August 20, 2024 • 30 mins
Most promotional efforts will center around publication month, but that doesn't mean your job is done when the first of the next month rolls around! Brand expert Deb Gabor joins us to discuss what it takes to grow and manage a successful brand and key things she's done post-publication with her book.
“Leading Expert" doesn't come close to describing Deb Gabor's passion for brands. More accurate? Brand Guru. Brand Impresario. Brand Evangelist. She's written the book on branding (three times!) with bestsellers Branding is Sex, Irrational Loyalty, and Person-ality. She's the founder and CEO of Sol Marketing, a strategy-led marketing firm obsessed with solving major business and branding problems for clients in every industry. Companies throughout the world use Deb’s Brand Values Pyramid, Ideal Customer Archetype, and “Brand Swagger Questions” to align their teams and articulate their brands to audiences.
Deb also lends her brand authority with frequent contributions and commentary to major news outlets such as Entrepreneur, Forbes, FORTUNE, Inc., MediaPost, New York Times, NPR, USA Today, Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post. Business and marketing organizations regularly call on Deb as a keynote speaker and workshop leader, relying on her as an inspiration for executives to embrace the power of branding to create Marketing That Sells. Learn more at debgabor.com and solmarketing.com and follow Deb on LinkedIn, Facebook, and X.
Discover more about Smith Publicity at www.smithpublicity.com and follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Threads, YouTube, & LinkedIn.
“Leading Expert" doesn't come close to describing Deb Gabor's passion for brands. More accurate? Brand Guru. Brand Impresario. Brand Evangelist. She's written the book on branding (three times!) with bestsellers Branding is Sex, Irrational Loyalty, and Person-ality. She's the founder and CEO of Sol Marketing, a strategy-led marketing firm obsessed with solving major business and branding problems for clients in every industry. Companies throughout the world use Deb’s Brand Values Pyramid, Ideal Customer Archetype, and “Brand Swagger Questions” to align their teams and articulate their brands to audiences.
Deb also lends her brand authority with frequent contributions and commentary to major news outlets such as Entrepreneur, Forbes, FORTUNE, Inc., MediaPost, New York Times, NPR, USA Today, Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post. Business and marketing organizations regularly call on Deb as a keynote speaker and workshop leader, relying on her as an inspiration for executives to embrace the power of branding to create Marketing That Sells. Learn more at debgabor.com and solmarketing.com and follow Deb on LinkedIn, Facebook, and X.
Discover more about Smith Publicity at www.smithpublicity.com and follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Threads, YouTube, & LinkedIn.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to the Smith Publicity All Things Book Marketing podcast,
offering tips, insights, and advice from the best in the
publishing industry. Hello, and welcome to this episode of All
Things Book Marketing. I'm your host Olivia McCoy, and our
special guest today is Dev Gabor. She is a brand expert,
(00:21):
the founder and CEO of Soul Marketing, and a best
selling author of three branding books. Hi, Dev, Welcome to
the show.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
Hi, Hi, thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Of course, so I'm so excited to talk about author branding,
especially post publication. But let's start with what you do
and how you can help authors.
Speaker 3 (00:41):
Absolutely, So I'd like to explain to people that I'm
in the business of creating this condition that I call
irrational loyalty. And irrational loyalty is when people are so
indelibly bonded to a brand they feel like they were
cheating on it if they were to do anything else,
or work with anyone else, or read anything else, or
buy anything else. And based on the work that I do,
we've learned that when brands engender this quality of irrational loyalty,
(01:04):
they skip them more rapidly, more profitably, with more focus,
They have more repeat customers. They're just bigger, better brands.
And we've learned on the average, companies and organizations that
enjoy rational loyalty make about forty percent more revenue than
companies that don't. So it really speaks to the reason
why people do that. And so that means that I
(01:26):
do brand strategy. Branded content help take brands to market. Specifically,
for authors, we help them carve out their unique role
in relevance and sort of position themselves. Mostly I work
with nonfiction authors, you know, helping them sort of establish
a footprint and a platform for authority so that they
(01:50):
can create the change that they're looking to find in
the world any place they go, and take that authority
with them in a portable way across their entire careers
and lives.
Speaker 1 (01:58):
That sounds incredible. We've talked a little bit about branding
on the show before, but why don't you give us
a quick recap on what an author brand is and
what it looks like.
Speaker 2 (02:07):
Sure.
Speaker 3 (02:08):
Sure, So it's important to understand what a brand is,
and a lot of people think that a brand is
like it's a logo, or it's a color scheme or
a tagline or or something that you are known for
a brand. Really there's two kinds of branding. I like
to refer to big B branding, which is the kind
of branding I do, which is, you know, strategic branding,
which is really all about sort of carving out what
(02:30):
is the conceptual space that you occupy in the minds
of the customers who are most highly predictive of your success.
And then there's little B branding, which if you envision
a brand as being kind of like an iceberg, it's
the part of the iceberg that you see above the
top of the water, which does represent things like color schemes, logos, typography,
you know, campaigns, and things like that. So so, a
(02:53):
brand is the emotional connection that an author makes with
its audience, and it's something that's consistently delivered across not
just everything that they write, but everything that they do.
I always say actions speak louder than marketing. A brand
is more than marketing. A brand is a promise, and
(03:15):
that promise is the ultimate benefit, the singular benefit that
you're going to deliver to people when they don't just
consume your book, but consume any content or thought leadership
that comes from you.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
What are some good examples of a successful author brand,
including your own three times besself, I got it.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
Yeah, So I think about Seth Godin is somebody who
has like a very very clear brand that comes through
not just through his writing but writing speaking media. It
exists in three hundred and sixty degrees. I also think,
(03:57):
like some of the fiction authors that I read this summer,
I took a couple of weeks long trip to Spain
where I spent a lot of time on the beach
in my Orca, and I consumed a lot of what
I would describe as chick lit, specifically from one author,
Emily Henry. She wrote Beach Read, and then a bunch
of others like very fun, kind of light hearted books.
(04:17):
There's a brand there, There's a set of expectations of relationships,
some memories almost to formula that belongs that that I
have a deep emotional connection with that, Like when I'm
looking for something that's like mind candy, I can go
straight to that, regardless of what the subject matter is
or the storyline is. I know that there's an expectation
there that will always be met. And then in the
(04:40):
nonfiction world, you know, some of my favorite business books
were written by Jim Collins, and you know, here's a good,
good degree built to last.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
You know, books like.
Speaker 3 (04:52):
That they go back a very very long time, but
they have longevity, they have staying power, and they're sort
of like the definitive works for business strategists. And so,
you know, the thing that's common across all of these examples,
besides just being like strong brands, is they have consistency.
