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Tuesday, August 26, 2014

Musings of the Split-Personality Mind

When most fiction authors say they're driven to the page by voices in their heads, they are referring to hearing the dialogue of their characters.

Imagine my dilemma. In addition to my characters going on and on, I also have to listen to the banter of my split personalities (pen names) as they vie for my attention and our singular body.

The solution seemed simple at the beginning. I created three websites and three newsletters to communicate to our varied audiences. Then Elyse decided to write contemporary women's drama with a sci-fi twist about parallel-world travel. And, hot Ms. Layla decided to team up with another writer to pen erotic crime thrillers in addition to continuing with her steamy romances.

Conventional wisdom (ha) from branding experts tells me that I need to further segment my activity and target each audience separately. I looked at that possibility, but realized it would be the death of me, or at least one of my inner selves. I may risk losing some readers, but someone far smarter than today's pr pundits whose wisdom has never failed me (my mother) said, "You can't please all the people all of the time."

Sometime in the near future, I'll be integrating my websites into one. If you are on my mailing list (and if you're not, be sure to sign up using the form at the bottom of the righthand column), I've already started including blurbs from Elyse and Layla in my newsletter. I'm going to continue to share some of their stuff here...but only the parts I think are appropriate for all audiences.

I want to hear from you.
What do you think? How do you handle multiple interests/audiences/readers? Please comment below.