I Took My Own Advice

When I was writing my post yesterday about website analytics, I happened upon an article that talked about the elements an author should include in their website. Great article, by the way; you should read it. I always appreciate posts that include examples.

The examples I viewed made me realize just how mediocre my author site was. Yes, I use free Blogger hosting, which has many limitations, but it's somewhat customizable; I just didn't try hard enough. 

Writing under a pen name, I always struggled with my biography section. Everything in my bio is true, and I did add an * that indicated it's a pen name, but at first I didn't even use an actual image of myself, instead going with an avatar (which was cheesy and amateurish). Later, realizing that no one I know is ever going to find my website, I did find one semi-decent photo of myself to replace the avatar. But my lackluster bio remained. I'd taken a stab at personalizing it a bit by listing my "currents" ~ currently reading, currently listening to, etc. The cheesiness of the page remained. 

I have a bias against poorly conceived sites; you know the kind ~ a pink background, white cursive type, images randomly scattered on the page, and fuzzy images at that. I even detest a font style that looks like the designer was trying too hard. My website wasn't quite that bad, but it certainly didn't look professional.

One of the bio examples presented in the article caught my attention, and not because I read children's books; I don't. But it felt...friendly; approachable. The author still included a professional version of her bio for media and whoever else needs one, but her focus was mainly on the reader. Aha! I exclaimed inside my head. That's it! (See why I love examples?)

With hers as a guide, I completely revised my bio page. Take a look. I did have some trouble coming up with "Ten Things You Don't Know About Me", because I wanted items that were relatable and not braggy (especially since I have little to brag about). Thus, I leaned somewhat into humor, the self-deprecating kind. And this section can always be revised if I think of something later that's better. I also liked the author's Q&A section, and I borrowed some of her Q's. I didn't think it was right to ask myself leading questions, so a lot of them were subjects I'd rarely thought about, and thus my A's were fresh.

I'm aware that some of the same subjects on the page mirror posts I wrote for my News section, but you know what they say about repetition. (What do they say?) I guess if one wants to drive a certain point home, keep repeating it.

Now, of course, I'm on a mission to make my other sections better. I did take care of a few minor issues, like an image bleeding over into the margins. I reduced a few images' sizes as well. My "buy" icons didn't need to be quite as large as they were; I'm pretty sure people get the point. I'm still dissatisfied with my home screen. I want to keep the scrolling graphic with a snippet from Running From Herself's professional review. It's one of the few advertisements I have that I didn't create myself. But there's something off about the home page's arrangement. As for the other sections, I might have to look at those examples again.

My site 

I've still got a ways to go, but I'm happy with the changes. I want my site to be accessible, to be more like me; not any random expert's expectation. I'd love to have a professionally designed, personalized site, but that's out of the question. I need to make the most of the tools I have to work with.