book cover as marketing tool

Tips on How to Work With Cover Designers

Book-Cover-DesignPublisher Logo

Looking for a professional cover designer for your books?  A stunning book cover is one of the best marketing tools for any writer!  You will never have a second chance to make a first good impression with your book cover – online and offline!  From the moment a person picks up your book, you have about 6 seconds to convince them to buy it.  Effective book covers have a “hook,” something that intrigues readers to purchase your book.
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Ask to see the designer’s portfolio. Compare the portfolio to the covers of best sellers on Amazon. Does the designer’s work stand up to the best sellers? A no-brainer: Choose a designer who specializes in book covers. It’s harder for designers who specialize in, for example, brochures and posters, to understand how the elements work together on a book cover. Clarify your expectations upfront. What does the designer need? Ask for references from the designer, or if you are still searching for a designer, ask your friends and colleagues for a referral.  Get at least three quotes from different professionals for any book cover design project

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Joel Friedlander’s List of Tips for Working With Your Cover Designer:

  • Check the designer’s portfolio to make sure she understands and has worked in your genre, category, or niche.
  • Make sure the designer’s fee is within your budget.
  • If you need to have the work completed by a specific date, make sure this is communicated to the designer at the outset, and that he agrees to your schedule.
  • Review the designer’s contract or agreement under which the work will be done.
  • Let your designer know exactly what you’ll need besides the basic front cover.
  • Review the formats you’d like to receive your cover in when it’s done: PDF for uploading to print on demand, a JPG of the front cover for your e-book, a high-resolution file, etc.
  • Supply the designer with necessary background material (see the list above).
    Give the designer photos or drawings that you think will be useful as background or visual inspirations.
  • Don’t dictate that the designer must use those elements, but leave it up to him or her—that’s why you hired a pro!
  • Talk over the various approaches to your cover in the sample designs he/she will provide you with.
  • Remember that you and your designer are collaborators trying to reach the best approach to packaging your book for sale.
  • It’s wise to have a written agreement with your designer that addresses the exact work to be done, what it will cost, how payments will be made, how either person can cancel the contract if they wish, and the ownership of the artwork used to create the cover as well as the files the designer creates.

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Front Cover Tips
E-books are bought online, usually displayed on a page with many other books. Therefore clarity, simplicity, brightness, and information must jump off the screen. Use simple, yet stunning graphic elements and bold clear text for the title and the authors’ name, both must be easy to read on the tiny online image.

Never, Ever:
use the word “by” before your author name. Using the word ”by” screams DIY self-published.
Do not use a white background for your book! White on white is barely visible and on websites, your book will not stick out, as the sites’ background are almost always white.

Visit a Bookstore
Check out all the books that are similar to yours. Place your book (or a mock-up) between these. Does it look better? Is the spine eye-catching? Ask other patrons what they think about every book, but don’t tell which one is yours. Listen to their opinion. Place your book on the first table in the bookstore where the NY Times bestsellers are placed. Does your book cover really stand out?

Book Spine
The majority of books displayed in bookstores are shown “spine out” to maximize limited shelf space. So, one of the key tasks for the book designer when it comes to books sold at retail stores is the design of the book’s spine. It means to have clean, clear spine designs that actually help sell the book. What belongs in a spine:

  • The author’s name, frequently only the last name to conserve space
  • The book title, and if it contains information that helps define the book, this should be the dominant element
  • Publisher identifier, typically a logo alone

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Discuss these Points with Your Cover Designer:

  • Use bold or complementary colors
  • Use light on dark for dramatic effects (if it fits your book content)
  • Use not more than different two fonts in total
  • Use not too wide vertical spaces between lines of text
  • Use few shadow, bevel, gradient or glow – keep it subtle
  • Align the cover text – center left or right
  • Place text on a plain background to stand out
  • Let the front cover design flow into the book’s spine
  • Use the same fonts for all your books and readers will be able to identify them easily – think branding!
  • Test the cover in thumbnail size to make sure it looks good at online seller’s website

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Not that an appealing cover means automatically a great book, but a book that is accurate and even interestingly represented by its cover, is more likely to catch the eye of someone who is going to enjoy reading it.

