Attracting attention with your artisan business website
Ready to craft the perfect website for your artisan business? Whether you’re an experienced web designer branching out into new territory or a non-coder just getting started, We Are Seven is here to help. We’ll get you ready to sell your handmade items online in no time.
Getting people to notice your online artisan business
As an artisan crafter, you know how hard it can be to strike the balance between the ubiquitous and the avant garde. Too innovative, and potential buyers will see your craft as confusing or difficult to use. But if you err on the side of being too bland, those same buyers will never even turn their heads. The same thing is true in web design. The product type should be instantly apparent; Your style should be unique.
The reality is that whether you’re a crafter, tradesperson, artist, or author, as a businessperson you don’t want to stand out too much. A viewer should immediately know they’re looking at a cutting board, rather than a piece of wall art. They should also see what makes this cutting board subtly different from all the others they’ve seen before. You want your products (and your artisan business as a whole) to be instantly recognizable, while still having that ‘je ne sais quoi’ that sets them apart from every other Etsy listing or craft booth.
So how do you pull all of this off? What’s the secret to standing out without going over the top (and potentially opening yourself up to ridicule—remember Regretsy)? If you want to sell handmade items online, you need top-tier web design.
How to set your products apart with web design
We’ve whittled this topic down into a tidy list of three things to keep in mind when finding that sweet spot between attention-grabbing and anxiety-inducing. When designing your artisan business’ website, make sure to:
1. Create a color palette that works for your products
When it comes to your website’s color palette, it’s easy to get lost in color psychology, industry trends, and your own preferences. All of those are important, but if you want to keep it simple and effective, focus on your products.
You’ll want to make sure you choose a color palette that makes your work look great. That color may be white, but it probably isn’t. Unicorn Eclipse uses a light pink background instead of white. This ties into most of their products and creates an immediate impression on website visitors.
2. Reflect your materials in the design
There’s a reason we went with a paper texture and kraft accents for this website. We wanted it to have a handmade feel as well as a recognizable look. If you work with marble, try a marbled background. If you work with clay, lean into a terra cotta color scheme. You can be subtle, but you can’t be bashful.
Amber Jean is a sculptor who works primarily with wood. Her website uses a wood grain frame. Before you ever see her artwork, you know what kind of work she produces.
3. Put your brand on everything
What we said about being bashful applies here, too. To successfully sell handmade items online, you need your business name to stick in vistors’ heads. More than that, you want them to associate your brand with your products. When designing an online artisan business, it’s vital that the brand is infused into the structure. That can mean having your logo in the corner of every page, but it should go further. Looking back to Unicorn Eclipse, the creators have their artwork on the header of each and every page as well.
A few things to avoid when designing your web-based artisan business
Now that you have the three main “do’s,” let’s get into a few “don’t’s.” When designing your web store…
4. Don’t put your visitors in a maze
This isn’t the time to get creative with navigation or site layout. Avoid the temptation of the sideways scroll bar. Make sure all of your site’s pages are visible in the main site navigation (use drop-down menus if you have a lot of sub-categories). You don’t want your visitors to spend any mental energy trying to find your products, their shopping cart, or important information like your privacy policy or contact methods. If you want to sell your handmade items online, make sure they’re easy to buy.
5. Don’t under-categorize
Group your products into as many different categories as they fit into, even if some of your product pages feel a little redundant. It’s unlikely that a visitor will sit down and click through every page, becoming annoyed at seeing the same products in multiple categories. What is likely is a visitor clicking on one category and missing a product they’d really like because it’s only listed on an overlapping page. Placing products in more than one category is one of the benefits of having an online artisan business, as opposed to a brick-and-mortar shop. Take advantage of it.
6. Don’t crowd your products
A best practice is to keep columns limited to three across and rows to around ten. If you have the ability to allow users to select how many items per page they want to see, that’s fine. But if not, let them click through multiple pages instead of scrolling endlessly.
If you want a maximalist design, go for a patterned background, not a cluttered site. At the end of the day, designing an online shop is about presenting your products. A museum doesn’t cram everything it has into one room, or even one wing. It lets each room present enough artwork that it doesn’t overwhelm the visitor.
