We share 9.5 author brand examples for non-fiction and genre fiction authors to help you find your author brand that is a big part of your author platform.
With the following author brand examples, including some by publishing houses, we could instantly understand those authors’ messages. For others, we’d struggled. What follows is the hits and misses to help you get an idea of what kind of author brand you want as you build your author platform.
So sit back, sip on your favourite beverage, and get ready to scroll…
As an FYI, the following author brand examples are in random order. Seriously, we just plucked their names from a hat for this – so now you get to be a judge.
Ready?
Let’s do this.
AUTHOR BRAND EXAMPLE #1 — DONALD MILLER
Donald Miller’s book: Building a Storybrand – Clarify your message.
We chose this author because we’re talking about author branding and it’s one of our favourite books about building a solid brand, so we poked around to find Donald Miller’s author brand.
But what we discovered raised a few eyebrows…
Donald Miller’s website is more about his live stream events that aren’t cheap either. The colours of the website match the book that got them their name, yet the book is nowhere to be seen. At. All.
Which is weird when the guy is known for building a brand – as an author.
Did we miss the memo or something?
Because I don’t think this book, Story brand, has left the bestseller’s list since it was released.
So we conversed over coffee and cake, coz we could, sitting closer to the PC screen while debating if to include this author in the mix as one of our author brand examples.
I have the early version of this book. However, the latest version that was also tabled seems to be spamified with in-house marketing promos. Sadly, the latest reviews of this book also reflect this change, too. But once you get past all that self-promotional gunk, you’ll find the message is the same – your brand is your story and one that is worth sharing in the clearest possible way.
I’m not so sure about Donald Miller’s author brand, none of us could make it out. It’s gone in such a different direction from the book that made him famous.
What do you think? Can you find this author’s brand? Let us know.
AUTHOR BRAND EXAMPLE #2 — TONY ROBBINS
This pick for an author brand example surprised us too when one of our team members dropped this suggestion on our desk.
Hold on, before you roll those eyes and scroll on by, this guy spends $$millions just on promoting his brand alone.
His brand helped his latest book, Life Force, that rocket launched to the top of the bestseller charts on the day it was released.
But what confused us is his latest book, Life Force, is a whopping 700+ pages all about health and medicine. He’s now promoting vitamin supplements and health gadgets when all his previous books were about financial freedom. How’s that for a brand switch.
But his brand’s message is LOUD and clear…
LIVE. LARGE.
Do you agree?
AUTHOR BRAND EXAMPLE #3 — TESSA BAILEY
Dubbed the “Michelangelo of dirty talk,” by Entertainment Weekly, Tessa Bailey is an international bestselling author who really knows her author brand. It’s consistent across all of her social media sites, making it easier for her readers to recognise her.
Her brand colouring is pink, blue, white and gold with animated images all cleverly targeting her audience of women readers. And it works, with over 8,500+ readers reviews for her latest release, It Happened One Summer.
So digging deeper into her author platform to see how her brand carried across in her advertised social media links, we discovered her Twitter feed has been abandoned, and her Facebook feed is a replica of her Instagram feed.
But we loved her on the ‘Gram.
Tessa Bailey’s Instagram feed radiates the colours of her book covers. And those book covers are fun, especially the Hot and Hammered Series that put her on the map.
This author obviously has a load of fun sharing images of her family and stories. We could feel the fun.
There are no suits. No ball gowns. No stilettos. But real-life suburbia. Which suits her stories that are all blue-collar romances.
Her author brand: Fun. Sexy. Romance.
And her books are fun. Light. Clever. Sexy. Romance … Yeah, we’re a fan.
AUTHOR BRAND EXAMPLE #4 — BRIANNA WIEST
Brianna Wiest is a non-fiction author with a no-nonsense site that is simple and white, allowing her message to speak for her. It’s in direct contrast to her black covered bestseller, The Mountain is You.
Her avatar of profile in a black high-neck sweater (that really shouts – literary author) is consistent across her author platform and two social media platforms she focuses on, being Twitter and Instagram.
Her Instagram is just white pages and black text, which are images from the pages of her books. This author has only posted 90 images of her book’s text and no book cover anywhere on her main feed. Yet her IG story highlights told a different story, where she’s already accumulated over 300k worth of followers. It’s obviously working for Brianna in connecting with her audience.
Her topic core is how to be happy. Yet, we struggled to find anything showing this literary poet as being happy.
So what do you feel from this author’s brand example? Try and describe this in two to three words.
#5 — MARIAN KEYES
This is an example of a website produced by a publishing house, in this case, it’s done by Penguin Books, and you soon learn why… Marian Keyes has been around for 20+ years, selling millions of copies worldwide in an astonishing number of languages, like her bestseller, Grown Ups. Or her latest release, below…
Her women’s fiction is so well branded they have always stood out in bookshops and library shelves.
Yet, stepping away from her website and exploring her author platform we discovered her social media avatars were all different.
Her Facebook page seems to be promoted and managed by Penguin Books. Lucky girl.