They have a footprint of awareness and authority, They have
(05:13):
a unique point of view, there's passion behind what they're writing,
and there's a desire to make some kind of a
connection with the reader. And so those are some of
the characteristics of a really really good author brand.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
And then we talk all the time, both at Smith
Publicity and consulting and in general in the industry about
how to build up an author brand. Pre publication.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
We know we want to.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
Be building momentum, we know we want to get people
excited about the book coming out, we know we want
to get pre sales, all of this, but then it
kind of peters off after that because the excitement and
the timeliness of that book's publication is gone, and so
we don't talk about continued branding. So we do know
there's never a time too early to begin your author branding,
start building up your network. Is there ever a time
(06:02):
that's too late.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
No, I'll say there's never a time that's too late.
Speaker 3 (06:05):
I always say that branding is like an always on activity.
And and you know, if you're an author or you're
thinking about being an author, you know, you're kind of
like a startup, right And I always say brand early
often and always and always sort of have your finger
on the pulse of what's going on out there. So no,
there really is no time that's too early to think
about your brand.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
Now.
Speaker 3 (06:25):
I know because you know, you guys have referred people
to me, and I've referred people to you. Like that
what you guys do, which really is sort of less
about defining the brand and more about activating the brand
in my market through influencers and media, that these two
activities are intertwined. And I do know that sometimes it's
(06:46):
too early to hire a team to do your publicity
if the brand isn't really carved out, it's not well established,
like who you are, what you stand for, the change
you're looking to see in the world, the consistent message,
the you know, the footprint and platform for authority that
you have as an author. If that's not defined, it
makes the job of folks like Smith Smith publicity very
(07:08):
very different. But the question that you were asking was like,
is it ever too late? And I think that my
own story is a really good example of it's never
too late. So I don't know if you know this, Olivia,
But I used to be a publicist.
Speaker 1 (07:19):
I don't know, Okay, I did what I have that as.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
You know, like part of the CD underbelly of my career.
Speaker 3 (07:26):
But I used to be a publicist, and as a publicist, like,
there are lots of things that I should have known better,
one of those things being like if I was going
to come to market with a book, I probably should
have worked on publicity before I did that. But you know,
as the unshod shoemaker's children can tell us, sometimes.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
You know, we're our worst we're our worst clients.
Speaker 3 (07:44):
And I, you know, I made the switch over to
you know, doing brand and consulting, like you know, a
long long time ago, more than two decades ago. So
I wrote a book. I wrote a book that I
was compelled to write. That very first book that I wrote.
I wrote a book that I was compelled to write.
I wrote a good book. I wrote a very popular book.
But then what I hadn't thought about was like, how
(08:05):
is this book going to serve me in my career?
I was so compelled to share my content with other
people that I didn't think through all of these things,
thought bully and strategically, like the good former publicist that
I was right.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
So there I was.
Speaker 3 (08:19):
Yeah, here I was with a book that had been
on the market for like I don't know, by the
time I decided, I was like, yeah, you know what,
I really need to do some.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
Pr around this.
Speaker 3 (08:28):
By that time, the book had been on the market
for like seven or eight months or something like that,
and you know, I was having good sales and having
speaking engagements and all of.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
That kind of stuff.
Speaker 3 (08:36):
But I wasn't deliberate about how I wanted that book
to serve me in my life, my career, my authority,
what I wanted it to do for me personally, what
I wanted it to do for me for my company.
I hadn't thought about any of those things, so I
was sort of late to the game. The interesting thing was,
my brand has always been really really clear. I'm the brand,
(08:57):
like I'm the brand Dominatrix the irrational loyalty lady. Right,
I'm known for that in all those circles and things
like that. So I think it made the job of
publicity a little bit easier because I was very clear
on my brand.
Speaker 2 (09:08):
But what the.
Speaker 3 (09:09):
Publicity team did, and this is a lesson for everybody
post publication, instead of like using my book as the
you know, as the topic of the conversations that I
was to have with media, we used my book as
a piece of like referenceable credibility that helped me get
(09:32):
into the conversations that I needed to be in with
the right people.
Speaker 2 (09:37):
How did this work?
Speaker 3 (09:38):
So, you know, I want to say I started with
I started with Smith in twenty seventeen and or twenty Yeah,
probably my book came out in twenty sixteen. I started
with Smith at the beginning of twenty seventeen. I was
very fortunate that there were a couple of major brand
disasters that happened all around the same time. The smart
(10:00):
publicist that Smith, you know, they thought, hey, who better
to comment on not just what happened, but what's going
to happen? What are predictions? What can other organizations learn
from these brand disasters? One of them was that Pepsi
Kendall Jenner commercial where seemingly Pepsi suggested that we could
solve all of society's ills if you could share a
(10:21):
can of pepsi with a riot cop at a completely
whitewashed like Black Lives Matter protest. And then the other
thing that happened was United Airlines. They had their big
brand disaster where they pulled that poor doctor David Dowe
out of a seat on an airplane, beat him senseless.
Speaker 2 (10:38):
He was bleeding.
Speaker 3 (10:39):
The video was shared over eleven million times on Twitter
and other social media, and we didn't hear from United
Airlines for you know, forty eight hours, and when we did,
it was one hundred and forty character tweet written by
a bunch of lawyers, blamed the victim, et cetera, et cetera.
Two such big stories where because I had a book,
(10:59):
the publicity team was able to get me into conversations
with people who were interested in talking about those things
from a brand perspective. And my book really was kind
of the calling card that was like, you know, not
only is she, you know, a twenty plus year brand strategist,
also she's written this great best selling book where she
talks about brand strategy, and that got me into the
(11:21):
right conversation. So it's never too late to think about
your brand and what your brand should do with you.
The biggest lesson that I learned, and part of the
reason why I wrote my most recent book, which is
really about this idea of authority, is establish your footprint
of authority from the start. Really, no, like, is your
(11:42):
book the first in a series of books that's going
to help you create a platform where you can engage
community to share an ideal with them that's going to
change the state of matter, or change the way people live,
or change the way people think it. Like I said,
like a startup, it's always it's you know, early, always
(12:02):
and often in my own case, like, I was very
fortunate to be able to be in those conversations because
I think over the period like this is probably legendary
in Smith's publicity, but over the course of like the
two weeks during which those disasters were going on, I
don't know, I probably did like one hundred and twenty
interviews with top tier press. I was writing op eds
(12:26):
for Fortune, you know, just like immediately sort of thrust
into the conversation because a I had a unique point
of view which emanated from my brand. I had a
very succinct, simple, non academic, non esoteric, just sort of
down to earthway of talking.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
About those things.
Speaker 3 (12:45):
And finally, the third thing is that I really felt
like I was doing this in service of others rather
than doing it myself.
Speaker 2 (12:53):
Does that make sense that answer your question?
Speaker 1 (12:55):
Yeah, it does, it does. And honestly, I have heard
about your campaign before. It is a little bit legendary
in the Smith offices. They mentioned it to me when
I started three years ago, so that's kind of cool. Also,
you're you are kind of famous in the Smith office.
