Viewers’ eyes decide on what book to read while scrolling down to the screen. Thinking about the inside material is the second step. Today we are will be only focusing on what is outside, the outlook the cover design of your e-book. The saying that does not judge a book by its cover does not imply in every situation most of the times viewers like to decide a book by its cover design, how creative it is? What it is telling about inside material? Is it of their interest or not? What is the theme? These are some of the questions readers asked themselves while deciding on a book.
Still deciding book come after a book cover design caught their attention. As an e-book writer, you must only care about the content you write but guess what? Elements like book cover design, size, dimension are some of the decisive features as well for designing a book. Of course, you are planning to launch and sell it, right? Readers would always like to know what they are getting into.
Are you a professional graphic designer who is trying to get an author’s book cover design? or you are an author yourself trying to understand guidelines for your book’s cover design? does not matter if you are either. This blog will clear all your confusion with additional tips and ideas. Creative designs can develop by learning and making efforts with your desired expectations and ideas while keeping the actual theme in your mind.
Difference between an E-book and print book cover design
The first major difference between an e-book and a print book is that e-books do not have a back and spine which also have to be designed in print books.
Second, e-book cover design has a different feature than printed book the cover cannot work in the same way. Why? The dimensions and sizes, e-book cover has a restriction of designing a book cover in a way they can be displayed in different sizes, thumbnail to actual size.
Thumbnails are designed so users can see your book easily while scrolling down, it is also a very important factor to consider.
Other than this there is no actual difference between an e-book and a print book. Readers are reading the same material either it’s on-screen or in print, the main focus will be genre and the theme.
Why is e-book cover design so important to ponder?
Let’s not get into detailing paragraph about it rather we will put it for you in some important points so you can understand fast and easily. Some of the points below will be describing the importance of designing an e-book cover:
- Catch the attention of viewers while scrolling.
- Generate interest for readers before they read.
- A strong and creative book cover design is a way of perfect first impression.
- A properly designed book cover can tell everything about the book’s genre and theme.
- Tells a lot about the author’s thinking as well.
- Helps the reader to decide easily.
- Even if the content is not that good, a good design book cover can motivate readers to buy.
- Easy to target your specific audience.
Considerable questions for designing any book’s cover
We are listing down a few questions that should be considered before designing a book’s cover. These questions will help with all the confusion and problems in the future, or in case you miss any while designing. Or if you are a designer, you should ask your client.
- What type of book cover are you looking for? Print media/web media or both?
- What is the genre of the book?
- What are the different aspects you would like to see in your book cover design?
- What is the key message (if) you are trying to deliver through this book?
- What are the target audience’s behavioral, geographical, demographical, and psychological aspects?
- What are the different online book publishers you are considering?
There are tons of publishers with their criteria that must consider before designing a cover. for instance; Apple iBook’s dimension is 8×6 inches. While amazon kindle’s dimensions are 6.3×4.5×0.34 inches.
Choosing for Correct e-book cover dimensions
Different aspect has to be considered before we jump into designing, choosing correct book dimensions are important for various platforms. Let’s start with:
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Reader’s screen size
There are dozens of platforms and display screens to read new books. Readers can have their screens as well. A designer should consider all the platforms while designing or otherwise the reader would face difficulties and that will be a huge failure. If any author is considering hiring a graphic designer for his or her book’s brands design then better look for a professional one with experience of doing so.
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Genres
Every reader has an interest in a different set of genres or some might go for variety but the point different genres have different book cover dimensions, shocking? I know. Make sure how you are going to market your book according to the genre.
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Words limit
Dimensions also vary with the word count of the book. The length of your material will be the aspect to make changes in dimensions adjustments. You might be writing a novella so you would not want to go with larges fonts.
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Designer
It is not necessary that a designer who has tons of experience can also design a cover for your e-book to sell out online. You have to do market research on it to cut down the future regrates. The author should also have a basic knowledge about book cover design, this way he can make sure his or her book’s cover is designed well.
