It may seem unfair to judge a book by its cover, but the unfortunate truth is that most potential readers will do just that. Many an author’s fortunes have hinged on whether their book cover managed to convince the right readers to take a chance on it. In this post, we’ll walk you through the essential elements of an effective cover design to help you create a cover that will have your book flying off of store shelves — and so that you can spend less time on marketing . Why your book cover matters Cast your mind back to the last time you visited a library or a bookstore, and consider how many books you browsed. In just a few minutes, you may have skimmed the spines and covers of  dozens, if not hundreds, of books. In such a competitive market, you need to do everything you can as an author to make your book stand out from the crowd — and that begins with the cover design .  Thinking about the books you picked up, what about the cover drew you to them? Whether it was intriguing...

First off, one should not schedule the pre-order release of a book, then promptly be pretty much out of commission for a couple of weeks. That is the big DON'T on the list. Early in August, I got the edits back from ALTO Editing for Desperate Season , and sent the manuscript to a professional to format the book for Kindle and paperback. I already had the new cover, so it was good to go as soon as formatting was finished. Luckily, about the same time I set up some ads in advance at sites like Kindle Book Review and Kindle Nation Daily . A friend offered to feature the book on his blog if I sent him an excerpt and the ordering information. I put all that together right away, except for the link to order. That I could send later. Here is the sample at Caleb and Linda Pirtle's terrific website where they promote other authors as much as their own books, which are quite good, by the way.  It's a good thing I did all that work early on, because I got slammed again w...

This post was first published here on January 16, 2009 Mark Goldwich, author of UNCOVERED: What REALLY Happens After The Storm, Flood, Earthquake or Fire asks, "How do I get back cover reviews from the people I want reviews from?" Good question, Mark. Thanks for asking. The quotes you see on the backs of books come from two sources. Most are blurbs - short recommendations written specifically for the cover. Others are excerpts from reviews. I first learned about blurbs in Austin Camacho's marketing text. I recommend you find a marketing book for writers that will work for you. Many exist. How do you acquire blurbs for your book? The short answer is you ask for them. I know this is not an easy thing for many writers to do, but it is a necessary part of our business. If you are not comfortable writing request letters, find a friend who is and ask for help. When deciding whom to ask for a blurb, consider your target market. What name (or title) would your reader...

On my book tour, friends invited their friends to parties and threw me into the mix as an attraction. Photo by Cara Lopez Lee Before I landed a publisher, I established a platform for my memoir, They Only EatTheir Husbands (Conundrum Press, 2014). In fact, my original publisher said my platform was part of what decided him to sign me—on top of my killer manuscript of course. My book was about my life and loves in Alaska and my solo trek around the world, with a theme of moving from dysfunctional relationships to self-actualization. Successful entrepreneurs have taught me the importance of focusing on a narrow target market rather than trying to appeal to everyone. My goal for my memoir has been to target readers interested in: travel, women’s empowerment, alcoholism, and abusive relationships. I’ve sought to achieve that goal through less conventional events and tours. In that vein, I started Girls Trek Too, which was both an adventure blog and a series of independent-travel...

Every writer must think about marketing. Why spend all that time, effort, blood and sweat on something which no one (other than those you emotionally blackmail) will read? You need to think outside the box. So why not… 1. Don’t do the normal postcard advertising your book launch. How about a postcard in the shape of a triangle and something about ‘getting the point’?  2. Start a blog/Pinterest account/whatever featuring recipes your main character would love. People love recipes. Pictures of food stops people scrolling down the screen. 3. But so do cute pictures of animals. Does one of your characters have a pet? Post pictures of the beast. Also a scroll-stopper. 4. Non-writers are curious about the Secret World of the Writer. Make this shadowy world a feature of your marketing. Why not make a list of music that helps you write? Is there a certain genre that you listen to when you’re writing a first draft? Editing? A romantic scene? A cliff-hanger? Don’t forget about w...

Writing is a solitary profession. With the exception of a few remarkable people who work in writing teams, few people can conceive of an idea, draft it, and then edit and revise to create a finished project. This much is obvious. But what about when that initial stage is over and your book is out there in the world? For those of us who are self-published especially, once you click “publish,” approaching a writing career as a solitary endeavor might not be the best plan of action. Only one person can bring a book into the world, but sometimes it takes a little help to get it to soar. This is where publicists and author assistants come in mighty handy. You hear about a lot of the big names having assistants, but the truth is, even someone who is just starting out or who is building an indie career can use the professional help of someone whose job it is to build up the work you’ve already done. Working with a publicist has been one of the best professional decisions I’ve ever made....

Image by Ryan Ritchie , via Flickr Let’s face it: being an author isn’t a simple, one-task job. Similar to that of a wage earner/wife/mother (or the male counterpart), it requires expertise in multiple fields. Exactly what all does a writer need to be? We can begin with researcher, organizer, storyteller, grammarian, developmental editor, content editor, proofreader, marketer, publicist, PR person, distributor, and the list goes on. Oh, yes, this includes learning the formats/skills required by these diverse professions. Remember that being a jack of all trades also implies being a master of none. Yet we are counseled to learn our craft. How can we do that without acquiring the expertise needed to fulfill all the “jobs” included under the “successful author” umbrella? We can become advocates for ourselves. One dictionary defines advocacy as the act of supporting something, and who can support us better than we can? After all, we have the most to gain—and the most to lo...