You’ve got good design sense. Trust it.
When you get right down to it, selling handmade items online is pretty similar to setting up your booth at a farmer’s market or craft show. You want your booth to be distinctive, easy to navigate, and pleasant to be in. You already have a good sense of design as a creator. So tip #7 is: Don’t shy away from your instincts for design just because you’re working in a different medium.
What tips would you add to this list? Let us know in the comments below!
In future posts, we’ll go into product layouts, shopping cart options, and visitor retention. To be notified when these posts are available, sign up for our mailing list.
As a traditionally published or indie author, you need direct access to your audience. A website is the ideal way to build a platform where you can maintain contact with your fans. WordPress for authors offers a wide range of benefits (as well as a few drawbacks). So, is WordPress right for your author site? Read on to find out.
WordPress is the single most popular content management system (CMS) on the internet. And it’s easy to see why. It can build blogs, shops, and much more. And because of its code-free interface, it’s possible to create a website without learning HTML, JavaScript, CSS, or PHP. However, that doesn’t mean that you won’t have to learn anything. Some users find the learning curve for WordPress significantly steeper than for drag-and-drop builders, like Wix.
So, should you use WordPress for your author’s page? Explore the benefits and drawbacks below to find out.
The overwhelming majority of author platforms we see and work with are built on WordPress. Some of the advantages of WordPress for authors are its:
Cost: It’s a free and powerful content management system
Simplicity: You can use it without knowing how to code
Appearance: You can get an amazing look without being a designer
Those are three pretty strong points in favor of WordPress. Let’s look at them more closely.
A free, powerful CMS
WordPress makes blogging tools, like comments, automatic archiving, sorting by categories, and tagging available to everyone. Instead of working with half-a-dozen third parties to get the tools you need, you can quickly and easily download a plugin. That’s why we use it for our blog!
A simple way to customize your author’s page
Using WordPress.org’s built-in Theme Editor, you can:
Add or remove elements (like images and forms)
Change colors, fonts, themes, and templates
Implement special features with third-party plugins
Create custom pages, a blog, and a storefront
And you can do it all without knowing any coding languages.
A custom design
By building your own theme or customizing an existing theme, you can incorporate color schemes and motifs that tell future readers exactly what your author brand is about. Even if you know nothing about design you can get a professional look by adapting an existing theme. A beautiful website with no web design experience? That sounds excellent.
WordPress author sites are typically easy to navigate and simple to update. They also offer built-in options for blogs and, thanks to plugins like WooCommerce, online shops. That means you can interact with your fans through comments and sell your books directly from your website. What reason could there be not to use WordPress to build your author’s page?
Though incredibly popular and powerful, WordPress is not without its flaws. Let’s go over a few of them so you can make an informed decision on whether or not a WordPress author site is right for you.
Before you get started on your author’s page, consider the…
Cost: WordPress.org is free to use, but you still need to find webspace.
Difficulty: It will probably take you a little time to understand the interface
Appearance: Without CSS, you won’t be able to fully customize your site.
Are any of these deal-breakers? Let’s go over each point in more detail.
Finding webspace for your author’s page
You can buy webspace through companies like WordPress.com (a separate entity from the free WordPress.org) or other web hosting providers. We’ve worked with HostGator for many years and can highly recommend them. All major web hosts will offer WordPress integration, though, so you still won’t need to worry about code.
You’ll also probably want to secure your own domain name. Some web hosts, such as InfinityFree and Neocities, will offer you a free subdomain. And while we think using a free web builder is fine, we strongly recommend owning your domain name. We’ve used Namecheap for many years and have never had an issue, so we recommend their services.
Learning WordPress
We would rank using WordPress as a little more difficult than using Wix. But that’s much easier than learning how to code (which would take months, minimum!). Still, the interface takes a little getting used to. We strongly recommend using the official tutorials as well as watching experienced WordPress designers on YouTube before getting started. You can also find guides specifically geared toward using WordPress for authors’ sites, so you can find industry-related tips.