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Read more:

Lousy Book Covers
http://lousybookcovers.tumblr.com/
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Inside Random House: “The Art of Cover Design”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l2Z86L25v30
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Beautiful Books: Designer Editions & Sets
https://www.apartmenttherapy.com/books-beautifully-designed-editions-sets-187414
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23 Creative Book Cover Designs and their Story – a showcase of fabulous book cover designs
http://www.1stwebdesigner.com/inspiration/creative-book-cover-story

 

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Books by Doris-Maria Heilmann:

111 Tips to Create Impressive Videos:
How to Plan, Create, Upload and Market Videos
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07BYDH41S/

111 Tips To Make Money With Writing
The Art of Making a Living Full-time Writing
An Essential Guide for More Income as Freelancer
https://books2read.com/u/bWZMjz

111 Tips on How to Market Your Book for Free:
Detailed Plans and Smart Strategies for Your Book’s Success
https://books2read.com/u/bMre1a

111 Tips to Get Free Book Reviews:
Best Strategies for Getting Lots of Great Reviews
plus 1,200+ reviewer contact links                                    
https://books2read.com/u/mZ5nx5

111 Tips to Create Your Book Trailer
How to Create, Where to Upload and How to Market Your Videos
https://books2read.com/u/mVZkjr

Book Marketing on a Shoestring:
How Authors Can Promote their Books Without Spending a Lot of Money 
https://books2read.com/u/mZ5gdp

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Author Sue Grafton & How Book-Branding Works

Sue-Grafton-Books

 

Sue Grafton is famous for her “Alphabet” mystery book series.  Her private investigator Kinsey Millhone is the heroine, but the novels’ setting also plays a starring role: Millhone lives and works in Santa Teresa, a fictional town based in Santa Barbara, California.

Grafton began writing the Kinsey Millhone mysteries in 1982, alphabetizing the title of each book with crime words – branding her work in an exceptional way.
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Your Brand is Your Signature
We distinguish between ”Series Branding” and ”Author Branding”.  Visual author’s brand is also called “Author Identity”: You see a book cover without reading the text and you know it must be from this or that author.  Author branding is how you represent yourself to the entire industry and create a recognizable and trusted name.
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A brand is about how you want your audience to perceive you as a person and a professional.
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Strongly branded book covers can also have a huge, positive impact on your chance of gaining media attention or getting bookstores interested in stocking your books.  Cover designer Aimee Coveney lists these essentials:

  • a strong, unique font for your author name and book title
  • similar illustrations or image styles for each book
  • consistent layout
  • maybe even similar use of color

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See a great example of the bestselling authors Leigh Bardugo, Stephanie Garber, Pierce Brown, Tahereh Mafi, and Victoria Aveyard:
https://www.amazon.com/Leigh-Bardugo/e/B005ZZ8XQS/
https://www.amazon.com/Stephanie-Garber/e/B01M8Q21WC
https://www.amazon.com/Pierce-Brown/e/B00EDBZVNI/
https://www.amazon.com/Tahereh-Mafi/e/B005DISZ0Q/
https://www.amazon.com/Victoria-Aveyard/e/B00LMXGOBS

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Find Great Book Cover Examples
Get 15 branding examples in this “Adrijus” article.  He is the mastermind behind Rocking Book Covers.  See also his useful book cover design checklist to learn what to think about, what to prepare and what to communicate with your cover designer.
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Multi-Piece Designs:
Same cover style, and one element (the author’s name for example) in the same font and font size. An example is the Chicken-Soup series of inspirational and motivational books.
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Series Branding:
Use either a signature element in different cover concepts or a one-design-concept and then change small elements.  A mixture of both is exactly what Sue Grafton’s alphabet series show.  Check out her website, especially the bookshelf page where all the book fronts of the Kinsey Millhone series are shown, starting in 1982.  Twenty-five years ago – every year publishing one new title.
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Y-for-Yesterday
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25 Letters Down, One To Go
An NPR reporter asked Sue Grafton in a 2013 interview if crafting so many murders makes her think about her own mortality.  “I haven’t agreed to do that yet,” Sue says with a laugh — meaning dying. “I know it’s the general plan for humankind.  But you know, I think it’s really rude.”
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Her last book before she died had the letter “Y” – for Yesterday.  She was not able to finish her “Z” book, which would have stood for Zero.  She once told NPR “after she finishes that one, she’s taking a nap.”
She is taking a very long nap… RIP Sue Grafton…

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How to Brand Your Book Covers

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Family-Ties

See Danielle Steel’s numerous books, a great example of cover branding

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During a recent brainstorming session with a multi-book author, I was searching for images of trade-published book covers to show her some that readers easily could recognize – belonging to a certain writer: Similarities throughout the titles, at least in the same genre.