Promotion is a black hole. It has no boundaries, no end in sight. The dark is so complete you can lose your aim within it, shooting expensive ammunition at imagined targets. This black hole may or may not lead to a universe of measurable results—and if it does, the sale of books may not be the best indicator of those results. Marketing, likewise, only the stakes are higher, because that black hole will be sucking money from your hand. Yet this we must do, because if no one knows of our books, they can’t purchase them. So when deciding on events and products for my launch later this month, I found it best to ask: Does this promotion fit within my budget of time and money? What do I hope to gain? 1. Launch party. Budget: Many will say a launch party is never worth the money (you’d have to sell one book for each dollar spent). But for me investing in such milestone celebrations makes life sweeter, and with donations and discounts, I believe we’ll have a night to remembe...

In January of 2012, after two years represented by an agent, I self-published three mystery/thrillers on Amazon’s KDP Select program. That month, I sold 38 books for a grand total of $82, one in the UK. Wow, I was an international seller. That meant 39 people besides friends and critique partners read my books. Since then, I’ve sold many more. A few free days during the first part of the year garnered enough reviews for the promo sites to feature me, a key in selling. The biggest free promo site then and now is EReader News Today . In July, 2012, they featured Murder Déjà Vu , and that’s when everything changed. The book totaled 37,000 downloads and sold, with borrows, 1800 units. Mind Games got a bump because the first chapter is at the end of MDV. In August, Hooked earned the reviews for an ENT feature. Results: 44,200 downloads, and it sold, are you ready, 3500 books/borrows. Murder Déjà vu continued selling with over 1100 copies sold. It was the best month ever. I ...

To kick off a new month at the Blood-Red Pencil, please welcome one of our favorite guests, Susan Wittig Albert . After nearly three decades of writing traditionally-published fiction and nonfiction, I decided to publish a standalone novel under my own imprint, Persevero Press. (For the reasons behind the decision,  go here .) I have to admit: this has been a major adventure—the equivalent of a hike across the U.S., maybe, or a safari in darkest Africa. I’m not out there trekking by myself, of course. There are dozens—hundreds, thousands—of authors heading in the same direction, many of them quite a distance ahead of me, and I’m grateful to them for blazing the trail. But there’s one little side road on this trip that I’m taking on my own—well, probably not, but it feels that way. My book—a biographical/historical novel called A Wilder Rose —is about the collaboration of Rose Wilder Lane and Laura Ingalls Wilder on the writing of the Little House books. Since most...

This past month I arrived at the narrow end of the editing funnel, where we examined all of the final finicky details. Copyedits Thankfully, considering I’m an editor, I received a pretty light copyedit. Comments from two copyeditors dotted my manuscript. Even though I recommend that my clients spell out all numerals, I had applied my own advice inconsistently. I had to decide when God was the almighty or the god of casual “oh my—” usage. My “blonde” was changed to “blond.” I surrendered a few commas, they traded a few back. One editor pointed out the possible unintentional humor in the sentence, “By the time we got to the butt-blaster, Angela looked pooped.” I had two weeks to address these edits and make any other final changes. Template review My first glimpse at the interior design and all its elements! Everything looked great. Because my book quotes "articles" written by a character who is a dance critic, and in one place contains a formal invitation, we had a lit...

Last week, I released my first novella, Saying No to the Big O [ Amazon | Smashwords ]. Instead of reading a book description, you can view the trailer for SN2BO below. As I began promoting Saying No to the Big O , I thought about how I would use Twitter in the promotions. I tweeted the obvious posts that brought people to my Website to read the novella's description, to watch the trailer, to read a sample, and to read commentaries I wrote on the novella, but I wanted to do something that was fun and intriguing and that would be a challenge for me. Back when I was promoting my mystery Into the Web , I pulled several lines from the story and tweeted them along with the link to purchase the novel. Tweeting lines from the story generated a lot of interest. Many people messaged me to talk about how much they enjoyed the tweets, many retweeted the lines, and others went directly to the purchase link to buy a copy of the novel. With the success of the tweets, I decided to do i...

This month’s question addresses appearance rather than content. How important is a book cover? After all, what’s on the outside doesn’t affect what’s on the inside. Cover artists can be expensive, and a great story is still great regardless of packaging. True, but . . . by extension, a potential reader’s expectation for a book’s content is very often created by the cover—this is especially true if the author is unknown or the reader has not heard of the book. From a reader’s perspective, the actual quality of the cover sets the tone for the anticipated quality of the story. As the saying goes, “you never get a second chance to make a first impression.” The cover makes that first impression. Recently, I read that more than 2 million books were published (or re-published) in 2011. Another source stated that number to be in excess of 3 million . Talk about mind-boggling! Now couple that information with claims that the number of readers is dwindling each year. The challen...