Blogging has always been fun for me, but I’ve never given it much serious thought. I have always been the type to throw down a few words, and then unleash them on the Internet. This style offers great things in the way of instantaneous feedback as well as blowing off steam, but can definitely go wrong in the TMI and personal privacy departments.
Don Draper (via Glory Fades)
CT Moore has recently been writing about the concepts of transparency and trust on the Internet, and he says in his post What Would Donald Draper Blog? that building your personal brand is not about sharing everything. He notes that Don Draper “wouldn’t talk about his personal life or what he likes doing on the weekend. And he definitely wouldn’t gossip. Neither of these would do anything to help him fill the demand of his audience.” Indeed, being personal or authentic isn’t the same as being transparent. In fact, he argues that Don Draper wouldn’t be transparent at all, because his personality is actually a brand he has built to hide his true identity, Dick Whitman.
So what does this have to do with me, Laura Roberts, the person, or the “brand”? Do I even have a brand? To some extent, yes, I have several. I’m the face of Black Heart Magazine. I’m V for Vixen. But here, on my personal website, I’m Laura Roberts, Writer. And that brand needs developing.
How does one develop a writer brand? By writing, of course. But also by writing about writing. Not to the extent that your writing is overshadowed by talk about the writing process, but enough that it helps you to clarify your own thoughts on that process and how to move through it.
The other day I wrote a blog about How to Get Published. I was tired of people asking me the same old questions, of coming to me for advice that they won’t even take, of pumping me for information that is freely available. But you know what? The fact is, that information is freely available, so what does it matter if they want to get it from me instead of from Google? It’s already free, and it doesn’t damage me in any way to share what is already known and available. In fact, it may even increase the trust people have in my writer brand, so why not do it?
Should I charge for these pearls of wisdom? If I can, yes, that would be great. But if someone asks me for an opinion, or advice, why should I be stingy, or tell them I’m not going to give them the information they’re looking for unless they pay me for my time? The information is already out there. The fact that I will pass it along for free can really only make me look good. It’s something for you, and something for me. No money needs to exchange hands.
Anaïs Nin (via SLGA)
So yes, I can answer your questions about writing. I can share a few “secrets.” And I can keep a few to myself, too. But blogging—and writing in general—is about setting people free and giving everything you’ve got to the page (or the screen). To quote Anaïs Nin:
“To write means to give all. No witholding is possible. The best writers are those who give all. However, there is the choice of clothing: fiction, symbolism, poetry, etc.”
In the end, I subscribe more to the Anaïs Nin school of writing everything and choosing the veils through which things are presented than the Don Draper method of building mysteries from the ground up, though each has its value in different situations. Here, as my writer self, I choose not to withold anything, whether we’re talking about writing, art, sex, life, the universe, or anything else. That authenticity is important, even if transparency isn’t.
Which type of blogger are you: Don Draper or Anaïs Nin… or someone else entirely?
I’m definitely more on the Anais side of blogging, but that does bring up some concerns in terms of wondering how much is too much to reveal especially when the things I want to reveal might inadvertently reveal things about other people who would rather stay under the radar. Also lately, I’ve been wondering whether I should call Bell and ask them to make my number a classified number. If you’re on the Internet and using your real name it just becomes way too easy for someone to find you through 411. Maybe, I’m being paranoid, but should bloggers who use their real name and reveal what city they live in take steps to protect themselves and their privacy?
I totally understand that concern. Usually, I just refer to “one of my friends,” or employ a pseudonym if I need to name someone who doesn’t want to be named. That seems to work pretty well, and if people recognize themselves in what I write, they can choose to “out” themselves or to keep quiet if they prefer privacy.
In terms of protecting yourself and your identity, I would say HELL YES! And no, it’s not paranoid at all; it’s just good sense. I’ve only got a cell phone, which is automatically unlisted, but anyone with a land line certainly puts themself at risk for stalkers, particularly when they write about sexual subject matter. I’ve had freaks call me by looking up my WHOIS info on my website. It’s public info, sure, but when you call me at home and I don’t know you, I feel stalked and violated, and it’s not cool.
Yeah, I’m still rocking it old school with a landline. I think I shall take steps to make that shit classified today. What’s weird is that Bell charges you to unlist your phone number, you would think publishing it would cost them more money.
I think it’s similar to the way websites charge you extra to make your company info private; everyone’s automatically listed because then Bell looks like they’re a trusted authority with the info you want. To get unlisted, you have to pay them cus it’ll make the phone book smaller and therefore seem less valuable. Although since it’s free, and now everything’s online as well, the whole thing could be said to be useless anyway.
Oh and in the spirit of sharing free information, here’s a link you might find interesting: http://www.erotica-writers.com/ERA/G/Call_For_Submissions.htm
It lists a bunch of places that are looking submissions for erotica.
As a blogger, I used to be more of an Anaïs Nin, and now I’m trying to be more of a Donald Draper — and let me tell you, when you used to drunken video blog and tell everyone what you think about Jewish girls, it’s kinda hard to come off as mysterious.
I think, though, that as you build your brand, you have to transition from one to another. What works for the little guys works because s/he’s not the big guy. The little guy is a branding guerilla. He lets it all hang out so that s/he can build relationship and maybe a bit of cult personality.
As you build that personality, though, I think you have to become more exclusive. As the 16th law of power dictates: “Use absence to increase respect.”
So I guess it’s (1) let it all hang out so that you can build trust based relationships with peers, and (2) withdraw to reinforce the the authority that their trust has given you. Hmm, I make it sound like I speak from experience… :P
As for building up credibility as a writer, I’m not sure if writing about writing is the way to go. Not to say that you should avoid the topic. Only that you shouldn’t make it part of your MO. Personally, I think you should just write about what interests you. After all, isn’t the mark of a good writer that they can make anything interesting to the reader because of the way they tell the story?
But again, what do I know? I’m just a douchie video blogger with a bit of Google juice…
CT: I think that writing about writing is part of building a writer’s brand, especially as you become more well known. People like to know how you do what you do. But you’re right, it shouldn’t be the bulk of the stuff I write about, because a) it’s not that interesting to non-writers and b) all things in moderation.
I think I struggle with finding a good balance between the image-building and the personal-sharing on this site precisely because it doesn’t have a firm image. I want it to reflect my personality, but I want it to remain a bit mysterious. So I wrote a spy-themed bio.
I guess what I am finding is that what interests me changes from day to day, and if you can’t pin it down to just three or four main categories, people start to ask “WTF is this site really about?” I like writing about writing, so I will include that for sure. But what else? The sex stuff is pretty well covered by Black Heart and Vixen. I am still experimenting with other topics, at this point.
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