“Branding” is the cool word lately, the thing everyone’s buzzing about online. Everywhere you look, it’s about building your brand, designing your brand, and being your brand.

Obviously authors need brands, too! But I feel like sometimes the general advice about branding out there doesn’t really go into what authors need or want. I designed and built my own Between the Lines brand, and I wanted to share some of that process with you in this blog post. I also developed a new free email course about branding for authors; the sign up link is at the end of this post.

// What is a brand?

Put simply, a brand is a combination of your aesthetic, including logo and colors, and your tone. Put together, they create a visual identity that’s easy for followers to recognize online and/or in stores.

Let’s think of a popular real-life example. Nike is known for its swoosh logo and inspiring, powerful language. Their commercials and ads focus on people working out, achieving goals, and having a good time. It’s easy to spot a Nike ad or product when you’re out and about. Next time you go to the store, see how many people you spot wearing a certain brand just based on the logo.

// Why is a brand important?

Branding as an author is important so that you stand out from the crowd and your readers recognize you. And when you stand out from the crowd, more people are likely to click on your blog post links, follow you online, and engage with you on social media. Building awareness for your author brand ultimately brings in more readers and followers, which then translates to sales.

// What do you need to consider when branding?

So, what do you consider when you’re building your author brand?

It’s more than a cool logo and a couple of slogans like a sportswear brand. As you begin to build your author brand, you’ll want to consider…

• If you’ll publish under your name or a pen name
• The colors you want to use in your visual branding
• The fonts you’ll use
• What social media platforms to use
• Your tone/persona

Whatever you choose, it’s important to be consistent. This helps people immediately recognize you, your site(s), and your writing.

If you want to learn how to do the above, I’ve created a free five-day email course to help you start building your author brand. It goes over everything above in detail and walks you through how I built my own brand. You can sign up below, and I hope you’ll join me for your branding journey!

Questions? Email me at hannah@btledtorial.com or join my Facebook group for writers.