Covers that Connect: IBPA PubU 2018
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Covers that Connect Presented by Shannon Bodie, Partner & Art Director, BookWise Design; Tamara Dever, Owner & Creative Director, TLC Book Design Discover what makes design so important to a book’s sales and how to get your book noticed for the right reasons. Instructors will prepare individualized critiques for each person who submits their designs in advance of the workshop (no later than March 12, 2018). As an added bonus, submit a JPG or PDF of your book’s cover on or before March 12, 2018 to shannon@bookwisedesign.com. If your critique suggests improvement is needed, you will be entered to win a front cover redesign from the presenters of this class. The winning redesigns will be revealed during the course. Even if you don’t have a design to submit, join us to learn how a cover can make your book salable vs. driving customers to the competition. Course includes techniques to get your book noticed, redesign examples, and insider tips on how best to work with a design team to make your cover a success!
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Covers that Connect: IBPA PubU 2018
- 1. Covers that Connect Shannon Bodie, BookWise Design Tamara Dever, TLC Book Design Class Time: 1:15 PM – 2:15 PM WIFI Network: SCI (no password needed) Slides: www.slideshare.net/Shannon_Bodie
- 9. With only seconds to reach readers... WHAT REALLY MATTERS?
- 10. AUDIENCE MATTERS Research your book’s target audience and genre Fiction Nonfiction
- 11. PRE-DESIGN CHECKLIST Target market specs: gender and age are key, also consider ethnic and economic diversity if they apply. Be specific and realistic, not everyone is in your target market. Your top 10 best-selling competitors: How is your book unique and/or better than these books? Key team members with special knowledge: Include authors, editors, and marketing staff.
- 12. Goals for sales of books: do you have the start of a series, potential for market expansion, strong author-speaker support? At least five samples of cover designs you like. Not to copy, to help detail visual or “gut reactions” to design styles. Your personal preferences (or the author’s) are important, but remember the target audience matters most.
- 13. TYPEFACE MATTERS There are tens of thousands of typefaces and fonts out there. A good designer will not only know the appropriate fonts for your book, but how to combine them effectively.
- 18. Use good contrast for type and keep it concise.
- 19. Examples to review contrast and text readability:
- 21. IMAGE MATTERS Choosing the right image is imperative. If you’re off-mark, you can lead the reader into thinking your book is about something different than its true topic.
- 22. IMAGE MATTERS
- 23. IMAGE MATTERS
- 24. IMAGE MATTERS
- 25. Too many images can detract from your message and text Use images in a way that won’t overpower text
- 26. COLOR MATTERS Color is a powerful tool, as it evokes instant emotion and can send strong messages to the viewer.
- 33. Cool colors tend to have a calming effect on the viewer. Used alone, these colors can have a cold or impersonal feel. So when choosing cool colors, it may be wise to add a color from another group to avoid this and add warmth. COOL Warm colors tend to have an exciting effect. However, when these colors are used alone they can over- stimulate, generating emotions of anger and violence. When choosing warm tones, adding colors from another group will help to balance this. WARM Neutral colors are a great selection to mix with cool or warm palettes. They are great for backgrounds, and tend to tone down the use of other bold colors. Black is added to create a darker shade, while white is added to create a lighter tint. NEUTRAL
- 40. SIZE MATTERS Proper use of size can create peace or tension, lead your reader’s eyes through the cover design skillfully, and emphasize specific elements such as the title, an image, or a famous author’s name. Let’s play Goldilocks and the 3 Bears…
- 41. SIZE MATTERS
- 42. SIZE MATTERS
- 43. SIZE MATTERS
- 44. SPACE MATTERS Positive and negative space are often used improperly in self-published books. Negative or unused space — commonly referred to as white space, regardless of its actual color — is just as powerful as type and imagery in creating a useful and attractive design.
- 47. Tips for making dense copy work: • Make your title “pop” • Leave some white space “open areas” for balance • It’s a balancing act—not all the text will read well at reduced sizes • No more than 2 typefaces, use the same font family when you vary style (bold, italic, etc.) • Make sure any images work well with text, doesn’t pull the eye away
- 48. THE WHOLE COVER MATTERS The cover as a whole should present a cohesive and informative package. As we discussed earlier, each piece of the cover has its own job and they must work together to create a successful design.