And it also sounds a little bit like using your
book maybe as a business card, which is another big
(13:15):
thing that Smith talks about all the time. So let's
go into some of the best ways that authors can
use their books to boost their branding. And like you said,
credibility building is a huge one. It's adding another title
to your name, it's adding that credibility that I published,
and it is resonating with people and it's getting this
great visibility. But what other ways can you actively use
(13:39):
your book to boost your branding?
Speaker 3 (13:41):
So I use my book kind of in the way
that the book was written. Like my first book is
about the methodology that we use in our business. I
basically give our secret sauce as an organization a way
for almost free. I mean for the cost of a book, right,
I give that away. It is an artifact of my
(14:04):
career success, my knowledge. And also I know this is
the big secret about writing nonfiction books, especially business books.
I know that if I give the if I give
the methodology away for free, I don't put it behind
a gate. I don't put it behind a paywall. I'm
just like, here, have at it. I feel so strongly
about this that I want you to have it for
(14:25):
fifteen ninety nine or whatever. Like I think you can
get it unkindled for eight ninety nine or something, right Like,
it's a very very low cost to do this. I
also know that people can't really do it on their
own right, and so to some extent, it's more than
a business card. It's kind of a lead magnet.
Speaker 2 (14:42):
Now. I did a really.
Speaker 3 (14:44):
Really bold thing in my second book, my second book,
The Irrational Loyalty Book. At the back of the book,
in the epilogue or in the acknowledgments, you know, I
acknowledge everybody who was part of making that book possible.
But I also write like a letter in there to
the reader that says something like, you know what, if
you don't believe that branding is important, and you don't
(15:07):
believe that it can change the trajectory of your organization
or you as an individual, here's my proposal to hire me,
pay me nothing upfront, and then once we go through
the process of really focusing, refining, and articulating your brand,
you can pay me what you think it's worth based
(15:28):
on whatever stray idea transformative notion you picked up from working.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
With me, and you'd be surprised. I've had some people
take me up on that. So so you know.
Speaker 3 (15:39):
Having a book is it is more than just a
calling card. It does more than just give you credibility. Like, yeah,
it's really cool for me. You know, I'm a professional
speaker now too. Like I can walk into a room
full of CEOs, you know, and I flash them my
credentials and I'm like, I'm here, you know, not only
do I know my stuff and have an interesting way
(16:00):
to convey it, and we're going to have fun together. Also, like,
here's the credibility. I've written three best selling books on
this topic.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
Right.
Speaker 3 (16:08):
Plus I have a thirty plus year career doing this
kind of work and my own company for you know,
twenty one years or whatever. It makes the story a
lot easier and I don't really have to defend myself
because you know what, writing.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
A book is hard, Yeah, it is. Writing a book
is hard.
Speaker 3 (16:23):
Like you know, in the circles that I move in,
I'm always surprised when I run into an entrepreneur or
a business a business owner who doesn't.
Speaker 2 (16:30):
Have a book.
Speaker 3 (16:31):
But that's because, like you know, there's the there's the
selection bias of the people that I surround myself with.
But it's a very small percentage of people who actually
can write a book, complete a book, get a book
to market, and then actually get people to throw down
real hard money to buy it, right, And so that
is something It gives credibility. So using it as a
(16:52):
lead magnet, using it as sort of an artifact of
your authority, using it. I use it for friends material
and also for content. So you know, one of the
things about sort of establishing and growing your authority footprint
is like you got to be out there all the time.
You have to be sharing information. Well, I wrote a
(17:13):
couple of books that are all over two hundred pages.
Like every single word in those books is a piece
of content that can be up level, repurposed, atomized, turned
into a different form factor, used in a media interview, whatever.
Speaker 2 (17:28):
That Like, I have so much content out there in
the world that I'm easy to find, right.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
I love content chunking. I love content junking book two
years of content.
Speaker 3 (17:42):
Absolutely every single book. It's like two years of content
and then it's two years of new content if your
thoughtful and strategic about it.
Speaker 2 (17:48):
So one of the.
Speaker 3 (17:49):
Things that the that the publicity team at Smith does
really well is there, you know, they have their ear
to the ground and they're listening to like what are
the what are the trends and the challenges that are
going on, what are the newsworthy things that are happening,
And then they're like, you know, deb always talks about
this thing here, how do we position that particular thing
against this sort of like I think they call it
(18:10):
newsjacking kind of idea, But.
Speaker 2 (18:11):
The idea is like piggybacking.
Speaker 3 (18:14):
On a market level conversation that is happening. You have,
like in my case, I have like over six hundred
pages of bookshit that I could use to like enter
a con enter a conversation about that. Also, excerpts of
the book, digital downloads, like I've even done blog posts,
LinkedIn posts, you know, social media outreach. I send excerpts
(18:38):
of my book to clients and potential clients just to
be like, you know what we were talking about brand
values Perraimid. Let me send you the short passage from
Branding a Sex all about the brand values pyramid on
how this applies to you. So, just from a content perspective,
can you imagine any other situation where you would sit
down and you would create two years worth of content
(18:59):
like in One Fell Swoop?
Speaker 2 (19:02):
No, you wouldn't.
Speaker 3 (19:03):
So so that's one of the greatest things about about
the books.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
And I know people are worried about giving it away
for free. If you give it all away, are they
going to buy it? Yes, because they don't want to
have to scroll back through your last two years content
to read everything. They like it in a nice, easy
accessible format. And also it's that loyalty that you're talking about.
They see your value, they want to give back, they
(19:28):
want to buy into the brand. And I think that's
true of fiction as well. I mean, you're promising a
certain emotional feeling, a certain theme that's going to connect
something that's going to happen, character development that people are
going to love and they're not going to get.
Speaker 3 (19:45):
I think it's I think, yeah, I think about some
of my favorite fiction authors of late like and patch It.
Speaker 2 (19:52):
I always know what I'm going to like. I always
know what I'm going to get.
Speaker 3 (19:54):
I'm going to get something that's entertaining. It's going to
be it's going to be thoughtful. It's going to be
something that's going to challenge me, like emotionally, but I'm
going to get something that takes me sort of like
as I read it, on a journey of self discovery.
Speaker 2 (20:10):
Likewise, Barbara King Sliver, I'm like, all right, I'm going
to be really challenged.
Speaker 3 (20:13):
I'm going to get into a really deep book that's
going to make me feel really bad at times, and
I'm going to need to put it aside and read
some chick lit for a little bit, or go read
some of my darn business books or you know, like whatever,
and then come back to it and get back to it.
But it's going to be reflective of what's happening out
there in society kind of in real time, I'm going
to relate to these characters. I'm going to probably hate
(20:34):
some of them and feel sorry for them, you know
what I mean. It's like I know again, like a
brand is a promise, and it's a set of it's
a set of expectations. And for these authors, I mean,
these are like top top, top of mind fiction authors,
but you always know what you're going to expect. Like
when I go to the bookstore, I go to the library,
I'm thinking, like what am I in the mood for?
