Promo Primer for the UnPublished: Part 2A—Primer on Websites
Posted By Judith Laik on June 4, 2010
Judith Laik, Regency Romance Author
Part 2A—Decide how you want your website to look
by Judith Laik
1st Turning Point Staff Columnist
Copyright © 2010 Judith Laik
You’ve determined that you are going to have a website. Congratulations! It’s a great step forward in building your career. But . . . how do you get started?
You have some big decisions to make. Are you going to do it yourself or hire a designer? Bare bones or glammed up? How much time and money do you have/want to invest?
First thing is to reserve your domain name, if you haven’t yet done that. If you don’t know how to get started, google “website domain registration.” You’ll find Go Daddy, Network Solutions, and many other domain registration services. Check out their websites. Ask friends with websites who they are registered with, the cost, and if there have been any problems. If you prefer to use a website designer, you can ask the one you are planning to work with for recommendations.
Web host. This is the place where your website is “parked.” You can also google names for your web hosting service. Some of the registration services also do hosting, or you may go with a separate company for this. For this article, when I did an internet search for “web hosting,” I also discovered some sites, such as the Web Hosting Research Center, that review hosting sites.
In the meantime, while you are pondering these decisions, look at author websites. Look at lots of them. A good starting point: If you belong to any writers’ organizations, visit their websites and find the page that lists member authors with links to their sites. Study them all. Continue with the websites of authors on the best seller lists (you can google them or just try their name dot com), your favorite authors, and anybody else you can think of.
Notice design elements, colors, navigation buttons, loading times, extras - anything and everything that contributes to the look of the sites. What do you like? What didn’t work for you? Lots of text? Graphics mixed in for variety? Flash? Sound? A clean look with lots of white space or the space filled in with a lot of different elements?
People have strong opinions on many of these elements. I know people who have serious antipathies to flash and sound. They can be annoying. My own tendency is to immediately leave any website that bombards me with them. Besides being infuriating to some, they slow loading time to a crawl for people whose systems don’t have a lot of bandwidth. So, consider carefully whether you need to have the bells and whistles.
Check out the 1st Turning Point website reviews. The reviewers give a reader’s viewpoint on websites.
If the website has been designed by someone other than the author or a non-professional family member, the designer’s name and a link to his/her site should be given somewhere on the website. Go to a number of designers’ sites, and find the gallery page and visit their clients’ sites. Notice if there’s a certain “look” to the sites by that designer, or if they made an effort to make every author’s site unique. And which way do you prefer? A number of top designers have a signature appearance and you’ll find that, once you’ve studied enough sites, you can instantly identify the designer of a new site you visit.
If you’re thinking this is going to take beaucoup time, you’re right. But it’s all worth it, no matter which way you come down on the major decision of doing it yourself or hiring a designer. If you’re your own designer, you’ll have a self-education on the subject. If someone else is going to do it, you’ve done a major part of your homework in finding the right designer for you, and being able to communicate with your designer about what you want.
If you thought I was forgetting about your brand, I’m coming to that. It’s a vital part of your web design. Read the article by Theresa Meyers. If you haven’t yet determined your brand, at least make a start at it. Are your books light and humorous? Deeply sensual? Dark and edgy? Historical? Contemporary? Paranormal? You probably found, maybe without even realizing it, in your study of websites, you were attracted to those whose mood matches your style of writing. If not, you might need to do some serious thinking about why you write what you do!
If you know your brand before you put up your website, you can save an expensive or time-gobbling redesign later on, such as what I’m going through now—not because my site was wrong for what I wrote at the time, but it doesn’t fit what I write now. And if your genre or style changes down the road, you may have to go back to the drawing board also, but that’s a tale for another time. Just, for now, make sure your site reflects what you write.
Next month, Part II: apply your new knowledge and set up your website.
Judith Laik lives on a mini-farm in the Pacific Northwest with her husband, daughter, three horses, two cats, approximately a dozen Collies (they’re a dog show family), and one Scottish Deerhound that doubles as a sofa cover.
 Blue Moon Enchantment |
 The Lady In Question |
 The Lady Is Mine |
 Under Whose Influence |
 A Horse’s Tale |
 Around The Circle Gently |
Oops! When this article was scheduled, I didn’t think about the fact that my grandson’s graduation is this weekend, so I’ll be gone and won’t be able to check for comments. I’ll get home Sunday and look then; if you have a question or something you’d like a reply on, check back Sunday evening or Monday.
Some valuable tips. One question though. What if you are trapped for money? Having my own domain is a luxery to me.
Judith,
Sure wish I had had all of this information before starting my website. The info here is excellent. Thank you for taking the time to share this with all of us. As usual, Judith, you have done an excellent job.
I’m not out of here yet, so I’ll quickly reply:
Glynis, my suggestion is to look at the various sites that will register your domain name. Some of them are really very inexpensive. You may find you can afford it after all.
You can set up your website for free at one of the website builders I’ll talk about in the second part of this article. They don’t require you to register your domain name. But I really don’t recommend skipping this step. There are even people who’ll steal your domain name, trying to get you to pay them to buy it back. Your name is too important to leave it to chance. I think it’s the one mandatory expense in all of this. Everything else you can decide not to do, or find a free way to do it.
I hope this helps!
Norman, thanks for the comment! I wish I’d known this stuff too!
Judith, You’ve done a fabulous job of breaking the steps down so they don’t seem overwhelming and are easily accomplished. And you’re so right about domain names…it cost only a few dollars to hold the place name. So valuable. Believe me, I know. I’m a .net instead of a .com because I didn’t think ahead many years ago. I do have an alert on the .com in case it ever comes available, though.
Judith, the tip on considering your brand when designing your website is excellent. My first site was nice and pretty and not at all like what I write. I had to do a complete makeover to match my brand and voice. I still need to have a new picture taken. The one I use is a left over from that first site.
Thanks for the first of another helpful set of articles.
Ann Charles
Excellent advice, Judy! I agree with you about registering your domain name. Be sure to register as soon as possible, especially if you’re going to write under a common name that you may have trouble securing.