Websites for Writers: Planning your website - part 3
I started this series of blog entries on websites for writers with an introduction, then I talked about whether you needed a website. In the last entry, I looked at identifying your target audience. If you're following along, trying to plan out a website, then you should make sure you've identified that audience before you go on to this next stage.
3. What are your audience looking for when they come to your website?
In the last journal entry, I said you would need to remember that the audience for your website is not you. One of the biggest mistakes most people make when they put together a website is that they think, 'What do I want on my website?'
This is the wrong question. You should be asking what your target audience is looking for.
People go to a website with specific questions or ideas about what they want to find out. If you don't give them that, they will leave, and you'll have lost them for good. For the most part, the idea of people 'surfing' the internet--randomly travelling from site to site, without a purpose--is a myth. Your visitors, particularly your target audience, want something from you, and it's your job to give it to them.
To do this, you need to try to imagine yourself into the role of someone from your target audience and think what they are likely to be looking for when they come to your website. This might not be easy, but it shouldn't be any harder than imagining yourself into a character. If you've already got an established audience, you may be able to ask them what they're looking for, but be aware that the people who answer are likely to be the ones you've already converted, not the ones who went away unsatisfied.
So, what do your audience want from your site?
If you're a short story writer, they might want to find out if you've written anything else they might enjoy. What would you have to provide to tell them that? Or they might want to contact you to say they liked (or didn't like!) it.
George R.R. Martin's readers probably want to know when the next book in his series is coming out (if ever). The want a preview of it. Because Martin writes such involving books, they also want to know more about him. They want to know what he's interested in. They want to know when he's doing a signing or talk or reading.
If you're a less famous author and your target audience haven't yet read your novels, maybe they want to find out exactly what your books are like. They want to read the opening to see if the novel is worth reading. If they have have read one of your novels, maybe they want to find out more about you and see what else you've written and what you're writing now.
If you're looking for a publisher, maybe the editor who you hope will visit your site wants to know that you're professional, have an engaging manner and understand the audience for your book.
Whoever your target audience is, try to figure out why they might have decided to visit your website and what they want to find there. You'll want to go into lots and lots of detail here. Try scribbling notes on little stickies or on index cards (keep these for later).
List all of the things you can think of that your target audience are looking for. Don't worry about organising it for now. We'll deal with that later. Just throw it down.
And while you're at it, get rid of absolutely everything that you personally thought you wanted to put on the site but which your target audience won't be interested in. Yes, this can be painful, but then so is revising a story, and you've done that. This is much the same. Put in what's relevant. Throw away the rest.
When you've done that, you can think about what your two subsidiary audiences might want. Keep those items separate from the main list and from each other for now.
At the end, you should have a large number of items listed on several different lists. We're not going to do anything with them just yet. Before we do, there's a bit more planning you need to do. In the next entry, I'm going to be talking about the impression you give with your website.
As always, feel free to ask questions or give your own opinion. See you next time.
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psamphire) wrote,
