Make it Easy
for Website Visitors To Know Who You Are and What You
Do!
On a client call with the client and her PR person
we looked at book author websites to see what other
people are doing.
One site made what I consider the biggest error of
all: The book author's name was nowhere - and
I mean nowhere - on the home page. In fact, it
was very unclear what the home page was about.
Plus there were tons of nav buttons including one near
the bottom of the nav column that announced: "Yes!
It's a book as well." (I kid you not.)
And guess what? We couldn't find the author's name
on this page announcing the book will be out this June.
(If his name was on the book cover photo, it was so
small we couldn't read it.) Finally, on the "Speaking
Events" page we found the author's name mentioned.
A few hours after this phone consultation I noticed
a link to a post about branding. I clicked to check
it out. And shook my head in disgust. The post was written
in all caps - (that's right, all caps) - in white type
on a light blue background. Basically the post was illegible.
Right before this I had checked on someone's Twitter
profile. He had just started following me and I wanted
to see if I was interested in following him back. His
bio of some indeterminate color ink was written on a
black background. I couldn't read a word. Do you think
I followed him back?
And clicking through on a link to a blog post that
someone said had to be read about the book publishing
industry - the type was so small and the paragraphs
so dense that I took one look and said to myself: "I'll
have to pass up this info - valuable though it may be
- as I'm not going to hurt my eyes squinting to read
it."
A few weeks ago I read a blog post by a book author
who bragged she knew her book site was good because
many other mystery writer sites also had white type
on black backgrounds such as hers. She was clueless
that, just because many mystery writers make their sites
extremely difficult for people to read, does not mean
this is a good idea.
If you get one point, please get this one: If you make
it difficult to read (in any number of ways) what you've
written in cyberspace, you've guaranteed that less people
will read your words.
Wise up! Forget playing with the black backgrounds,
small type, dense paragraphs, all caps, etc. Publish
your words in a type and format that can be read clearly
by most people.
Phyllis Zimbler Miller is an author of the novel Mrs.
Lieutenant and the co-author of the Jewish holiday
book Seasons for Celebration. She's a National
Internet Business
Examiner, has a B.A. in Journalism from Michigan
State University, and an M.B.A. from The Wharton School.
She's the co-host of the BlogTalkRadio show
www.YourMilitaryLife.com
and founded the websites In
Support of Our Troops and Operation
Support Jews in the Military.
Contact Information:
Phyllis Zimbler Miller
MILLER MOSAIC,
LLC
www.MrsLieutenant.blogspot.com
www.twitter.com/ZimblerMiller
www.facebook.com/PhyllisZimblerMiller
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