Website design and development
The best time to get an author website is…well, as soon as you’ve decided to get one. The good news is, you don’t need a computer science degree to get it up and running. The bad news—you may have to get comfortable with some mildly technical stuff. (Helpful hint: Keep this page handy as you … Read more
Deciding to get a website for the first time means a flurry of decision making. Are you going to have a blog? How do you get that “yourname-dot-com” web address? Are you going to sell stuff on the site? If so, how will you accept payments? Will there be newsletter integration? What about SEO? What … Read more
There are many different ways to fulfil your author website’s primary directive—sell books and help your audience connect with you. But what is the best strategy for you? As we mentioned earlier, this depends on who you are, what kind of books you write, and who your audience are. For instance, a celebrity author needs … Read more
What does learning to play the guitar have to do with making websites? Quite a bit, as it turns out: they both produce beautiful music. Or at least they should.
Now that you’ve decided you need a website, the first question is: what should it have? Of course, in some ways it will be just like any other website. But what are the essentials for an effective author website? More importantly, what will make it uniquely yours, and speak to your audience? The No.1 function … Read more
If you ask a web designer if people should build their own website, the answer is always going to be: best leave the job to the experts. But what if you are not in a position to hire a web designer? Perhaps there’s a cash crunch, or there just isn’t enough time. Or maybe you … Read more
Before the internet became such an important part of our everyday life, all an author needed to do was sit down in front of her typewriter, hammer out tens of thousands of words, and hand the manuscript over to the publisher. The publisher would edit, proofread and print the manuscript, as well as take care … Read more
A few days ago, I was scouring the web for an email marketing tool. I’d already zeroed in on a few options. Now my goal was to quickly check the price of each and pick the one best suited to my pocket. On most sites, I found the pricing page link in the main navigation, … Read more
Imagine navigating a website on your phone. First, the page takes ages to load. Then, the display runs out of the screen. You have to endlessly scroll sideways in both directions to read the text. Or there’s a pop-up and you can’t figure out how to shut it. Frustrating, isn’t it? That is what a … Read more