A website shows who you are, where you’ve been, and what you offer to make someone’s life sweeter.

Many writers think that having published someplace validates them. Some think that promising the moon will entice someone to hire them. You’ve got to give them something to study about you, and without a website or a very solid social media presence, your promises to do a good job appear rather diluted.

You need a website:

To show that you take your writing seriously.
To demonstrate what you’ve achieved.
To show your efforts moving forward.
To post examples of your work.

A lot of writers think publishing an article is a one-way street, or that writing material for a client is just about the job. They believe that submitting something that ticks the boxes ought to work and merit payment. They hope that including a link or two where they’ve published before will work.

You have to show your success. Why? The publication or client that hires you also wants to piggy back on your platform and your reach and your success. It is a two-way street.

What if you’ve never published anywhere before? You can still have a website that shows what you are willing to do and are capable of doing. Then each time you land a gig, you post it on your site. You keep the site updated, alive, and appealing. The energy on a well-designed site could be interpretted as the energy you are willing to infuse into your writing.

In this day and time there is almost no excuse not to have an online presence. A website is a business card these days. It doesn’t take much of a site, but it does require the site be eye-catching and scream professional. To not care about a site is to not care about your writing business, plain and simple.