places for potential use, before we walk you through the precise process of thinking up title ideas: How A Book Title Can Be Used • To sell the book to readers • Establish the author’s authority in a subject • Be a hook for the author to get media visibility • Branding for a company, author, conference, or course materials • Advertise/market the book • Used in speeches, slides, or other in-person activities • Used in reviews, blog posts, articles, etc. • Something the author has to say in all their press appearances • Become a defining part of an author’s future bio • Decorate the cover • Identify the Amazon/B&N listing • Start a line of books • Use on T-shirts, flyers, or other promotional material The point of this whole list is simple: Know which of these objectives apply to your book, and make sure your title can serve those objectives. For example, if your goal is to build a brand, make sure your book title is your brand. Dave Asprey’s first diet book is called The Bulletproof Diet, because that’s his brand: Bulletproof. The book is about selling everything around the book, not just the book itself. If your goal is authority in your field, make sure the book title sounds authoritative to whom you are trying to speak. Whimsical doesn’t work in serious academic fields, whereas serious doesn’t work in comedic fields. If your goal is to get media attention and raise your visibility, make sure the book title appeals to media and makes them want to cover you. 190 · ThE SCriBE METhOD