Are Pen Names Ethical?

Last week I received an email from a concerned blog reader. He writes:

Hey Ryan,

How do you reconcile Ryan Healy’s core value of honest copy with the _________ persona? Don’t get me wrong, I understand the concept of pen and stage names, but am not aware of a marketing equivalent.

Thanks for taking the time to read this.

P.W.

So, are pen names ethical? And can they be used in a marketing context?

I think so.

In fact, every freelance copywriter is a ghost writer. The sales letters I write for clients are never published under my name. They are always published under the client’s name or a persona that the client has created.

So, in a sense, every successful freelance copywriter already has dozens of pen names.

But what if you want to start a new business and use a pen name? I think this is fine, too. There is no overt deception going on. The name you use doesn’t change the content or truthfulness of your copy.

Personally, I’ve chosen to use a nom de plume for a new info-publishing business. The pen name will help avoid confusion with my primary business: copywriting.

But while I’m using a different name, I’m not going to great lengths to hide my identity either. I registered the domain in my own name. I’ve even got pictures of me on the site.

The only difference is the focus of the business and the name I’ve chosen to use.

Of course, there are dozens of examples of pen names in the literary world. The average person doesn’t know that Mark Twain was a pseudonym used by Samuel Langhorne Clemens. Even well-educated people don’t know that George Orwell was a pseudonym used by Eric Blair.

But is there any kind of precedent in the marketing world today? Absolutely!

Take for instance David DeAngelo, the persona created by Eben Pagan to market his Double Your Dating products.

And then there’s James Chartrand of the popular blog Men with Pens. James recently revealed that he is not a man. He is a woman.

Just as Mary Ann Evans published her writing as George Eliot to overcome the bias against women, so James Chartrand is the pseudonym that an unnamed woman uses in the copywriting world. (When James revealed the truth on Copyblogger, it set off a firestorm of discussion: 531 comments, 2396 tweets, and 1689 Facebook “likes.”)

As James reveals in her story, she chose a male pen name as an experiment and found that she suddenly began to collect better fees. The rest, as they say, is history.

Personally, I decided to use a pen name to avoid confusion between my different web sites and businesses. And to create a brand that could be sold later if the opportunity ever came up. (It’s hard to sell a business that bears your own name.)

Anyway, I realize that the subject of pen names in business can sometimes be controversial and not everybody will agree as to how, when, and why they should be used. What do you think?

-Ryan M. Healy