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You have navigated through your first draft, nailing every hint in the self-published book process while writing a genuinely compelling novel full of Action and Adventure or Historical Fiction.
Suddenly, you hit stop when you get to the last step: write an author’s short bio.
Dealing with this final step in the writing process can send shivers down the line for a novice author when he asks, “how to write an author bio without any writing experience?”
Writing an unpublished author bio is not as complicated as it first appears. After all, an author has to start somewhere!
Think about it…
…all great authors have to write their first book at some point, which means they face the same problem of how to write an author bio without experience.
Without a doubt, these great writers also struggled to resolve their dilemmas but managed to advance and establish incredible literary careers just like you.
Page Contents
An Author Bio: Bio About Yourself
The author’s bio includes a few short introductory paragraphs for the reader. It does not need to focus solely on your professional writing career; the best author bios also give a personal touch.
You can mention your hobbies, family life or include some interesting narrations about yourself.
It is about engaging your target audience with relevant and interesting information about you that could help you stand out from other authors in your niche.
Top 6 Tips On How To Write An Author Bio
Authentic and well-polished Author Profiles allow authors to interact with more and more readers.
Whether you are writing a short paragraph to include at the end of a recently completed novel or editing the “About Yourself” page on your website, it is significant to avoid misquoting yourself in an author bio.
The “About Us” page is one of the most visited pages on the website, right behind the home page. Moreover, if your readers want to know more about you, one of the first places they will look is an author bio, which is often found at the bottom of a book, as well as any website or social media links. It is also a place to establish your brand and stand apart from others.
Read on for some tips on how to write a bio for work to make it easy for readers to connect with your work and you as well.
1. Start With An Introductory Byline
Experts encourage authors to start their writer’s bio with a byline (one-liner) that summarizes their profile and the titles of the latest publications.
For example,
“Jane Doe is a professor of anthropology at UCLA and author of Insights into Our Past: Tracing the Legacy of Intergenerational Trauma in the United States in the 19th Century.”
Or
“Jane Doe is a poet, author, and writer. New novel We Were Schon There.”
If you are using this bio digitally, put the book title on the sales page, such as Amazon or the author’s website, and do not forget to link.
It is also a good practice to add titles such as “Award Winning” and “Best Seller” to the byline, if applicable to your expertise.
The great thing about writing the byline as an opener is that it can also be used as a short biography for guest articles and social media.
2. Think Of Your Readers
It may sound counter-intuitive, but the focus does not always have to be on you when you write an author bio. You should think about your ideal readers and how best to interact with them.
What do they want to know about you?
What motivates them to buy more books from you?
For example, a reader of a personal finance book may want to know about the author’s qualifications. Fiction readers will want to understand more about the author’s writing journey.
No matter what genre of writing you write, you should take the time to figure out who your ideal audience is and then create a self bio specifically tailored to their interests and needs.
This way, you can make your author bios much more engaging and make it easier to connect with your target audience.
3. Create a Compelling Story
Instead of writing an author’s biography detailing degrees, titles, and other facts, focus on creating compelling stories.
Depending on your ideal audience, this story could explain how you became the writer you are today.
If you are a non-fiction writer, you can tell a story about how you gained knowledge in your field.
Again, it is significant to consider the ideal reader. Which stories are most interesting to them?
To understand what stories should be included in the author’s biography, answer the following questions:
- What unique skills do you bring to the writing community?
- Have you had any experiences that have had a significant impact on you as a reader and writer?
- Why is it important to tell a story?
- What are you passionate about?
- What are you standing for?
- How can your work help readers?
Answering one or more of these questions on the author’s biography or ‘About Us’ page can go deeper than talking about your degree or residence. This way, you are actually giving your readers a reason to contact you.
4. Discuss Your Accomplishments
The author’s biography is a great place to talk about your achievements, but do not overdo it.
“People don’t want to read long bios! Keep it under 300 words. Only include relevant materials and be as succinct as possible. If you have won many awards, for example, only include the most impressive ones. The same goes if you’ve published a couple of books; only include your most successful three.”
– Joel Pitney
For short biographies of authors (such as those on the back of a book), you should only talk about recent or significant achievements or awards, such as literary awards. Alternatively, you may include the most recently published books.
Often authors have a separate page with awards on their website for not cluttering the ‘About me page.
If you have a massive list of achievements and rewards and you want to share it on your website for your readers, consider creating a separate page. This way, your readers can focus on sharing fascinating stories without worrying about touching long lists.