(20:56):
What am my emotions? Like?
Speaker 2 (20:57):
What emotions are stirring in me? Right now?
Speaker 3 (20:59):
When I can very clearly see on the shelf, I'm like,
I know this author, I know what this brand stands for.
I know what this is going to give me. Right Likewise,
I'm in an airport. I buy a lot of books
in the airport, like a lot of people, do you know.
I'm looking for something that's really going to jump out
at me, and I want something that I can read
over the course of two like coast to coast US
(21:22):
domestic flights. Right, I'm like, I'm like one book, I
read half of it on the way half of it
and on the way home there's certain authors that I
go to all the time where I know I can
get that right. And so that is the essence of branding,
is when you project to the world a set of
expectations and then you deliver on them every time. And
so I tell people, like, a brand is a construct.
(21:43):
It's made up of two parts, the brand identity and
the brand image. It's kind of like yin and yang, right,
And the brand identity is the part that you own.
The brand image is what's reflected back to you. Ideally
you want those things to match, otherwise you have a
broken brand promise. So you know, it's like on the
odd occasion when I read something, I'm like, Okay, well
that was a bomb, right, you know from an author
(22:05):
that I have like has a strong brand and I
have a strong set of expectations.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
So I'm like, oh, that's nothing like any of their
other stuff.
Speaker 3 (22:12):
And we see this. We see this all the time
where it's like, oh, that was off brand for that person.
That's why a lot of authors like when they when
they want to go off brand.
Speaker 2 (22:21):
They use non toplue, right, And you.
Speaker 3 (22:24):
Know, because they're like, all right, I don't want to
I don't want to negatively impact my brand equity by
doing something that is off brand or off expectation for
what people have come to know me for So, if
people don't think that branding is part of writing and
publishing and being an author, then they're being very short
(22:45):
sighted because it is a projection to the world the
brand identity. You own this, you're projecting that to the world.
The brand image is reflected back, and you can't have
one without the other. It's time to take control of
the part of it that you own, the identity.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
So the last that a big question. I'd love to
wrap it up with a few actionable things that authors
can do post publication to continue growing their brands.
Speaker 3 (23:09):
Yes, so if you haven't done it yet, clearly clearly
articulate your brand narrative, your brand foundation. The hand that
I give for this, like the branding methodology, really like
the core of the branding methodology is really about these
three things. Number one, the best brands in the world
become part of the people who use them. Number two,
(23:32):
they're not just different to they're unique. Legendary brands are unique.
And number three, brands make their customers a here in
their own stories. So, if you are an author, and
you are not clear on your brand identity and your
brand narrative, your brand foundation.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Answer these three questions. Three questions.
Speaker 3 (23:48):
Number one, what does it say about my reader that
they read my book? What does it say about them?
Number two, what is the one thing that people get
from me as an author and my books by extension?
What is the one thing, the singular thing they get
from me that they don't get from anyone else?
Speaker 2 (24:11):
And number three, how.
Speaker 3 (24:12):
Do you make your reader the hero in their story
through the act of reading the book? I'd say, like,
so figure out your brand. That's the shortcut for doing
it right there a lot of us want to talk
about like what we do and how we do it
and all that kind of stuff. This really goes into
the idea of putting your reader in the center of
(24:33):
the brand and demonstrating how do you become part of them?
Speaker 2 (24:36):
So that would be.
Speaker 3 (24:37):
Tip number one. Figure out your brand narrative and do
it by answering those three questions. What was what was
the rest of the question. It was like, what are
some things that authors actionable? Says Yeah, okay, so that's
actionable number one. And also, I have free digital downloads
on my website that people can go and they can
download brand exercises to like really really.
Speaker 2 (24:57):
Dial in their brand. Number two, figure out.
Speaker 3 (25:01):
How are you going to extend your brand beyond book?
Speaker 2 (25:04):
Right, how are you going.
Speaker 3 (25:06):
To get the thoughts, the ideas, the notions, the stories,
like the change that you want to see in the world.
How are you going to get that out to as
many people as possible? Doesn't necessarily have to be in
a monetizable way, but how.
Speaker 2 (25:17):
Are you going to how are you.
Speaker 3 (25:20):
Going to take the content in that book and bring
it into the real world, bring it into real life,
take it off of the pages or out of Like
I record my books on audio as well, and so people,
you know, they're like, oh, it sounds like you're sitting
right next to me. I'm like, yeah, because I read
my own books. But how are you going to use
all of those different assets to complete a story out
(25:43):
there in the world and reach as many people as
you possibly can? So that's content, Like, really figure out
how are you going to use this for content? And
then I would say post publication if you haven't engaged
a publicist or you haven't started to like do your
own pr and like I don't want to disintermediate you guys,
(26:03):
because you know, I refer to as of clients to y'all.
But at the same time, you can do your own
pr you know, Cameron Harrold wrote a really good book
about that and whatever, and so some people it's like
it's a budget impossibility to hire a professional publicity team
figure out what are the market level conversations that are
(26:24):
taking place, what's happening in the media, what are the
stories that are being told, and how can you have
a point of.
Speaker 2 (26:31):
View on those things.
Speaker 3 (26:31):
And that's mostly for our nonfiction authors, you know, people
who are writing about academic subjects or business subjects or
things like that. But at the same time, I do
believe that, you know, people who are writing fiction, there's
a way to get into the conversation that's going on
at the market level because art imitates life and life
(26:52):
imitates art, and these things are really truly intertwined. And
really being thoughtful, deliberate and proactive about engaging people in conversations.
Like a book that I just finished was Deemon the Copperhead,
which is like a retailing retelling of David Copperfield by
Barbara King Salver. But you know, the storyline really focuses
(27:14):
on like the opioid epidemic and things like that. You know,
this is this is something like that is real. It's
it's reality to a lot of people. And and this
is a you know, sort of a creative articulation of
something that is actually happening here. It's very smart if
you're an author and you and you are going there
(27:37):
to use the use the content of your book to
like get into conversations or even start conversations.
Speaker 2 (27:44):
And the last thing I.
Speaker 3 (27:46):
Would say is books are a way to create community,
right no matter what kind of book you have, And
it's a way to bring people together like minded people
and then differently minded people to engage in conversations using
the content of your book like almost as the seed
(28:06):
for those conversations. And you know, I feel like as authors,
we to some extent like we are writing books unless
we are writing books exclusively for ourselves, which I'll say,
like the people that I work with in our authority
marketing and branding practice, these are all people who are
compelled to share with other people. So it's pretty much
(28:27):
across the board. But you know, people are writing in
the first place because they have something that they want
others to know and benefit from, and those ideas can
take flight when they are shared with the community and
the community gets to take them and really turn them
into their own incredible.
