1. Stain your lips
As you wear a red lip, it will fade, usually in the centre first. If you stain your lips this helps keep  the colour put longer. It also gives you a great base layer of red.

I personally love Sephora's lip stain or Balmshells, they are deep and dark and look great on their own.

Bonus tip: I let the stain absorb and will apply it two or three times before moving on for maximum saturation of colour.

2. Line your lips and fill them in
This is an important step, for a few reasons. One, lining prevents feathering and smearing of the lipstick outside the lip area. Two, by filling in your lips all over (seriously coulour all your lips, not just the rim) you prevent that fading in the centre and stop you from having just having liner left on your lips when the lipstick fades away.

I love Annabelles liners, they come in any shade you could dream of and are pocket book friendly.

3. Reverse line your lips.
This prevents you from smudging outside your lips and gives it more definition and that sharp wow look.

Line the outside of your lips with a pencil that matches your skin tone, then blend out with fingers. You can do this before all the other steps if you want or even at the end.

I love Cargo's Reverse Lip Liner or Mac's Pro Chromagraphic Liner in nc15/nw20.