroll through several pages and spend several minutes at my site. And obviously, some of those folks bought the book, because that's when sales took off. By contrast, people who came to my site via advertising tended to take a quick look at the landing page, and leave after just 30 seconds.

Why do blogs generate such great traffic? For one, blogs are topical. If you're writing about a single topic day in and day out, after a few months your Web site will contain a tremendous number of keyword combinations. Also, recent content enhances your search-relevance ranking with Google -- the theory being that searchers will find "fresh" content more useful and relevant.

For authors without a long track record of sales and readership, blogs are invaluable for forging new relationships. Over the course of a year's time, your book blog can generate hundreds of thousands of visits from potential readers worldwide. If you provide an e-mail address where these visitors can reach you, they will troubleshoot your book before you've even finished writing it. Your blog readers will suggest corrections in your blog posts, long before they end up on a printed page. And readers who feel they've somehow contributed to your work will be your most loyal supporters.

Besides being much easier to maintain and fresher than a plain-vanilla Web site, your author blog or book blog makes it much easier for readers to stay in contact. Most readers won't remember to re-visit a Web site they found interesting. But with a blog, where subscribing to the content is easy through syndication or e-mail, you can effortlessly stay in touch with your online audience. And the more contact you have with potential readers, the more book sales you'll have.

And beyond all the practical business reasons for having a blog, it's just a great self-motivational tool for authors. Blogs are an instant antidote to writer's block, or just plain procrastination. Sometimes you need a push to write a few paragraphs. Finishing a blog post can provide a nice jolt of energy and generate some new creative ideas.

What type of blog should you produce? Nonfiction writers will have some obvious choices related to their book's content. But there are styles to consider, including:

-- A daily diary format

-- Weekly updates

-- Issue-oriented blogs

-- Group blogs

Here's a great rundown of each of these blog approaches, courtesy of InternetWritingJournal.

Are you ready to start? One of the easiest blogging programs to use is Blogger, which is owned by Google. You can publish your blog for free on Google's Blogspot domain, and a great many bloggers do. But another option for authors is to use Blogger, then transmit their posts to their own domain via FTP. This is a wise approach since you'll be in control of domain where your posts (and inbound links point to) and you'll be free to change to a different blogging software if necessary without having to change the Web location of your blog.

Want to look at some more author blogs and book blogs? There's a directory of them here as rated by The Internet Writing Journal. A more diverse selection of author blogs is displayed at Authors' Blogs.

So if you accept the premise that a Web site is a powerful, inexpensive tool for publicizing your work and forging connections with readers, blogging is indeed a no-brainer. A blog is simply a Web site that's easy to maintain and update -- and brings fantastic free Internet traffic.

For months now, my book has been the number-two bestseller in its category on Amazon (Business/Entrepreneurship/Home-Based), and I attribute it to the blog readership and the word-of-mouth it has generated. And here's the kicker: writing the blog has been infinitely easier (not to mention cheaper!) than Adwords. Before I dumped Adwords, I'd spend several hours a day fiddling with my account settings and keywords. (I figured it once I got it "working right," I could leave it alone, but that day never came.)

I've concluded that low-margin products like books just can't be marketed effectively with pay-per-click advertising. Other publishers have found the same thing.

For higher-margin products -- for example, an insurance policy where you have a built-in marketing budget of tens of dollars -- I'm sure Adwords is an effective tool. And no doubt some publishers are able to market expensive professional books using Adwords, when they can justify spending $20 or $30 to get a customer. And Adwords might work well for some ultra-niche books, where you're the only person in the world bidding on its keywords. But for 99 percent of authors, my hunch is Adwords will be a tremendous waste of time and money.

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.