What can cause a reader to expect a certain tone or outcome from YOUR writing and something utterly different from someone else’s? It’s a little thing called branding. But what is branding and how does it work? Here are two examples:
1) Let’s say Judy strolls down the romance aisle in her favorite Barnes and Noble. She happens to come across your book. She’s never heard of you before but feels the back cover blurb is interesting enough to take a risk and buy the novel. What’s Judy’s expectation? That your book will follow the same “formula” as other romance novels she’s read and loved. She wants the hero and heroine to meet fairly early in the story, but something will keep them apart. By the end, they will conquer that conflict and live happily ever after.
Judy’s expectation: ROMANCE. Why? Because your book was placed on the shelf with other romance novels and most likely had the word romance written on its spine.
2) Michelle has bought every book you’ve written thus far and has been excitedly awaiting your next masterpiece to hit the bookstores. When that finally happens, she rushes to the “New Arrivals” shelves and grabs the book without reading the back cover. She loves your work and KNOWS this novel will be as great or better than the last.
Michelle’s expectation: CONSITENCY. What do you think would happen to Michelle’s expectations if she was accustomed to your romantic stories only to discover your new novel was about flying monkeys and how they escaped from a lab on Mars?
Branding has a lot to do with your readers’ expectations. They associate your name to a certain type of writing including the style, tone, and genre you write. This is why agents and editors will tell you it’s dangerous to write a little bit of this and a little bit of that. They recommend you stick to one genre for example and build a following. Does this mean you will forever be writing romances when there’s a mystery novel brewing in the depths of your core? No, but it does mean you have to be smart about how and when you present this new genre to your readers. Some authors, like Nora Roberts, have chosen to use a pseudonym so their readers know what to expect when they pick up the book. Nora Roberts = Romance. J.D. Robb = “In Death” series. Other authors have kept their name and tried to please both their readers and themselves by releasing one novel in their original genre and another in the new genre during that same year. This is a little riskier and can alienate some of their followers, but certain authors are successful with this system.
Have you thought about branding? If you’re not published, now’s the time to decide what your brand will be. So, what IS your brand?
Lynnette Labelle
www.labelleseditorialservices.com
This sounds a lot like the trap that actors fall into when they get stuck playing the same roles. Sure it is consistency but it traps the artist in a rut. Is that necessarily a good thing?
Michael: I wouldn’t say it’s a bad thing. It’s all about readers’ expectations. I used to collect novels from a particular author until he all of sudden switched genres. I don’t care for his new genre, so I no longer read his books. Unfortunately, I’d gotten to the point where I bought any book he wrote because I THOUGHT I could count on his voice and genre always being the same. I didn’t realize until I got home and started to read his new book that it wasn’t at all what I was used to. I read the whole thing to give it a chance since it was his book, but that was pretty much the end for me. So, because I expected him to be consistent and he wasn’t, I was disappointed.
If you write a little bit of this and a little bit of that, it may be harder to gain a large following unless you can produce a book a year in each of the genres you’re writing. If you’re traditionally published, your publisher will expect at least a book a year in the same genre but possibly more. Until you’re a big name author, it’s very likely people will forget about you. Sad, but true. I’d rather have a starting place, my target audience. Once I’ve built a following, I wouldn’t consider myself stuck there. I would branch out and try to reach readers of other genres and bring them over to “my side.”
And to comment on your point about this trapping an artist, I don’t agree. You simply have to know how to juggle more than one genre. Nora Roberts does it successfully but many don’t.
Lynnette Labelle
http://www.labelleseditorialservices.com
Great post, Lynnette!
Thank you for always having such informative blog posts.
I agree completely and the best way at creating a loyal following is to find a niche and write for it.
I think you are right about readers expectations. In fact, I’ve been mindful of it as I had a ton of story ideas and thought… how can I break this down into less genres? I had about 5 genres I had stories for, but I altered some of those story ideas so they fit more into 2 genres. This way, I only need two names to publish under. The reason I felt sticking to 2 instead of 5 was important is because of another thing that needs to be considered. Length between publications. I figure I need to do 1 book under each “name”/genre per year. I can’t do 5 books a year. In fact, even 2 a year would be pushing it for me *at this time*. So I have one that I focus on for now, and the other is “on the side”. I may even do something with a co-author, but it’s in the genre that blends our genres together (paranormal horror, I’d say, in a literary writing style and historical elements). Anyone who reads our individual works would not be surprised by this blend.
Anyway, for those authors who have a lot of different ideas and a wide range, I say find a way to take that early on and blend it together to create your own little niche. If you want to write paranormal and horror and historical…is there a way you can bring that together? Is there a way you can make your horror idea a bit more paranormal and add some historical elements, or make your your historical more horrific and add some paranormal elements?
Ideas can be tweaked to blend your “range” together into a very unique branding. That said, you mentioned earlier about expectations based on genre. That will, of course, means being ever aware of what genre is the forefront of any of your books, and if anything deviates too much from your “brand”, finding another way to pitch that to the readers, which may mean using a pen name. And, as I said before, that can mean deciding how much you want to take onto your plate, in terms of how frequently you’ll be releasing a book under any of those names.
Anyway, great post.
Hi Lynnette. I don’t disagree with you when you say readers’ expectations are important. They are. I started right from the beginning writing across different genres and will continue to do so. I have three manuscripts in at the moment, one Australian life fiction, a YA romantic supernatural and will release a children’s fantasy in ebook next year. While I can separate and create different websites for each of my writing genres at the moment I chose not to. I take photographs, I paint, I write poems, flash fiction, short stories etc. I think readers are now in a changing climate. I read horror, sci-fi, all types of non-fiction and YA romantic supernatural and I don’t necessarily stay with one author, though, I know many people do. I also collect comics, over many different genres and have done for 30years. On Xbox I play Halo, but I also play Fable, two completely different genre games. Many young gamers I know do the same and read over many different genres. While writing over different genres may be a risky business, does it always have to be about a large following? Or is it about the stories an author will produce? Everything changes over time, even readers’ expectations. I could never stay writing in one genre. I’ve experienced far too much in my life to be confined to one particular genre. I may alienate some readers. I will have to live with that. Publishing is also changing. The question I asked myself was simple. Why do I write stories? An the answer was just as simple. Because I love write, to create.
Vacen: You’re right. If you’re writing because you want to get the story out and aren’t concerned about how much money you make, you can do whatever you want. That’s a wonderful freedom to have.
Lynnette Labelle
http://www.labelleseditorialservices.com
Rebecca: Great idea!
Lynnette Labelle
http://www.labelleseditorialservices.com
Candace and Martha: Thanks!
Lynnette Labelle
http://www.labelleseditorialservices.com