In the course of keeping up The Season sites, I peruse a lot of websites. There are some authors I absolutely adore because their websites are lovely and always up-to-date. They have their covers and blurbs displayed and easily accessible. The same goes for publishers. I love a website that is user-friendly, attractive, and has a solid search feature.
For me, there are only a couple publishing websites that meet and surpass these standards. The first is www.eHarlequin.com. Let me show you why I believe the IT team that put together and manages this site has it right. Let’s start with the front page:
The front page is clean, the links clearly visible and properly identifiable. Absolutely no guess work as to where the links go. Every single line is prominently displayed at the top and then below, broken down into categories (Passion, Erotic, Inspirational, Young Adult etc.). I love the animated or flash ad usually running at the top in the middle ad space. I also love it that they give you the Top Ten Bestsellers and that the list is updated daily. I’m definitely one of those people that like to check out what books other readers find interesting and are purchasing.
Harlequin always seems to be running some savings or another, and they are featured down the right side of the page. Did you know that you can get 3 (three) Silhouette Desires for $9.99 until the end of the month. 
Here you see they are displaying the Top Ten Bestsellers and the Top Ten Budget books. It’s lovely because each book has a corresponding link. And as you can see from the drop down menus, they are, like all the other links, straight forward and clearly identifiable. As you roll over each category, it is high lighted as, in this case, is Harlequin Historicals.
Here’s the page I love the most. Why? Because it allows me to get all the covers and blurbs in one place. The layout is exactly as it should be. It also has the price and links to the excerpt. Other categories like Presents, Desire, and Blaze has a Browse Inside feature for all the books. That’s the only thing I wish they had for the Historicals. Now from this page I can just click the ADD TO CART button to add the selected book.
Voila! I’ve just added Sold and Seduced to my shopping cart. Canadian residents can easily change the purchase to reflect Canadian currency with a click of a button. Applying a coupon is easy and like every other company, they want to sell you more before you close the deal so below are book covers for other books they suggest you might like. It’s all clean, attractive, and user-friendly. Love it!
The Search Feature is always a toughie. It usually retrieves a whole plethora of stuff. Harlequin does pretty well here, though. As you can see, I searched for Sarah Mayberry and thankfully, Sarah’s books came up first. I see that two Home For the Holidays came up but I also see they’re not the same. Each is priced differently. But when you add them both to your shopping cart, the price is the same. I’m assuming there was a sale going on at one time and the price for that is still in the system. It’s not flawless, but it is retrieving the information you want.
The only thing I would have liked to have for the search is that it would do literal searches. Which means, if I type, “Sarah Mayberry”, it would ONLY pull up Sarah Mayberry and nothing else. Sarah Elliott would not appear or any other authors or titles with Sarah in it.
Now if you’re an aspiring author, the Submissions Guidelines page is clear and concise. They have links to the web version AND the .PDF version of the guidelines for every single line. The guidelines are so specific and so clear, I’m sure they don’t have to field a lot of questions after someone reads them.
Here’s the guidelines for Harlequin Historicals. I love that they give you all the editors who work on the line. They have the address for the location under Writing Guidelines. I wish they would also include it on the individual series guideline pages. It would be just be more convenient.
The site features so much more than I can adequately cover in this post. I love the Podcasts. It’s so nice to have actual voices discussing what they are looking for for particular lines. I find them informative above all else, but also more entertaining than a dry read.
Harlequin also hosts many different Forums and Blogs in their Harlequin Community. There is also a separate website for their ebooks, eHarlequin eBook Store, which operates in exactly the same manner.
There’s really just tons of stuff to see and experience on www.eHarlequin.com so I won’t keep you.
Next time I’ll be taking a look at Avon Book’s website. Another fine example of website building with readers, aspiring authors, and authors in mind.
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