You’re a “Do It Yourself” kind of person. We get it! We want to help. People always ask us what tools we use. Obviously the internet is always changing, and we are constantly learning new things and using them to help clients’ sites be more successful. Here are some of the things we’re using right now:
Design Resource:
My # 1 choice for paid WordPress themes is MyThemeShop. I love it because they have a great variety of themes, excellent tutorials, and a solid selection of plugins that work with their themes.
Domain purchase:
I think all authors should own their own domain names. I recently made a whole video about why!
GoDaddy: I keep trying to find a decent alternative (because I love to support the little guys), but GoDaddy keeps topping my list. Plus they will sell you a domain for 99 cents if you use that link. I don’t know of anyone who can beat that.
NameCheap: A fine alternative to GoDaddy, and they usually have great prices.
Domain.com: Also has great discounts.
Hosting:
In case I haven’t said this enough, I think all authors should have their own hosting.My current favorite company for hosting is HostNine. Their pricing is good, they have responsive tech support, and I like the simplicity of their user interface.
Book Marketing Courses/ Programs:
(Note from Lori– I spend at least one hour per day reviewing new course offerings/ doing continuing education to constantly be learning about marketing and digital publishing. These are my current recommendations for self-study courses):
Author Marketing Club Premium Membership: I have said before, I think the “annual membership,” which is like $100 for the whole year, is way underpriced given the amount of work Jim Kukral has put into building up the “educational resources” section and creating all the software that is inside this membership. You totally can get the free membership just to learn about it (the link is really small, down at the bottom), but I think the premium is definitely worth it.
Self Publishing, Kindle Promotions, many other useful courses. We love Udemy and highly recommend it. Go over and sign up— they have many free courses!
Website Building in General: Did you know we have a whole course just on this topic? It’s called How to Make a Website, and you can start right away, building your site. Don’t pay designer/ developer fees when you can do it yourself!!