Speaker 1 (28:49):
Thank you so much. Ball's great information. How can our
watchers and listeners learn more about you?
Speaker 3 (28:55):
I think that the best way to find out is
to go to devgabor dot com. There's links to all
my books, there's video stuff on there, there's those digital
downloads are on their media kit. Get in touch with me,
all of that kind of stuff. You can learn all
about branding. You can learn about these books, and probably
the most important thing you can you can find me.
You can reach me.
Speaker 2 (29:16):
So if you do submit a if you do submit
something through the website, just mention where we met. Because
I do a.
Speaker 3 (29:24):
Lot of interviews and I do a lot of speaking
of stuff like that. Mentioned where we met, and you know,
then then I can make sure that we get everybody
to the top of the pile.
Speaker 1 (29:33):
Well, thank you so much for joining us and listeners watchers.
Speaker 2 (29:36):
If you like this episode, don't forget to rate, review.
Speaker 1 (29:39):
Subscribe, and share with anyone else that might be interested.
We'll see you next time. Thank you for listening to
this episode of the Smith Publicity All Things Book Marketing podcast.
Speaker 2 (29:49):
To reach us and learn about our
Speaker 1 (29:50):
Many services, visit Smith Publicity dot com or send us
an email to info at smith Publicity dot com
Welcome to the Smith Publicity All Things Book Marketing podcast,
offering tips, insights, and advice from the best in the
publishing industry. Hello, and welcome to this episode of All
Things Book Marketing. I'm your host Olivia McCoy, and our
special guest today is Dev Gabor. She is a brand expert,
(00:21):
the founder and CEO of Soul Marketing, and a best
selling author of three branding books. Hi, Dev, Welcome to
the show.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
Hi, Hi, thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Of course, so I'm so excited to talk about author branding,
especially post publication. But let's start with what you do
and how you can help authors.
Speaker 3 (00:41):
Absolutely, So I'd like to explain to people that I'm
in the business of creating this condition that I call
irrational loyalty. And irrational loyalty is when people are so
indelibly bonded to a brand they feel like they were
cheating on it if they were to do anything else,
or work with anyone else, or read anything else, or
buy anything else. And based on the work that I do,
we've learned that when brands engender this quality of irrational loyalty,
(01:04):
they skip them more rapidly, more profitably, with more focus,
They have more repeat customers. They're just bigger, better brands.
And we've learned on the average, companies and organizations that
enjoy rational loyalty make about forty percent more revenue than
companies that don't. So it really speaks to the reason
why people do that. And so that means that I
(01:26):
do brand strategy. Branded content help take brands to market. Specifically,
for authors, we help them carve out their unique role
in relevance and sort of position themselves. Mostly I work
with nonfiction authors, you know, helping them sort of establish
a footprint and a platform for authority so that they
(01:50):
can create the change that they're looking to find in
the world any place they go, and take that authority
with them in a portable way across their entire careers
and lives.
Speaker 1 (01:58):
That sounds incredible. We've talked a little bit about branding
on the show before, but why don't you give us
a quick recap on what an author brand is and
what it looks like.
Speaker 2 (02:07):
Sure.
Speaker 3 (02:08):
Sure, So it's important to understand what a brand is,
and a lot of people think that a brand is
like it's a logo, or it's a color scheme or
a tagline or or something that you are known for
a brand. Really there's two kinds of branding. I like
to refer to big B branding, which is the kind
of branding I do, which is, you know, strategic branding,
which is really all about sort of carving out what
(02:30):
is the conceptual space that you occupy in the minds
of the customers who are most highly predictive of your success.
And then there's little B branding, which if you envision
a brand as being kind of like an iceberg, it's
the part of the iceberg that you see above the
top of the water, which does represent things like color schemes, logos, typography,
you know, campaigns, and things like that. So so, a
(02:53):
brand is the emotional connection that an author makes with
its audience, and it's something that's consistently delivered across not
just everything that they write, but everything that they do.
I always say actions speak louder than marketing. A brand
is more than marketing. A brand is a promise, and
(03:15):
that promise is the ultimate benefit, the singular benefit that
you're going to deliver to people when they don't just
consume your book, but consume any content or thought leadership
that comes from you.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
What are some good examples of a successful author brand,
including your own three times besself, I got it.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
Yeah, So I think about Seth Godin is somebody who
has like a very very clear brand that comes through
not just through his writing but writing speaking media. It
exists in three hundred and sixty degrees. I also think,
(03:57):
like some of the fiction authors that I read this summer,
I took a couple of weeks long trip to Spain
where I spent a lot of time on the beach
in my Orca, and I consumed a lot of what
I would describe as chick lit, specifically from one author,
Emily Henry. She wrote Beach Read, and then a bunch
of others like very fun, kind of light hearted books.
(04:17):
There's a brand there, There's a set of expectations of relationships,
some memories almost to formula that belongs that that I
have a deep emotional connection with that, Like when I'm
looking for something that's like mind candy, I can go
straight to that, regardless of what the subject matter is
or the storyline is. I know that there's an expectation
there that will always be met. And then in the
(04:40):
nonfiction world, you know, some of my favorite business books
were written by Jim Collins, and you know, here's a good,
good degree built to last.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
You know, books like.
Speaker 3 (04:52):
That they go back a very very long time, but
they have longevity, they have staying power, and they're sort
of like the definitive works for business strategists. And so,
you know, the thing that's common across all of these examples,
besides just being like strong brands, is they have consistency.
They have a footprint of awareness and authority, They have
(05:13):
a unique point of view, there's passion behind what they're writing,
and there's a desire to make some kind of a
connection with the reader. And so those are some of
the characteristics of a really really good author brand.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
And then we talk all the time, both at Smith
Publicity and consulting and in general in the industry about
how to build up an author brand. Pre publication.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
We know we want to.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
Be building momentum, we know we want to get people
excited about the book coming out, we know we want
to get pre sales, all of this, but then it
kind of peters off after that because the excitement and
the timeliness of that book's publication is gone, and so
we don't talk about continued branding. So we do know
there's never a time too early to begin your author branding,
start building up your network. Is there ever a time
(06:02):
that's too late.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
No, I'll say there's never a time that's too late.
Speaker 3 (06:05):
I always say that branding is like an always on activity.
And and you know, if you're an author or you're
thinking about being an author, you know, you're kind of
like a startup, right And I always say brand early
often and always and always sort of have your finger
on the pulse of what's going on out there. So no,
there really is no time that's too early to think
about your brand.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
Now.
Speaker 3 (06:25):
I know because you know, you guys have referred people
to me, and I've referred people to you. Like that
what you guys do, which really is sort of less
about defining the brand and more about activating the brand
in my market through influencers and media, that these two
activities are intertwined. And I do know that sometimes it's
(06:46):
too early to hire a team to do your publicity
if the brand isn't really carved out, it's not well established,
like who you are, what you stand for, the change
you're looking to see in the world, the consistent message,
the you know, the footprint and platform for authority that
you have as an author. If that's not defined, it
makes the job of folks like Smith Smith publicity very
(07:08):
very different. But the question that you were asking was like,
is it ever too late? And I think that my
own story is a really good example of it's never
too late. So I don't know if you know this, Olivia,
But I used to be a publicist.
