UPDATE: After months of work, we’ve just launched the coolest online 3D book cover creator in the world. It’s amazing, and totally free. Go check it out! (OOPS, Flash died, so I’m rebuilding the tool. It will be back…) My graphic design skills give me a huge advantage for book marketing. It’s almost unfair...
Over the last couple of years my mission has been to improve the quality standard for self-published book covers, and after helping thousands of indie authors, I know I’m making a dent. But authors still face two huge challenges: author marketing, and having a decent author website. Although I talk a lot about book marketing, The 3...
Cover design contests and “cover wars” are becoming a staple of indie book promotion and marketing. For awhile I’ve been quietly voicing concern but I thought it about time to take a stronger position. Here’s why: 1. The underlying assumption behind book cover contests and cover wars is that the best designed cover will...
Recently I asked you guys if you had any publishing questions on this post: “Ask me anything about publishing – please!” I answered a lot of questions on that post, but I also decided to put them altogether into an ebook. And it’s free! I’ve sent it to my list already, but if you aren’t The 3 secrets to book marketing, and...
Can someone explain Booktrope to me? I don’t get it. It looks like people can volunteer to be part of a creative time to produce the book, then earn a percentage of the sales revenue (and, apparently they only publish quality books that the community has supported, which means a better chance of revenue.) If The 3 secrets to book...
I got an email today from a wife helping her husband publish and worried about the book’s potential success. Putting your book out there is scary. Spending a lot of money and not earning it back is a very valid fear. There are ways around it, but it’s mostly a gamble. You can mitigate the The 3 secrets to book marketing, and a...
Most of the people I know who are working online are selling hot air. In other words, they fill people with hope, motivation and inspiration. They get them charged up and excited. They tell them “You can do anything you want, if you just BELIEVE in it!” They say, “Just follow your passion and the The 3 secrets to book...
This is a short post: I hear a lot of indie authors complaining about how everybody is against them. Reviewers won’t touch their book. They can’t get into bookstores. Everywhere they try to promote their book they hear things like “we don’t work with self-publishing authors.” That can seem like prejudice. It can...
This past month I’ve been thinking big and buying up online platforms related to publishing and book design. My little blog gets some traffic, and my book cover design business is doing fine – I just want to be a bigger player. A couple weeks ago I found a little blog network for indie authors The 3 secrets to book marketing, and...
For years I’ve been dancing around the idea of offering author websites. I’m a WordPress pro PLUS a graphic designer, so I’ve got the skills – and WordPress author websites are in huge demand and average around $1000 to build. Why I don’t do it? I don’t want to become the author’s life-long tech person...
A lot of indie publishing gurus talk about being an Authorpreneur or Entreprenauthor – basically referring to the importance of treating your writing and publishing as a business. But something real entrepreneurs are very familiar with is the guy going through the motions of business without actually doing anything. Trying to act like a...
Using the right fonts on your book cover helps tell the reader what genre your book fits into and elicits an emotional response. You want it to look great, but also be appropriate, fit in well with the cover design, and (probably) be just a little more interesting than a standard font. So I’ve put The 3 secrets to book marketing, and a...
