1. A domain name (like outboxonline.com)
2. A web hosting service – the place where you’ll put the files that make up your website so that you can access them through your domain name (see above)

These can be mysterious and often confounding propositions – where to begin?

If you’re just starting out, I recommend that you buy both before you do anything else about your website.  And buy them for as long as possible – usually it’s cheaper that way & search engines favor long-term sites .  I often get asked where to purchase them, and I use and recommend GoDaddy.com.  They’re competitively priced, have great customer service, and allow you to do everything you could possibly need to do to administer your website online.

If you already have a domain name, but no hosting package, I recommend that you get a hosting package through the same company (ie: registrar) that owns your domain name.  This isn’t necessary, but in the long run it’ll make your life easier.  If you own your domain name through a company that is difficult to work with (you’ll know this because you have trouble contacting them, and when you finally do it’s like talking to a pile of rocks), you can transfer it to another provider.  This can sometimes be a painful process, but it’s worth it.  Here are the basic steps:

1. You contact your existing domain name registrar and have them unlock your domain name.  Domain names are locked so that people can’t just initiate a transfer of other people’s domain names to their own account without permission – it would be chaos.
2. You also ask your existing registrar for the “authorization code” that you’ll need to complete the transfer.  This is like a password that only you know to make sure only the owner of the domain name can transfer it.
3. You initiate a transfer at your new registrar & provide them with the auth code.
4. You wait a few days for the transfer to take place.
5. Once your domain name is fully transferred, you should make sure you close your account with the previous registrar so you’re no longer paying them for a service they’re not providing.

If you already have a hosting package with the company to which you transferred your domain – have them update the “DNS settings” so that the domain name is connected to your hosting package.  Your website can now go live!  Unlike with domain names, if you had a hosting package with another provider, you don’t need to transfer it – as long as you’re set up with a new hosting package with your new provider, you can just cancel the old one and ideally get a refund for any unused paid time.

Here are some interesting things about hosting packages & domain names:

1. You might be asked about private domain registration – this is because there’s a public database (the WhoIs database) that keeps track of everyone who owns a domain name & their contact information.  If you don’t want that information public, you can pay to have the information replaced by the information of the service you’ve employed – thereby masking your info.  If for whatever reason the feds needed to get at it, they certainly could, but a regular person could not.
2. You might be asked if you want to pay for your domain name to be “certified” – there’s really no reason to pay for this.
3. You’ll often get a whole bunch of choices when it comes to hosting packages – like Windows vs Linux (the answer is almost always Linux – but your web designer/developer can let you know if they need the specific development languages supported only by Windows).
4. There’s also the choice of how much data you plan to transfer & how much storage you need – unless you’re hosting lots of audio and video files on your own server – you can probably stick with the cheapest option.  Keep in mind that companies like GoDaddy won’t bring your site down if you exceed the amount allocated b/c suddenly something you wrote on your blog ended up on the front page of digg.com (the Digg effect) – they’ll gracefully handle it and give you the chance to upgrade and pay for the additional traffic.  There are other companies (like one whose initials are N.S.) who will just bring your site down causing you major headaches to resolve and blemishing your online reputation.
5. And then there’s the option of multiple domain names — there are two things you can do if you have multiple domain names:
   1. If you want to own multiple domain names but have them all point to one website, you can just place a “permanent redirect” on all but the one connected to your hosting account (which would be your primary domain).
   2. If you want to own multiple domain names for multiple sites, you don’t need multiple hosting accounts – you just need to make sure your hosting account supports the ability to host multiple domain names (it’s usually slightly more expensive).

Once you have your domain name and hosting package organized, you’ll need to keep track of your account access info.  Even if your web designer/developer(s) will be handling everything for you, it’s *very important* that you know your administrative login & password (and a phone number for the provider), and the FTP login & password.  If your web designer gets hit by a bus (*knocking on wood*) – what will you do if you don’t have that info?

If someone owns your domain name and hosting package on your behalf (which is completely fine) – just make sure you’re also listed as an administrator on the account.

Phew!   It’s lots to know – but just like managing any project, even if you’re not doing the work yourself, it’s best to understand the work being done.

