Many book authors decide that they do not need their own book websites. These authors feel that they can get enough exposure by listing their book on the various online book sites.
Yet, if you are truly interested in giving your book the best online marketing opportunities, you need to have your own book author website.
To begin with, if you use social media networking sites such as Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn to promote your book, you will want to include a URL link that sends people to a dedicated website to show that you are a serious author.
And this is especially true because you don’t want to use a URL to a shared site where people can get distracted with the other books available and forget about checking out your book.
Second, you want to be able to offer a sample chapter on your site in order to entice potential purchasers to buy the entire book. This sample chapter can also be used to encourage people to give you their name and email address.
Thus, if you have this information, you can keep yourself in front of people who might not have bought your book the first time they visited your site. Now you can send emails with updates of your writing.
Another important reason to have your own website is to be able to include book club discussion questions on the site. Plus you can also include videos and audios.
Then there’s the advantage of having your blog on your website. With the constant addition of fresh material, you make the search engines happy with your site. The result of this is to help your site come up higher in the organic search results when someone is looking for a book related to the topic of yours.
Of course, you can add your own book signings and event dates to let your fans know when and where they can meet you in person. And you can add reviews and testimonials to encourage potential purchasers.
The bottom line is that, if you have your own book author website and you can control it yourself, you can greatly increase your online marketing opportunities.
Phyllis Zimbler Miller (@ZimblerMiller on Twitter) is the co-founder of the social media marketing company www.MillerMosaicPowerMarketing.com.