Customizing WordPress author sites
Creative people tend to have very precise ideas about what they want. As a writer, you probably already have an image of how you want your author’s page to look. And while WordPress offers plenty of customization options, there are limits to how much you can do.
For instance, we designed weareseven.com first, then designed a custom WordPress theme for the blog portion of this site. We wanted to make the blog’s style indistinguishable from the rest of the website. We did most of it with the basic tools found in the Editor panel. But there were a few details, such as the boarder image we use, that we had to add with CSS.
Overall, you should be able to build the WordPress author site you have in mind. Just be prepared to let go of a few details here and there.
But speaking of design oversight when it comes to WordPress for authors…
You don’t have to either hire someone to code a website from scratch or design one yourself using WordPress. Plenty of web developers also build WordPress author sites. This means that once the site is up and running, you can use your WordPress dashboard to make updates and changes yourself, without relying on a third party developer.
This is the option I recommend for people who want more hands-on control over their website, but don’t have the time to learn the ins and outs of designing with WordPress.
Consider hiring a designer to create an author’s page using WordPress if you plan to…
Publish regular blogs or news updates
Make frequent updates to your site’s content
Keep costs low by managing things yourself
If you want to take the reins of your website once it’s live, this might be the ideal option for you.
However, if hiring a designer isn’t in the budget, but you still want someone else to craft a beautiful website, we’ve got good news. You can easily buy and install a professionally built WordPress theme.
After you install the theme, you can use the WordPress dashboard just like you would if you selected one of the default WordPress themes. Also, should you want to make changes as time goes on, you can go into the site Editor and adapt the templates that are already there.
What’s right for your author site?
We hope that’s given you a thorough overview of your options for designing your author’s page. You have a wide range of choices, including:
What are your thoughts on using WordPress for authors’ sites? Would you like us to go into more detail on designing WordPress author sites? Let us know in the comments below.
This blog was written by a human for We Are Seven. For permissions or questions, please contact us.
Lately, we’ve been seeing quite a lot of disingenuous arguments regarding AI. And while confusion and anger get engagement, these issues are too serious to descend into intentional misunderstanding and false offense. However, the conflicts aren’t all manufactured, and they aren’t just happening online. People we know are either sincerely misled or else sincerely confused about the basics of the AI discourse. We want to have a more productive conversation about AI moving forward.
But we can’t have an honest conversation unless the participants agree on what it is they’re talking about. So, in this blog post, we’re going to go over…
A few definitions (including “AI”)
What data centers are, how they operate, and why they’re being built
What the main concerns over data centers and generative AI are
How we can talk about problems with AI with the aim of reaching understanding
We’re also going to touch on…
Disingenuous questions
False comparisons
So if you’ve been wondering about these issues or trying to find out how to have more productive conversations about AI, read on.
What is AI?
Though AI stands for “artificial intelligence,” (it’s sometimes also called “augmented intelligence”) it isn’t technically an intelligence. In the same way that “autopilot” in cars isn’t an actual autopilot, large language models aren’t actually AI.1 At least, not yet. LLMs analyze linguistic data and make predictions based on those analyses. They ‘recognize’ patterns in speech and writing so well that they can generate their own human-sounding text. Proto-chatbots existed as far back as the 1960s (such as ELIZA), but bots as we know them today didn’t appear until the late aughts. Cleverbot arrived in 2008 and began making a splash online.2
Learning models were developing quickly all over the world, from England to Japan. In 2024, a news story about a computer program from a Japanese bakery started gaining traction. ZME Science reported3 that a decade prior, BakeryScan—a neural network model4 developed to identify pastries—started making waves. The article says that a doctor in Kyoto saw the potential to use this model to identify cancer cells. A few years later a prototype appeared in hospitals.
Eventually, this lead to generative AI models like OpenAI (ChatGPT), that could generate content that was virtually indistinguishable from a disinterested human writing to a template.
