Note: My Story Empire partners pushed for me to write this. (You know who you are.)
Hi, gang. Craig here again for something called Five for Friday. This is where we pick five things, hopefully related to writing, and share them with all of you. If this one has a theme to it, it has to be advertising.
My opinion is that I am the brand. Sure, I have books available, and will have more, but those are short sighted advertising. When I talk about branding, I’m looking at a bigger picture. I needed something to make myself stand out from the crowd a bit.
Once upon a time, I wrote a novel called Wild Concept. It was the first thing I ever published, but not the first one I ever wrote. I decided to publish it, because I really liked the character and the character arc. It’s a bit rough around the edges, and it shows me how far I’ve come since those days. Nutshell explanation: Lisa Burton is a concept model robot built for experimental and promotional purposes. She escapes her shackles and declares her independence.
There I was, trying to figure out how to sell this thing on the internet. I had a blog, and decided to occasionally say something about the book. This led to some fictional posts where I interacted with Lisa, but they were more about my writing challenges.
It turned out the posts with Lisa were pretty popular, so I added some other fictional characters. Some are unique to the blog, some are characters from other stories I’ve written.
At this time, the only graphic of Lisa was the original book cover, but I decided maybe something for the blog could be helpful. I commissioned my first piece of blog art.
5.) When my first piece of blog art arrived, I was both excited and apprehensive. The day I shared it set records for my blog traffic, at that time. There have been many pieces prepared for the blog today. My number five Lisa Burton promotion is the blog art. Here is a small collage.
4.) In the novel, Lisa was much like a concept automobile. Promotion was a big part of her reason for existence. I might be a little slow on the uptake, but I get there eventually. Lisa was recognizable, popular, and drew the eye. This all sounded like what we want for a book cover. We want people to at least stop and look. This works really well for promotional blog tours. I had participated in tours as myself many times, but people wanted to have Lisa come over. I started commissioning artwork to promote my subsequent books with. Why not, actually? People make fancy banners, book trailers, and such. My number four choice is posters to promote individual books with. I usually commission three, but only did one for Quantum Wanderlust. QW is an anthology, and I only have one tale in it. I’ll include the Egyptian Lisa in this collage. I’m thinking about using it for a new iPhone cover, since it also includes my image. (Twice)
3.) At this point, Lisa became kind of my trademark. She is a recognizable entity. She might not be the Golden Arches yet, but among the independent author community she is recognizable. I’m not exactly known for writing lengthy series, but Lisa helps tie all my works together. It’s always a fair idea to help other authors, and we’re actually dedicated to it here at Story Empire. There is an occasion where I might want Lisa to help illustrate a concept. This requires something I can reuse on occasion. I had my artist make a sequence of six “whiteboard” images. These involve Lisa using her pointer at three different angles, and from the left and right side of the board. A board which I can add anything I want, including graphics. While I was at it, he made me some “sign shaker” images, and gave me a selection of colors for Lisa’s outfits. These have also proven useful for promotion on social media. My number three choice is re-usable artwork.
2.) At this point, I’m all in. I decided that if Lisa was my recognizable logo, I might as well expand a bit. I got her a Facebook site, and use it to interact there. FB requires some specific images, so I had them commissioned. A bonus here is the availability of apps to add some fun things to the graphics. My number two concept is to use those images to promote my brand everywhere. This collage is of things I’ve put through an app to add something to them.
1.) At this point, with Lisa becoming popular, and in my desire to help other authors, I created a platform for you to promote your books. It’s called Lisa Burton Radio, and Lisa interviews the characters from your books. As part of this, I commissioned the most popular poster to date. It’s been posted on over a hundred interviews and counting. In the spirit of making a collage, I’ll also include a “red carpet” image that I’ve had the background changed on several times to reflect the event. In this case it was Lisa’s 100th episode. My number one choice is using my logo to help others reach their goals.
To bring this full circle, it never hurts to have a logo or something that makes your body of work recognizable. It wouldn’t be hard to come up with a logo, symbol, or something else recognizable to promote your own brand. I’m still waiting around for my next fun idea, and you can almost bet it will include my spokesmodel in some fashion.
Lisa’s artist is the amazing Sean Harrington. He has a fun webcomic called Spying With Lana, and has done covers for quite a few independent authors.
Story Empire 
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Reblogged this on Where Genres Collide.
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Thank you, Traci.
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You’re welcome, Craig!
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Reblogged this on Archer's Aim and commented:
Fantastic Five for Friday on Story Empire today featuring C. S. Boyack’s spokesmodel, Lisa Burton!
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Thanks.
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You’re welcome, it’s a fantastic Five for Friday!
