Lena Nilsson

This article outlines the basics of setting up your own website without a tutorial in a specific program.
 
Why a writer needs a website

Published authors have fabulous, and many times, fun websites to promote their writing and their books, but even non-published writers should seriously think about showing their presence.

When you submit a manuscript to a professional, such as a literary agent, manuscript assessor, or publisher, it's an advantge to be available on the net. As you all know, the cover letter sent with a manuscript has to be professional - precise and concise. No way can you bombard the intended person with irrelevant details, or your life story. If you do, you run the risk of having your manuscript buried in the permafrost pile - never to thaw. 

The easiest way for someone to find out more about you is to look for information on the Internet. For this to function, you obviously have to be out there. Think of your webpage as an extensive business card where you can state so much more than what's displayed on a card.   

Another important factor, if you want people to perceive you as a writer, is that you will probably do better if you act in a professional way from the start. One way of doing this is to promote yourself by having your own site. An alternative is a blog, which has no cost involved. I have tried, but believe it takes too much time away from my main writing. A blog is only useful if you write updates regularly. For me it's too hard to keep up, so my blogs hibernate at present.

How to go about creating a website   
 
For many, setting up a web page may be a question of cost. If you're prepared to pay, including on-going expenses (apart from the website name and the hosting, which come with unavoidable fees) your best bet is to enlist a website designer.

The more pages you need and the more graphics and gimmicks you want, the more expensive it will be. A web designer may charge anything from maybe AUD$500.00 up to many thousands of dollars. You should take into consideration that every time you want to add or change something, the costs add up. Unless you choose to maintain full control by doing the web page yourself, you'll have to pay every time you need to bring it up to date - possibly even if you only want to change a typing error!

The developer may do an excellent site for you, but for a struggling writer, the service provided by of a professional may be as unattainable, as it was for me when I first needed a website.

In 1998, I needed a website for other reasons than writing. It was to be my own business site and, amazingly, I accomplished my professional presence on the web entirely on my own, and without any technical expertise in html and web developing. If you're a beginner, you can quite easily do this too, but so much simpler with an easy-to-use professional program.

The main programs I used at the time were Cute Website Builder, MS Publisher and later MS FrontPage, apart from trying out many free programs. I was learning on the go by adding tables and, at times, html.

With trial, error and lots of irritation, I had my site up and running. In fact, I had a few sites at the time. The most important issue was that, even if it was time-consuming, I had set up my own business webpage, which I was able to update without any costs and exactly at the time needed. My site functioned well and enabled me to run a successful business dealing with people from various countries for close to eight years, mainly over the net.  

Recommended web development program

Today, I make my websites with the help of an excellent program - XSitePro2, Version 2, which is by far the best I've used during at least 11 years of making my own sites. From the start, it exceeded all my expectations. 

If you use this program, you should be able to produce your own webpage within hours of training. I believe most people who write are familiar with MS Word. In that case, you'll find that many tool bar commands and features are in unison with this program.

The amount of time you'll have to spend producing your site depends on, of course, how much you already understand about the special terms. Not to worry. If you don't know the common words when you start, you'll soon find out by simply using the program. 

After playing around with XSitePro2 by checking many of the features for half a day, I was able to produce two websites in two days. I had some of the writing material finished before I started and it helped.

I was surprised how easy it was to design and change within the template I had chosen. A few times, I changed the template in the middle of my work, but there was no problem. The program adjusted itself and all information I had added stayed in the right places.

Another good feature is that you can easily copy your site before you close down, each time you work on it. You can also set it up to undertake backups regularly. A many times over-looked precaution is to have a separate hard drive and save your work there too. That way, you will not lose out if some strange ill-feeling gremlin wants a break and decides to visit your computer.
  
Let's say that you want to invest in your future as a writer by buying the software program XSitePro2, or some other program, but you know you also need some graphics. Even if you have a free XHeader program with XSitePro2, you may find that the massive amount of headers included are not exactly what you want for your site.  