- 49. Back cover and spine check list: Cover template from printer: Includes the trim size dimension, bleed, and the spine width based on final page count. This is very import to have exact. Any change in paper (change in printer) will alter this measurement. Headline: Can be a call to action, and include the book’s title. Paragraph or two of concise marketing copy. Keep this readable, most fonts need to be at 10pt or above. Endorsements: Again keep these concise and readable, if needed get approval for reduced version and run full version if you like on a review page in the interior.
- 50. Author photo: If your author is an expert/speaker, it is a good idea to place their photo on the back cover. However, if they are not well-known yet, better to use space for endorsements. Barcode/ISBN/price: Remember to order individual ISBNs for hardcover, audiobook and ebook editions. Category: Don’t use more than 3; too many can be confusing. Publisher: name, logo, url, and tagline if you have one. Spine: title, author’s last name(s) and publisher logo (can be icon only). If your spine is wide enough you can use an image, but consider binding tolerances.
- 58. DESIGN MATTERS If your book is underselling and your content is strong, check the design. Do you have any of the issues we’ve reviewed that could be hurting sales?
- 59. COVER REDESIGN
- 69. For submitting covers for review. None of our comments are meant to criticize or judge your efforts. Our feedback is intended to support you in reaching your audience and selling more books! THANK YOU…
Editor's Notes
- Would you be proud to put your name on this book? Would you be excited to distribute it to others? Does it compel you to take a trip to Panama?
- How about this one? Which would prefer to call yours? Right away, we can see that design does matter and may even influence a person’s decision to buy this book.
- Picture this… You’re an executive hoping to hire a particular young woman with a stellar resume when she walks into the interview wearing ripped jeans, a wild shirt, mis-matched socks, sandals, and unbrushed hair. As a manager, would you take her seriously? Would you spend your time listening to her? Would her look distract you from her words? Would you question that stellar resume? Your book’s design is like a person’s clothing. It speaks volumes about what’s inside — your writing — whether you want it to or not. Readers prejudge your credibility as an author by what they see on the cover and the interior. If you want people to not only read your book, but take you seriously as an author, show them respect first by dressing your book properly for its job.
- Every aspect of creating your book affects your company’s success. Book design goes way beyond aesthetics. Design is a sales tool. It is a means of conveying information and a way to get the attention of buyers. When used properly, it not only reflects but elevates your message. The design of your ENTIRE book — inside and out — is important to SELLERS, DISTRIBUTORS, REVIEWERS, BUYER, and utlimately your readers. Your books need to get noticed for all the right reasons. As a small or independent publisher, you must be better than the big guys and design is a big part of the overall picture. Let’s get into the nitty gritty of what makes a good book cover.
- Did you realize that each piece of the book has a different job? When seen first, the spine is the attention-getter or a mini billboard. If it does its job, you’ll pick up the book to view the front cover.
- The front cover serves as your main billboard, begging to be picked up. It should be intriguing or enticing. If it does its job properly, you’ll flip the book to read the back.
- The back cover serves as an advertisement, providing easy-to-read, bite-sized information to hook the potential buyer on your book. If the back does its job properly, you’ll flip open the book to glance through it further and, hopefully, purchase the book.
- Experts say your cover has only 3 to 8 seconds to grab a reader.
- Before starting the cover design process determine your target audience. This is not all the possible readers your book will have, but the most likely readership. Knowing your target audience guides you (and your book design team) in all aspects of the design process: trim size, font, color, imagery, even what paper and finish are used when printing your book. Know your genre—what books are your audience buying? Gather genre research. Fiction titles tend to leave you guessing, open ended, planting an idea of the story. Nonfiction titles have a clear message, answering a question or need. Of course you want to stand out in the crowd, but you don’t want to look out of place. Fiction vs. nonfiction, then drill down to your specific categories. Learn what books are selling well to your audience.
- Target market specs: gender, age, ethnic diversity. Does your target reader have any special training or knowledge, or beliefs to consider? Be specific and realistic, not everyone is truly in your book’s target market. What are the top 10 best-selling competitors? How is your book unique from these books? Also look at the books not selling as well. How will your book be better? Key team members with special knowledge, especially authors, editors, and maketing should be included. Don’t forget a distributor with market info to share—can they review proofs with their sales staff?