Yes, artificial neural networks could make life easier
When most people praise AI, they’re thinking about its potential. These models could eliminate most of the “busy work” that people—especially people who can’t pay for convenience—have to do. Here’s one example. If you need a mechanic, a well-trained and accurate model could compile information about local auto shops, including:
reviews
years in business
complaints
average rates
and other important factors
All of this, in seconds, allowing you to compare them side-by-side. That would save quite a lot of time and frustration. Or an AI tool could make grocery shopping simple. It could:
scan all the sales at local grocery stores
compare that to your weekly grocery needs
consider the time you have to shop
factor in price changes from week to week
Then, it could generate an almost-instantaneous shopping itinerary with a route that could save you time and money.
But, at least so far, legitimately useful AI tools like these aren’t freely available to the average- or low-income person. Instead, AI is being leveraged against everyday people with applications like dynamic pricing (which can track what you buy and increase the price on items you need most). So while we acknowledge that these tools have the potential to change our existence for the better, what the average person is actually facing are more problems from AI than solutions.
What are the supposed problems with AI?
What started out as a technology that offered fun interactions with chatbots and life-saving medical applications quickly cascaded into a cause for concern. We’ll discuss data centers in a moment, but for now let’s take an overview of the problems with AI itself. The primary concerns making headlines are the loss of jobs and the loss of skills. Let’s break those down.
Job Loss
In 2025 alone, AI implementation at workplaces caused 54,694 layoffs, according to this report.5 The Word Economic Forum predicts that by 2030, 92 million jobs will have been eliminated.6 This would be great news if the United States and other affected countries had guaranteed universal basic income, as it would allow many people to do meaningful, human-powered work regardless of whether or not it paid well. But in our current economic reality, those numbers are devastating.
Skill Loss
Professional skill loss due to AI
But what if the economic devastation wasn’t so severe? Would AI still present problems if no one lost their jobs and homes? Well, there are still real concerns with the human cost of relying on AI. “Skill atrophy” due to AI is a particular worry when it comes to doctors’ abilities. In 2025, The Lancet published a study that suggested a reliance on AI-assisted diagnostics could result in a loss of ability to correctly diagnose patients without AI. That is to say, diagnosticians could see their skills decline as they use AI assistance.7 We’ll need more rigorous and well-controlled studies to know if this is a threat, but in the meantime it is a cause for concern.
Developmental skill loss due to AI
But it isn’t just diagnosticians we need to keep an eye on. Psychology Today writer Timothy Cook argues that, though offloading cognitive tasks to AI can lead to skill atrophy in adults, it will prevent those skills from ever being formed in children. He describes this as part of the AI audit problem. That is, adults who have learned how to do these tasks and are simply looking to save time still have the capacity to examine AI’s results and see if they’re correct.8 But children, who have not learned how to do the task on their own, will not have the knowledge or experience needed to perform this audit.
AI dependence may cause adults to lose skills. Children will never learn them.
And with more and more students relying on AI, we could be seeing the beginning of a loss of skill far more dramatic than the one we’ve been part of for the last couple of hundred years. This isn’t fear-mongering or pearl-clutching on the part of a handful of sulky, unemployed people. It’s not the rant of an old man shouting at clouds. This is a real potential danger that we should be diligently monitoring and investigating.
What’s the deal with data centers?
Even if we somehow dealt with the loss of jobs, and it turned out that the fears about skill atrophy were overblown, there’s one more major problem with AI proliferation. If we want to have a sincere and productive conversation about AI, we need to consider data centers.
Data centers are not new. But their numbers have risen sharply with the demand for bitcoin and, especially, generative AI products. Structurally, they’re similar to supercomputers; buildings filled with thousands of servers performing calculations. However, while a supercomputer usually focuses its resources on a single computation, data centers perform thousands of separate computations simultaneously.9 This article by Forbes outlines the different types of data centers.10
The problems with data centers
This expansion comes at a cost. While proponents are eager to focus on the temporary construction jobs and handful of long-term jobs at the data centers themselves, residents are fighting to keep these projects out of their communities. Surges in energy costs, the co-opting of millions of gallons daily from local water sources, and the increase in pollution that come along with data center construction are, unsurprisingly, unappealing. Now that word has gotten out about what some residents are suffering, worry and resistance are growing. This public push-back has led developers to add some sustainable features to future projects, but with the long history of large corporations sickening and killing U.S. citizens, it’s easy to see why many people are still deeply skeptical.11
Further, with the increase in energy usage due to AI applications, all that new energy has to come from somewhere. The construction of multiple nuclear power plants (as well as an unknown number of gas and coal plants) is being planned across the country. And while Meta uses phrases like “energy leadership” and “reliable and firm power,” people become defensive when these innovations arrive in their backyards.12
Now we’re on the same page about what AI is and what the major causes for concern are. But before we can have a productive conversation about AI, we need to address a few of the most common disingenuous questions, concerns, and talking points.
