Going beyond the book cover

Along with getting a professional and effective book cover design the next element which any author should be focusing upon are the materials used to help promote their book to a wider audience, if you are an indie author however, you’ll be well aware that the book’s promotion and exposure will be down to you completely, so it pays to consider how your book will be represented.
 
This should be considered as early as possible even as you’re in the process of writing the first couple of chapters, most authors will start with a ‘slow-trickle’ approach to the promotion of their book building the awareness of the title and its future release. What it isn’t about is ‘spamming’ followers on social media or excessive comments (packed with links) on others blogs, again, this is a slow tickle to generate genuine interest.
 
With that in mind we have to look at the type of content which you are posting, when it comes to the use of Twitter and Facebook then you should be using something visual to grab the attention of the reader, it’s also worth taking into consideration that both social media streams get inundated with updates very quickly so you will only have a small window to catch your viewers eye.
 
Using a small digital poster to update your followers will allow you to stand out in the crowd, on top of this it helps to cement your standing as a professional author too. Digital posters and banner ads should be based around the design of your book cover, however, if you’re starting the process early then you may not even have a book cover designed yet, but don’t let this stop you.
 
Without a cover your promotional banner/ad should take elements from with the book itself, it should make the viewer aware of the book’s overall concept and theme, you want the banner/ad to be memorable and eye-catching but without becoming too busy or crowded.
 
The size of your banner/ad is also very important, most of the social media streams will only show a portion of a larger image so sizing the poster to the smaller ‘what’s seen’ size will ensure that the reader gets the message. You have to be realistic and understand that most ads never get clicked on (to open up for the full message), so it’s here where you need to make it readable in an instant.
 
So along with the images and designs which you’ll use on social media you should consider what images you’ll use within your website or blog.
 
Again, banners and ads will really help and you’ll also have the advantage of being able to control the size and placement of the designs too, the use of 3D renderings of your book is also important as it shows your book as a tangible product. For the 3D elements then there are several ways to showcase your book, you’ll want to show the book as a paperback, hardback and even upon the screen of a tablet to represent the eBook version.
 
But along with the images of your actual book it is still good to use some elements from within the book itself, these can become backgrounds or headers/footers to the pages of your site or blog, it all adds to the overall perception that your readers will have of you, again, you want this to accurately reflect the professionalism and creativity of your book and writing skills.