On Twitter, she has a sticker (?) for an avatar and her title is MariankeyeshaswrittenasequeltoRachelsHoliday@mariankeyes. Phew.
Her very active Twitter feed is also about promoting other authors with her own cleverly worded book reviews. Do check out #MarianRecommends, it made us add to our TBR pile.
#6 —SARAH J. MAAS
Sarah J. Maas’s books are her brand. That’s it. With the colours all about her new book covers, it’s carried across to her Facebook page that is very slick with the same repeated messages.
We all oohed and ahhed like granny’s over a newborn for the following book promotion that was watched over 434,000 times on Instagram!
View this post on Instagram
As she is a fantasy YA author, there is very little shared of her personal life on Facebook.
Although on Instagram we all sat back to pause when the author announced the birth of her new baby girl. (*aww – so cute*) The rest of her Instagram feed is book quotes, and book covers, keeping up with the brand of her latest book’s colour theme.
As mentioned before, her author brand and her entire author platform is all about her books first. Not the author. Her bio is so super short and doesn’t say much – just her books. Well, she was 16 when she started writing the immensely popular, Throne of Glass Series.
But if you had never heard of Sarah J. Maas and were to land on her website, could you tell what genre she wrote in?
Ah – before you slam us with tweets, her title is #1 New York Times Bestselling Author. But nowhere, anywhere could we find clarification of her genre.
But everyone here in the office owns a copy of book 1, Throne of Glass. So, yes, we’re all fans.
#7 — JOHN GRISHAM
As the master of legal thrillers, John Grisham has been around a while and many know his author brand.
His signature crisp white collared shirt makes up John Grisham’s author brand which is all about legal thrillers. He’s a lawyer sitting behind his legal desk, near a bookcase full of important legal books and you can feel this throughout his very large author platform.
His author image is consistent with his Twitter account, which hasn’t been touched in over a year. The Instagram and Facebook feed are mostly images of his books with a dark and serious tone carried throughout, with touches of gold.
But his consistent and clear author brand is: Smart. Legal. Thriller.
See if you can feel this too?
#8 — DEAN KOONTZ
Bestselling Master of Suspense, Dean Koontz is another example of a publishing house having a hand in maintaining this author brand.
Although Dean has been around for a while, his author platform made us all swoon. You can tell right from the start what Dean Koontz’s genre is when you visit his website. The colours are a dark emerald shifting in gradient to black. The colour gradient seems to be his brand’s schtick, and it’s used on the website, promo and book covers that are bold with some black, suiting the genre.
For a scary author, Dean’s Twitter feed is fun. It’s filled with images, not just of his book, but of his pets playing with his books.
He also does a great Q&A session about his latest books. One question, one post, one photo of his book—it’s one to remember.
However, upon closer inspection, where we more spilled cake crumbs and leaned over our near-empty coffee cups, we found it was the same images, same quotes, same captions on his Facebook, Instagram and Twitter feeds. Although, he does seem to respond to his tweets.
Oh, and the publishing house that has done his website is AMAZON PUBLISHING. Surprise.
#9+9.5 — PIPPA GRANT ALSO PENS AS JAMIE FARRELL
This is why it’s not 10 author brand examples! This one author has two author names. Both are romantic comedy styled authors, and we struggled to find why the pen name, especially when it is clearly stated on the covers: Pippa Grant (in HUGE LETTERS) writing as Jamie Farrell (in teeny tiny letters) on the book covers.
But her author brand is the same with a blend of bright colours that is loud and fun, as are her books.
Pippa Grant’s website is worth a peek at for ideas as well as her entire author platform as this lady knows her audience. Her Twitter feed seems abandoned, yet her Facebook and Instagram feed appears to be uniquely managed but both are fun. She also has a great merchandise store made from her book quotes through to book club tees.
Pippa took her author brand, blended it, expanded it across her author platform and shot for the bestseller’s moon and beyond! She’s a brilliant example of what an Independent author can achieve with their author platform.
The clever use of her name as the PG rating, and how she’s named her author newsletter the Pipster Report and the Pipster Squad as the name for her Facebook readers group is brilliant. Her amazon image is her wearing a unicorn hat, and she cleverly uses memes and 90s styled images to truly connect with her readers.
All together, Pippa Grant’s author brand stands for: Fun as a down to earth author of romantic comedy. We love it.
What do you think?
YO! ONE LAST THING… ABOUT THESE AUTHOR BRAND EXAMPLES
For the record, the above author brand examples were not done to judge the above authors. We only did this as an exercise to show you the various ways of creating and promoting your author brand within the different genres to help you get an idea of what you can do for your own author brand. Most of the authors above we support by buying their books, except for Tony Robbins. Sorry, Tony.
This shortlist of author brand examples were done to help you look at how you can create your own author brand, by making the message clear to your readers. Having a clear author brand just makes your author platform so much more effective!
If starting out with your author brand read this.
But most of all, the biggest message is for your to have fun building your author brand as part of your author platform because your readers can feel it.