Disingenuous questions and arguments
You can’t have a productive conversation about AI with these
Often, when someone on the internet says they’re against using AI, a percentage of comments will say something like, “But AI has medical applications!” Or, “Do you really want people to die of cancer?” These responses may be well intentioned, or they might be badly used rhetorical tools to win an argument.
What do we mean by disingenuous? Here’s an example that’s been around for decades:
Bette: “I don’t want to eat a bunch of chemicals on my fruit.” Bob: “Well actually, everything is made out of chemicals.”
If Bob responds to Bette, knowing full well that Bette meant artificially created and added chemicals, then Bob making a disingenuous argument. Of course, if Bob didn’t know that’s what Bette was referring to, that’s okay. That’s why it’s important for all of us to ask follow-up questions instead of assuming we know what’s being discussed and jumping in with an objection.
False assumptions about AI
Here’s an example we’ve heard regarding AI:
“Isn’t the cost of the environmental destruction AI is causing worth the medical advancements?”
The problem with that question is that few people are unhappy with the existence of data centers that provide computational power to medical applications. Genuinely sustainable solutions can be found and implemented for AI usage designed to save lives. But most people are unwilling to risk poisoning their local water supply and soil just so someone else can earn money through bitcoin or so multi-billion dollar corporations can offer cheap generative AI and cloud computing. The question is comparing apples and oranges.
Some of these arguments go beyond being disingenuous or ignorance-based, however. Recently, we’ve seen some pro-AI arguments that can only be described as racist, ableist, and classist—whether or not that was the intention.
Here’s one that we’ve seen several times:
“But AI is the only way disabled/Black/disadvantaged people can compete!”
While it’s possible this sort of thing is said with good intentions, the racism and classism inherent in it is impossible to ignore. And yet it isn’t new. In 2024, NaNoWriMo faced backlash after stating that condemning the use of generative AI had “classist and ableist undertones.”13 Many long-time supporters of the organization seemed to find that statement itself classist and ableist, saying that it implied disabled and poor participants needed help from AI software to write. While there is a larger and more nuanced discussion around the fact that people facing socioeconomic disadvantages are, obviously, disadvantaged when it comes to paying for feedback and finding free time, many found NaNoWriMo’s broad statement cloaked in politically correct language offensive and cowardly.14
It isn’t a lack of creativity or ability that disadvantages disabled and lower-income creators. It’s a lack of access to editing and publication services. A lack of time due to working excessive hours or losing ‘working’ time to illness. And AI could help break down those barriers. But conflating the use of generative AI to create the end product and using AI tools to gain access or reduce barriers is not helpful.
Possible advantages for the disadvantaged?
How could AI level the playing field for lower-income people? Addressing that is, unfortunately, beyond the scope of this post. However, we’re working on another blog that addresses the topic of AI in art and writing in greater detail. In that one, we’ll look at generative AI in the context of the history of technological advancement in the arts and as a means of eliminating gatekeeping in the literary and music publishing industries. If you’re interested, subscribe to our mailing list or follow us on social media to be notified when that post is live.
In the meantime, how can we have a productive conversation about AI? We’re glad you asked.
How we can communicate effectively about these issues?
There are a few very simple ways to make the conversation around AI more productive. First, let’s stop using “AI” in such a broad, all-inclusive way. If you mean generative AI, say that. If you mean AI-powered translations, say that. And if someone says “AI” without any further context, ask them what type of AI application they’re talking about and accept their answer.
