A gift to writers from Microsoft! We need an online presence, but we don’t want to spend a fortune for it. For the first website, most writers want something low-cost, or better yet—FREE. Recently, I discovered Microsoft’s free websites for small business. I’ve “test-drove” it, and I’m now recommending MS Office Live Small Business (hereafter referred to as OLSB).

My trial site: See my experimental site at http://emilyakin.web.officelive.com/default.aspx. Check out the description of the service here.

The Advantages:

• Easy to set up. All you need is a Microsoft Windows Live account. If you have a Hotmail account, you can probably use that. I set up emilyakin@live.com for mine. Once you have your e-mail address, go to http://www.officelive.com/ and click on Get Started.
• There’s plenty of help online. Whenever I was stuck, I just went to Google and searched my question. For example, I searched “how to add a picture in Office Live Small Business.” Here’s the result. I encountered no problem that I could not solve by searching on Google.
• It’s free. As with any free product, there are add-ons that seem very affordable. Details on that here.

The Disadvantages:

• The lengthy URL (see my sample above) will not be easy for customers to remember. It will clutter up your business card, too. You can purchase a domain name for $14.95 a year as an add-on or purchase it elsewhere.
• Although there are numerous generic design options, none of them are specifically for writers. You can add photos to the design header to customize your look, however.
• No blog feature. Some of the other free options for websites also include a blog page. But, you can always blog on Blogger or WordPress and link to your blog from your site.
• No phone or chat support. This is only a disadvantage if you lack confidence in your ability to use the help info you find online.

This is neither an advantage or disadvantage—just something you should know. You need to log in once in a while to keep your service active. If you don’t, you will get an e-mail saying that, since your site is dormant, it will be deleted. You need to update frequently anyway, so I don’t see where that’s a problem.

Examples:

Southeast Christian Writers (purchased domain through OLSB)

Kentucky ChristianWriters Conference (domain name with another service, pointed to OLSB)

Try it out. Set yourself up and experiment. Don’t worry about what others think of it. As long as you don’t publicize your URL, it’s unlikely that anyone would find it. If you decide to go with it, you can start sharing your URL when you’re sure it’s ready for public consumption. Here’s a great tutorial if you need it.

PS: In the past, I have recommended other free site services. I have set up sample sites on Viviti, Freewebs (Webs.com), and Blinkweb. Visit the URLs below. Blinkweb is the only one that is free of ads as well as free of charge. Except for the blog feature, I think MS Office Live Small Business is the better choice for a writer.

http://emilyakin.viviti.com/

http://www.freewebs.com/emilyakin/

http://emilyakin.blinkweb.com/

Also, see my previous posts about free websites here.

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Note: I’m switching to “website” for this blog as opposed to “Web site,” because Associated Press has recently changed their rule to make “website” the correct spelling. See AP Stylebook site here.

Free Website Offerings, Part One

Free Website Offerings, Part Two

Since then, I’ve worked with Tripod, Freewebs, and Blinkweb to the point that I’m ready to make a recommendation on which one I think is the best choice for a freelance writer wanting a brochure-style site with a blog attached. But, first I have to tell you about a new one I encountered.

Recently, I learned about Viviti, which offers a no-ad trial period. After two weeks, though, you either sign up to pay the monthly fee or live with the ads. I set up my own experimental free site and have fiddled with it a bit. Take a look: http://emilyakin.viviti.com/. The templates are creative and colorful, but I found the sitebuilder hard to manage.  I became frustrated all too easily while trying to set up my simple experimental posts. The design choices are acceptable, but I just don’t think a novice website builder will find this one user-friendly.

So—back to the others I previously evaluated. I’ve totally ruled out Tripod, because the ads are just too intrusive. Here’s my test site: http://emilyakin.tripod.com/. I really like the design templates in Blinkweb, which features no ads. However, I found the site-builder even more frustrating than Viviti’s. I could not figure out how to do a bulleted list on the blog page.  Take a look at my Blinkweb site: http://emilyakin.blinkweb.com/.

Drum roll, please! Now we come to my final recommendation. For someone wanting a simple site with plenty of design choices, a blog, and an intuitive sitebuilder, Freewebs is the way to go. Actually, the name has been changed to simply Webs.com. I’ve worked more with Freewebs, because I have my own experimental site at http://www.freewebs.com/emilyakin/ and another site for my music club at http://www.freewebs.com/philharmonicmusicguild/.

The Freewebs text editor works much like a word processor and has more design features than the other free sites mentioned above. Also, you can now have a blog with Freewebs. The Freewebs ads are less intrusive than Tripod, and you can get rid of them entirely if you want to go upgrade to paid plan, about $10 a month, as is the case with all of the free sites.

Keep in mind that you do get more features and benefits with a paid plan, but, for a freelance writer establishing his or her first Web site, Freewebs is the way to go. Play around with it and be creative, but keep it business-like. Choose a design with no graphics or with graphics that suggest you are a serious writer. Pass up the cutesy designs and any add-ons that distract from your message.

If you’re a writer aspiring to publication, you need a Web site, so go on over to Freewebs right now and get started. It’s free, and nobody knows it’s there unless you tell them. Keep it under wraps until you’re ready for your grand opening.

Blinkweb: Visit http://business.blinkweb.com/ and try out the Demo first. You’ll get to set up a trial site without setting up username and password. However, if you want to publish your trial site to the Web, you’ll have to set up the username and password at the end of the process. It’s free, and you can set up as many sites as you want. I love the design of the site I created. Check it out at . There’s a blog feature, also free, explained on this page, http://blog.blinkweb.com/. There are NO ads, if you noticed when you visited my Blinkweb site.

EZ-Christian Hosting/Highpowersites.com: I’ve mentioned this company in previous posts, but I’m repeating myself because I was so impressed with it. There is no free plan with this company, but they do offer a free 10-day trial of the website builder. No obligation, no credit card required, no setup fee. The designs are very professional, and the web-builder is easy to use, although there are layout limitations that come with any online web-design package. The deal-breaker for most people will be the cost of this plan, about $17 a month. It does, however, offer many features that the free sites (and cheaper plans) don’t offer.

Decision Time

I think a writer who wants to be taken seriously by publishers should have a well-designed site with NO ads. The content of your site depends on what you want to do with your writing, but the design and appearance of your site is what comprises that critical first impression. You have about 20 seconds to catch your visitor’s attention and make him/her want to stay around to find out what you have to say. A gaggle of ads and an amateurish design will announce that you don’t take your work seriously enough to invest in a professional-looking site.

Blinkweb is the only free plan that does not mention upgrades to a paid plan. That means you’ll always be limited to what they offer for free, or you’ll have to go to another company. The upgrades on Tripod and Freewebs are very affordable. I suggest you try one or more for yourself. Only you can decide what’s best for you.

Bonus link:
Tiffany Amber Miller offers three articles on websites for writers on the Christian Authors Network blog:

http://canblog.typepad.com/canbookmarketing/tiffany_amber_miller_stockton/