What Features are Important in an Author Website?

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Especially in today’s age, if you’re a self published or traditionally published author, having some kind of internet presence is an absolute must.

Gone are the days where you solely relied on a publisher.

Now are the days for self-promotion.

Although we shouldn’t focus solely on self promotion, after all, we should be focused on writing our stories and poetry. We should however put some effort into having an online presence.

One of the most important spots for a writer of course is social media. It’s a must for readers to be able to find us there. We don’t have to be on every platform, but instead focus on at least 3 we feel the most comfortable with.

In comes the author’s website.

Author’s website vs social media

Some writers would argue that having just a social media presence is enough, but I would argue that it’s important to have a place that we own where we can display everything at once.

Having your own website is important because social media comes and goes, but if you own your own website, you don’t have to worry about that. You don’t even have to update your website that often.

You want readers of all ages to be able to find you on the internet regardless of what platforms they use and what their tech savvy skills are. If they’re on the internet, the majority of the time, they know how to find a website.

Website vs goodreads

Alright, so I personally count Goodreads as a social media platform, but I’m putting it separately because it’s so central to authors and readers.

Goodreads is great in that it lets you create an author’s page where you can display all your works, links to buy it, quotes and lists, and more. It’s honestly a great place to start if you don’t already have a website.

But just because you have a Goodreads page, you should still have an author’s website.

Reasons to have a website

These days are easy to set up and maintain (Wix, Squarespace, Webflow, etc).
If you own it, you aren’t subject to whims of what’s a popular platform and what isn’t.
You have total control over what you show and don’t show.
You can customize it however you would like.
You have a central place to list either all your stories/poetry or you can have multiple sites for different series (for example).
You have a central place to list everywhere your work is being sold.
You can focus on you.

What to feature on your website

Authors have a LOT of options when it comes to what to put on their websites.

Any published works
Links to articles you wrote or are written about you
Links on where to buy your published works
Sneak peaks to unwritten works
Short stories based on longer works
A blog about you, your writing, and ideas.
Playlists based off of your writing.
Pictures of who you would want to star as your characters on TV or in a Movie.
Extras such as maps, character trees, glossaries, etc.
Interviews.
Q&A guides for book clubs.
Illustrations based off of your writing.
Swag based off of your writing.
Events you will be attending or are hosting.
Where you can be found on social media.
Press releases.
Media kits.
Interactive content about your work.
Fan submitted writing or art about your work.
Giveaways.
Your favorite quotes from your writing.
Video or podcasts based on your works.
Book cover reveals.
Book video trailers.
Reviews of your writing.

PAges to have on your website

About
Published Writing
Blog
Press Releases/Media Kits
Social Media Links
Home Page
Contact Info
Calendar
Resources
Events
News

What you have on your website is up to you (and your platform)

One of the important things I want to bring up is that you can have as little or as much on your author website as you want. You can even have different websites for each book series. <—Although it might be good to link those back to one main website.

If you hire a marketing expert, they will probably be able to advise you on the best course of action for your marketing strategy.

But thankfully in 2020, it’s very easy for authors to market themselves and even maintain their own website without spending thousands of dollars.

For beginners, I recommend Wix or Wordpress (.com), for more savvy, Squarespace, and then if you want to get even more technical, Wordpress (.org) or a custom website built by a web designer and a developer.

The pros and cons of site builders

I won’t get too much into this because that’s for another post, but each of these platforms has pros and cons to them. Each platform (and template) will ultimately decide what exactly you can and cannot put on your website. Sometimes you can hack it to get where you want, but it might be extra work.

So do your research.

Wix has free options and is a great drag-and-drop website, but it can get annoying and confusing. For example, you have to separately design the mobile view from the desktop view. While on most website builders, they automatically do this for you. But Wix gives you a lot of options.

Squarespace gets high marks on my recommendations because it isn’t that expensive, it’s easy to use, and you can pretty much do everything on one platform. But Squarespace gets downgraded for me because it doesn’t give you as many options and the 7.0 templates’ abilities and functions vary by template (Brine templates give you the most control).

Wordpress (.com) is easy to start and use, but it doesn’t give you as much control as the other platforms and in my opinion, can be a bit clunky to use.

Wordpress (.org) is a wild land on it’s own because you need a professional to set it up and then there can be a lot of maintenance to it. But it gives you the most control over your website and is the next best thing to getting a site built from scratch.

Now there are some other website builders out like like GoDaddy, Weebly, etc (you could even use Tumblr I suppose if that’s where your target audience was) but they are not used as often.

Think about hiring a professional if you need

Of course, each of these methods depend on how much time and money we have. I mention these platforms because they’re generally not that expensive or time consuming once you have them set up.

But if you’re really not familiar with websites, the design or how they’re built and maintained, I would for sure ask a professional for some help.

Hear me out, this is a great time to hire a young professional.

Usually junior designers and junior developers have a good idea of what they’re doing and you usually don’t have to pay them as much as you would paying an agency or a seasoned professional. They usually want to make some money, have a portfolio piece, and a testimonial from you.

Author websites usually are not that complicated so it shouldn’t be too hard for them to help you out.

Now if you’re looking to do it on your own, it still won’t cost you too much and there are a ton of tutorials out there on the web.