- Goals for sales of books: do you have the start of a series, potential for market expansion, author-speaker support? Share your goals for book sales: plan to start with a digital print run or ebook version, then future print or add-ons (guides, online courses, etc.) At least five samples of covers with design qualities you like. Not to be copied—to help detail the visual or “gut reactions” you have to design styles. Your personal preferences (and the author’s) are important to work into the design. Don’t hold back thinking you are “stifling creativity.” Professional designers know how to filter out what is right to sell the book from personal preferences.
- In typography, a typeface (also known as font family) is a set of one or more fonts each composed of glyphs that share common design features. Each font of a typeface has a specific weight, style, condensation, width, slant, italicization, ornamentation, and designer or foundry (and formerly size, in metal fonts).
- When the Struggle is Real: This is a book of prayers and meditations written in a rap style. Its primary target market is individuals living in the inner city who struggle with drugs and crime. A truly unique book! • Action of the Times: This typeface literally shows a struggle, but is too playful, taking away from the seriousness of the topic.
- • Sabotaged: This is a logical typeface, but it becomes trite and takes attention away from the title’s meaning and the power of the photograph.
- • Caslon: This classic typeface has a more serious tone and allows the photo’s message to come through, but lacks real impact and doesn’t seem to fit the book’s audience.
- • Hardline Grunge: This is a simple, easy-to-read, modern typeface with a bit of grunge inside. The condensed nature allows for the title to be larger and more hard-hitting without losing readability. Its straight edges contrast nicely with the photo, allowing for the stressful scribbles to make an impact.
- Assure any images used do not conflict with readability of the text. Try to keep character count lower so the type can be larger and easier to read. Title is placed over a background with variation in light and dark (poor contrast). Text is also a hand written font style which is more difficult to read. Good contrast is crucial for readability of text: use light text over dark areas, or dark text over light backgrounds. Note: adding a stroke to text, makes it more difficult to read, not easier.
- First book: Difficult to read: text is running over background with variation in light and dark (poor contrast). Second book: Similar design concept, but the text is larger, and white, with better contrast in the background for a more readable title.
- Title over a background with no variation—black background and light text—contrast at the highest level. Equals a very readable title. Avoid text over images that interfere with readability. First book: Difficult to read: text is running over background with variation in light and dark (poor contrast). Second book: Text is over a background with less variation in dark and light. Areas of the image with variation in contrast (hands) do not have text running over them.
- This can lead to selling to the wrong audience, which could mean poor reviews. And as we saw in the previous slides, an image that doesn’t work well with text is a poor choice too.
- Sensory Parenting is a book about parenting kids on the Autism spectrum. These kids most often have trouble with making eye contact, so we had to be sure the subject was not looking directly at the reader.
- Unprofessional images and design can send the wrong message to the reader. This publisher wanted a more professional, but still sexy look to attract the right reader. They felt the original cover was turning off readers and was dated design as well.
- Avoid the urge to show too much or represent every reader possible on the cover. Instead of attracting “everyone” as you hope, you can overwhelm, and detract from your message AND potential sales. The first cover has too many images, so the cover feels crowded. The second and third, use multiple images in a clear and balanced way that doesn’t take attention away from the text. Too much text or imagery can turn off the entire market, instead of widening your audience.
- We’re going to show you one cover with four different background colors. Without reading much of the type, I want you to think about what comes to mind within the first couple of seconds of seeing this.
- • Green: money/finance, green energy
- • Purple: self-help, spirituatlity/inner energy/enlightenment
- • Taupe/gray: boring, business, textbook
- (Actual cover) • Orange: invigorating, ideas, creativity, ambition
- For this cover, I used a warm sepia tone to reflect the historic subject matter. Then added brighter and warmer gold touches to the artwork for interest at center, right under the title To draw the eye. This color palette evokes a sense of history and authority.
- Color is a powerful tool, as it evokes instant emotion and can send strong messages to the viewer. This publisher updated only the background color for a powerful change. The image pops more, and overall the cover feels more fun and eye-catching. It was too subdued before for a humorous book.
- Here’s a TIP: Color has different meanings in different industries and especially in other countries. For example, red is a poor choice of color for a finance book. In Western cultures, blue represents the birth of a boy, whereas in China, blue is a feminine color. In Ireland, green is associated with good luck, but in many South American cultures, green symbolizes death! If your book is to be sold abroad, be sure your designer takes color usage into consideration.
