Episode 233: Branding Part 2, Fable's Branding
Today on Fable and the Verbivore, we talk about the specific questions Fable used to help develop her own author brand.
This episode is part two of our new series on developing a distinctive brand as an author. In it, we dig into Fable’s personal author mission statement and brand and how she went about refining and building it over the last two years. Specifically, by looking at her books and asking herself what her writing is and what it isn’t.
In this conversation, we talk about a method for brainstorming and workshopping your own personal author brand by reviewing the natural tendencies within your work and asking yourself some key introspective and fill-in-the-blank questions.
Things like:
What is consistent across my work?
What are my strengths?
What are my weaknesses?
My voice is…
My reader wants…
My reader needs…
When they read my stories, they want to feel…
They read my books, when they want (a consistent thread or experience)...
My reader’s pain points are…
What gaps in the market can I fill?
What is the kind(s) of story readers can expect from me?
My target audience is…
My author competitors are…
My ideal readers are…
What font and colors best reflect the feeling of my brand?
For instance, Fable’s brand is writing clean, crisp, exciting, fast-paced, and entertaining stories that will make you lose sleep, miss your bus stop, or burn dinner. She enjoys crafting and helping others craft stories that you can’t put down. Her books are speculative with magic, monsters, and aliens.
Towards the end of this conversation, Fable talks about how part of this process for her was using concrete examples that encouraged readers to think of the last time they felt a certain way about a book (unable to put it down, pulled out of a reading slump, lost in a great story) and in that way tie her work to something that’s familiar by helping them to feel (not just know) what her books are like.
We hope you enjoy listening to this episode and that you find it useful wherever you are at on your writing journey!
We’ll be back next week with part three of this new series on author branding to discuss how The Verbivore answered these same questions. Keep reading, writing, and putting your voice out there!
Into the woods,
Fable & The Verbivore
Notes:
We reference a couple past episodes from the Fable and the Verbivore podcast. They are:
Here are a couple resources referenced in this series of episodes on author brands:
Techtarget.com Definition of Brand: “A brand is a product, service or concept that is publicly distinguished from other products, services or concepts so that it can be easily communicated and usually marketed. Branding is the process of creating and disseminating the brand name, its qualities and personality.”
The Verbivore references Kris Jenner’s MasterClass on “The Power of Personal Branding”, especially episode 2 “Create Your Personal Branding Story”
WritersDigest.com Article “3 Ways to Find Your Book's Unique Selling Proposition”
Forbes.com Articles “What is a Brand, Anyway?”, “The Importance of Being First”, and “Brand New Profits”
Ramotion.com Article “Brand Attributes Examples & List for Understanding”
Publishdrive.com Article “6 Effective Ways to Build an Author Brand”
TheBookDesigner.com Article “Author Branding: What’s Your Author Brand?”
Music from: https://filmmusic.io
’Friendly day’ by Kevin MacLeod (https://incompetech.com)
Licence: CC BY (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)