Website design for authors, books
For everything you’re told you have to do as an independent author publishing and promoting a book, I’d argue there are only two absolute, universal musts: you must get a professional edit and you must have your own author website.
Whether you’re building your author web platform, hosting a blog, interacting with readers, or providing a behind-the-scenes look at your creative process, you need a home on the web — a hub for your online marketing activity. Over the last 10 years, I’ll bet there has not been a single successful author who didn’t have a great author website.
It’s a given that your site should be clean and easy to navigate, and it should contain a few other key elements. Four things your author website must have include:
- Your latest book/news front and center. This might seem obvious, but I’ve seen too many sites where the author tries to inject him/herself into the foreground. It’s understandable why an author might want to do this, but it’s important you reject this impulse. Feature new content first. What readers are really coming to your site for is to determine whether or not they should spend money on your book. Promote your book and save the promotion of your face until you’re a household name.
- An obvious “call to action.” What do you want your web visitor to do? Buy your book? Sign up for updates? Add their name to your newsletter mailing list? The goal of every great author website is to elicit some kind of action from the reader.
- A clear way to contact you, the author. This includes links to your social media profiles, but there should also be a way to contact you directly. You don’t need to post your email address, you can have a widget or form that keeps the email address private, but a direct line makes you likable and approachable.
- Promotion of upcoming events. If you have book readings or signings scheduled, they should be prominently placed on your site — with special offers to drive attendance whenever possible.
Of course, some author websites are better than others.
