Should you have a fake author name or do you keep it real? Find out with the list of questions and restrictions you may find, especially when it comes to building your author platform.

Why would authors change their names?

There are many reasons for a fiction author to create a fake author name. Below are a few real-life examples of why they created their fake author names that worked.

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When publishers dictated the need for fake author names

JK Rowling stands for Joanne Kathleen Rowling. Yet, her real name is Joanne Murray.  She changed it because the publisher said that young boys might not like reading from a female author, especially a story about a little boy named Harry.

Oh, and she also has the fake author name of Robert Galbraith.

Then there’s the world’s most successful horror author, Stephen King, who has the fake author name of Richard Bachman with a bio claiming he was a dairy farmer in New Hampshire. For real.

So why would a famous author want to create another author’s name?

King created a fake author name because of his publisher’s schedules. They didn’t want to overwhelm his readers, preferring to stick to publishing only one of his books per year.

Doing a sneaky flip over fake author names

Meet George Eliot from the Victorian era, known for his poetry, clever journalistic works, and novels.

But George was actually a Mary! True story.

Mary Anne Evans faked being a man just so she could get her works published.

Now, meet the marvellous middle-aged widower, Mrs Silence Dogood.

Mrs Dogood would write letters about fashion, schools, and the gossip of Boston for the local newspaper. Her witty letters were so popular she’d receive marriage proposals from her many male admirers.

But the middle-aged widower was none other than the writing scholar and future statesman Benjamin Franklin!

His/her letters were printed in the family newspaper, where young Ben was a teenage apprentice who’d never told his own family until he outed himself.

How about a list of fake author names gone wrong…

Would Mary Poppins be suitable as an author of macabre murder mysteries? It’d match the cosy mystery genre. Especially if she brought along her sugar-loving, playful parade of penguins as the perfect sidekicks to her solve those crimes. (Try and say that three times real fast.)

What about Dorothy Dolittle as an author of erotica novels? Wait, isn’t that a drag queen’s name?

We could try Slaughterhouse Nellie as a marvellous writer of stories for toddlers? Erm…

How about Frederick Poisonous, who pens books about keeping gardens healthy?

Yeah, I’m gonna stop now.

Today’s authors have good reasons for having a fake name

Many independent authors I know today, write under various pseudonyms based purely on their genre.

Fake names are very common among romance authors where an author may write a sweet and clean romance, and her pseudonym writes sexy romance.

A lot of erotica authors have fake author names to protect their families.

So knowing your genre and knowing your readers’ preferences matter in choosing an author name. It’s what I discuss in my book, Your Author Brand.

Your author name matters more than you know.

There are countless times ahead involving your author’s name, that will set free that feel-good rush of emotions, or it may embarrass you.  So choosing the right name does matter.

Your author name is your brand.

That’s it.

Your author brand is your author’s fake or real name.

If you’re new to author branding, think of it like this: what memory or emotion do you get from the name Stephen king—it’s horror. Good horror.

What about the name we shouldn’t mention from the Harry Potter series? Voldemort.

What about Cat in the Hat by Dr Suess? It’s an odd combination of a doctor writing funny little children’s stories. But it works. Oh, and Dr Suess is the pseudonym for writer and illustrator Theodor Seuss Geisel.

Your author name when it comes to your author platform

Your author name, as mentioned earlier, makes up the bulk of your author brand.

Remember, your author name will get shared, liked, commented on, and splashed across various social media platforms. Well, you’d hope to.

So how do you want your author name to look on Facebook or TikTok?

Or when:

• you see your author name on that book cover in the bestseller lists.
• Bookstagrammers flash your book cover, creating a hashtag of your name as they tell everyone how much they love your work.
• you hear your author name on the local radio
• spotting your name in the library catalogue.

Sorry, but nonfiction author names must play by the rules.

Names for nonfiction authors can’t change.

The nonfiction rules are that your author name must match the certificates and other awards on your wall. It’s part of the deal.

It’s how the entire author platform process came to be, because of a nonfiction author.

What about using your author name on your author’s website?

Authors should be using their chosen author names on their website and everywhere else across social media, so people can find you.

It’s that simple — consistency is key.

Which is what author branding is about.

Of course, as many branding specialists will tell you there’s a tonne of money to be spent on perfecting your brand.

Psst, lemme tell you a secret. I found a free shortcut to branding especially for aspiring authors. It’s so effective many authors have tested its effectiveness, that I then wrapped the entire process neatly into one short book and put my nonfiction author name on the cover.

When you don’t use your author name on your author platform

As an exception to the rules, when it comes to author branding, I flipped that script. 

As I’m writing about a topic that over 54% of authors don’t know what it is—the author platform, how do I get aspiring authors like you to find me?

By my author name? Or something else?

I went for something else when building this author platform.

Naming an author’s website to suit your author goals

As part of my author goals, I needed a name my readers could easily find.

You’d think it’d be easy, considering I build author platforms for authors?

Bah.

There was a lot of paper scribbling and nose-wrinkling moments in this author platform name challenge.

Would the name:

• Fit with my readers?
• Who else was using that name?
• Would it be easy to remember?
• What emotions did this name bring up?

And that’s just for the website.

These are just some of the questions every aspiring author should ask when choosing their author name.

When you find your perfect author name, does it make you wanna do backflips down the corridor? Click To Tweet

The race to save my name begins…

After more nose wrinkling, a new day began when the muse whispered in my ear, I’d found a name for this particular platform—the Author Platform. Whoo-hoo. Doesn’t that make you wanna do backflips down the corridor?

But before I could pop those champagne bottles, I slammed down my money so hard on the table my palm tingled as I bought that name. Actually, it was more like whipping out my credit card to purchase the domain name. Hey, I write fiction too, buddy. It’s my blog, lemme me play, okay.

But truthfully, settling on a name began the race to see how many social media platforms as I could use under that name. Regardless of where my readers were, I just wanted to lock in that name!

For Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest and the many other social media platforms they all allowed for the name :

@theauthorplatform

Of course, there’s always one member in the party who didn’t want to play… *rolls eyes*

Twitter was that player.

For Twitter, the name needed to be less than fifteen characters, so I settled with @authorplatforms. *Yes, I’m rolling my eyes again!*

Your personal fake or real author name challenges

Finding an original unused author name is rare, especially when building an author platform.

Besides Twitter’s word limit, there are challenges you’ll need to consider when choosing your fake author name, such as:

• Is your name already being used?
• Will it be available on social media?
• How many letters make up your author name?
• Imagine the fit on a book cover. Will the name be legible? What about at thumbnail size?
• Will your author name be easy to read?
• Is your author name easy for your readers to rewrite in their reviews?

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What author name will you choose to suit your author platform?

Even with the various options and restrictions you may face when choosing an author name, your author name is far more powerful than you realise.

Remember, your fake or real author name will play a big part of your author brand for many years to come.

So, what kind of name will you choose as your author’s name?