This is the first part in a series I’m doing this week on building your author platform. Every writer needs a website whether they’re a published author or not. The same goes for freelancers too.

Your website is what is used as your main hub and where you’re readers come to find out more about you and to get news about your books.

There are lots of different routes to choosing where to host your author website.

There’s the free route which includes sites such as

• WordPress.com
• Wix
• Blogger

Most of these sites are fairly easy to setup and different designs to choose from. I originally chose WordPress.com but I found that it had limited functionality. A free site is okay if you’re just starting out and ideal if you’re not very technical. But sometimes free sites can come across as unprofessional. I recommend at least buying a domain name which are very cheap and look more professional than something like tiffanyshandblog.wordpress.com.

The other route includes a self-hosted site through sites such as WordPress.org or Squarespace where you pay a company to host the site for you. Squarespace it easier to use and less technical than WordPress.org. I eventually decided to go with WordPress.org and was able to get very cheap hosting through Namecheap. It was a bit challenging at first but I took a couple of courses on Udemy and learned how to set it up myself.

Moving from WordPress.com to self-hosted WordPress was rather a nightmare though as I was essentially setting up my website again from scratch. So if you can afford it, I highly recommend going with a self-hosted option if you can.

What kind of author website do you have or do you plan to have? Will you go the free route or self-hosted?

Resources

A step-by-step guide to building your author website

Build a stunning author website with no web skills course

How to build your website in 1 hour

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