Almost every author has a website.
But very few stop to ask the most important question of all:
What is my website actually doing to help me?
In practice, most websites function like static brochures. They look fine. They contain information. But they don’t “do” anything.
Visitors arrive, glance around, feel mildly interested—or mildly confused—and leave.
If you want your website to contribute to book sales, revenue, or authority, it cannot be passive. Your website must be engineered to create movement.
In other words, your website should be a decision‑making machine.
What a Decision-Making Machine Really Means
A decision-making website is not pushy or manipulative. It is simply intentional. It recognizes a basic truth about human behavior: when people are given too many options—or no clear options at all—they default to doing nothing.
Most visitors will not hunt for what you want them to find. They won’t piece together your strategy. They won’t intuitively understand what step comes next. If you don’t guide them, they’ll wander.
And wandering is the enemy of conversion.
Strategic aside: Authors often assume visitors arrive highly motivated. In reality, most visitors are curious but cautious. Your website’s job is to reduce uncertainty and make the next step feel obvious.
A Simple Self-Test for Your Website
Here’s a quick test that reveals whether your website is helping or hurting you. Go to your homepage and count how many times you ask a visitor to make a decision.
Then repeat the same test on your most visited pages. If you see long stretches of content with no clear invitation to act, you’ve found a leak in your system.
Effective decision‑making prompts often include things like:
• Start Here
• Free Gift or Download
• Read Case Studies
• Take a Free Quiz
• Work With Me
• Register or Sign Up
• Buy Now
These prompts are not clutter. They are guidance. They signal to visitors that there is a path—and that you’ve thought about where that path leads.
Why Indecision Is Costing You Money
When a website fails to guide visitors, it doesn’t feel neutral. It feels confusing. Confusion creates friction. Friction kills momentum.
Some websites act like stop signs. Others act like dead ends. Visitors read a page, reach the bottom, and subconsciously ask, “Now what?”
When there’s no answer, they leave.
Truth‑teller moment: Every unprompted exit is a missed opportunity. You paid—either with time, money, or effort—to get that visitor there. Letting them leave without direction is one of the most expensive mistakes authors make.
Purposeful Guidance Beats Self-Guided Tours
Many site owners believe visitors prefer freedom. In reality, visitors prefer confidence. They want to feel that someone has thought through the experience.
This doesn’t mean forcing everyone down the same funnel. It means offering a small set of clear, relevant choices—what I call “choices of yes.” Each option moves the visitor forward, even if they choose different paths.
Your homepage should present multiple next steps. Every article or subpage should end by pointing somewhere else that logically continues the conversation.
Your Website Is a Machine—Treat It Like One
Your website lives on a server that runs 24/7. It doesn’t get tired. It doesn’t need encouragement. But it also doesn’t think for itself.
Machines only create value when they are designed with a clear function.
If your website isn’t helping visitors make decisions, it’s not working hard enough on your behalf.
Make a Smart Decision
If you’re unsure whether your website is helping or quietly undermining your goals, guessing won’t fix it. You need a clear diagnosis.
That’s exactly what I do inside my Strategic Bestseller Advisory. We evaluate your website the way a strategist evaluates an asset: what decisions it enables, where visitors get stuck, and how attention flows.
And if you want a complete framework for building marketing infrastructure that consistently moves readers toward action, the Book Marketing Master Class lays out the systems that make your website—and every other marketing channel—work together.
A website that merely exists is a liability.
A website that guides decisions becomes a powerful, compounding asset.
The question isn’t whether visitors will decide. The question is whether you’ve decided what you want them to do.