Most authors out there who have created a blog are trying every method possible to get traffic to it (see my blog entry last week on the subject). But here’s one method they shouldn’t be trying: link dumping. What is “link dumping?” It’s simply posting links to your blog post wherever you can: LinkedIn, Twitter, […]
Authors: Avoid the ‘Link Dump’ Read More »
I came across a discussion today on a LinkedIn group for authors. The conversation was started by the following question: How do you find people to read your blog – and on a consistent basis? Here are some of the responses I found to be most interesting. I hope you find them helpful, too. —–
How to Drive Traffic to Your Blog: Ideas from Authors Themselves Read More »
I must confess … I came across this press release weeks ago, and only now got around to blogging about it. But maybe that’s a good thing. Let me explain… According to the release, author Sandra D. Bricker wanted to do something really special for the final book of her four-part series, which is due
A Great Idea for an Author Website (But Poor Execution) Read More »
This week, we feature another author who has drawn a great deal of traffic to his website. His name is Mark Hamel, and he’s the author of Kaizen Event Fieldbook. Most of us won’t understand a word of the book. But that’s okay, because what we really need to know is how he got so
Author Success Story: Mark Hamel Read More »
It’s one of the first questions I ask every author as we prepare for the design process: “Do you have a photo of yourself that we can use on the site?” Surprisingly, a good percentage of the time, the answer to that question begins with hees and haws. Most authors want to have a good
The Importance of an Author Photo on an Author Website Read More »
If you’re an author using Facebook (and really, I hope you are), then you need to look at social networking as a piece of your business. That means analyzing it — just like you would any other advertising initiative — to determine what’s working and what’s a waste of your time. Enter Facebook Insights. Much
Why All Authors Should Be Using Facebook Insights Read More »
As I’ve mentioned many times before, collecting email addresses is a great way for an author to stay in touch with a ready-made audience of followers. By putting together an email list, an author can contact readers (instead of waiting for readers to come back to their website) when they are ready to announce a
5 Tips for a Successful Author Email Campaign Read More »
Websites should be fun places to visit. They should be full of stories, tips, ideas, and things that can improve your life. Unfortunately, most author websites don’t do that. Too many authors use their website more as a portfolio — a place to feature their work and themselves, but not really offer anything of value
8 Ways to Make Your Author Website Less Boring Read More »
Every author wants to build a website that generates thousands of visitors (and hopefully, thousands of books sold). Richard Bard has done just that. In the five weeks since his website launched, he’s had 5,000 visitors and over 9,000 pageviews. That’s impressive! Richard has also been kind enough to take the time to answer some
Author Success Story: Richard Bard Read More »
It’s one of the most important aspects of building and maintaining a website: creating new content. Without it, an author website is nothing but a static portfolio that people may visit once, but they’re certain not to return. Yes, folks, creating new content is super-important. Not only does it help to get people to return
The Importance of Author Website Content (and How to Create It) Read More »