Readers need to know at a glance what your books look like.  The book cover is most important when people are browsing titles online.  It must stand out on online retailer search results, even when the cover is the size of a postage stamp.  The same is true for print books at stores.
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‘Visual Identity’ and Brand
You want your readers to identify your books by their covers. You need to decide how you want to brand your author name.  Use the same font families for the same genres, as you will want your readers to identify your work as quickly as possible.  But font is not only important for your books, your website also should tell a consistent story – even your entire author platform.  Your aim is to be instantly recognizable.
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A brand is a name or logo with which consumers identify certain attributes.  The goal of the cover is to evoke some coded message for the reader.  Sometimes covers now have even cult status.  Align your book covers, create a consistent message for different books you wrote.
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Brand identity looks at the aesthetics you create for your author platform. It focuses on:

  • Colours
  • Fonts
  • Logos
  • Images
  • Layout
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First Important Step:
Take your time and research as many bestsellers in your genre – online, in bookstores and in libraries.  Study at least a hundred or more.  Great examples of book cover branding can be found at Rocking Book Covers.  Read also their article “12 Things to Expect from Your Book Designer”.

You have the power to create your own brand identity, and a clever book cover can help.  You want readers to recognize your titles straight away.  This is how you stand out from the crowd at bookstores and online retailers.  Your book covers can help your author platform.  You can separate it from the process, or make it part of it.  Think about the big picture.  You don’t need to change your coves totally, but maybe altering the font, or changing one of the colours, or adding a simple touch of something to bring it all together.  Package them all in the same style.
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Discuss These Points With Your Designer:

  • Bold or complementary colors?
  • Light on dark for dramatic effects (if it fits to your book content)
  • Test the cover in thumbnail size to make sure it looks good on online page
  • Not more than two different fonts in total
  • Not too wide vertical spaces between lines of text
  • Use few shadow, bevel, gradient or glow – keep it subtle
  • Align the cover text – centre, left or right
  • Place text on plain background to stand out
  • Use the same fonts for all your books, so readers will be able to identify them easily
    .

People read left to right, top to bottom.  Position your elements in appropriate levels of importance.
Never, ever, use a white background for your book!  White on white is barely visible and on websites your book will not stick out, as the sites’ background are almost always white.
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Once you have a mock-up of your book cover, visit a bookstore, place your book on the first table where the NY Times bestsellers are placed.  Does your book cover really stand out?
How consistent is your brand?  Is it the same on your book covers, your website, on Twitter, Google+, Pinterest etc?

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More reading about book covers:

https://savvybookwriters.wordpress.com/2014/03/23/the-best-and-the-worst-book-covers/

https://savvybookwriters.wordpress.com/2013/12/22/book-cover-you-never-get-a-second-chance/

http://www.rockingbookcovers.com/book-cover-design/different-ways-to-brand-book-covers-for-series/

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If you would like to get a mentor and our support in all things publishing, have your book intensively promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites – or learn how you can make yourself a name as an author through content writing: We offer for three months all this and more for only $179 – or less than $2 per day!  Learn more about this customized Online Seminar / Consulting / Book Marketing for your success: http://www.111Publishing.com/Seminars

To learn more about professional book marketing and publishing, please read also
“Book Marketing on a Shoestring”
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00UAVL3LE

Our email newsletters with free insider tips are sent out once a month. To sign up, just go to the form on the right site of each blog post.

