Proposal

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For this Experiment, I will be making a website for my Origin Piece, which is a novel I’ve been writing about a girl who becomes the victim of a bullying scandal after an unfortunate mispronunciation of her last name gives rise to the moniker “Sea Hag.” However, at the height of this bullying scandal, an unexpected friendship will turn the tables and thrust the main character into an odd position: she is now “one of the popular,” and she must wrestle with all that this means and how it may impact how she acts towards others – all in a dramatic, comedic, coming-of-age saga. This website will function as the “official” website for the novel, which essentially makes it a celebration of the book, a marketing platform, and a source of information. As such, the website will act as the “second face” of the book for those who have already read it (and, in the case of those who haven’t yet read the book, an introduction to all that the book will hold).

 

This Experiment is important to me because I’ve grown up visiting author websites and book websites, but I’ve never had a good purpose to create my own. That is, until this class. With the time set aside to create this website, as well as the prompting to do so, I think I finally have the drive to make something I’ve always dreamed of making but have previously lacked the motivation to make. I also think this is a good time to make the website because my other experiments have produced projects that could act as bonus features for the website, so I’ve already started to work on the website, whether I realized it during my other experiments or not.

 

 

Genre Analysis + Research

 

According to Tim Grahl, Founder of BookLaunch.com, your website needs to do two things: “sell books” and “build an email list” (Grahl). As such, the design needs to be clean, clear, organized, and simple. The website should be very easy to understand and navigate, and the design should make it clear who the author is (including their name and photo near the top of the page) and what books the author is trying to sell. Additionally, the email signup link/box should be prominent and appealing, including a short sentence/phrase about why the person should sign-up to be on this email list, such as “Sign up to receive Alexis’s book news!” (Grahl).

 

Grahl also provides a step-by-step on how to create an author website, including “Choose a Domain Name,” “Signup for a Web Host,” “Choose the Right Platform,” “Choose an Author Website Theme,” “Add Your Content,” and “Customize with Plugins” (Grahl). Under “Choose a Domain Name,” Grahl’s most important advice is to “setup your website under your own name” and not under your book’s name, pointing out that your writing could shift over the years, but your name is not likely to change – which means you’ll always be searchable at the same website (Grahl). “Signup for a Web Host” discusses the importance of buying a website host, which Grahl compares to the actual home of your website (compared to the domain name, which is just the address of your website) (Grahl). He suggests using a site called “BlueHost,” but I’m going to deviate from that because I plan on using Google Sites, which will automatically host my website, I believe.

 

The next two sections, “Choose the Right Platform” and “Choose an Author Website Theme,” highly recommend using WordPress to make the site (as does Elizabeth Mays from Pressbooks, who has built and maintained many WordPress sites for organizations), but I think I’m going to deviate from this because I don’t yet want to make this site ‘official,’ and I also don’t want to pay the fees to purchase domain names and website hosts ‘for real,’ especially since this will probably remain an incomplete experiment (Grahl, Mays). As such, further research may need to include how to use Google Sites, which is a platform I have used once but may not yet know everything about.

 

Since the last section of Grahl’s article applies more to ‘real’ websites, the second-to-last section (“Add Your Content”) is the last high-importance section for my research. In this section, Grahl says that every author’s website should have the following pages: “Homepage,” “About,” “Books,” and “Contact” (Grahl). Additionally, “most authors are going to want” pages for “Events,” “Blog,” and “Resources” (Grahl). The Homepage should include features like the cover and description of the author’s latest book, an email subscription box, a “headshot and short bio that ends with ‘read more’,” “Excerpts of other content” (like “your latest three blog posts or links to your resources page”), and the author’s social media links and/or contact page (Grahl). The “About” page should include a “Headshot,” an “Email subscription box,” and “two versions of your bio”: a “two paragraph version that is very straightforward and then a longer version that goes into your background, where you grew up, what led you to being a writer, etc.” (Grahl). The “Books” page should be an overview of all of the author’s books, including images of each of the book covers, their titles, short descriptions of each book, links to buy the books, an email subscription box, and a “read more” link (which links to an individual page for each book that will include the cover, title, full description, blurbs and testimonials, links to buy the book, and [you guessed it] an email subscription box) (Grahl). The “Contact” page should have the author’s email address, mailing address, social media links, a contact form, and (obviously!) an email subscription box (Grahl). Finally, Grahl provided some useful info on “Event,” “Blog,” and “Resources” pages, but I don’t think I’m going to need those pages for this experiment, so I will simply keep those pages in mind for possible beyond-this-class website development.