It’s also important to remember that many, many things have been retroactively labeled AI. Voice changer apps that have existed for the last 20 years are now being referred to as “AI,” even when no AI has been implemented. Filters that were available with the original Adobe Photoshop released in 2000 are now being called “AI.” The rush for companies to jump on the AI bandwagon has made the language around these topics unclear, so we need to pause long enough to ask a few clarifying questions and make a few qualifying statements.
Keys to having a productive conversation about AI
When you’re talking to someone, either online or in person, assume ignorance, not malice. If you’re talking to someone for the first time, and they appear to be making disingenuous arguments, respond from the point of view that they’re simply uninformed. Remember that the language around AI has been intentionally muddied, and plenty of so-called AI evangelists are spreading misinformation.
Remember too that most people don’t want to destroy their local or global environment, lose their livelihoods, or increase the bloated wealth of the 1% at their own expense. If you seem to disagree with someone over the problems with AI or data centers, the most likely reasons are miscommunication or misinformation, not a misalignment of beliefs.
We believe that the goal of conversation should be mutual understanding, not victory over an opponent. If all people leave the conversation comprehending the points of view of their fellow interlocutors, that’s a productive conversation, whether it’s about AI or any other topic.
Have you had genuine discussions about AI, either with people you know or with strangers on the internet? Does this guide seem helpful? And is there anything that we left out? Let us know in the comments below.
As LeVar Burton always said, “Don’t take my word for it!”
In computing, a neural network is a model that takes some inspiration from actual neural networks found in organic lifeforms. No actual neurons are involved. ↩︎
Your Instagram is probably amazing. But your art site should be the hub that your fans keep returning to. While social media is vital in today’s world, depending on it for engagement is risky. You’re at the mercy of each platform’s creators (or, more likely, bots that can ban without providing cause, warning, or recourse). Algorithms change overnight, potentially cutting off your revenue before you know what’s happening. In this environment, you need a direct line of communication with your fans, completely independent of social media.
But how can an individual or small business compete with the likes of Meta and TikTok? Believe it or not, it’s not too difficult.
When discussing competition in marketing, one of the most important questions to consider is “Who are our competitors?” For example, Trader Joe’s and Wal-Mart are not direct competitors, even though they’re both grocery chains. That’s because, in spite of offering similar products, they’re marketing to completely different clientèle. Trader Joe’s focuses their advertising on middle to upper class consumers, while Wal-Mart directs their ads to shoppers from the lower and lower-middle class. Likewise, even though both Sushi Kashiba and RockCreek Seafood & Spirits price their meals similarly, they offer vastly different dining experiences. That means they tailor their marketing to appeal to different tastes.
The point we’re getting at is that the best way to ‘compete’ with major social media platforms is to not compete at all.
Your art site should be in an entirely different category than Instagram, TikTok, X, Facebook, or any of the others. When it comes to user experience (UX), it’s in a league of its own.
Creating a UX that art aficionados will love
Most social media platforms offer a streamlined experience to their users. Algorithms tailor their home feeds so that users find more or less what they expect. The experience is low-energy and fleeting. It’s like stopping at a convenience store for a quick hot dog.
Your personal art site, on the other hand, should be more like a fine dining experience. You’ll want to give users…
An interactive experience
Give your fans a way to interact with you, your artwork, or other fans. This can be something as simple as having a blog that allows comments, or something as sophisticated as clickable, animated artwork. Simon Freund offers an interactive art site with works like mit oder ohne.
Several different things to do
You don’t want your art site to be only a portfolio or shop. Ideally, your website should include your artwork, products for sale, a guide to your creative process, information about upcoming events, and a way for fans to get to know you personally. When your fans know they can expect updates on any of the above, they’ll return.
Something new each month
This doesn’t have to be a new piece of art. It could be a blog, product drop, or site update. Your fans likely won’t have time to stop back every day, or even every week. But they’ll be glad to see a notification or email from you about once a month. And you’ll benefit from keeping your art on their radar.
Even if your artwork isn’t interactive, the internet is. By designing your website with your fans in mind, you can create an artistic oasis in the midst of a chaotic social media landscape.
