PUBLICIZING YOUR WEBSITE

Okay, now you’ve built it. It was a job getting it just the way you want it, getting the right feel in it, along with letting it show the world that you’re a professional. Now what? It’s up, it’s published, but who’s going to see the videos, and read your brilliant words? How do you promote your website? I ran into this problem myself, and I’ve found a few ways to do this.

SOCIAL MEDIA

Visit Twitter (X), Facebook, Instagram, Tic Tok, or any other social media site you visit regularly. Create a post saying something like, “Hey, I’ve just built a website. Come check it out and tell me what you think!” Then add your URL or link.

I did this on Facebook. I put it on my wall, my announcement and link traveled down my newsfeed, and went out to all my friends. Who knows where it went from there. I also shared this announcement with any applicable Facebook groups I’m in. Make sure the group will accept announcements for blog posts or articles first.

I also did this on Twitter and added appropriate hashtags. The hashtags I put in my announcement were things like #Children’sWriting, #DebHockenberry, #Article, and #Links, and #Website. Don’t forget to include your link!

Pinterest is a great way to do this. You can create boards that link to your website. Each time you add new content, pin it and put it on the appropriate board. It will automatically link back to your website, and people will notice.

You can use all the other social networks in the same fashion.

 

YOUR EMAIL SIGNATURE

I’m supposing you have your email signature made out. If you don’t, it’s in the settings area of your email program. You’re allowed several lines to put your information. I’ll use myself as an example here. You can have something like this:

Deb Hockenberry, Children’s Author

Where Can We Have The Party? http://www.amazon.com/dp/1537077120 <-List your book here. If you have more than one you can list them one under the other.

KidzTales: http://authordebhockenberry.weebly.com  <-Here’s your website and it’s link.

Do you have a blog with a different address? Do the same as you did with your website.

Because of your email signature, everyone that you email will know about your books and website including where they’re at. Hey, I’ve had people visit this website from the email link!

YOUR OWN WEBSITE

That’s right. Your own website can help you get the word out that it’s there! You see all those social media icons on the left side of your monitor on KidzTales? Click them and fill in your information for that site. When someone reads or views your content and is impressed, they’ll click those buttons and information goes out. Believe me, this does happen. It’s happened to me more than once!

GUEST BLOGGING

When someone puts out the call for anyone to be a guest blogger on their blog, jump at it!

Ask to have your website link below where the blogger puts ‘by guest blogger, Your Name’. When the blog owner’s readers read your informative article, they’ll visit your website to see what other information you have to offer them. And all because you asked the blog owner to include your website link.

COMMENTING ON OTHER’S BLOGS

When commenting after reading another’s blog post, don’t just say things like, “nice post,” or “I can relate to everything you say.” Add something useful to the subject or expand on something the blogger touched on. At the end of your comment, add your link. Others will read your words of wisdom and wonder what else you have to say. They’ll see your link and visit. This does work!

SEARCH ENGINES

There are a few search engines that will let you list your site for free. You will want to have a few good keywords of exactly what you have on your site. People who want to find a (example) children’s writing website will put in the search bar “children’s website.” For your convenience, I’ve included a few of the most popular search engines and the pages where you can list you website. We’ll start with the most popular search engine.

Google- http://www.google.com/submityourcontent/website-owner/

Bing- http://www.bing.com/toolbox/webmaster/

Sign in with your Microsoft account. If you don’t have one, it’s free. Just go to http://www.hotmail.com.

Yahoo – That just took me to Bing, who I suppose, has control of Yahoo search.

If you decide to submit your search to other search engines, always read the privacy notices and the terms of services! Sometimes these are just called legal terms.