Romance Author Website Redesign – A New Website for Anni Rose

Anni Rose is a romance author with a growing catalogue of feel-good books and a loyal readership. When she came to us, her existing WordPress website had served her well for a while, but it was starting to show its age. The design felt dated, the site had developed some technical issues behind the scenes, and it no longer reflected the warmth and personality of her writing. She needed a fresh start — something that felt like her.

Looking for more detail on this project? Take a look at the case study.

The brief

Anne wanted a website that would do a few things really well. It needed to showcase her books front and centre, give readers an easy way to stay in touch through a newsletter, and feel welcoming and personal without being fussy or over-designed. She also wanted to be able to update her blog and share posts across social media without it becoming a chore. Beyond the redesign itself, she was looking for ongoing support to keep things running smoothly, along with help managing her social media presence so she could focus on what she does best — writing.

What we found

When we set up the development environment, a routine security scan flagged signs that the existing site may have been compromised at some point. This is not unusual with older WordPress installations, particularly where plugins have fallen behind on updates, but it meant we could not simply reskin the existing site and call it done. Rather than try to patch things up, we recommended building the new site cleanly from scratch. It was a better outcome in the long run — the new site would be more secure, faster, and far easier to maintain going forward.

We were upfront with Anne about what we had found and why the approach needed to change, and it did not affect the agreed scope or cost of the project. We also resolved a handful of technical issues on the old site along the way, including file upload size limits and expired plugin links that had been quietly causing problems in the background.

The design

We built a custom WordPress child theme on top of the Hello Biz parent theme, branded as “Anni Rose by O’Brien Media.” The design centres on a warm pink colour palette that reflects the personality of the Anni Rose brand, with a clean layout that puts the books right where they should be. The homepage opens with a welcoming tagline and leads straight into the book covers, giving visitors an immediate sense of who Anni Rose is and what her stories are about.

Each book has its own dedicated page with reader reviews and links to purchase on platforms including Audible. We also added a fun touch to the book pages — a checkbox feature that lets readers see at a glance whether a book contains animals, a happy ever after, and other details that romance readers tend to care about. Anne described that feature as “fabulous” when she first saw it, which is always a good sign. The site also includes a blog for news and updates, an About page, and a Contact page. Everything is fully responsive, looking just as good on a phone or tablet as it does on a desktop.

Newsletter and social media

We connected the site to MailerLite for newsletter signups, with a form collecting first name and email address. We set up the subscriber groups, created draft newsletter templates for Anne to use as starting points, and walked her through the process of sending her first campaign.

On the social media side, we set up connections to Facebook, Instagram, Bluesky, and Threads via Jetpack, so that blog posts and updates can be shared across platforms with minimal effort.

Ongoing support

The project included setting up an ongoing website support arrangement covering both anniroseauthor.co.uk and a secondary site for Anne’s sister, janebrenchley.co.uk. The support package provides approximately two hours of hands-on help per month, with the expectation that the early months would be busier as Anne got to grips with the new site. We agreed to review the arrangement after six months.

The outcome

The finished site is clean, fast, secure, and unmistakably Anni Rose. It gives Anne a proper platform to promote her books, connect with readers, and grow her audience — without needing to become a web developer in the process.

More than that, the project is a good example of how we like to work. We were honest when things did not go to plan, we adapted our approach when the situation called for it, and we kept the lines of communication open throughout. The result is a site that Anne is proud to share, and a working relationship that is set up to carry on long after the launch.

If you are looking for a website that works as hard as you do, we would love to hear from you.