For many years, I've used Microsoft PhotoDraw 2000, Version 2, to manipulate pictures into banners, or to make other graphics by reshaping, cutting and changing colours etc. I use the Windows Vista operating system on my computer and the old PhotoDraw seems to work well on Vista too. Unfortunately, Microsoft ceased to produce this handy program.

If you're interested in PhotoDraw, you may find it, as used, on the net, if not, you could try an alternative. When I did a search, I found this site: http://alternatives.rzero.com/graphics.html where they have listed a few brand names of suitable graphic programs. 

How to start if you want to be on the web

Start your site by making a plan of the kind of pages you need. You can always add the correct site name later when you have organised your domain name. Use any name in the meantime.

Plan your suggestions of your suitable pages on a plain piece of paper- or why not do it in Word, where you can add writing for the site at the same time?

Then it's just a matter of copying and pasting into your website template as you prepare to set up your webpage.

Do not be overwhelmed by thinking of the many pages you want (or think) you need! To start with, you can probably make do with only a few and when satisfied, publish them to the net. Later, it's easy to update with more pages as you come up with more writing and more information. How many depends on exactly what the purpose is with your webpage.

Write down what you want to disclose about yourself. It's good to have this ready for the next step whether you enlist a web developer to make your site, or you prefer to do everything yourself. 

The following pages are what I consider the basics of any site: 

• Home (also called an index or default page)
• About (+ your name, or nothing)
• Contact (+ your name, or nothing) - You do not have to use this as a separate page. You can add contact details such as an email address on the Home page, or on the About page, if you like.
• Links (you should add links to pages reflecting what you do, or what you find interesting in your line of work. Reciprocal links are supposedly good for high placement on search engines.)

Home or index page

This is where you write something about what the website is for and what you do. The main writing on the Home page should have your chosen keywords in the main writing/information and in the first few paragraphs.

If you have no idea what keywords are, you can look up what keywords your favourite site on the net has used. Basically, when you search the net, you use keywords. If you search for "writer", it may be too broad. If you add more words e.g. "children's writer in Perth", you're more specific. It's the same with keywords. Use words which you believe may be used to try and find your website. 

This is how you find out more about a website's specific keywords:

If you use MS Internet Explorer as your browser, add any website address, and when your page comes up, go to View (on the Toolbar) and then click Source. If you look into the new page, you should see "keywords" and "description" closer to the top end.

You also need to add relevant keywords to your webpage in a separate section before you publish your webpage to the net. In this separate section, which you'll find easily when using the software program, you add a description of your page with a sentence or two, but don't make it too long as it will be harder for search engines to accept.
  
"About" page

Write down what you want to say about yourself on this page. Maybe add a picture, but try not to make the picture file too large. If you can, you should optimize your pictures before adding, as it's important to keep picture files smaller for the page to load faster. If you search for optimization programs, you should find some on the net where you can optimize them to smaller file sizes free of charge. 

Contact

This is where you tell people how to contact you either by email or with a form, which you have set up in the program. Be wary of adding your home address, telephone number and mobile number for obvious reasons. If you use XSitePro2, there's an easy way of setting up a form and there's a way of obscuring your written email address from robots. You don't want too many spam emails.

Links

Add your favourite links on this page. Search the Internet and when you find a page you like, copy the address in your browser bar before pasting the same by inserting the link into your page. It should become clear when you use the website development program how this is done.

If you use XSitePro2, you can learn how to set up your webpage by first making a "mock webpage" before you start on your own. 

If you use a header, which comes with the program instead of buying a separate program to make your own, you can still add suitable photos or pictures, either in the left or right panel, or in the main writing on any, or all, of your pages.   

After you've done your basic pages, you can add pages as you want. It does not matter in what order you make them. You can move them up or down inside your site. If you want to delete a page, you can, and if you want to add one, it's the same - a click on an arrow button (up or down). You can make more pages, or sub-pages, at the same time as you are setting up your site, or later.  

Don't forget the cardinal rules - copy and backup! I emphasise this again that a good investment is to buy a separate hard drive and backup all writing on this too.

Next week you will find the next instalment of this article with 10 things to think about, and some details on domain names and web hosting.
 
© Lena Nilsson, 2009.