The Best and the Worst Book Covers

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1372440635zbro5

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Interesting book covers are getting more exposure on shelf-displays, both online and off-line. We are a very visual culture, which influences our book-buying habits. A stunning book cover is one of the best marketing tools for any writer!  And you will never have a second chance to make a first good impression with your book – online and offline!  In the last weeks I have seen so many ugly and boring book covers and lots of beginner errors on self-published books, I just had to write this reminder.
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Chris Robley wrote recently in a blog for BookBaby:

  1. Before someone buys your book, they will probably read your book description, blurbs, bio, and maybe even skim a few pages from chapter one.
  2. Before they can do any of that reading, they will have to pick the book off a shelf, or perhaps click to the book’s page on Amazon, B&N, etc.
  3. And before they are compelled to click a link or pick up a book, they will have to be attracted to your book’s cover (or thumbnail image).

From the moment a person picks up your book, you have about 6 seconds to convince them to buy it. This includes the time they take to look at the back cover and the spine.

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Front Cover Tips
E-books are bought online, usually displayed on a page with many other books. Therefore clarity, simplicity, brightness and information must jump off the screen. Use simple, yet stunning graphic elements and bold clear text for the title and the authors’ name, both must be easy to read on the tiny online image.
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BookCover_last-last-chance

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And Never, Ever:
use the word “by” before your author name. Using the word ”by” screams DIY self-published.
use a white background for your book! White on white is barely visible and on websites your
book will not stick out, as the sites’ background are almost always white.
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BookCover_eat-pray-love-elizabeth-gilbert
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Back Cover Design
Book Layout Designer Joel Friedlaender posted in a great blog 7 Secrets to Writing Persuasive
Back Cover Sales Copy http://www.thebookdesigner.com/2013/05/casey-demchak-back-cover-copy
“If your cover is good enough to grab readers, your back cover copy needs to convince them to
buy. For authors who self publish this can be a challenge because writing promotional copy
many not be their area of expertise. Plus, for many authors it’s never easy to “brag” about
themselves and their own work.”
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BookCover_valkyrie-book-cover-design-think

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Visit a Bookstore
Check out all the books that are similar to yours. Place your book (or a mock-up) between these.
Does it look better? Is the spine eye-catching? Ask other patrons what they think about every
book, but don’t tell which one is yours. Listen to their opinion. Place your book on the first table in
the bookstore where the NY Times bestsellers are placed. Does your book cover really stand
out?  Has any of the bestsellers the word “by …. author name” on the front cover? For sure not!
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BookCover

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Book Cover Size:
Check if there are specific or popular sizes in the genre your book is in. And do all these
BEFORE your book is ready to print. Later changes only confuse readers and they are very
costly.
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Discuss these Points with Your Cover Designer:

  • Use bold or complementary colors
  • Use light on dark for dramatic effects (if it fits to your book content)
  • Test the cover in thumbnail size to make sure it looks good at Amazon’s website
  • Use not more than different two fonts in total
  • Use not too wide vertical spaces between lines of text
  • Use few shadow, bevel, gradient or glow – keep it subtle
  • Align the cover text – centre, left or right
  • Place text on plain background to stand out
  • Let the front cover design flow into the book’s spine
  • Use the same fonts for all your books and readers will be able to identify them easily
  • People read left to right, top to bottom. Position your elements in appropriate levels of importance

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Read more:

Lousy Book Covers
http://lousybookcovers.tumblr.com/
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Inside Random House: The Journey from Manuscript to Book
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XFUcWguqr7U
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Inside Random House: “The Art of Cover Design”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l2Z86L25v30
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“23 Creative Book Cover Designs and their Story” is a showcase of creative book cover designs,
indicating the typefaces used for the title or text:
http://www.1stwebdesigner.com/inspiration/creative-book-cover-story
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Front and Back Cover Copy for Book Covers
http://www.coverdesignstudio.com/book-cover-copy/
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Joel Friedlander wrote a great blog about brilliant book titles in one of his blogs:
http://www.thebookdesigner.com/2010/06/how-to-write-book-titles-for-people-robotsJoel
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Book Design and Production
http://www.amazon.com/Book-Design-Production-Pete-Masterson/dp/0966981901
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Basics Design Layout, 2nd edition
http://www.amazon.com/Basics-Design-02-Layout-Second/dp/2940411492/
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“40 Extraordinary Photoshop Text Effects”, it shows detailed tutorials, how to create amazing book title effects, step by step and is using lots of screen shots.
http://www.problogdesign.com/resources/40-extraordinary-photoshop-text-effects