5. Choose the Correct Point of View
“First-person voice is fine for your website, but for everywhere else, make it 3rd person. It’s more professional.”
– Joel Pitney
Short biography (sometimes longer) of authors are usually written in the third person. An article, book, or blog bio is written in a general format that you might find at them the end of the book or article.
However, the ‘About Me’ page on the author’s site is slightly different. It can be written in the third or first person, but it is most often used in the first person as this particular perspective creates a more friendly and personal tone.
Whichever point of view you choose to write the author’s biography, you must be yourself! Do not pretend you are not. And don’t be afraid to have fun.
Depending on your ideal reader, you can also share some fun facts about yourself. You may also want to share cute photos of your dog or cat (who does not love pet photos?). The main thing here is to stand out from your readers.
6. End With An Appealing CTA
Finally, it is always helpful to include a powerful call to action (CTA) at the end of the author’s bio. CTA may include the following links:
- Newsletter signup form
- Author’s website and social media pages
- Next book in a series you are currently writing
- A Contact form or email address where readers can reach you
With these calls to action, you invite readers to your community, Sign up and be fully engaged with you and your work.
Author Bio Examples:
Keeping author bio concise, author Farrah Rochon has described her personality.
“A native of south Louisiana, USA…”
The first thing she has started by telling her readers about where she resides.
She doesn’t use a complete design from where she belongs to.
“..Today Bestselling author Farrah Rochon…”
Secondly, it refers that she is selling a large portion of copies from her masterpieces.
“…officially began her writing career while waiting in between classes in the student lounge at the Xavier University of Louisiana…”
The third point of concern is she is a graduate of the Xavier University of Louisiana. In addition, in the fourth thing, she has mentioned the time of attraction towards her career.
…After earning her Bachelor of Science degree from Xavier and a Masters of Arts from Southeastern Louisiana University…
After that, she has done a master’s degree from Southeastern Louisiana University. She has not listed her accomplishments but has formed a storyboard to engage and hook the reader. You may get inspiration from this fifth point.
“…Farrah decided to pursue her lifelong dream of becoming a published novelist…”
She has explained here about her career path to kicking start with. Of course, the sixth point is about her experience, or call it a journey.
“She was named Shades of Romance Magazine’s Best New Author of 2007…”
Her first accomplishment; point seven!
“…Her debut novel…Choice Awards…”
And point eight, about her later rewards.
Moreover, the paragraph ends here. See, she has talked about the past till now. She has not added anything about her today’s life about what she is today.
The first paragraph should always focus on the background of an author. Now, moving towards her second listing, of course, paragraph.
“…When she is not … shows as her budget will allow…”
Point nine. About her hobbies!
“An admitted sports fanatic, Farrah feeds her addiction to football … Sunday afternoons…”
Point ten, a hook to her hobbies, also refers to her addiction.
Finally, where she works or where she stands today – point eleven.
“Farrah is represented by Evan Marshall … Agency…”
So these were the eleven points about her. If we consider her each hobby, it would be eighteen points, she has mentioned about herself. Knowing at least eighteen things about your cherished writer is worth it, doesn’t it?
So what do you conclude from her bio? Ask yourself. Well, we learned how to write a short author bio, and here is what we saw (to list a few):
- A story tale
- A summary of her career
- A third person voice
- usage of different worlds
- Personalization
Takeaway!
For non-fiction authors, the author’s biography is an important marketing tool. Because who you are is often as important as the content of your masterpiece whether it is a book, article, or a website “About Me” page.
To write a good author bio, you need to know your audience, work on your genre, brag (but not too much), be concise, and encourage your readers to act.
In brief, the steps in this post describe all the steps you need to take to get started writing your author’s biography. See them when you start writing and you have a convincing author biography that should make it easier to sell more books.
“Reading is an intimate endeavor in which the reader and the author are engaged in a kind of relationship. So, it’s important to provide potential readers with the chance to get a sense of who you are and why you have the authority/expertise to write about a particular topic before they pick up your book.”
– Joel Pitney
Also Read: How Much a Professional Author Earn Per Book
Ready to write an author bio?
Get assistance from Mczell Book Writing – an online book writing service. All you need to do is provide them with your capabilities and expertise – no matter what you write or how you do – not only they will help you with an engaging and most appealing headline for your bio, but they will ensure to make your bio as concise as readers love. And of course, engagement of your targeted audience is their promise.
Happy writing!
