Hi lovelies! Been a while, unfortunately I've been feeling a little under the weather the last couple days due to chronic illness, but I'm back now!
I'd like to start this post off by saying that your personal brand, while important, does not have to define your entire career. Once you've gotten your 'big break', it's absolutely fine to branch out and evolve, (a la Taylor Swift: Eras), however, (just like she did) you need to start somewhere, and have a definitive, recognizable style. The purpose of your personal brand is to establish your space and your audience. It's how you advertise yourself. If you look at TV advertisements for popular brands: McDonalds, Cadbury, New World, ANZ (only New Zealand brands here because I'm sheltered, okay), they all have very distinctive features.
Let's look at colors, first off. McDonald's uses a distinctive, vibrant red and yellow color palette. This color palette is used in their ads, on their billboards, in their social media posts. It's almost impossible for someone to see that red and yellow and not immediately think of a cheeseburger and fry combo. This is the result of successful branding, something you'll want to mimic in order to build your own personal brand. Having a simple logo, like the M for Maccas or my own paper and pencil, is an easy but good place to start. From there, you can pull on a bit of color theory to work out your own color scheme. It's important to consider your intention, in regards to what your brand represents when using color theory, but also consider your personality and style, a good place to start with this is your wardrobe. For me, I wear a lot of whites, with sage green (my favorite color) and denim blues. So, these were the colors I selected for myself, which you can see incorporated in my photos and website. Most notably though, white represents peace, calm (representing the space I'm hoping to create) and also paper (important to me as a writer). Green represents the same peace and calm as white, but carries its own sophistication when in its sage form. Blue also follows this theme of peace and calm, but also has connotations with tech (significant to me as a gamer and my gaming aspirations). All in all, there is an overarching theme with the colors I have chosen, which represents the "ideal" of what I want my brand to be. Additionally, they do go together well, making for an aesthetically pleasing feed on Instagram and my website. They are also staples in my closet, which lends itself to my look-book and Instagram as I don't have to go out of my way to acquire clothing that fits my theme.
The way this manifests in literature is most commonly in covers and posters, which is easy to manage and customize if you are self-published, but is still taken into consideration by your company if you are under contract with a publisher. For example, the 'A Court of Thorns and Roses' series follows a uniform theme, the color schemes of which are repeated in the 'Crescent City' and 'Throne of Glass' series.
This is where the importance of intention comes in. When you write, you must write with intention: what do you want to say? What do you want the readers to take away from your novel? If you're a writer looking to establish your brand, this is where you should looks before considering all of the above. What colors represent your intention and yourself? What symbolizes your intention and personality best? Consider this, dear reader, and discover your own personal brand :)
-Adira
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