Plug Your Book!, Steve Weber [the unexpected everything TXT] 📗

Content. Nobody will visit a site that's merely an advertisement for your book. Your content can be a series of articles, book excerpts, or even feedback from your readers.

Book cover artwork, description, and excerpts.

Your biography.

Links to purchase your book, either on your site or online retailers such as Amazon and Barnes & Noble. The more choices you offer buyers, the better.

Reviews of your book.

A form where visitors can enter their e-mail address to subscribe to a newsletter or site updates.

Contact information--your e-mail address (or a form that forwards messages) and perhaps postal address and phone number.

A "media room" with any press releases announcing your book or any news coverage involving you or your book.

Suggested interview questions, along with your responses.

Every author site is different, and you're free to borrow ideas from the best, and ignore the worst. Here are some good examples:

This feature-packed site of mystery writer #Lisa Scottoline# includes everything the newcomer or longtime fan might want: a biography and several photos, background stories on her books, links to buy the books at various online retailers, book club information, tour schedules, an e-mail newsletter sign-up form, monthly trivia contests, audio and video clips of interviews, order forms for tote bags and signed bookplates, and a media kit with press releases and high-resolution photos. For each of Scottoline's 13 titles, visitors to the site can view the cover art, reviews and the first chapter.

Although this site is designed and maintained by specialists, it illustrates features any do-it-yourselfer can emulate on their own site.

Award-winning science-fiction writer# Cory Doctorow# maintains this site himself. The main page is a diary-style list of updates about Doctorow's travels, interviews and current articles. From a navigation bar at the top of the main page, visitors can dig into Doctorow's novels, nonfiction books and articles he's written for newspapers and magazines. Other sections include a biography and a recurring audio clip of Doctorow reading from one of his stories each week, called a podcast.

In one section of the site, #www.CrapHound.com/unwirer#, readers can view a story that was written online, a collaboration of Doctorow and author Charlie Stross. The story was written in public using a blog, with the whole process exposed to the public, so anyone could see and participate in the writing.

Doctorow publishes his site using the WordPress blogging system. Interestingly, Doctorow allows visitors to download the full text of any of his books for free. He believes the resulting word of mouth outweighs the danger of any lost sales.

Like most good author sites, this one has a clean, uncluttered design. Reading a Web site is made easier with the liberal use of white space.

Built to support the 2005 business bestseller, Freakonomics.com includes links to more information about the book, news stories covering topics in the book, and new articles by the book's co-authors. Free signed bookplates are offered to visitors who register their name and address. Free downloadable teaching guides are available for instructors who assign the book to college and high school students. And, of course, there are links to buy the book at online retailers.

This popular site helped build an audience for expanded editions in hardcover and paperback, and is piquing interest in a planned sequel, SuperFreakonomics.

This site is simple but well planned. For example, many folks misspell the book's title as Freakanomics. Realizing this, the publisher also reserved a domain for the misspelling, and those who type the wrong name into their Web browser are forwarded here.

Here's a site that's constantly updated to feature the latest business book by bestselling author #Seth Godin#. From this page, visitors are a link or two away from Godin's popular blog, a calendar of his public appearances, and links to his other books.

Godin displays generous samples of his books, and for one of his bestsellers, _ Unleashing the Ideavirus_, allows visitors to download the entire text free:

Here's a do-it-yourself site by a first-time novelist, #David Louis Edelman#. It includes book excerpts, forums, a blog, biography, and free audio of Edelman reading from the book. Visitors can also subscribe to announcements of book signings and readings.

Edelman provides a level of detail that few others match. For example, each of his nine Chapter 1 drafts are posted on the site, along with footnotes recounting the editorial decisions made for each draft.

Although Edelman is an experienced Web designer, he contends that anyone with basic computer skills can build an author site similar to his using simple, inexpensive tools like Google Pages and WordPress, a blog service.

In 1996 #Aaron Shepard # was one of the first children's authors to venture onto the Web. His site provides teachers, librarians, storytellers, and parents with a collection of free reader's theater scripts. Shepard provides stories in adaptations for storytellers, and in their original form for normal reading. The site has led to a number of subsidiary and foreign rights deals.

Other areas of Shepard's site are geared toward adults interested in writing and publishing. One handy resource is this tutorial on creating short, simple Web links to your books on Amazon:

In addition to showcasing your writing, a Web site enables you to host publicity materials at practically no cost. Instead of sending press releases and photographs via overnight mail, you can make the material available immediately to anyone.

Online press kits usually include an author biography, book descriptions and artwork, book excerpts, and high-resolution photographs suitable for reproduction in print publications. Some authors include a sample interview, with "suggested" questions and answers.

Here's an excellent example of an online author press kit:

#www.TLHines.com/presskit. html#

The kit includes PDF documents of press releases for the release of each book, suggested interview questions and answers, and a page of "interesting facts" about the author and his latest title. Several high-resolution photographs of the author in black-and-white and color are offered, suitable for reproduction in newspapers or magazines.

Here's an online press kit for author David Baldacci:

#www.DavidBaldacci.com/press#

And here, Baldacci provides the "Top 10" questions he's asked most often in interviews:

#www.DavidBaldacci.com/faq#

Some authors choose not to dedicate a specific area of their site to a press room. According to their theory, "publicity" materials are interesting to readers as well as the media, providing an "insider" feel. Instead of an online press room, these authors have a variety of pages dedicated to "touring," "photos," "biography," and other content.

As high-speed Internet service becomes more common, audio and video content are becoming valuable tools for online book promotion. Multimedia is particularly effective for niche authors and newcomers who haven't attracted mainstream media coverage.

Multimedia grabs the attention of younger people who spend more leisure time online, while consuming less traditional media like newspapers and television. Meanwhile, production and distribution of trailers is getting easier and cheaper by the day, thanks to inexpensive video cameras and free hosting sites like #www.YouTube.com#.

Book trailers, an increasingly popular tool for book publicity, often resemble movie previews, music videos or talk shows. Even though trailers are promotional materials, the people who choose to watch often perceive them as interesting, valuable content.

For authors and publishers, trailers can serve as an infomercial, a message that appears on a cable network of 5 million channels--except you have global reach and very low costs. The videos contain a "buy this book" link to Amazon or the publisher's site, prompting impulse purchases from viewers, which can make an effective trailer instantly profitable.