It's Day 14 of Jeff Goins' Great Writers series. I can't believe there is only one more day. This challenge has been so helpful to me. What about you? If you have been following, I would recommend signing up for Jeff's mailing list or Join his community on Facebook. Jeff offers ongoing advice and resources for writers.
Today is all about finding a Brand for yourself, a way to Market Yourself
Jeff says that the truth is you already have a brand; you just need to decide to do something with it.
Why everyone has a brand
He explains that a brand is exactly what it sounds like. It’s an impression you leave on the customer or reader’s mind, a mental imprint. And we all have them.
You’ve likely heard about the importance of first impressions; our culture is full of them. This is a form of branding — the belief that people get an idea in their minds of our personalities based on an experience.
A brand is the simplest, most memorable part of yourself you can give.
The challenge
Brand yourself. There are three elements of every brand that you need to pay attention to
Name. This is what you call yourself (e.g. Copyblogger or Anne Lamott). It may be your given name or a pseudonym or something else, but you need to be consistent. Make sure your website, business cards, and social media properties all say the same thing.
Image. This can be a logo or a headshot. It’s whatever you want to use to make people recognize you and your work. If it’s a photo of you, make sure people would recognize you in real life if they’re seeing it on the Internet. Also, make sure it’s on your blog, Twitter profile, etc. Don’t use different images; make them all the same.
Voice. This is how you sound. It’s your style and personal flair as a communicator. If you aren’t confident in your unique writing voice, go through these 10 steps to find it.
I have a lot to do in this area. When I started my blog 6 months ago I had no idea what I was doing. The name Random Interruptions was a name that I thought sounded fun and sounded like my writing.
As I have gone along, my writing has become a lot less random. I am happy about that fact, but I thing I need to do some work on branding. I have started to feel more comfortable in certain areas and I need to concentrate on being more consisent and a little less random.
What about you?
I think I'm consistent on most of that. Voice is definitely casual, but then, so is my writing.
ReplyDeleteBranding is a great idea. My voice is me, so it stays the same, but I used to change my picture often. Now I use the same one everywhere.
ReplyDeleteI was surprised to find that my voice is the same no matter what I write. Not sure what I was expecting.
ReplyDelete