Build a website for authors and your books

Build a website for authors and your books.

Build a website for authors and your books. Websites can be incredibly powerful for self-publishers. Perhaps you will use your website address to link to your Amazon author page, book, or in your social media posts. It takes work to have others find you online, even when you have a website.

QUICK TIPS

Establish a website even before you complete a book.
Buy your own domain name.
Your email should use your domain name.
Use keywords and keyword phrases on your site that are also in use on your Amazon author page and books.
Use social media.
I recommend what I use, and that is WordPress ® (.org, not .com), Kadence Framework with a Kadence child theme, and Yoast SEO.
When building a brand, establish the CMYK colors first and work backwards to RGB color for website.

Website sitebuilders

Should you use a website sitebuilder or drag and drop builder? That depends on where your traffic will come from. The short answer is if you are not dependent on your site to generate traffic, you can use a website sitebuilder.

Good SEO is critical for a site without traffic, and that does not automatically happen. A site built with a sitebuilder is only good if a significant amount of traffic can link from another source. This might be from your Amazon listing.

Authors should have no expectations of generating organic traffic if using a sitebuilder. Organic traffic is not a guarantee. But maybe a simple sitebuilder page on your own domain name is all you need.

Remember these points:

Sitebuilders are cheap plus their basic site designs are often attractive. However, when adding your content, the site might not look as you would imagine.
Sitebuilders are not the best choice for Search Engine Optimization. You have complete control over SEO with WordPress as you can edit the code as deep as you want to or as skills your allow. You cannot do this with sitebuilders. I do not code. I recommend the Yoast SEO plugin, and use the Pro version.
Sitebuilders may offer only one-page sites.
You are on a sitebuilder server with many other sites. It slows your site.
Ads for the sitebuilder may appear on your site, depending on your plan.
It is better to use your own domain. If you are using a sitebuilder URL address and later move to your own domain, all links will be lost. Maybe SEO will not matter with a sitebuilder URL, but it will matter when you move your site.
Use an email address with your own domain name, book title, author name, or business. Do not use a web address with the name of the sitebuilder. You are viewed as more professional with an email address using your own domain. Anyone can use a generic like “gmail.com.”