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Contents
Setting Up Your Website
- NameBounce
- Find Available Domain Names on Namestation
- “+300 Awesome Free Things for Entrepreneurs & Startups” on Growth Supply
- “11 Essential Elements of an Author Website” on How to Blog a Book
- “5 Things You Need On Your Author Website” on Book Marketing Tools
- “9 Author Website Trends You Need to Know About” on BookBub
- “An Author Website Checklist” on Digital Book World
- “Author & Book Websites: What to Include?” on Outbox Outline
- “Before You Launch Your Author Website: How to Avoid Long-Term Mistakes” on Jane Friedman
- “Building an Author Website on WordPress: How to Start Smart” on Jane Friedman
- “Building Your Professional Author Website: WordPress vs Squarespace” on Jane Friedman
- “Creating Author Websites: The Definitive Guide” on Write to Done
- “Do You Need to Rethink Your Website’s Key Elements?” on Jane Friedman
- “Does Your Author Website Have The Essentials To Attract Readers And Sell Your Books?” on The Creative Penn
- “Step By Step Tutorial: How To Build Your Own Self-Hosted Author Website In 30 Minutes” on The Creative Penn
- “How to Create Your Author Website Using Self-Hosted WordPress” on PressBooks
- “How to Make the Most of Your Website” on BookWorks
- “How to Take Charge of Your Author Blog” on Social Media Just for Writers
- “Let’s Address a Common Misunderstanding About Author Websites” on Writer Unboxed
- “A Writer Gets All Techie About Her Website” on Gail Gauthier
- “Self-Hosting Your Author Website: Why and How to Do It” on Jane Friedman
- “How To Start A Money-Making Blog In Less Than 5 Minutes (Step-By-Step Guide)” on Dukeo
- “Developing an Author Website – A Marketing and Communication Checklist Study” on The eBook Author’s Corner
- “The Ultimate Guide to What Every Author Website Needs, Part 1” on Patrick Samphire
- “The Ultimate Guide to What Every Author Website Needs, Part 2” on Patrick Samphire
- “Web Hosting Review: So Just Who is the Best?” on wpmudev
- “Your Blog Might Need a Makeover” on Rafflecopter
- Fat Cow Hosting Review
- Chocolate Hosting
- “The Truth About Thesis.com” on Pearsonified
- “How to Make a Website” on WebsiteSetup
Website Content
- “14 Strategies for Curating Great Content” on Social Media Just for Writers
- “7 Tips for Designing Awesome Animated GIFS” on Invision
- “Blogging: Fundamentals” on Blogging University
- “Download: Optimize Templates for Keyword Glossary & Editorial Plan” on Optimize Book
- “How To Write A Click-Worthy Blog Title” on Molly Greene
- “Six Ways To Create Great Content In Just 15 Minutes A Day” on Small Business Newz
- “How to Optimize Your Content for Social Media” on Sarke Media
Website Design
- Essential Grid
- Pixelwars website themes
- Genesis WordPress
- “Animated Content Tabs with CSS3” on Codrops
Website Maintenance
- “10 Essential Website Housekeeping Tasks” on Molly Greene
- “10 Simple Ways to Make Your WordPress Site Faster” on Sugar Rae
- “Why Trying to Get 95+ on Google PageSpeed Insights for Your WordPress Site Will Drive You Mad!” on wpmudev
- Browser Compatibility Test
- “HowTo: Configure WordPress To Use A Content Delivery Network (CDN)” on nixCraft
- “My Website is Slow” on Hostmonster
- “Performance of the Best WordPress Hosting Companies Compared” on WP Site Care
- “How I Cut My Page Load Speed by 90% Using Jetpack, CDN, Dedicated Hosting, and More” on SDavis Media
- “How to Make WordPress Sites Load 72.7% Faster” on CopyBlogger
- “How to Use Google Webmaster Tools to Diagnose and Improve WordPress Page Speed” on wpmudev
- “W3 Total Cache Plugin : Speed Up Your Website” on WP Widgets
- WP Super Cache
- “Improve Your Website’s Health With These 20 Simple Actions.” on Blogging Love
Getting Traffic and Visitors
- “21 Tactics to Increase Blog Traffic” on MOZ
- “21 Ways a Reader Might Find Your Author Website” on BookBaby
- “3 New AdWords Automations You Can’t Afford To Miss” on Search Engine Land
- “WordPress SEO Tasks: 5 Things You Always Forget” on Dukeo