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Cost
Different sizes of your book with different elements can lift the cost of designer book cover up and down. Designers charge a lot and to be honest it’s not that easy to design a book cover that is going to sell out in the market. If your budget is not flexible you should concise your book’s cover accordingly.
Vital Steps For Engaging E-Book Cover Design
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Search for different ideas
Searching and looking for good ideas related to your book’s genre will give the of what has been done. You must not be wanting to create a replica of the existing version of the genre, but gather the information only. For example, if your book’s genre is suspense search for different suspense books and learn how they conveyed their message through their book cover designs. Adheres to the design norms from famous and best books sold online of your same genre for distinct aspects. This will save you from targeting the wrong set of audiences.
You may want to scroll down through different platforms so you can your inspiration like amazon, they have different portions for bookselling you can check what book is sold more and has eye catchy book cover. explore Pinterest, save the different designs you may like for further, you might come with a new idea or maybe you would mix all the inspirations you saved with the touch of the theme. Another site you can look at is kindlepreneur they have separated the entire board for book cover design tactics, inspirations, and ideas.
Remember, do not copy or call it inspiration anyone’s book’s main object or aspect you may say. This search will only be done for gathering ideas and better understanding.
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Podiums and their tools
A certain amount of platforms, software, and apps offer book cover designing features. Further, it is your choice either you want to go for custom design or template. Normally, when designers are hired by authors they do custom designs for the client. Custom design means designing from scratch, only original and new ideas accordingly. Different platforms offer different features like:
- Canva
- MS word
- Adobe photoshop
- Placeit
- GIMP
- Coverfactory
- Ebook maker
- Insofta
- Mediamodifier
Through some of these apps, you can only design custom, some of them offer template and a few of these offers both features as well. You have done a lot of hard work in writing a book, it is suggested to hire a professional graphic designer if you are not willing to ruin your book’s image. Hiring will cost definitely but will also provide you a professional look for your long write book.
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Appropriate cover size
When you start working on designing anything from a logo to the book cover, you may find that step is always choosing the size. If you choose the size of your required dimensions after book design it will ruin your design’s alignment, this way you will have to adjust everything from the beginning and it might not look that perfect or professional, you probably want to skip the problems. Define the accurate width-height ratio to fit into desired dimensions.
Sometimes designers have to go through different canvases to design one book cover for different sizes, screens, and platforms.
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How to add life to your book’s cover?
Different aspects can result in a great title cover for your book. Even little detailing matters while designing, if you are not a designer your self you may not notice these but a designer always consider these small details because these result in an aesthetic look for your viewer’s eye. Now we will discuss these aspects in some detail.
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Themed fonts
Yes, fonts also have themes. Certain fonts are used for specific themes only. Fonts help greatly in designing a cover page, it reflects better to the viewer if used properly.
For e.g: romance genre (amaze, lavender, twilight)
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Right colors
We all have learned from our childhood that colors play great roles in building our memory. Colors are always the first thing that we see and attract us, we see colors with different themes and ideas. For instance; we see red as danger, evil or bold. Like these different colors convey a different message while designing we have to be concerned for our theme and stick to it.
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An accurate image is important.
Some authors set their images or some set professional photographs for a certain genre. You might have also seen original pictures that were taken for a certain book. Most of the time book sod does not even have the image, they only put large fonts with certain elements, that’s it.
But if you are adding an image to your title, the key is to make it simple do not add too much traffic, and make it attractive for your readers.
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Feedbacks!
With all these ideas and inspirations you must have created multiple cover designs for your book. It’s time to ask your friends and family, which one looks more attractive to them or maybe raise a poll. Select the one with the most votes.
Conclusion
A single wrong decision while designing can ruin all the hard work you made in writing your book. The content in the book is a king, but the cover design is the first impression that attracts mouses in the cage. We hope you will this blog helpful, follow us for more and comment if you have any queries for us.