Writers! Want a Website That Is Easy to Set Up, Looks Great, Maintains Itself, and Is Free?

Two words: Muck Rack

I’m a writer. My first website was created and maintained by my son, the computer genius, back in the 1990s when he was in middle school.

After Tom went off to college, he had better things to do than maintain mom’s website. So I paid my tech-savvy pal Steve to set up a new site for me. Steve had always been on my wavelength, so he was able to design a site that was absolutely perfect!

But over the years that site became super glitchy, and clearly needed to be either totally reconfigured or trashed. While I figured out what to do next, I decided to use my Muck Rack profile page as a temporary website.

That was five years ago. I’ve used it ever since. I’m planning on using it forever.

Muck Rack is a website for journalists. Lots of pros belong, but any writer can join. Setting up a Muck Rack home page is simple. If I can do it, anybody can. You just plug in some basic information about your writing career, answer a few questions for your Interview section, decide which posts to feature in your Portfolio and you’re good to go!

And it’s free.

Here’s my Muck Rack page.

Once you set up a page, Muck Rack maintains it for you. They’ll automatically add your recent work to your Articles section. This happens quickly — often within an hour. They also automatically display your Twitter feed.

Muck Rack also has a nifty feature called Who Shared My Link that enables you to plug in the link to any story and see how often it’s been shared on social media. That’s how I learned, for instance, that this essay had been shared 2,543 times on Facebook.

Muck Rack works for me because it pretty much runs itself. I’d rather spend my time writing than futzing with my website. And I’d rather spend my money on books, music, or soy milk lattes than on paying somebody else to futz with my website.

It could work for you too. Check it out!