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Ingenious! Thanks so much for sharing… 🙂
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Glad you enjoyed it.
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Lisa reminds me of Betty Boop, she’s sexy and smart, too, just like you! Great post, Craig. You’ve given me something to think about.
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Ha ha. I think you need to have your eyes checked on that last part of your comment, but thanks.
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Lol, hope I made your day 🙂
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You did.
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The anatomy of a promotion that is a promotion. Pretty clever.
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I have my moments. It’s like an infinity mirror.
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Yes. Perfect description.
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The concept of Lisa Burton radio is brilliant, Craig, I am very in awe of your vision. A great post. I have Sir Choc but I can’t tie him to my adult writing. I will have to think about something for Roberta Writes.
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Maybe you and Lisa can make black bread together on your site. Wonder if it can use sourdough???
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I have never made black bread, Craig. Sir Choc has a lovely white milk bread they could make together. Or Lisa could make sourdough bread and teach Sir Choc how.
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Me either. I’m sure I can get some good rye flour around here. Let me think about it, so it also promotes your book. Maybe we each make one and post pictures. (Note: rye is kind of touchy.)
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We can promote both our books.
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I adore Lisa! And, you are right, she is your brand. I’d love to see you expand a little on your muse, Lorelei (hope I spelled that right). I have a vision of her in my head but would like to see what she actually looks like. 🙂 Great post, Craig!
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I’ve given thought to commissioning a piece with her, but never have. I’ve described Lorelei a few times. One day I’ll have to spring for a graphic, and maybe the Research Sirens.
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Lisa is definitely recognizable in the independent author world. I think everyone loves her, men and women both, and that’s not always easy to accomplish. It’s great how you use her to help promote your work and the work of other authors. You are your brand, but she is part of it. Awesome post, and great collection of Lisa artwork. I really like the Glamour magazine cover.
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There is a fun little app that will make the magazine covers and more. It’s called PhotoLab.
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I almost did a spit-take when you said, “You know who you are.” You always make me laugh, Craig.
I ADORE Lisa art and think it’s a great use of her likeness to market all of your work. The whiteboards are exceptionally clever. She looks amazing in all the graphics, but I’m especially drawn to the gold dress glamour shot, the milk dress, baseball, and the archaeologist. And when I shared this post, I used the angel and devil graphic. That one’s awesome.
Nicely done.
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I’ve had a lot of fun with it, and I know some others who have enjoyed Lisa’s antics. Lisa and I spent one entire summer on an outlining safari. We storyboarded four different books, some of which I still haven’t written. It was some of the best time I ever spent, because I can stay ahead of the game now. The safari graphic was used for those posts. Her character is helpful, intelligent, but naïve at the same time. I think a lot of people can relate to that.
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You should do a storyboarding post.
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I think I already have.
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Can’t hurt to do another. I never storyboard. The concept interests me.
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Great post, Craig. Lisa is a great vehicle to promote your books and those of others as kind of a virtual assistant. She is also a good role model that shows girls like my daughter that you can be attractive and smart. The thing I like about your use of her character is that, although she makes an appearance in some of your works, you don’t feature her in all of your work which gives you the freedom to write your truly unique stories.
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Now that you say that, she is kind of like my Mickey Mouse. She has some tales, but isn’t in all of them. It’s a balancing act to keep the posters cutesy, but not take it too far.
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Very true. You do a great job at keeping the balance.
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Reblogged this on Author Don Massenzio and commented:
Check out this behind the scenes look into the origins of C.S. Boyack’s character, Lisa Burton, from his post on the Story Empire blog.
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Appreciate the help, Don.
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My pleasure.
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Lisa is “quite the woman.” Like another commenter said, she has inspired many of us.
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Thank you, Joan.
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I love Lisa, she’s so spunky and irreverent. And her interviews are fantastic. Really enjoyed hearing the background to Lisa and your marketing gestalt, Craig. I am one of those authors who has zero marketing know-how, so this was extremely helpful, thank you.
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It’s been a really tough year, marketing or not. As a guy who writes paranormal, science fiction, and fantasy it’s my attempt to tie it all together under one banner.
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Lisa may have started out as your inspiration, Craig… but she inspires so many of us now!
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Makes my day to learn that. Thanks for sharing the post.
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Reblogged this on anita dawes and jaye marie.
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Great graphics, Craig. My favourite has to be the ‘spilt milk’ dress one, lol. You’re spot on: every author is the brand, not just one of their books. Best of luck with everything. 🙂
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I like that one too. It isn’t hard to develop a logo to stitch everything together. We are a lot alike in that we write across multiple genres. I think it helps.
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