Authors: Don’t Build a Book Website!

Posted by Christina Hills | Articles, Marketing | 5

Christina Hills With Publisher Reid Tracy and Christian Mickelsen

Several years ago, I attended a live event with Christian Mickelsen. Christian is a recognized authority on personal development and coaching, plus a best-selling author.

While at the live event, we had lunch with Reid Tracy, President and CEO of Hay House Publishing. Reid and I had a fantastic discussion about authors and their websites.

I’d like to share the biggest takeaway from our conversation. Are you ready for this?

Websites for Writers

During our chat, he told me that authors should NOT have a book website!

That’s right. If you’re an author, don’t build a website dedicated to the book you wrote. Instead, you should have an Author Website!

Advantages of an Author Website

Think about it. If you create a book website, all a visitor will see is information about that one specific book. As an author, you’re missing out on a great opportunity.

Instead, create an Author website where you showcase ALL the books you’ve written (plus any other projects and articles). Then, visitors will not only see information about that specific book, but they’ll also learn about your other books, programs, and events.

Here is a quick 5 min video to explain the concept:

Open the Door for Rabbit Trailing

Don’t you ever have experiences of going to a bookstore to find one particular book, but ending up walking out with a few more books because you “happened to see other books.” I call this “Rabbit trailing”, and it can happen on the internet as well as in the bookstore!

That’s why it’s so important to writers to have an Author website, instead of just a Book website. An Author website will allow you to guide the visitor to your other books.

Setting up Your Author Website

Here’s a simple website strategy I recommend:

Purchase your name for the domain of your website (ex. https://yourauthorname.com)
Build a page within your Author’s Website dedicated to one book. (ex. yourauthorname.com/yourbooktitle)
Buy the domain name for that book. (ex. yourbooktitle.com)
Forward that domain name to go to the book page on your Author Website. (You can set this up with your domain company. In this example, people who type in yourbooktitle.com in their browser will be automatically taken to yourauthorname.com/yourbooktitle with this setup.)

For help with learning how to build your own author website yourself, join our next Website Creation Workshop.

Final Thoughts

No matter what business you’re in, your website is an important marketing tool. If you’re an author, be sure your website is about YOU and not just about one of the books you wrote. I know this sounds counterintuitive. After all, remember it’s not about you...

However, according to our publishing expert Reid Tracy, writers who build an Author website will also build a bigger and more loyal audience. It makes sense. If the visitor enjoyed your work enough to do the initial search, they’ll probably enjoy other books you’ve written as well.

For more author website inspiration, check out Six Great Examples of Author Websites that my students created from taking the Website Creation Workshop!

(originally published in Feb, 2015)

About The Author

Christina Hills

Christina Hills helps entrepreneurs setup their websites using WordPress without having to rely on a webmaster. Her trainings are fun and she makes it easy! Get the free PDF "The Do-It-Yourself Website Creation Checklist" Report Here

5 Comments

Michelle White on February 24, 2015 at 9:35 am

For Christina Hills,

I enrolled in Ryan Ellison’s program last year. One of the bonuses was working with you to create a website. When the two day training you provided, I was not able to participate. I was wondering if that opportunity is still available to me? I look forward to hearing from you as time permits. Thanks in advance!

PS…this video was amazing and insightful.
- Christina Hills on February 24, 2015 at 9:39 am
  
  Michelle,
  
  Glad you liked the video!
  Do contact our support department regarding the 2 day training that has now passed
  they can help you out. Send a message to: support at website creation workshop dot com
Carly Alyssa Thorne on February 26, 2015 at 12:56 pm

Exactly I tell my clients this all of the time….
Ruth Deutsch on March 19, 2015 at 2:56 pm

Brilliant Idea! You just answered one of my q’s – do I need a book website….but now I’m wondering how that will integrate with the main website I’m creating which is http://www.TotalBrainOptimization.com. Perhaps I have a link to it? People don’t know me or how to spell my name well (yes I did buy the http://www.RuthDeutsch.com) I have planned to hold off with my own name turning into a website until I have enough of a following. Thanks.
- Christina Hills on March 20, 2015 at 5:10 am
  
  Ruth,
  
  Since you are just starting out, I’d go ahead and start developing ruthdeutsch.com as your author website. And then have the name of your book point to a page on your site.

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