Literary Publicist Stephanie Barko discusses the author’s online presence.

Tip #5: Authors Online

Authors online need to be visible three ways– through their website, blog and social suite.  These three online elements are like a three-legged stool.  If any one leg is missing, the result is a structure that falls down.  When all three elements are present, the stool is stable, sturdy, and balanced.  Good author infrastructure is like a three legged stool with all three legs properly tied in.

The first leg of the stool for authors online is the author website. One way an author needs to appear online is through his or her website.  The most pervasive website software today is WordPress.  Developers all over the world create WordPress themes and plug-ins, many of which are free, so it is a smart idea to begin your site in WordPress.

The second leg of the stool is the author blog. Ideally, the website will have a page on it that formats as a WordPress blog.  There are perhaps just as many blog themes to choose from as website themes.  Think of how many blog posts to show at one time, where you want your social media icons, and how you want the eye to move across the blog.  Make sure you use your keywords to tag your blog posts.  Think about choosing a theme that will allow you to file your posts the way you want.  For instance, you wouldn’t pick a blog that sorts its archives by date if you wanted to file them by topic.

The third leg of the stool is the author’s social networking suite, probably Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, GoodReads, Pinterest and YouTube.  Integration in the social sphere can save you time, so you may want to note that GoodReads integrates with Facebook and LinkedIn with Twitter. Pinterest allows crossposting of pins to Facebook & Twitter.

Authors online do best with a sound infrastructure.  If  you need help creating one, reach out to a book publicist.