To Attract Search Engines and Readers – Websites Need Updating

by Phyllis Zimbler Miller

I know Phyllis from Linkedin. She’s a real pro with online marketing.

Book authors may be relieved when their books are published. Yet the next stage of being a book author – marketing the book – awaits them.

And by now many authors realize that, for purposes of connecting with prospective readers, they need to be active on social media sites and have their own “home base” book author website.

Now here is an important piece of information about that book author website:

While your book may be finished, your website should never be “finished.”

Why?

First, let’s talk about SEO – search engine optimization.

You want your website to attract the search engines so that your site has a good possibility of coming up in people’s search results.

Search engines are picky – and many of their quirks are secret. Yet it is known that search engines have a “taste” for fresh content.

For example, if your site is three years old and there have been no blog posts, new pages added, or new content, the search engines probably believe that your site is not an active one. And search results do NOT like to include inactive sites.

How do you tell the search engines that your site is indeed alive? You add fresh content as often as possible to demonstrate that all is well.

Second, let’s talk about attracting readers – those people who appreciate what you write.

Fresh content appeals to the search engines and also appeals to your prospective readers. Particularly as you are a writer (you did write a book, right?), having a blog on your website offers the opportunity to showcase your writing and continually add fresh content.

What you blog about should preferably be somehow connected to your book(s). The “somehow” gives you plenty of writing space as long as you stay on what I call the “spine” of your blog.

For example, if you blog about food and cooking, to suddenly write a blog post about coal mining would be off the “spine” of your blog unless, perhaps, that post includes the description of a special food dish prepared by the coal miners.

The consistency of your blog post topics is important for readers who have expectations as well as search engines, which also have expectations.

If you have been telling the search engines via the content on your site that you write about food and cooking, the search engines will rightfully be confused by a post all about coal miners.

Search engines strive to return the most accurate results when a person searches on a word or expression. A website/blog with information about food and coal miners could hinder your website URL being returned in search engine results for blogs about food and cooking.

When you write your blog posts, share interesting information with your readers while staying on the “spine” of what you write about.

Okay, no one said that being a book author required becoming an expert in search engine optimization. Yet it is a good idea to remember that the on-the-spine content you continually provide your prospective readers will also please the search engines.

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Phyllis Zimbler Miller has an M.B.A. from The Wharton School and is the co-founder of the WBENC-certified marketing consulting company www.MillerMosaicLLC.com, which also builds WordPress websites/blogs for clients.

Check out Phyllis’ fiction and nonfiction books plus her other online projects at www.PhyllisZimblerMiller.com

Published by Judy Cullins

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(C) 2013 Judy Cullins. Skills Unlimited Publishing.