People, people, people. I don't know whether to be appalled or to think I'm rather narrow minded.
I'm adding massive author links to my website as part of a 'helping hand promotion' and while I understand you all are entitled to your own style and styles are dependent on genres or whether you're writing fiction or non-fiction. Even your age and life style factor into your decisions and all these are right. Still there are basic requirements that are needed.
1. Introduction -- the first page should give the reader an idea of what your site is all about. One shouldn't have to search to find out that you're an author, much less what genre you write or even your name.
2. People like to know a little about you and how it relates to what you write. Give a biography of yourself, but not your life history from birth on nor your exact location - you're inviting trouble. Stalkers are no fun.
3. Make it easy to find a little bit about your books - where to purchase them - what people are saying about them.
4. Share where you can be found. Such as where you regularly chat or blog. Are you on Twitter, Facebook, other social networds where you regularly post updates?
5. How can people contact you aside from leaving comments.
These are the very least you should have on your website. Rather, I'm finding websites that only contain one page of nothing but book blurbs -- this is nothing more than advertisement floating out of a package that I'm guessing doesn't exist as I saw no links to at least a home page. And I couldn't even begin to guess the genre of the books.
Some are blogs that as far as I could tell were personal and had nothing to do with your writing. Sorry - won't get put on my website. Your writing is a business venture so the website you share with the writing community should reflect your writing most of all.
Websites geared toward a single book sends out a messge that you don't plan on writing more. Readers tend to want more books from a writer before making a decision or especially if they should like your 'one and only'. The website base should be about you, the writer. If you want to do a special book feature on your site, wonderful, but don't send readers packing before they have a chance to like you.
This is a first for me - coming across sites which does not give the author name, some even on the book covers. How do these books get published? Even self-publishing sites require title and author on the cover.
Sites that are set up like a magazine ad section are a major turn-off. My eyes are going squiggly trying to locate the information that's supposed to be there and by the time I find it half way down the page, I'm no longer interested. This may just be me, but hey - I'm a potential customer.
I'm sure this is simply one of my pet peeves, but if you are writing under a pen name, your website address, nor email addresses should be under any other name. Yes, you may not care who knows that you write under this or that name, but it looks unprofessional. Customer perception is a major. Also, what if you were searching for an author and all you could find was a website which mentioned the name. I know I don't have the time to spend figuring out if this is really a site for this person or if this person simply likes this person enough to promote him/her.
Fonts -- some fancy fonts are hard to read. They may be pretty to you, but to someone else, they may be illegible, especially now that many are reading on ereaders, phones and netbooks. I'm guilty of this and this is why I'm mentioning it. Publishers aren't trying to limit our creativity by limiting which fonts and sizes can be used there is a legit purpose behind the demand. Use that same guide for all of your websites.
Sound effects on websites - really! A major turn-off as are videos that automatically play. Have some respect for those who might me taking a moment while kids are napping or in a classroom situation that might be finished with a test, but others aren't. All sorts of reasons not to impose these features on others.
Photos -- keep them small sized .jpg's -- believe it or not, some are still using dial-up networks. Photos and music will cost you potential customers as these take forever to load.
And believe it or not - Facebook is not considered a website. It's a social networking site.
For the most part, the hundred plus websites I've looked at today haven't been all that bad. However, one was ghastly. It appears the person responsible has no idea there are free templates and other componets to put together a professional looking website. This site reminded me of when I first built websites back in the 90's when all the background choices were solid colors and navigation links were large ugly buttons. We've come a long way baby - catch up or it will cost you in more than sales -- you have a reputation to consider. And keep in mind, the background should never distract from the content.
Have a great week!
Bekki
http://bekkilynn.net
I'm adding massive author links to my website as part of a 'helping hand promotion' and while I understand you all are entitled to your own style and styles are dependent on genres or whether you're writing fiction or non-fiction. Even your age and life style factor into your decisions and all these are right. Still there are basic requirements that are needed.
1. Introduction -- the first page should give the reader an idea of what your site is all about. One shouldn't have to search to find out that you're an author, much less what genre you write or even your name.
2. People like to know a little about you and how it relates to what you write. Give a biography of yourself, but not your life history from birth on nor your exact location - you're inviting trouble. Stalkers are no fun.
3. Make it easy to find a little bit about your books - where to purchase them - what people are saying about them.
4. Share where you can be found. Such as where you regularly chat or blog. Are you on Twitter, Facebook, other social networds where you regularly post updates?
5. How can people contact you aside from leaving comments.
These are the very least you should have on your website. Rather, I'm finding websites that only contain one page of nothing but book blurbs -- this is nothing more than advertisement floating out of a package that I'm guessing doesn't exist as I saw no links to at least a home page. And I couldn't even begin to guess the genre of the books.
Some are blogs that as far as I could tell were personal and had nothing to do with your writing. Sorry - won't get put on my website. Your writing is a business venture so the website you share with the writing community should reflect your writing most of all.
Websites geared toward a single book sends out a messge that you don't plan on writing more. Readers tend to want more books from a writer before making a decision or especially if they should like your 'one and only'. The website base should be about you, the writer. If you want to do a special book feature on your site, wonderful, but don't send readers packing before they have a chance to like you.
This is a first for me - coming across sites which does not give the author name, some even on the book covers. How do these books get published? Even self-publishing sites require title and author on the cover.
Sites that are set up like a magazine ad section are a major turn-off. My eyes are going squiggly trying to locate the information that's supposed to be there and by the time I find it half way down the page, I'm no longer interested. This may just be me, but hey - I'm a potential customer.
I'm sure this is simply one of my pet peeves, but if you are writing under a pen name, your website address, nor email addresses should be under any other name. Yes, you may not care who knows that you write under this or that name, but it looks unprofessional. Customer perception is a major. Also, what if you were searching for an author and all you could find was a website which mentioned the name. I know I don't have the time to spend figuring out if this is really a site for this person or if this person simply likes this person enough to promote him/her.
Fonts -- some fancy fonts are hard to read. They may be pretty to you, but to someone else, they may be illegible, especially now that many are reading on ereaders, phones and netbooks. I'm guilty of this and this is why I'm mentioning it. Publishers aren't trying to limit our creativity by limiting which fonts and sizes can be used there is a legit purpose behind the demand. Use that same guide for all of your websites.
Sound effects on websites - really! A major turn-off as are videos that automatically play. Have some respect for those who might me taking a moment while kids are napping or in a classroom situation that might be finished with a test, but others aren't. All sorts of reasons not to impose these features on others.
Photos -- keep them small sized .jpg's -- believe it or not, some are still using dial-up networks. Photos and music will cost you potential customers as these take forever to load.
And believe it or not - Facebook is not considered a website. It's a social networking site.
For the most part, the hundred plus websites I've looked at today haven't been all that bad. However, one was ghastly. It appears the person responsible has no idea there are free templates and other componets to put together a professional looking website. This site reminded me of when I first built websites back in the 90's when all the background choices were solid colors and navigation links were large ugly buttons. We've come a long way baby - catch up or it will cost you in more than sales -- you have a reputation to consider. And keep in mind, the background should never distract from the content.
Have a great week!
Bekki
http://bekkilynn.net
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