[Small Business Deals] September 2026 Edition

Small Business Deals September 2026 Blog Banner

Okay, I admit that I sound like a broken record with what I’m about to say in this month’s Small Business Deals: September 2026 post.

But it’s worth repeating, considering how important this is to your author business.

If you’ve been with me for quite some time, you know what I’m referring to.

Yup, I’m talking about the humble author website.

When I say a website, I mean it’s your website with your own domain name in it, not someone else’s land where the only thing you have is an online profile.

Regardless of what people say, having your own website is here to stay.

And so does having an email list.

That’s another thing that is here to stay, but you can only do that when you have your own website.

There’s no other way around it, especially since every single email marketing platform these days requires you to have your own website if you want to send emails to your readers.

The good news is that there are many viable options to create a website if WordPress sounds too technical for you.

Even better?

You can even create a website for free, with an annual spend for your author brand.

Even with that, it won’t cost you much.

And that’s what this month’s Small Business Deals: September 2026 post is all about, along with other deals that you don’t want to miss.

Build your own website and start selling directly to your readers for free with Payhip

Some of you may think Payhip is only for selling your products, nothing else.

Well, you’re not wrong about that since that’s what I use Payhip for.

But the thing about Payhip is that it’s more than just an online land to sell your products.

Believe it or not, Payhip can be a full-fledged website like you would with a WordPress site if you want it to.

Want to start blogging?

Well, you can do that with Payhip as well.

The key to getting all those features boils down to the theme that you use.

Some of the themes on Payhip allow you to have a full-fledged website, complete with a homepage that briefly states who you are and whatnot.

And what’s even better is that the theme customization is pretty straightforward, too.

With some imagination, creating a professional-looking website is possible with Payhip.

Of course, there are some trade-offs with Payhip.

But it may not be much of an issue for some of you who are already running ads or paid promotions of any kind for your books.

Want to get started with building a website that you can finally say is yours?

You can sign up for Payhip right here:

Start building your author website with Payhip

Your website needs a domain name, and you can get it from iWantMyName

It doesn’t matter whether you choose to have a website on WordPress or Payhip.

You still need to have a domain name for your website.

Sure, there’s nothing wrong with redirecting your readers to this payhip.com/yourauthorname link.

But it only makes you look less professional, which is not the kind of impression you would want to leave with your potential readers.

The good news is that getting a domain name doesn’t cost you that much.

And it’s even more so when you only need to pay annually for the renewal.

You can read everything you need to know about getting a domain name for your website right here if you’d like.

But when it comes to getting a domain name, you can get it from Namecheap or iWantMyName.

While I do get all of my domain names from Namecheap, iWantMyName isn’t a bad option either.

If anything, that’s the best place to get a domain name if you’re using Shopify since it offers a one-click installation for Shopify.

It’s too bad it doesn’t offer a one-click installation for WordPress and Payhip.

But it does offer a one-click installation if you’re using WP Engine, though.

While I don’t talk much about iWantMyName, I did use them in the past when I used to be active on Tumblr, though.

Interested in getting a domain name from iWantMyName instead of my usual Namecheap recommendation?

You can get your preferred domain at iWantMyName right here:

Buy a domain name from iWantMyName

Want to up your writing game? Then ProWritingAid will do just that for you

Okay, I admit it feels like a random segue here, considering that we’re now switching topics to publishing.

But how can I NOT tell you about it when ProWritingAid is currently running a sale where you can get 25% off the annual subscription for their Premium or Premium Pro plans?

That’s more than 67% in savings compared to the normal price you pay for the annual subscriptions.

What if you already subscribed to any of their plans and you rely on their other features such as chapter critique, plot analysis, and virtual beta reader?

Guess what?

You’ll get 25% off on story credits, too.

The only caveat is that the sale won’t be available for long, since it will only be available until September 14, 2026.

If you’ve been using ProWritingAid for quite some time and you’re thinking about upgrading, now is your chance to do so.

You can learn more about it right here:

ProWritingAid Storyteller’s Sale

A note about ProWritingAid

Just to be clear here that ProWritingAid has undergone a major upgrade over the last few months.

Rather than using ProWritingAid mainly for editing, you can now use it for writing your first draft like you would with Word or Scrivener.

I have yet to look into their new features as I write this.

So, I can’t comment much about it as of now.

But all the ProWritingAid features that I’ve been gushing about in this post somehow remain the same, though.

There’s not much change on that front as far as I can see.