Speaker 1 (07:19):
I don't know, Okay, I did what I have that as.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
You know, like part of the CD underbelly of my career.
Speaker 3 (07:26):
But I used to be a publicist, and as a publicist, like,
there are lots of things that I should have known better,
one of those things being like if I was going
to come to market with a book, I probably should
have worked on publicity before I did that. But you know,
as the unshod shoemaker's children can tell us, sometimes.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
You know, we're our worst we're our worst clients.
Speaker 3 (07:44):
And I, you know, I made the switch over to
you know, doing brand and consulting, like you know, a
long long time ago, more than two decades ago. So
I wrote a book. I wrote a book that I
was compelled to write. That very first book that I wrote.
I wrote a book that I was compelled to write.
I wrote a good book. I wrote a very popular book.
But then what I hadn't thought about was like, how
(08:05):
is this book going to serve me in my career?
I was so compelled to share my content with other
people that I didn't think through all of these things,
thought bully and strategically, like the good former publicist that
I was right.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
So there I was.
Speaker 3 (08:19):
Yeah, here I was with a book that had been
on the market for like I don't know, by the
time I decided, I was like, yeah, you know what,
I really need to do some.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
Pr around this.
Speaker 3 (08:28):
By that time, the book had been on the market
for like seven or eight months or something like that,
and you know, I was having good sales and having
speaking engagements and all of.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
That kind of stuff.
Speaker 3 (08:36):
But I wasn't deliberate about how I wanted that book
to serve me in my life, my career, my authority,
what I wanted it to do for me personally, what
I wanted it to do for me for my company.
I hadn't thought about any of those things, so I
was sort of late to the game. The interesting thing was,
my brand has always been really really clear. I'm the brand,
(08:57):
like I'm the brand Dominatrix the irrational loyalty lady. Right,
I'm known for that in all those circles and things
like that. So I think it made the job of
publicity a little bit easier because I was very clear
on my brand.
Speaker 2 (09:08):
But what the.
Speaker 3 (09:09):
Publicity team did, and this is a lesson for everybody
post publication, instead of like using my book as the
you know, as the topic of the conversations that I
was to have with media, we used my book as
a piece of like referenceable credibility that helped me get
(09:32):
into the conversations that I needed to be in with
the right people.
Speaker 2 (09:37):
How did this work?
Speaker 3 (09:38):
So, you know, I want to say I started with
I started with Smith in twenty seventeen and or twenty Yeah,
probably my book came out in twenty sixteen. I started
with Smith at the beginning of twenty seventeen. I was
very fortunate that there were a couple of major brand
disasters that happened all around the same time. The smart
(10:00):
publicist that Smith, you know, they thought, hey, who better
to comment on not just what happened, but what's going
to happen? What are predictions? What can other organizations learn
from these brand disasters? One of them was that Pepsi
Kendall Jenner commercial where seemingly Pepsi suggested that we could
solve all of society's ills if you could share a
(10:21):
can of pepsi with a riot cop at a completely
whitewashed like Black Lives Matter protest. And then the other
thing that happened was United Airlines. They had their big
brand disaster where they pulled that poor doctor David Dowe
out of a seat on an airplane, beat him senseless.
Speaker 2 (10:38):
He was bleeding.
Speaker 3 (10:39):
The video was shared over eleven million times on Twitter
and other social media, and we didn't hear from United
Airlines for you know, forty eight hours, and when we did,
it was one hundred and forty character tweet written by
a bunch of lawyers, blamed the victim, et cetera, et cetera.
Two such big stories where because I had a book,
(10:59):
the publicity team was able to get me into conversations
with people who were interested in talking about those things
from a brand perspective. And my book really was kind
of the calling card that was like, you know, not
only is she, you know, a twenty plus year brand strategist,
also she's written this great best selling book where she
talks about brand strategy, and that got me into the
(11:21):
right conversation. So it's never too late to think about
your brand and what your brand should do with you.
The biggest lesson that I learned, and part of the
reason why I wrote my most recent book, which is
really about this idea of authority, is establish your footprint
of authority from the start. Really, no, like, is your
(11:42):
book the first in a series of books that's going
to help you create a platform where you can engage
community to share an ideal with them that's going to
change the state of matter, or change the way people live,
or change the way people think it. Like I said,
like a startup, it's always it's you know, early, always
(12:02):
and often in my own case, like, I was very
fortunate to be able to be in those conversations because
I think over the period like this is probably legendary
in Smith's publicity, but over the course of like the
two weeks during which those disasters were going on, I
don't know, I probably did like one hundred and twenty
interviews with top tier press. I was writing op eds
(12:26):
for Fortune, you know, just like immediately sort of thrust
into the conversation because a I had a unique point
of view which emanated from my brand. I had a
very succinct, simple, non academic, non esoteric, just sort of
down to earthway of talking.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
About those things.
Speaker 3 (12:45):
And finally, the third thing is that I really felt
like I was doing this in service of others rather
than doing it myself.
Speaker 2 (12:53):
Does that make sense that answer your question?
Speaker 1 (12:55):
Yeah, it does, it does. And honestly, I have heard
about your campaign before. It is a little bit legendary
in the Smith offices. They mentioned it to me when
I started three years ago, so that's kind of cool. Also,
you're you are kind of famous in the Smith office.
And it also sounds a little bit like using your
book maybe as a business card, which is another big
(13:15):
thing that Smith talks about all the time. So let's
go into some of the best ways that authors can
use their books to boost their branding. And like you said,
credibility building is a huge one. It's adding another title
to your name, it's adding that credibility that I published,
and it is resonating with people and it's getting this
great visibility. But what other ways can you actively use
(13:39):
your book to boost your branding?
Speaker 3 (13:41):
So I use my book kind of in the way
that the book was written. Like my first book is
about the methodology that we use in our business. I
basically give our secret sauce as an organization a way
for almost free. I mean for the cost of a book, right,
I give that away. It is an artifact of my
(14:04):
career success, my knowledge. And also I know this is
the big secret about writing nonfiction books, especially business books.
I know that if I give the if I give
the methodology away for free, I don't put it behind
a gate. I don't put it behind a paywall. I'm
just like, here, have at it. I feel so strongly
about this that I want you to have it for
(14:25):
fifteen ninety nine or whatever. Like I think you can
get it unkindled for eight ninety nine or something, right Like,
it's a very very low cost to do this. I
also know that people can't really do it on their
own right, and so to some extent, it's more than
a business card. It's kind of a lead magnet.
Speaker 2 (14:42):
Now. I did a really.
