SEO for Indie Romance Authors
As an indie romance author, the last thing you have time or bandwidth for is SEO. Search Engine Optimization is one of those nebulous things, and yet it’s touted as an extremely important component of your author website.
This post focuses on how employing a few SEO strategies can help readers find YOUR author website without the use of jargon, fancy plug-ins or paid sites.
How to Attract Readers to Your Author Website
What is SEO?
The founder of Moz, Rand Fishkin, defines Search Engine Optimization as:
“The practice of increasing the quantity and quality of the traffic that you earn through the organic (not paid) results in search engines.”
Since over 50% of website traffic comes from search engines, optimizing your site’s SEO will help get your books picked up by the bots.
Google is the ultimate matchmaker and wants YOU to get your HEA!
It wants to match your readers’ searches to your books, so let’s take a look at optimizing your indie author website for SEO, so your readers can find YOU.
What are keywords?
Keywords are the words you readers are likely to type into search bars when looking for their next book to add to their TBR.
To brainstorm a quick list of keywords, think about the words you use to describe your book.
These can be your book’s:
✅ tropes
✅ subtropes
✅ genre
✅ setting
✅ plot points
✅ characteristics of your MMC
✅ characteristics of your FMC
✅ characteristics of side characters
To help ensure readers are actually searching for the specific keywords you just brainstormed, consider using Ubersuggest. This is a free site that allows you to zero in on frequently searched keywords that you can use on your indie author website.
In order to get your website to rank higher when a specific word is searched, use these high ranking keywords on your site so it appears at the top of searches.
Where do I include the keywords on my author website?
Sprinkle in your keywords throughout your site’s content. Since writing is your area of genius, this is an easy strategy to help ensure your website is further SEO-optimized.
🎯 As part of your book descriptions
🎯 In your author website’s content and in headings
🎯 Across platforms and link back to your author website and vice versa
Are there other ways I can use SEO strategies on my site?
💡 Create valuable, frequently searched for content on your website.
Most often this is in the form of a blog. It’s an easy way to add to your current website with no additional expense and with not much technical know-how.
Even though it might feel awkward at first, it might be helpful to remember that your readers are on your website because they want to learn more about you, your processes and anything else you would like to share!
If you already have a newsletter, consider having it do double duty, and repurpose it on your site in the form of a blog.
Google rewards content. Remember, Google is the ultimate matchmaker! It WANTS you and your readers to have their HEA!
The more content produced on your site, especially content that is added regularly, the better.
💡 Give Google what it’s searching for, and direct potential readers to your website.
You likely have book blurbs, marketing materials, a social media presence, and/or a newsletter. Include it on your site, and let the already-existing fruits of your labor do double, triple and quadruple duty.
Take advantage of the fact that it’s the worldwide web 🕸️, and create additional links from your author website to your social media platforms. This also helps Google learn how all of your links are tied together across the internet and to create highways back to YOUR site.
💡 Google loves active author websites.
You may have heard of Google’s bots. Their job is to troll around various websites to look for new content to scan and index. If your site is inactive each time they do their search, your site is then not favorably ranked by Google.
Because Google wants everyone to get their HEA, it “rewards” active sites with more traffic. This equals more book sales and more readers who are eagerly anticipating your next release!
Consistency is key, so to ensure those hungry bots are satisfied, please be sure to add new content to your website on a regular basis. This could be the perfect job for your PA, or author personal assistant!
Even though these strategies take time, their implementation is important to prioritize.
Plus, the creation and posting of these content strategies are easy to outsource.
In the post, Easy Indie Author Website Tweaks to Boost Book Sales, we took a look at creating an SEO-optimized website that drives traffic to you even when you’re not searched for by name.
Built-In SEO Optimization
If your website builder has built-in SEO optimization features, like Squarespace does, be sure to take advantage of it!
As noted in the posts, Indie Author Website Builder Comparison and in Why Squarespace is the Best Website Builder for Indie Authors, Squarespace has built-in SEO optimization. Therefore, there is no need to pay for and to install additional plugins. Furthermore, there is no guesswork and industry know how needed!
Also noted in the posts is that while plugins can add cool features to your website, they add complexity and expense. This additional complexity means that your website becomes more challenging to edit and to update.
Google is so entrenched in our lives that it is difficult to remember a time without it! In fact, we now turn to Google to help us find what we’re looking for!
Be sure to optimize your author website to take advantage of this and to help your readers find YOU and your books to add to their TBR!
Regardless of where you decide to add these keywords to your author website, it does not require much additional skill or time. In fact, this is a great task for your PA, or your author personal assistant!
When you’re ready, check out my PA services to learn more about how I can help get your books into readers’ hands!
Although there is much to think about and to do when it comes to crafting and then maintaining your website, please know you do not have to do it alone!
Mint Copy Services offers affordable options.
From never having a website before, to having a full-blown multi-page site, and everything in between, Mint Copy Services has got you covered.
Not sure what you need? Let’s chat and plot next steps together!
In the meantime, know that your readers appreciate you and are so grateful to you for sharing your stories with us! ❤️
Your supportive side character,
Lisa