A Rose by any other name gets lost.
Are you an aspiring author preparing to self publish your first title? If so, please pay attention to this friendly bit of advice.
After completing your labor of love, you will work to promote yourself as an author almost as hard as you did writing the book itself. Let's face it, garnering those reviews and capturing new fans is an uphill climb for every author starting out. Don't make the job any harder than it already is by confusing your readers about who you are.
What do I mean? Your pen name, however you decide to present it, becomes your brand.
I regularly run across authors (while volunteering for Faerytale Magic) who are inconsistent about how they credit their prose. They do not understand the concept of branding. This can cause them to lose out on both sales opportunities and increased fan following.
As an example, if your pen name is Jane Marie Doe then you need to be Jane Marie Doe on Amazon, Barns and Noble, Smashwords, GoodReads, janemariedoe.com, Facebook, Twitter, etc. Not J.M. Doe on Amazon, Jane M. Doe on Barns and Noble, J. Marie Doe on GoodReads and Janie Doe on social media.
Why? you ask.
Let's say I liked your book after finding it on Amazon and I told all my friends that J.M. Doe's science fiction adventure was the best science fiction book in the world. Further, I recommended they buy a J.M. Doe book right this very minute. Some of my friends have a Kindle and some of my friends have a Nook and others only read in paper form. That is the way of the world. Who is my Nook friend going to find when searching Barns and Noble for J.M. Doe? Not you, because on that site, you are J. Marie Doe. Search results are specific to the search term. In other words, they only give you what you asked for.
The goal of your brand is name recognition. Name recognition is one of the keys to successful Word of Mouth advertising. And that form of advertising is FREE. If you fail to be consistent with your branding, you will fail in this important area of book marketing.
Let's consider one of the most successful authors of all time. Joanne (no middle name) Rowling, aka J.K. Rowling. J.K. Rowling is always J.K. Rowling everywhere her books are sold. She is not J.K. Rowling on Amazon, Joanne K. Rowling on Barns and Noble, Jo Rowling on Smashwords and Joanne Rowling on her website, etc. When she agreed with her publisher to become J.K. Rowling, that became her brand and she uses it consistently, on everything, everywhere, all the time. So should you.
Remember, a rose by any other name may smell as sweet, but if that rose is lost amid the myriad of other roses due to inconsistent naming, it will never get a good sniff.
