Should you set up a website for your screenplay project?

I got this question recently:

“Would you advise I buy the domain name for one of the scripts that I’m polishing right now, a contained thriller. I will give it all up should I sell the script. I was thinking I could develop the website and put a high quality poster there about the movie and refer producers to the website in the query letter.”

I would say this really depends on your skill set. If you’re a graphic designer / web developer and you can easily and cheaply create something like this it might add some interest to your project. I’m skeptical, however, that most producers would take the time to actually go to the website so I wouldn’t spend a lot of time or money on it. The biggest downside that I see is that unless you do this sort of thing professionally your website might look amateurish and you might actually end up hurting your script’s chances of being taken seriously.

I do however think you should create some sort of online presence as a screenwriter where you list contact information, loglines and synopses for your screenplays. Over the years I’ve had many people read one of my scripts, they like the writing but don’t think it’s quite right for them, and then they’ve gone to my website and requested another script. In addition I mention my website in the query letter and sometimes people don’t like the ideas I pitch in the query letter but still end up agreeing to read another script after they’ve looked at my website. So assuming you have more than one or two completed screenplays I highly recommend that you build a website to represent yourself as a screenwriter.

One of things I’m working on is building a simple online interface for screenwriters to create a professional website for themselves. I’ll hopefully have some time soon to actually roll this out.