Fonts for book titles:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typeface
http://www.dafont.com/themes.php
http://www.1001freefonts.com
http://www.identifont.com

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Tagged: back cover, book cover as marketing tool, book cover design, Book Design and Production, Book Layout, Cover art, e-book cover, font for book cover, front cover, how to create amazing book title effects, Joel Friedlaender, top to bottom

Book Cover: You Never Get a Second Chance …

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… for a first good impression!  Always remember : 
Your books’ title and its appearance is the first, and perhaps only impression you make on a prospective reader.  A great image on your book cover will undoubtedly catch your reader’s imagination, wondering what lies beyond it. A fantastic opportunity to draw readers in.

Not that an appealing cover means automatically a great book, but a book that is accurately and even interestingly represented by its cover, is more likely to catch the eye of someone who is going to enjoy reading it.  Interesting covers are going to get more time on shelf-displays, online and off-line.  We are a visual culture; naturally that is going to influence our book-buying habits.
A stunning book cover is one of the best marketing tools for any writer!
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Bali Rai wrote in one of his blogs:  ”In 2002, as one of the judges on the Guardian’s Teenage prize, I remember a book called Thursday’s Child by Sonya Hartnett.  It’s a simple yet wonderful story of 1930′s Depression-era Australia, and it went on to win the award. However, it was not my choice for winner, simply because I thought the cover illustration would deter people from reading it. It was drab and old-fashioned in my opinion and had I not been reading and judging the book, it would have put me off completely.”
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Here are some points you should discuss with your designer.

  • Use bold or complementary colors
  • Use light on dark for dramatic effects (if it fits to your book content)
  • Test the cover in thumbnail size to make sure it looks good at Amazon’s website
  • Use not more than different two fonts in total
  • Use not too wide vertical spaces between lines of text
  • Use few shadow, bevel, gradient or glow – keep it subtle
  • Align the cover text – centre, left or right
  • Place text on plain background to stand out
  • Use the same fonts for all your books and readers will be able to identify them easily
  • People read left to right, top to bottom. Position your elements in appropriate levels of importance.
  • Never, ever, use a white background for your book! White on white is barely visible and on websites your book will not stick out, as the sites’ background are almost always white.

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E-books are bought online, usually displayed on a page with many other books. Therefore clarity, simplicity, brightness and information must jump off the screen.  A simple and arresting graphic element and bold clear text for the title and the authors’ name must be easy to read on the tiny online image.
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A book that is brilliantly written, but lacks a good quality cover design will remain unnoticed and undiscovered.  It is absolutely crucial to have a book cover that grabs the attention of readers and book buyers and shows the heart and the soul of the book in one single image

Read more:

Lousy Book Covers
http://lousybookcovers.tumblr.com/

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“23 Creative Book Cover Designs and their Story” is a showcase of creative book cover designs, indicating the typefaces used for the title or text:
http://www.1stwebdesigner.com/inspiration/creative-book-cover-story
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Joel Friedlander wrote a great blog about brilliant book titles in one of his blogs:
http://www.thebookdesigner.com/2010/06/how-to-write-book-titles-for-people-robotsJoel
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“40 Extraordinary Photoshop Text Effects” shows detailed tutorials, how to create amazing book title effects, step by step and using lots of screen shots.
http://www.problogdesign.com/resources/40-extraordinary-photoshop-text-effects

Fonts for book titles:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typeface
http://www.dafont.com/themes.php
http://www.1001freefonts.com
http://www.identifont.com

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If you would like to get more support in all things publishing, have your book intensively promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites – or to learn how you can make yourself a name as an author through content writing: We offer all this and more for only $159 for three months! Learn more about this individual book marketing help: http://www.111Publishing.com/Seminars
Or visit http://www.e-book-pr.com/book-promo/ to advertise your new book, specials, your KDP Select Free Days or the new Kindle Countdown Deals.

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Tagged: book cover as marketing tool, book cover design, Book Layout, book shelves, Cover art, e-book cover, font for book cover, front cover, People read left to right, top to bottom, You never get a second chance, Your title and its appearance