 

Since my research turned up a lot of information about making a good book website/author website, I think the best way to sort through it all and make sure my website meets the needs of this genre/medium is to seek to reach Grahl’s four main goals for author websites. First, my website should “[let] people know they’re in the right place” through prominent placement of my book cover and author photo (Grahl). Second, my website should make it “easy for people to find and purchase your books” through accessible navigation and useful information (Grahl). Third, my website should make it “clear that people should sign up for your email list” through frequent and prominent placing of email subscription boxes (which, for my experiment, might only include one on the Homepage) (Grahl). Fourth, my website should make it “easy to connect with and/or contact you,” which can easily be done through the production of a “Contact” page, as described previously (Grahl). In total, then, while I may need to do a little more research on using Google Sites (as opposed to WordPress, which both Grahl and Mays suggest and provide detailed descriptions about using), I think the amount of information detailed above demonstrates that these sources have amply prepared me to undertake this experiment with relative ease and direction.

 

Works Cited

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• Grahl, Tim. “Author Website: Examples, Templates, and How-to Build One.” Book Launch, 21 June 2018, booklaunch.com/author-website/.

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• Mays, Elizabeth. “Book Marketing 101: How to Create an Author Website in WordPress.” Pressbooks, 14 May 2015, pressbooks.com/blog/book-marketing-101-how-to-create-a-wordpress-website-for-authors/.

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Sketch

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For my website, I will have the following pages: Home, About, Books, Contact, and Extras.

 

My “Home” page will include a photo of the cover of my book, as well as a short description of the book (perhaps the back-of-the-book description, unless that is too long). It will also include an email subscription link, a headshot and short bio (which ends with a “Read More” that links to the About page), and excerpts of/links to some of my “Extras” content, including my sound essay and book trailer. Furthermore, at the bottom I will include contact information and any other relevant info.

 

My “About” page will include a picture of me, a short bio, a longer bio, and an email subscription box. The short bio will be only a paragraph or two, and it will probably resemble the straightforward bio a person would find at the back of a printed book. The longer bio will be several paragraphs long, and it will go into a lot more detail about me (such as my background, what led me to be a writer, etc.).

 

My “Books” page would, if I had more books, provide an overview of all those books and a way to buy the books. Since I only have one book right now, though, and it’s not finished, my “Books” page will include the cover, title, a description of the book, estimated release date, and an email subscription box.

 

My “Contact” page will include my email address, a contact form, and an email subscription box. Ordinarily, this page would probably also include my mailing address and social media links, but I don’t have those or plan on making them right now, so I’ll stick with the email address.

 

My “Extras” page will include any bonus material I have for the book or for myself as an author, such as the sound essay and book trailer I made in the previous two experiments for this class. If I had time to create more things, this page might also include character bios, a Q&A with the author, a blog about writing, etc.

 

 

Sample

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To view the book website, click the image below:

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Reflection

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This experiment was a whirlwind of deadlines that were very difficult to meet. The timeline was condensed to about a week, and I was definitely feeling the crunch. As a result, this experiment felt very rushed for most of the time, but I was able to slow down and spend an evening on it right before the due date, which helped. The irony in all of this was that I purposely planned for this website (of my three experiments) to be the last one, since I thought it would be the hardest/most work-intensive. I wanted to go into this experiment with a lot of experience with the format of the project, having made the other two, but I unwittingly also assigned the least amount of time to the project that would take the longest.

 

Additionally, plans changed a bit from beginning to end of this overall experiment experience. Originally, my plan was for this website to be my final project – the one I carried through to completion. I figured that it was the best option for the final project because it would be all-encompassing of my other two experiments, and I was excited about potentially making some bonus content that I could add to the website, too. However, I’m no longer sure that I want to make this website my final experiment. I’ve learned from all of these experiments that deadlines are tight, and I’m already basically done with my book trailer, so I will probably make my book trailer my final project, instead. It feels a little sad to give up on my website, though, so maybe I’ll change my mind in the next week or so. (Spoiler alert: I did.)

 

Even though this website was time-intensive to research, write about, and create, I did have a lot of fun making it. Google Sites has a very limited ability to edit the pre-made formats, and virtually no ability to edit fonts or colors, but I managed to make something I was happy with, and that feels like an accomplishment. If I had to do this project over again, I might have tried WordPress, like Grahl and Mays suggested, but Google Sites probably fits my academic needs better in the long run. In the end, I’m satisfied with my choices and the way I managed to work within my means for all three of my experiments, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little bit relieved I’m almost at the finish line. Wish me luck in this home stretch!