Remember to infuse your art site with your own creativity
Above all, your fans want to see your own unique style. The moment someone visits Teagan White’s website, they know exactly what type of art she creates, even before clicking over to her portfolio. That’s the kind of immersive design your followers will love. If you want to stand out, work with a custom website designer to bring your art to the screen.
Is that really enough to keep an audience engaged?
The reason social media requires such high output is twofold:
the algorithm rewards it by prioritizing creators who post multiple times per day
most of your audience will miss most of your posts, so you have to throw as much at them as possible
Those issues don’t apply with your own website. Yes, you’ll need to consider SEO to reach people in the first place, but these features are what will keep them coming back.
Remember, you’re not competing for your fans’ attention every day. Your audience doesn’t have that much energy to devote to your work, and frankly you can’t put out that volume of work. Think of this more as an adult friendship; you like each other enough to check in and offer support, but you don’t have time to spend every lunch break together.
Who are you going to happier to hear from—the spammer blowing up your phone with skits, ads, and overblown gossip three times a day, seven days a week, or your artsy friend who sends you a thoughtful email update once a month?
If you’re looking for a custom website designer to help you bring your ideas to life, contact We Are Seven today. You can also subscribe to our newsletter for more advice just like this.
This blog was written by a human for We Are Seven. For permissions or questions, please contact us.
Sometimes it’s best to start with a low-cost author website
As a creative collective earning our bread and butter designing custom, hand-coded websites, you’d think we’d tell authors they should avoid generic websites at all costs. But we don’t. In fact, during every consultation, we make sure the author we’re working with is certain that a custom website is in their best interest. Because the truth is that there are times when a basic web builder is really all you need.
In this blog, we’re going to go over a few of the talking points we use in our consultations to help you decide if a custom-designed website is right for your author page. Let’s start with a few basic questions.
How many books do you currently have?
If you’re in the processing of publishing your one and only book, the expense of a custom author website might not be financially feasible. You might be better off with a low cost or free site while you’re just getting started. Then, once the sales to come in and your bibliography expands, you can invest in a high-end website.
On the other side of things, if you have a large social media presence and hope to start off with a good number of sales, you’ll probably want a professionally built website as a resource for your fans, even if your current publication count is zero.
Do you want a multi-purpose site?
The ideal author website should serve several purposes. It should be a hub for your fans, a place where you can share your thoughts via a blog, post updates and press releases about your publications, and sell your books. This makes a website a worthwhile investment of your time and money.
If all you’re really looking for is a place to put your blog, you might be better off with a free blogging platform, like WordPress, or a newsletter service, such as Substack. You can always integrate that into a professional website later on.
Are you going to sell books on your site?
Selling signed copies of your books directly from your own site is a great way to increase your profit margins. However, free website builders don’t always offer e-commerce options. If the main reason you want an author website is to sell signed copies and special editions, you’ll probably need to purchase a paid version of your free hosting plan. At that price point, it might be worth considering a custom-built website.
The bottom line is, it all depends.
Seeing “Website by [Free Hosting Provider]!” on every page may not give off high-end vibes, but that doesn’t mean it’s a bad place to start. If your needs are few and your budget is limited, beginning with a basic web builder and a free hosting plan could be the best way to build your online brand.
Your own, custom author website is an excellent resource if you can afford it, but if you’re waiting to make your first sale, it’s fine to hold off for a while. What we strongly recommend, however, is snapping up your domain name. Many free and low-cost site builders will allow you to use your own URL, but even if they don’t, it’s worth $7-20 per year to hold your spot.
When you’re ready to upgrade to a custom-built website, the right designer will be ready, too.
9 things to remember when launching an online platform
Are you ready to put your book and brand on the internet? Congratulations on taking this step in your journey as an author. As a web design team who works specifically with authors and other creators, we’ve got a list of nine things you website should include.
Here’s what to expect:
We’ll start with the very basics. It’s easy to overlook the ubiquitous.
Then we’ll get into ideas you may not have considered. These are probably what you came to this post for.