- “How to Get Traffic to Your Author Website: 30+ Tips for Discouraged Writers” on Your Writer Platform
- “How We Increased Our Organic Search Traffic By Using HitTail” on WPBeginner
- “RSSTop55: Best Blog Directory And RSS Submission Sites” on Robin Good
- “The Optimized Publisher: Author Amplification” on Digital Book World
- “The Optimized Publisher: XML Sitemaps” on Digital Book World
- Google Search Console
- Yoast SEO for WordPress (tutorials)
- Social Triggers
- Google XML Sitemaps Generator
- Yoast SEO
Tracking Your Website
- “10 useful Google Analytics custom dashboards” on Econsultancy
- “12 Awesome Custom Google Analytics Reports Created by the Experts” on Kissmetrics
- “Google Analytics: 5 Tips for Easy Monitoring” on Dukeo
- “7 Google Analytics Custom Dashboard Examples To Segment SEO, Social Media, Mobile, And Other Metrics” on Online Media Masters
- “AuthorRise Shows Promise for Indie Writers” on The Book Designer
- “Google Analytics Bounce Rate (actually) Demystified” on Analytics Ninja
- Heap Analytics
- “How to Improve Your Marketing with Google Analytics Data” on QuickSprout
- Crazy Egg
- “Reach for the Stars with Google Analytics” on The YP Publishing
Earning Money on Your Website
- “All in One Adsense” on Linux and Open Source Blog
- LinkVehicle
- Riot Ad Network
- Blog Ads
- Ad Rotate for WordPress
- Warrior Plus Affiliates
- iTunes Affiliates (sign up here)
- Kobo Affiliates
- Audible Affiliates
- Google Adsense
- Mobile Theme Ads for Jetpack
- WordPress Affiliate from Shareasale
Selling Products on Your Website
- “How to Sell Digital Products & Services Directly from Your Website: Advice for Authors and Freelancers” on Jane Friedman
- “Adding Ebook EPUB and MOBI Downloads to WordPress” on Ed Schipul
- “How to Sell Books From Your Website: Top 3 E-commerce Solutions for Authors” on The Book Designer
- “Legal: “Terms and Conditions” Protect Your Online Business” on Practical ECommerce
- “How to Sell eBooks Directly to Readers” on Word Magic
Making Your Website Mobile Friendly
- “5 Myths About Mobile Web Performance” on Sencha
- “Check Out This Mobile Version of My Site (and links to how I learned how to do it)” on Idea Trash
- “Google’s AMP: The Fun and User-Friendly Guide to Accelerated Mobile Pages” on CopyBlogger
- “How and Why to Make Your Indie Author Website Mobile Responsive” on Self Publishing Advice Center
- “How to edit jetpack mobile theme” on TP
- “How to Turn Any Site Into a Responsive Site” on Vandelay Design
- “Mobile Theme” on Jetpack
- Onbile
- Onswipe
- ShoutEm API
Tools and Add-ons For Your Website
- Vanilla Forums
- Elementor
- “Subscription migration tool” on Jetpack
- “Monocle, or Something Exactly Like It, Will Change Everything About Publishing” on The Fiction Circus
- “Transferring Followers and Subscribers” on Jetpack
- Wishlist Member
- Enhanced Linking
- WP Minify
- “Essential WordPress Plugins for Book Authors Building a Platform” on wpmudev
- WP List Press
- Buddy Press
- Booktorious on Github
- Bookflip
- Book.ish
- BookJS
- Custom Google Search
- “Display & Style Related Posts For Your WordPress Site” on Envato
- “How to add WordPress Related Posts Without Plugins” on Hongkiat
- EPUBJS
- Pippity
Example Websites
- “29 Author Websites with Stellar Designs” on BookBub
- Andrew Hyde
- “Ten Author Websites That Really do the Business” on The Writing Platform
- This Book is About Travel
Additional Resources and Services
- Amanda Abella
- AppSumo
- Code snippets on Bill Erickson
- Google Webmaster Central Blog
- RKA Ink
- Wired Tutorials
- “What infrastructure should I run a WordPress installation with 200.000+ posts on?” on Quora
- Aptana Studio 3
- John Watson
- “WordPress themes for writers and authors: Build a website with WordPress” on Ben Zackheim
- “How to Speed Up Your WordPress” on Website Setup
- “A Comprehensive Guide to Building an Author Website” on The Self-Publisher
- Business Name Generator
Editor’s note: This post originally appeared January 2017.
Quite a collection, thank you for collecting these!