Related posts:

1. What’s in a name? Pretty much everything!
2. Tweet Your Blog
3. Social Networks for Authors

1. Don’t rely on someone else to determine where you’ll be able to advertise effectively, target your own market. Unless you spend a great deal of time tracking and researching it, Adwords often brings site visitors, but not necessarily conversions. So think about where you *know* your audience is, and then make contact to see if an advertising relationship is possible. For example, if you’re a designer looking for clients, target a blog that advises people about hiring designers and find out if you can offer something to their audience. This may be a great time to offer a freebie to their readership in exchange for access to their audience. Make sure that you fit their demographic – it won’t make sense for anyone involved if you’re targeting a mismatch.

2. Get out there in the “real” world. We get so wrapped up in the expanse of opportunity that the internet provides that we forget about what we might provide our local community. Often times people like to work with someone nearby – so offer your services through an old-fashioned tearsheet in a cafe, or offer a prize to a local contest (radio or at a community event/raffle). This approach will not only help bring your business, but will help you connect with people in your community through some good “old-fashioned” networking!

3. Host an event. You don’t need to have tremendous resources to host your own event. For example, if you have a landscaping business, offer a free class on starting a veggie garden. You can host it in your front yard using Craigslist and your local classifieds to get the word out. This is a great way to not only connect with a potential audience, but also get some name recognition for everyone who comes across the posting. And it doesn’t have to be in your front yard – host a virtual event – webinars are a great way to connect with people and highlight your expertise virtually. And there’s great webinar software out there for low or no cost – gotomeeting.com is a great, easy-to-use example.

If you’re thinking about having advertising on your own site to try to generate some revenue, here are some guidelines:

1. It’s not worth it if you don’t have enough traffic. Most advertisers have a minimum site traffic amount to justify their ad space. You might host their ad on your site for 3 months for free if you don’t have enough site visitors to meet their minimum.

2. It’s for content-driven sites, NOT your portfolio. Don’t place advertising on the page of your website that outlines your services, or showcases your work. No matter how much money you might make it’s not worth more than the amount it’ll cheapen your reputation by having them there.

3. Consider the time investment. If you’ll need to spend an hour over the course of a month monitoring your ad space for sale, consider what that hour might be earning you otherwise. If you can use that hour to seek out a new project or client, then benefit from that hour’s investment for the next “X” amount of time you’ll likely realize the finances don’t work out the way you might expect. Don’t get me wrong, passive income is great, but advertising may not be the most profitable of your choices.

Related posts:

1. Social Networks for Authors
2. Ways to interact with your site visitors
3. Harnessing modern media: audio & video promotion for books and authors

Here’s how:

• Push blog content to Twitter:  Twitter Feed
• Put Twitter content on your blog:  Twitter Widget for Blogs

Did you know you can do something similar with Facebook?  If you have a Facebook account, and especially if you have a page or group there for your business, you can have your Tweets automatically update your Facebook status, and have your blog content show up there too:

• Blog content on Facebook:  Networked Blogs on Facebook
• Twitter updates your Facebook status:  Twitter application for Facebook
• And this selectively updates your Facebook status: Selective Twitter

And while I’m offering suggestions on how to single-source updates to multiple platforms, Ping.fm will update multiple platforms at one, from just about any device or service!  And Minggl does something similar, but using a Firefox toolbar (love that!).

Keep in mind, however, that you don’t ALWAYS want everything to go everywhere or people might start to think of you as a broken record…  it is true that people tend to stick with their favorite service so they may not see that you posted the same thing across multiple accounts, but if someone is researching you, they certainly will.  And sometimes it’s just a nice thing for those who follow you to get a personalized message about a blog post you wrote.  So, go ahead, automate your social networking life… just don’t forget to add a little bit of your own voice sometimes.

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1. Social Networks for Authors
2. A blog or email marketing, which is better?
3. Getting your domain name(s) and web hosting organized

