We are moving on to marketing tactics! We’ll start off by talking about author websites. This post originally appeared as a guest post on Nathan Bransford‘s blog as part of his first-ever guest post contest in July 2009. I’ve refined it a little bit.

Once upon a time, my day job involved learning how to get the most out of your website—and how to make your website work for your visitors. So from the perspective of Internet marketing, here are the top seven things every aspiring author’s website should have.

7. A blog. All right, all right. I’m a little partial to blogs, but not everyone likes blogs or is good at blogging. And that’s okay. If you want to call it an “announcements” section, or call it your “articles,” that’s fine. But do have at least one section of your site where you can post your news—anything from finishing your latest work in progress to selling a short story. This is also a great place to start gathering a following, especially if you like to connect with other people, share your research and discuss the process of writing.

Free advice: If you already have a blog, you can integrate it with your website. Check out Blogger’s Custom Domain feature and host it at http://blog.YOURWEBSITE.com to make sure everyone linking to you is pointing those links to your domain.

6. Social media. This doesn’t mean you need to run out and join every social networking site you’ve never heard of. But it’s always a good idea to give your website visitors potential ways to connect with you. So if you’re already on MySpace, Facebook or Twitter, or any other large social network, list those somewhere on your site—somewhere easy to find.

5. Search engine presence. Unless your name is John Doe or Mary Smith, it should be fairly easy to find your website by searching for your name in the major search engines (Google, Yahoo and Bing). One good way to start with this is to buy YourName.com. If YourName.com (and YourName.net and YourName.org) is taken, experiment with middle initials, maiden names, hyphens, etc. Still nothing? Maybe you should consider a pen name that would be easier for your readers to remember, too.

Free advice: If you have some competition for your name in search results, put in a little extra legwork to find places to get links back to your site, especially from related sites—guest blogging, article writing, etc. I mean, we are writers here, aren’t we?

4. Professional design. For real. This doesn’t mean you need to run out and hire a $10,000 website designer, or that your website has to look as awesome as J.K. Rowling’s. You don’t have to dress like a fashion model to pitch to an agent at a conference.

At the same time, you’re not going to wear your ratty jeans and torn up tank top to a business meeting. Just like your nice pleated khakis, your website needs to look professional: clean, polished, easy to read (spell checked!), easy to navigate. Make it easy for your visitors to find the important stuff on your website (see #1, 2, 3, and 7, at least).

3. An about page. Most of us have an urge to list our friends, spouses, pets, children, favorite television shows, other hobbies, and small collectibles in our query letter. Hopefully, if you’re reading Nathan’s blog, you’ll forbear and omit this paragraph from your query. But your website about page is exactly where you should put all that information. After all, if someone visiting your website wants to know more about you, why not tell them?

2. Your work. No, you probably shouldn’t slap your whole manuscript on your website. But you should at least have a short summary of your work on your site. You might also consider a short excerpt—a chapter or less—in addition to your extremely engaging summary. After all, if your work is ready to query, it’s ready to show, isn’t it? This is also a good place to put your writing credentials (if not under #3 already).

1. A contact page. You’d be amazed how often both aspiring and published authors forget (or don’t want) to give their website visitors a way to contact them. Now, odds are low that a literary agent, editor or publisher is going to use your contact page to send you a desperate “Please, please, work with me! Your brilliance makes me cower in inferiority, but I cannot bear the thought of anyone else tainting your work!” note—but there’s always the possibility.

Free advice: Use a simple web form instead of listing your email address to avoid spam email harvesters.

What do you think? What else should an aspiring author have on his/her website?

Photo credits: Microphone—RAWKUS; binoculars—Joël Dietlé; telephone—Maria Li

It’s the second edition of Thinky Links! Wherein I share a bunch of articles and features that have made me think lately.

I don’t think I’ve mentioned this here before, but I have a problem with the usual, chapter-a-week critique group format. I’ve taken chapters through that format, and while the chapters themselves get better, it’s like putting lipstick on a three-legged pig. The thing needs a prosthetic, not make up. Kristin Lamb has a new approach to the traditional critique group with a Concept critique. (I love the idea, but shudder at the thought of writing out 75 pages of outlines before I begin.) This inspired my fledgling critique group to totally change up our format—and so far, it works! Now if only we could get our schedules to do the same.

I’ve mentioned a couple of Vince Mooney’s points on book marketing, but he also has some fun lists on his blog, including more than 100 nonverbal cues, 200 triggers for creating emotional responses, 100 ways a character might grow in the course of a romance and how to show it and more. While every one of these suggestions obviously won’t work for every character, hopefully there will be something to jog your imagination and personalize your character.

Want to inject more humor into your writing? Author Julie Lessman posts at Seekerville about the whys and hows of humor even in non-comedic novels.

Every week, author Julie Coulter Bellon offers a free first page critique from an anonymous national editor. Interested? Here are the guidelines:

Want your first page critiqued by a national editor? Submit your double-spaced, 12 point font, first manuscript page to juliecoulterbellon@gmail.com with First Page Friday in the subject line. Ms. Shreditor and Angela Eschler critique every Friday. (Please no swearing or explicit sex scenes).

In February, author Kathi Oram Peterson devoted the month to writing about faith—specifically, having faith in yourself and your writing. If your faith is flagging, check out her posts!

Every time I go to author Jody Hedlund’s blog, I read pretty much everything I get my hands on. Most recently, I really liked her articles on time management for busy writers (from a home-schooling mom of 5 and published author!), how to make more time for blogging (and writing), living intentionally but with breathing space (on time management and meeting goals). Apparently my subconscious is worried about something. . . .

Which of these links makes you think? What other great articles have you read lately?

Hey folks! In case you missed it yesterday, I put out my first PDF writing guide in years, this time on emotion. And my friend and new critique partner, author Julie Coulter Bellon, featured me and my writing guides on her blog today. And man, am I blushing after all the nice things she said. Thanks, Julie!

Also today, it’s the first of March, in case you didn’t notice. That means it’s time for the first ever AI MARCH-A-THON!

!I’m part of the executive committee of a writing community called Authors Incognito (our one and only membership requirement: have attended an LDStorymakers Conference). And this month, we’re setting the bar really high for ourselves. We’re shooting for a Nano-style “31 days of going for the gold”—only instead of 50,000 words, we can set whatever writing-related goals we want.

You don’t have to be a member of AI to join in—come post your goals now and work together with us!

So I dreamed big. I’m already afraid I dreamed too big. But I’m hoping to finish revisions on one book (1/3 of the way through now), read one book, and write one book.

Yeah, a whole one.

See what I mean?

And I’m going to keep up the blog? Oy.

Diving back into my revisions!

When I figured out which series were the tops in 2011, I suddenly realized how long it’s been since I put together one of my series into PDF format (hint: years). Plus, it’s my husband’s and my second anniversary of our first kiss. I wanted to celebrate, but I can’t really take you all to dinner. So I made you something instead. (Ten guesses what it is!)

I’m starting with the most popular of last year’s series: Emotion: it’s tough. Portraying emotion in fiction isn’t easy—but an emotional experience is exactly why readers buy and read books. Using that emotion makes your writing more powerful—when it’s done right.

Emotion might be a double black diamond ski slope, but it doesn’t have to be treacherous terrain in your writing. Hard work, perhaps always. But impossible? Nope!

So check out the free PDF version of the series Emotion: it’s tough!

More free PDF writing guides.

Photo by Peter Dutton