How to define your writer brand

Branding for writers: PART TWO

In my last post I talked about WHY it’s important for writers to have a brand. It helps readers make a decision, builds trust with your audience and helps you make sound business decisions. If that’s the case, then it’s a pretty powerful tool; one which we’d benefit from using. To be able to do that, we need to truly understand what a brand consists of. Like the word irony (try giving your 14-year-old a good definition of this word!), the term brand is thrown about in board rooms, webinars and podcasts, but do we really know WHAT it is?

Let’s start with what it ISN’T.

It’s NOT a TAGLINE

When most of us hear ‘Just do it’ we probably think of Nike, but this is actually a tagline – a short, snappy summary of the essence of the company – not the whole brand. It can be a helpful element to develop, even for writers, but your brand is more than this. Also, I don’t recommend starting here if you’re trying to button down your brand. It’s like writing the executive summary of a report before you write the report. Taglines – like product or company names – are notoriously difficult to come up with, and come out of the more lengthy work of figuring out what your brand is.

It’s NOT GRAPHICS

Back to Nike; it’s the swoosh. Companies also pick colours, type fonts, and a logo to represent themselves. All of these elements are carefully chosen to communicate certain things: agility, speed, energy. Nike typically go with bold colours and that swoosh which communicates movement and energy. They don’t go with flowers and minimalist typography; that might suit a photographer better. Once again, the graphics are part of the story but they’re not the brand. So, don’t worry if you’re not artistic or don’t have the funds to invest in a logo; this isn’t the place to start.

What is a brand then? I can’t put it much better than this Forbes article: “the perception customers have about that product or service”. For a writer, though, what does that mean?

WHO not WHAT

One of the traps we fall into when we first approach marketing is to talk about WHAT we sell or do. I’ve written about that here. It’s totally understandable; it’s because it seems much more concrete. It’s hard to talk about fluffy things like ‘brand’. However, brand isn’t a list of products or services a company sells. Similarly, for a writer, it’s not a list of the books, poetry or short stories you’ve written.

Start with WHO you are as a writer, WHY you write and HOW you write. What got you inspired to write? What still makes you get out of bed in the morning (or stay up late, or miss lunch) and write? Do you plan things meticulously or meander your way through a first draft? Do you wait for inspiration to strike or stick to a disciplined schedule? What are some of your core values or guiding principles as a writer? Not only will these questions help you get to the essence of your brand as a writer, but they’ll also give you things to share with your networks on social media.

The EXPERIENCE for the reader

The most important element of brand, and one of the reasons it’s a powerful business tool, is because it sums up the EXPERIENCE the customer will get. This is why it’s not about WHAT you do. It’s not about the features, it’s about the benefits. Marketers also refer to this as a brand ‘promise’. What they mean by this is: how an interaction with the company will make a customer feel.

This is where you put yourself in the shoes of your reader. What is it you want your reader to experience when they read your work? You can’t predict the impact of your book, but I guarantee there’s a reason and intended outcome of your writing. Picture your ideal reader. Just one. How do you want them to feel as you read your book? And after they’ve finished your book? Entertained, encouraged, invigorated, inspired, intrigued …?

WHERE you sit on the shelf

In my last post I said one of the reasons brand is important is because it helps readers make a decision about whether to invest in your book or not. As Blake Snyder so expertly explains, we often make this decision through COMPARISON. This book is like this one. It’s x meets x. Conversely, we might do this through CONTRAST. It’s like x but without the gore/the humour/the romance. Maybe this is because part of human nature is to seek out what is familiar. If I liked that book, the chances are I’ll enjoy this one.

It’s what marketers call ‘positioning’ which simply means: where do you sit in the market, who would I compare you to? So, for a writer, this is your genre and your comparable titles. Which books is yours or writers are you similar to? Now, I can hear an objection: “I write lots of different genres, I don’t have one brand.” Well, you have a couple of choices here. You could create a pen name for each genre. Or, you could take a look at your work across the different genres and see if there’s a common denominator. Do you find yourself writing about the underdog, the connection between nature and the human condition, family sagas?

If you haven’t thought about your brand as a writer before, why not take some time to answer these questions. When we are clearer about why we do what we do, what we stand for and what impact we want to have on our readers it leads to stronger marketing. We know how to position ourselves, how to write a good hook, what to post about on social media. Ultimately, we help readers know what they’ll be getting from us. Let me know how you get on, I’d love to hear your thoughts on your writer brand.

Do you need help figuring out what your brand is? Contact me to set up a one-to-one consultation.