Speaker 3 (14:44):
Really bold thing in my second book, my second book,
The Irrational Loyalty Book. At the back of the book,
in the epilogue or in the acknowledgments, you know, I
acknowledge everybody who was part of making that book possible.
But I also write like a letter in there to
the reader that says something like, you know what, if
you don't believe that branding is important, and you don't
(15:07):
believe that it can change the trajectory of your organization
or you as an individual, here's my proposal to hire me,
pay me nothing upfront, and then once we go through
the process of really focusing, refining, and articulating your brand,
you can pay me what you think it's worth based
(15:28):
on whatever stray idea transformative notion you picked up from working.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
With me, and you'd be surprised. I've had some people
take me up on that. So so you know.
Speaker 3 (15:39):
Having a book is it is more than just a
calling card. It does more than just give you credibility. Like, yeah,
it's really cool for me. You know, I'm a professional
speaker now too. Like I can walk into a room
full of CEOs, you know, and I flash them my
credentials and I'm like, I'm here, you know, not only
do I know my stuff and have an interesting way
(16:00):
to convey it, and we're going to have fun together. Also, like,
here's the credibility. I've written three best selling books on
this topic.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
Right.
Speaker 3 (16:08):
Plus I have a thirty plus year career doing this
kind of work and my own company for you know,
twenty one years or whatever. It makes the story a
lot easier and I don't really have to defend myself
because you know what, writing.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
A book is hard, Yeah, it is. Writing a book
is hard.
Speaker 3 (16:23):
Like you know, in the circles that I move in,
I'm always surprised when I run into an entrepreneur or
a business a business owner who doesn't.
Speaker 2 (16:30):
Have a book.
Speaker 3 (16:31):
But that's because, like you know, there's the there's the
selection bias of the people that I surround myself with.
But it's a very small percentage of people who actually
can write a book, complete a book, get a book
to market, and then actually get people to throw down
real hard money to buy it, right, And so that
is something It gives credibility. So using it as a
(16:52):
lead magnet, using it as sort of an artifact of
your authority, using it. I use it for friends material
and also for content. So you know, one of the
things about sort of establishing and growing your authority footprint
is like you got to be out there all the time.
You have to be sharing information. Well, I wrote a
(17:13):
couple of books that are all over two hundred pages.
Like every single word in those books is a piece
of content that can be up level, repurposed, atomized, turned
into a different form factor, used in a media interview, whatever.
Speaker 2 (17:28):
That Like, I have so much content out there in
the world that I'm easy to find, right.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
I love content chunking. I love content junking book two
years of content.
Speaker 3 (17:42):
Absolutely every single book. It's like two years of content
and then it's two years of new content if your
thoughtful and strategic about it.
Speaker 2 (17:48):
So one of the.
Speaker 3 (17:49):
Things that the that the publicity team at Smith does
really well is there, you know, they have their ear
to the ground and they're listening to like what are
the what are the trends and the challenges that are
going on, what are the newsworthy things that are happening,
And then they're like, you know, deb always talks about
this thing here, how do we position that particular thing
against this sort of like I think they call it
(18:10):
newsjacking kind of idea, But.
Speaker 2 (18:11):
The idea is like piggybacking.
Speaker 3 (18:14):
On a market level conversation that is happening. You have,
like in my case, I have like over six hundred
pages of bookshit that I could use to like enter
a con enter a conversation about that. Also, excerpts of
the book, digital downloads, like I've even done blog posts,
LinkedIn posts, you know, social media outreach. I send excerpts
(18:38):
of my book to clients and potential clients just to
be like, you know what we were talking about brand
values Perraimid. Let me send you the short passage from
Branding a Sex all about the brand values pyramid on
how this applies to you. So, just from a content perspective,
can you imagine any other situation where you would sit
down and you would create two years worth of content
(18:59):
like in One Fell Swoop?
Speaker 2 (19:02):
No, you wouldn't.
Speaker 3 (19:03):
So so that's one of the greatest things about about
the books.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
And I know people are worried about giving it away
for free. If you give it all away, are they
going to buy it? Yes, because they don't want to
have to scroll back through your last two years content
to read everything. They like it in a nice, easy
accessible format. And also it's that loyalty that you're talking about.
They see your value, they want to give back, they
(19:28):
want to buy into the brand. And I think that's
true of fiction as well. I mean, you're promising a
certain emotional feeling, a certain theme that's going to connect
something that's going to happen, character development that people are
going to love and they're not going to get.
Speaker 3 (19:45):
I think it's I think, yeah, I think about some
of my favorite fiction authors of late like and patch It.
Speaker 2 (19:52):
I always know what I'm going to like. I always
know what I'm going to get.
Speaker 3 (19:54):
I'm going to get something that's entertaining. It's going to
be it's going to be thoughtful. It's going to be
something that's going to challenge me, like emotionally, but I'm
going to get something that takes me sort of like
as I read it, on a journey of self discovery.
Speaker 2 (20:10):
Likewise, Barbara King Sliver, I'm like, all right, I'm going
to be really challenged.
Speaker 3 (20:13):
I'm going to get into a really deep book that's
going to make me feel really bad at times, and
I'm going to need to put it aside and read
some chick lit for a little bit, or go read
some of my darn business books or you know, like whatever,
and then come back to it and get back to it.
But it's going to be reflective of what's happening out
there in society kind of in real time, I'm going
to relate to these characters. I'm going to probably hate
(20:34):
some of them and feel sorry for them, you know
what I mean. It's like I know again, like a
brand is a promise, and it's a set of it's
a set of expectations. And for these authors, I mean,
these are like top top, top of mind fiction authors,
but you always know what you're going to expect. Like
when I go to the bookstore, I go to the library,
I'm thinking, like what am I in the mood for?
(20:56):
What am my emotions? Like?
Speaker 2 (20:57):
What emotions are stirring in me? Right now?
Speaker 3 (20:59):
When I can very clearly see on the shelf, I'm like,
I know this author, I know what this brand stands for.
I know what this is going to give me. Right Likewise,
I'm in an airport. I buy a lot of books
in the airport, like a lot of people, do you know.
I'm looking for something that's really going to jump out
at me, and I want something that I can read
over the course of two like coast to coast US
(21:22):
domestic flights. Right, I'm like, I'm like one book, I
read half of it on the way half of it
and on the way home there's certain authors that I
go to all the time where I know I can
get that right. And so that is the essence of branding,
is when you project to the world a set of
expectations and then you deliver on them every time. And
so I tell people, like, a brand is a construct.
(21:43):
It's made up of two parts, the brand identity and
the brand image. It's kind of like yin and yang, right,
And the brand identity is the part that you own.
The brand image is what's reflected back to you. Ideally
you want those things to match, otherwise you have a
broken brand promise. So you know, it's like on the
odd occasion when I read something, I'm like, Okay, well
that was a bomb, right, you know from an author
(22:05):
that I have like has a strong brand and I
have a strong set of expectations.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
So I'm like, oh, that's nothing like any of their
other stuff.