- While it takes skill to use all of these design methods properly, the proper use of space can be one of the most challenging.
- What if I have a lot of copy and just can’t reduce further due to importance to sales? Tips for making dense copy work: Make your title “pop.” Have a clear path for the eye: vary size and color of type to help the reader know what to read first. Leave some white space “open areas” for balance. It’s a balancing act—not all the text will read well at reduced sizes. Stay in the same font family when you vary style (bold, italic, condensed or extended). Try not to use more than 2 typefaces on a cover. Make sure any image(s) balances well with text and doesn’t angle the eye away from content.
- The cover as a whole should present a cohesive and informative package to get the reader into the book. With each piece of the cover having its own job, as we discussed earlier, they all must work together to present one branded cover. Suggested word counts here?
- Make sure to check your spine width carefully. Even a slightly too larger or too narrow spine can create an off center spine or rejection of files at press.
- Very dense copy with a small font size in reverse. Even with white over black which provides good contrast, but is still difficult to read at this font size. Reverse text is more difficult to read than black over a light color, so you may need to use a larger font size in reverse.
- For most books an author photo is not as key to sales as endorsements and strong marketing copy. Don’t forget to include a url and publishing contact. Try to wrap the spine image to avoid roll on the spine edge when possible. This is especially important for POD printing where you can have little control over the printed books shipped to your readers. Even slight variation in page counts can make your spine off too, make sure your cover designer is given accurate specs so you don’t have off center covers or rejected files on press deadline.
- When the author is a speaker, and/or building name brand recognition a high quality photo/bio can be important to their marketing efforts. I worked with the author to brand the series, with an “A” for Authentic Arts, that is in a tilted frame to reflect artwork and movement.
- Information is placed in different places on a book jacket because there’s more room. The blurb about the book is now on the front flap, author bio and publisher’s info on the back flap, leaving room for testimonials and perhaps a little teaser copy on the back cover.
- This jacket was a lot of fun to design but also a lot of content to design in a balanced way. The author helped a great deal by providing historic source images she found during her research writing the book. We layered and tinted the images in Photoshop, using a couple paperclips to add a sense of a historic case file. We even tinted the author photo to match the aged photos. A larger lead quote on the back draws the eye, then short book descripted in a boxed area breaks up the long endorsements. The publisher edited the longer quotes down, but wanted to keep as much as possible because of the quality of the endorsements. This is a difficult balance. We have some publishers that feel strongly that potential buyers will not read a lot of copy and instead include less on the cover and more on their retailer pages.
- You can learn from what other publishers improve in new editions. All three are great cover designs and well exceduted. First two images were off the mark, didn’t support the title or subtitle: The trouble with the truth is it can change everything . . . 1) Balloon feels child like, gives the impression of a missing or hurt child. 2) Woman’s hands trapping a butterfly. How does this relate to husband? Nice cover, but message is confusing. 3) Explosion of flower feels like love being destroyed. Title is easier to read and the message is clear. First edition, Berkley Books an imprint of Penguin Random House
- For review of cover design principles, what is not working on this cover design?
- Even small changes matter. This cover needed a boost in color and contrast for more impact in the youth fantasy market. The first edition the globe is too difficult to see. Here is a design that needed a boost to color and contrast for more impact in the youth fantasy market. You can learn from your supporters, if you have a list ask them for feedback in cover design surveys.
- Reasons to redesign • The most common reason is to bring out a revised/updated version • Reprinting book that’s roughly more than 3 years old • If you decide to turn a single book into a series and design of first book(s) didn’t work for series, it’s okay to begin the series design now and update the first book when you’re ready to reprint. • If your sales aren’t where you want them to be, consider that the cover could be contributing to the problem.
- We understand that you have worked hard to get your book to this important stage. We want you to succeed in publishing. As book industry professionals we are here to learn from and support one another in creating the best books possible. None of our design comments are meant to criticize or judge your efforts to date. You will need the skill to judge your book designs whether you hire a freelancer or have an in-house design team.
- Original design from publisher
- Cover examples for discussion of comments.
- Original design from publisher
- Cover examples for discussion of comments.
- Original design from publisher
- Cover examples for discussion of comments.
- Original design from publisher
- Cover examples for discussion of comments.
- Redesign winner
- Original cover design
- Original cover design