Finally, we’ll list optional items that can boost your chances for success. They might not work for every author, but you ought to give them a glance.
And, by the way, if you find this helpful, you can sign up for our mailing list to get more tips delivered to your inbox!
The 3 Must-Haves
1. Your name
It sounds like a no-brainer, but you’d be surprised how hard it is for some writers to prioritize their name above their work. As an author, your name is your brand, so you need that to be front and center. Your logo should be your name, and that logo should be clearly visible on every page and every device.
2. Your books
Specifically, you want one book prominently displayed on the home page. This can be your most recent publication, your best-selling work, or even something that you feel deserves more attention than it’s gotten so far. You should have clear links to all of your books, but remember that a good sales funnel offers a through-line to the buy page, not a bunch of distractions.
3. An email list sign-up
One of the top advantages of having your own author site (as opposed to just an Amazon sales page) is the ability to interact with your fans directly. Don’t overlook this opportunity to add as many fans as you can to your mailing list. These are the people who are going to pre-order your upcoming books and leave you reviews when you ask. Your email list signup needs to be a focal point of the home page and present on every other page.
3 Things You May Have Overlooked
4. An “about the author” page
We know that even amazing authors hate writing their own “about” pages, but it’s vital you have one. You know how more and more people are setting up drop-shipping sites that run on auto-pilot, making it hard to figure out which online sellers are the real deal? The same is starting to happen with bloggers and, sadly, authors. Now that LLMs can churn out more or less convincing novels (and they’re only going to get harder to discern), you need to set yourself apart as a real person.
Of course, an LLM can pop out an About page even more quickly than a novel. But this isn’t about one-upping the bots. The point of your About page is to offer your readers a genuine connection. Your readers want to know you. They want to get a glimpse of the person behind the pen. Give them a reason to believe that you write because it matters to you.
We plan to post a blog about writing an author about page soon, so subscribe using the sign-up form below to be notified when it’s published!
This can be a freebie they’ll get for signing up to your mailing list, information about the genre you write in, or a coupon code for your books or merchandise. Reward people for stopping by your site and you’ll encourage them to return.
6. A way to contact you directly
If you’re an indie author with no staff, you might not want to share your email with the world. But your fans still need a way to ask you questions and leave comments. If you have a blog, you can do that via comments. You can also link to your social media platforms (though you should share those no matter what). We typically recommend a form that visitors can submit via the site. The contents will go to your email without revealing it to the sender.
3 Ways to Give Your Site that Je Ne Sais Quoi
7. A design that speaks to your genre
To really take your author website to the next level, leave the ‘white site’ template behind. Yes, there is a reason that a sleek, minimalist, white look is so popular—it’s easy on the eyes and the mind. But it’s also forgettable. It should be clear from the moment someone lands on your homepage what kind of books you create. To give your author website a little extra staying power in your readers’ minds, make sure you have a custom designed site (or, at the very least, a color scheme) that reflects your genre and/or intended audience.
To give your author website a little extra staying power in your readers’ minds, make sure you have a custom designed site (or, at the very least, a color scheme) that reflects your genre and/or intended audience.
8. Exclusive insights
Give your visitors a behind-the-scenes look that they can’t get anywhere else—not on Patreon, not in your interviews, not anywhere but your domain. This doesn’t have to be anything major or time-consuming. For example, Brandon Sanderson has a progress meter on his home page where fans can see exactly where he’s at on projects they’re interested in. You could offer a fanart gallery, where your readers can see what others in the community are creating. By making your author site the exclusive source, you make that the place where returning readers will seek you out.
9. Easter eggs
In the late 90s and early 00s, website designers were really flexing their skills. Small animations and image maps meant that viewers could interact with parts of the page that seemed inert and, occasionally, be reward with a surprise. It made being on the website an experience in itself rather than just a way to get information. If you want visitors to see your website as comparable—or preferable—to social media platforms, this is how to do it. Make your website a welcoming, rewarding place on the internet.
Those are our top nine tips for creating an author websites that goes far beyond just checking all the necessary boxes. We encourage you to browse our other blogs for more information on creating a successful site, either on your own or with a designer.
