I work as the Administrative Overlord for Clockpunk Studios, a small author-focused web design studio. It’s a cool gig, because Jeremy Tolbert, the web-wizard behind Clockpunk, is super-cool and passionate about his work. It’s been interesting gaining insight into a part of having a writing career that I hadn’t ever considered.

What I’ve learned is that good author websites are extremely important for authors of every level. I kinda knew this before, but my approach to my own website had been “it should look cool and I should blog about stuff, right? But not just myself? Something?” My perspective needed some refining. Because really, a well-designed, easily-navigated site will really attract readers, and keep their eye on you. Er, if you keep up on content. Which is a lesson I could stand to take to heart, come to think of it.

But! Content-generation is for authors; design is for the web-designers. Jeremy’s kick-ass at what he does, but, being aware that what the market wants is sometimes difficult to predict, he and I worked together to design a survey asking people who frequent author websites what they like and dislike about those sites. It’s quick, and super-helpful to us, so please take the time to answer a few questions about how we can make Clockpunk Studios even more kick-butt. The more we know about what people want, the better sites we can create to help authors get the word out there about their work.

We’re hoping to get 100 responses by the end of October. It’s October 15th, and we’re halfway there! So please help us keep up momentum by either taking the survey if you haven’t already, or reposting/RTing/blogging about it, whatever. Thank you!

And here’s the survey!