• Podcast Promotions.  Whether you’re creating the podcast yourself, being interviewed by a podcaster, or offering your book as an award for a podcast promotional contest, you’re bringing a huge targeted market to your book.
  • If your book is about something practical, creating a podcast to accompany the book is a huge way to connect with your audience.  Many times podcasters go on to be authors, but authors can also move into podcasting!  For example, if your book is a how-to guide to training puppies, a podcast that offers tips and tricks is a great way to spread your message around.  It will bring a new audience to your book, and sustain/enhance your relationship with your readers until your next project is ready.  Just like Rachael Ray started with a cooking show, moved into cook books, then into affiliate marketing, then into her own TV show, magazine and cooking-related products… you too can span the venue boundaries to make yourself an expert!
  • There are existing podcasts, some hugely popular, and cover just about every subject.  So, send some emails to podcast hosts that target your niche (also works for blogs)…
    1. Write a quick introduction
    2. Offer a free copy of your book
    3. Offer up yourself to talk about it/set up an interview
    4. Then offer to help them setup a promotion for free copies to give away to their audience.
    5. Don’t get disheartened if it doesn’t work right away, they likely get lots of similar emails, but will jump at the ones that make sense for their audience. It’s still worth it to make the offer to gain exposure to the right people.
• Book Trailers.  It’s less expensive than you think to create a simple book trailer.  Some people go all out and create hollywood-quality shorts, but even an animated slideshow set to music, or a video of you being interviewed about the book is a step in the right direction.  Help your readership understand the tone of the book in a new way, and bring some life to what would otherwise be left to the imagination. (Note: there’s nothing wrong with leaving a book’s content to the imagination, in some cases that may even be the desired outcome.)
• Television (?!).  Did you know there is a new, dedicated TV show for authors?  Open Book TV, in their own words, “focuses on the writers and other storytellers living and working in a different spot on the planet each week.”  Their episodes are even embeddable in websites (just like YouTube).

Related posts:

1. Social Networks for Authors
2. 8 Communities for Book Lovers
3. Getting your book reviewed

But what if you want to sell your book yourself? You don’t need to make a big investment in a shopping cart service, or even spend your days waiting in line at the USPS -  you can easily set yourself up with a PayPal Merchant account, create a quick button for purchasing your book to put on your website, set your shipping preferences, and off you go!  100% of the sales of books sold on your website is profit to you (minus any printing costs of course) — so even if you can’t compete with Amazon.com on convenience, you can beat them on price.  If you sell your book yourself, offer a discount (say, 10%) off of Amazon’s cost & offer free shipping, you’re providing a huge incentive to your audience while still making much more money per sale than books sold through Amazon.com.  You can setup a channel for shipping through your distributor, or, if you’re willing to do the shipping yourself, you can also offer the incentive of a signed copy.

So, how do you bring people to this page where you’re offering your book for sale? You tell as many people as you can about it!  You can provide a link as part of a promotion for a social organization, a club, a team, an event…  you can participate in affiliate marketing (especially with those who enjoy great success), or buy ad-space on popular blogs that target your readership. Additionally, you can offer your book as a give-away in a contest for a popular podcast related to your genre, or as part of a blog-promotion.   Each of these gives you the chance to link back to your book purchase page.

So get out there and get selling!

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2. Social Networks for Authors
3. Harnessing modern media: audio & video promotion for books and authors

“Shelfari introduces readers to our global community of book lovers and encourages them to share their literary inclinations and passions with peers, friends, and total strangers (for now). Shelfari is a gathering place for authors, aspiring authors, publishers, and readers, and has many tools and features to help these groups connect with each other in a fun and engaging way. Our mission is to enhance the experience of reading by connecting readers in meaningful conversations about the published word.

Shelfari’s members:

• Build virtual bookshelves to express themselves to their friends and to the world
• Discover books that are popular in their trusted circles of friends
• Influence peers by rating and discussing books online
• Discover and learn from people with similar reading tastes
• Participate in online book groups to further explore literature and share ideas
• Interact with and learn from authors”

In combination with participating in the readership community at Amazon.com via AmazonConnect and Profile pages, Shelfari allows you to jump right into your niche without first wading through the rest of everything else!

Related posts:

1. 8 Communities for Book Lovers
2. Harnessing modern media: audio & video promotion for books and authors
3. Ask a Reviewer: Irene Watson of Reader Views and Inside Scoop Live

1. http://www.bubbl.us/ (example) – Here’s what they say about their service: “Bubbl.us is a simple and free web application that lets you brainstorm online.”  I think it’s a great way to visually establish the architecture of a website or web application, or even to organize content into logical groupings.
2. http://www.balsamiq.com/ – When you want to draw a simple mockup of what a web page might look like you could turn to Photoshop or Illustrator, but for much less hassle, you could also use Balsamiq Mockups. Even during a discussion where you’re sharing your screen, you can create live images to illustrate your ideas.
3. http://www.skitch.com/ - If you’re taking a screenshot, marking it up, and then sending an email asking for feedback over and over again, Skitch may be for you.   It makes the process of sharing images with markup super easy.  Watch their intro video to see how it works.

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2. The Naysayers
3. Harnessing modern media: audio & video promotion for books and authors