Your Writer Site vs. Your Blog Site

The first question is to ask yourself what you blog, and why?

If you blog family vacations, your kid's sports, and your dates, no, it shouldn't be part of your professional site.

If you blog about your books, publishing, writing, etc. then yes.

I'm wondering the same thing. I am setting up my freelance site, but I wonder if I should start blogging there also. I have a bunch of blogs on different topics but I do have a blog that is about blogging and writing. I think I will move that one to my freelance site and just reference my others on occassion.

I lose any link love I have but I recently moved it from one name to another anyway. I don't think I'll lose much by moving it one last (hopefully) time. And I think it makes more sense to be attached to my freelance site.

Melina said:

I'd be blogging about the subject area(s) I plan to specialize in when writing for magazies: single parenthood, law enforcement, and possibly a cooking blog. I wouldn't be blogging about writing--I'd be blogging about the stuff I'm writing about.

The reason for blogging (in my case) is to establish myself as an authority on these subjects. It would make sense to me to have my blog pages where my potential clients would see them and associate them with my business.

I just haven't seen any writers doing that.

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I have; I've even helped them set it up.

What I would do is get your domain, install WordPress (or use whatever blogging/CMS you prefer) and have the top page of your site be your blog, so that there's usually fresh content, then link to your various static pages (bio, contact, clips, etc. ) in the nav menu and/or sidebars.

I'm a fiction writer and it's what I do - if I were writing non-fiction, I think it would be triply important to keep the two together.

I use the Pages functionality in Wordpress to run a "normal" website about my books alongside my blog. The blog is a combination of news about my novels, tech reviews of interest to writers (e.g. software such as Scrivener), reviews of books I've enjoyed, and general musing on topics related to my writing, such as history.

You can find it here: http://www.annelyle.com

(I actually have two blogs on there - the one mentioned above, that appears as my home page, and a "writing journal" where I post my progress on my current projects.)

Anne Lyle said:

I use the Pages functionality in Wordpress to run a "normal" website about my books alongside my blog.

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I'd recommend this approach as well (I use Blogger instead of WP, but it has similar capabilities). I do have a separate website for my business, but that's because it's nonfiction.

Melina said:

Thanks, everyone. That's the way I started setting it up, but I just hadn't been able to find other writers who'd done it that way, and I didn't want to be the one who did that incredibly dumb thing that no one else does because it's incredibly dumb.

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It's not dumb in the least.

It's all about how you want to present yourself and your work; it's about decorum, in rhetorical terms.

And remember; data on the 'net is liquid. You can change it.

Good info here.

Melina said:

I didn't want to be the one who did that incredibly dumb thing that no one else does because it's incredibly dumb.

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Oh, my dear, you have no idea about incredibly dumb. Did you purchase a domain in China because it had your initials (cn) before the .com? Then find it was totally unusable? Well, I did.

Medievalist said:

I have; I've even helped them set it up.

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Yes, you have. You make it look sooooo easy and something to behold.

I would just think about one thing. Editors don't really want to or have the time to search around your blog. Freelance writers usually have a website to display their best work. I think you could put a link to your blog on there, but as an editor I would have been put off if a writer directed me to their blog instead of their published clips.

I've actually seen quite a lot of writer's websites with their blogs as a "page".

What I did was use a Wordpress blog (for ease of use and fresh content for SEO) to market my services. I made the main page a sticky. I used Pages for the About, Examples, Services and wrote posts about business plans, resumes, web content, press releases, etc.

I'm sorry I don't have a link to show. I disabled the site while I revamp my fledgling freelance career.

I have one of the little trashy free websites that looks like hell and draws very little attention. However, my separate blog is going gangbusters, and in just months has obliterated the page views and subscribers of the website.

I think it's a very cool idea to keep them separate. You can promo your books/stories on your website much more often than on the blog, and it's permanently fixed/placed there. My blog rolls over every time there's a new post and I haven't fixed by books and ads on the main page.

tri

Blog and Site, in a roundabout

I am not sure if it makes sense to keep the two linked, but I honestly wouldn't have thought to separate the two. It isn't as though they're akin to arguing kids; because the two feature me writing to some extent, it seems they relate to one another.

My Blog is not just a forum to spew what's in my life, but it can be personal thoughts. Overall, it is writing and I focus on doing that well there. So, if I place something on the blog, it might prompt someone to dig deeper.

Then, if the site prompts those to dig deeper, the blog is there to be viewed.

They both hint at 'pay attention to me', like a kid, so maybe they sort of compete...

I am not sure, but unless one is conflicting with the other, I would think they should link.

Or, you can get real different and put your clips on a blog: http://ober.org/clips/

I know, that's just not quite what you asked, but I got that tip from here, and I think it's a really awesome way to put some clips up. If I were blogging about the things I was writing about, I might put that on the same webs site, but perhaps in a different location (with links connecting the two places).

Own site will be better.

I keep my freelance business website and blog separate. I treat the website more as a portfolio of my best work. Also, some of my writing work is tangential to the topics I blog about, so I like to keep them separate.

I've considered adding a blog to the freelance business website that was about, well, being a freelance writer, but again, it'd be specific to the nature of the website.

Monica

As someone who watches a number of blogs/sites, I think some level of connection is preferable.

If they are connected, you only have to get interested visitors to one thing, not two.

Your blog - if you're interesting - could attract more attention than a site with an "About Me" and a list of your published work. Why not smoosh them together and expand your reach?

I think it really depends on what you're blogging about. If you're writing about stuff that would interest potential clients, then I think it's a good idea to combine your writer site and blog.

I have a writer site myself and I keep my blog under the same domain. This has worked out pretty well for me because I mostly blog about entrepreneurship and online marketing (topics that my target clients would be interested in) and it has helped land a few gigs.