Web Site Preparation for writers - page 7 - Titles and EMail contact

I don’t know about you, but I love to learn new computer programs and, in my first rush excitement to play with my new program, I have a tendency to think I can just jump in there and make a web page.

Yes, you can do that and I have. But, if you want to make the best page you can, some research time is well spent.

First is to decide who your target audience is. I have a tendency to spread myself off into too many directions. I am a painter, a potter/sculptor, a doll maker and a writer. Since 2003, my website has been targeted for selling my artwork from my home based studio. It was geared to show what work I could do and what work I had available for sale, and about visiting my studio.

When I started to redesign the website this time, I still had that in the back of my mind. It was research and Master’s Daughter, who pointed out where I was going wrong. After going over the initial design for my website (and I spent way too many hours on creating the page that was eventually declared to be going the wrong way), we decided that I was not focusing my site on what was important to me now. I had links to my painting and my pottery. Not only were they distracting, but they were taking up space that was better spent on telling about my writing experience and drumming up interest in my Young Adult Fantasy Series.

Research tells me that author’s seeking representation need to focus their site on themselves, first and foremost. I have a focus on marketing for my book, and I have decided to spread out my focus and cover my writing background, as well as generating some word of mouth, hopefully excitement for my book series.

SECOND: As Mike Cherim points out in Beast-Blog.com - Mike Cherim's Professional and Personal Web Log - Home Page, there are millions of websites out there. That means there are 999,999 + other websites, beside yours, for a viewer to click on. If you create a website that requires JavaScript, or large images to load, or “mystery meat navigation,” you are going to lose viewers. I am a dial-up user and no matter how much I want to view a site, I will close out of it if there are large images to load.

THE SEARCH: How will viewers find you? One essential element is the “title element” that is shown on the bar of your browser. It is the content title with the terms in it that users will search for. Each page of your website should have its own unique title. It is contained in carrots, at the top of your webpage. We are talking coding here in your WYSIWYG editor.

That would be the title for my first page, the INDEX page and a different one for each succeeding page. In my current webpage, I never thought about that fact that if you have twelve or six or more pages to your website. Each individual page should have its own title so that there are that many more titles to be found in a search. So, change that title for each page.

Also, it is important to NOT put your email address link on your site. Even supposedly secure ways of doing it will eventually be Spy Bot-ted. You do need a means of contact though. Use a secure contact form and we will get into that, just as soon as I have it all figured out. If you are in a hurry, Google it. This is from a person who has already had my domain email address harvested by SPY BOTS.

NEXT POST: Site Maps