Speaker 3 (22:12):
And we see this. We see this all the time
where it's like, oh, that was off brand for that person.
That's why a lot of authors like when they when
they want to go off brand.
Speaker 2 (22:21):
They use non toplue, right, And you.
Speaker 3 (22:24):
Know, because they're like, all right, I don't want to
I don't want to negatively impact my brand equity by
doing something that is off brand or off expectation for
what people have come to know me for So, if
people don't think that branding is part of writing and
publishing and being an author, then they're being very short
(22:45):
sighted because it is a projection to the world the
brand identity. You own this, you're projecting that to the world.
The brand image is reflected back, and you can't have
one without the other. It's time to take control of
the part of it that you own, the identity.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
So the last that a big question. I'd love to
wrap it up with a few actionable things that authors
can do post publication to continue growing their brands.
Speaker 3 (23:09):
Yes, so if you haven't done it yet, clearly clearly
articulate your brand narrative, your brand foundation. The hand that
I give for this, like the branding methodology, really like
the core of the branding methodology is really about these
three things. Number one, the best brands in the world
become part of the people who use them. Number two,
(23:32):
they're not just different to they're unique. Legendary brands are unique.
And number three, brands make their customers a here in
their own stories. So, if you are an author, and
you are not clear on your brand identity and your
brand narrative, your brand foundation.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Answer these three questions. Three questions.
Speaker 3 (23:48):
Number one, what does it say about my reader that
they read my book? What does it say about them?
Number two, what is the one thing that people get
from me as an author and my books by extension?
What is the one thing, the singular thing they get
from me that they don't get from anyone else?
Speaker 2 (24:11):
And number three, how.
Speaker 3 (24:12):
Do you make your reader the hero in their story
through the act of reading the book? I'd say, like,
so figure out your brand. That's the shortcut for doing
it right there a lot of us want to talk
about like what we do and how we do it
and all that kind of stuff. This really goes into
the idea of putting your reader in the center of
(24:33):
the brand and demonstrating how do you become part of them?
Speaker 2 (24:36):
So that would be.
Speaker 3 (24:37):
Tip number one. Figure out your brand narrative and do
it by answering those three questions. What was what was
the rest of the question. It was like, what are
some things that authors actionable? Says Yeah, okay, so that's
actionable number one. And also, I have free digital downloads
on my website that people can go and they can
download brand exercises to like really really.
Speaker 2 (24:57):
Dial in their brand. Number two, figure out.
Speaker 3 (25:01):
How are you going to extend your brand beyond book?
Speaker 2 (25:04):
Right, how are you going.
Speaker 3 (25:06):
To get the thoughts, the ideas, the notions, the stories,
like the change that you want to see in the world.
How are you going to get that out to as
many people as possible? Doesn't necessarily have to be in
a monetizable way, but how.
Speaker 2 (25:17):
Are you going to how are you.
Speaker 3 (25:20):
Going to take the content in that book and bring
it into the real world, bring it into real life,
take it off of the pages or out of Like
I record my books on audio as well, and so people,
you know, they're like, oh, it sounds like you're sitting
right next to me. I'm like, yeah, because I read
my own books. But how are you going to use
all of those different assets to complete a story out
(25:43):
there in the world and reach as many people as
you possibly can? So that's content, Like, really figure out
how are you going to use this for content? And
then I would say post publication if you haven't engaged
a publicist or you haven't started to like do your
own pr and like I don't want to disintermediate you guys,
(26:03):
because you know, I refer to as of clients to y'all.
But at the same time, you can do your own
pr you know, Cameron Harrold wrote a really good book
about that and whatever, and so some people it's like
it's a budget impossibility to hire a professional publicity team
figure out what are the market level conversations that are
(26:24):
taking place, what's happening in the media, what are the
stories that are being told, and how can you have
a point of.
Speaker 2 (26:31):
View on those things.
Speaker 3 (26:31):
And that's mostly for our nonfiction authors, you know, people
who are writing about academic subjects or business subjects or
things like that. But at the same time, I do
believe that, you know, people who are writing fiction, there's
a way to get into the conversation that's going on
at the market level because art imitates life and life
(26:52):
imitates art, and these things are really truly intertwined. And
really being thoughtful, deliberate and proactive about engaging people in conversations.
Like a book that I just finished was Deemon the Copperhead,
which is like a retailing retelling of David Copperfield by
Barbara King Salver. But you know, the storyline really focuses
(27:14):
on like the opioid epidemic and things like that. You know,
this is this is something like that is real. It's
it's reality to a lot of people. And and this
is a you know, sort of a creative articulation of
something that is actually happening here. It's very smart if
you're an author and you and you are going there
(27:37):
to use the use the content of your book to
like get into conversations or even start conversations.
Speaker 2 (27:44):
And the last thing I.
Speaker 3 (27:46):
Would say is books are a way to create community,
right no matter what kind of book you have, And
it's a way to bring people together like minded people
and then differently minded people to engage in conversations using
the content of your book like almost as the seed
(28:06):
for those conversations. And you know, I feel like as authors,
we to some extent like we are writing books unless
we are writing books exclusively for ourselves, which I'll say,
like the people that I work with in our authority
marketing and branding practice, these are all people who are
compelled to share with other people. So it's pretty much
(28:27):
across the board. But you know, people are writing in
the first place because they have something that they want
others to know and benefit from, and those ideas can
take flight when they are shared with the community and
the community gets to take them and really turn them
into their own incredible.
Speaker 1 (28:49):
Thank you so much. Ball's great information. How can our
watchers and listeners learn more about you?
Speaker 3 (28:55):
I think that the best way to find out is
to go to devgabor dot com. There's links to all
my books, there's video stuff on there, there's those digital
downloads are on their media kit. Get in touch with me,
all of that kind of stuff. You can learn all
about branding. You can learn about these books, and probably
the most important thing you can you can find me.
You can reach me.
Speaker 2 (29:16):
So if you do submit a if you do submit
something through the website, just mention where we met. Because
I do a.
Speaker 3 (29:24):
Lot of interviews and I do a lot of speaking
of stuff like that. Mentioned where we met, and you know,
then then I can make sure that we get everybody
to the top of the pile.
Speaker 1 (29:33):
Well, thank you so much for joining us and listeners watchers.
Speaker 2 (29:36):
If you like this episode, don't forget to rate, review.
Speaker 1 (29:39):
Subscribe, and share with anyone else that might be interested.
We'll see you next time. Thank you for listening to
this episode of the Smith Publicity All Things Book Marketing podcast.
Speaker 2 (29:49):
To reach us and learn about our
Speaker 1 (29:50):
Many services, visit Smith Publicity dot com or send us
an email to info at smith Publicity dot com
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