SPEAKER_00 0:00

Before commissioning someone for this kind of job, make sure your manuscript is fully finalized and you really understand the book's conflict, characters, and the world. You want your book cover to accurately convey the right message you want to send the readers.

SPEAKER_01 0:18

Welcome to the Write It Scared podcast. I'm your host, Stacey Fraser, a formerly repressed creative soul, turned fiction writer, story editor, and author accelerator certified fiction book coach. At Write It Scared, we tell the truth about why writing a novel is so hard by acknowledging that most writers grapple with two stories: the one they want to put on the page to the best of their ability, and the often subconscious internal story that prevents them from doing it. This show is designed to help you identify and rewrite the internal narrative holding you back while you discover and write the story you want to tell and learn all the tools to help you do that successfully. Join me each week for a new episode where we'll talk about writing to deepen our understanding of the craft and of ourselves as writers. Writing a novel is an inside job that we do not do alone. Welcome to Write It's Scared. I'm glad you're here. Let's dive in. Hey writer. Welcome back to the Write It's Scared podcast. Today we are going to talk all about book cover design. And I know this isn't exactly a craft topic, but this podcast is also dedicated to helping writers learn the tools they need to not only write, but also publish their books. So, and I just couldn't resist because I had so many questions and a beautiful opportunity to ask someone who knows. So today I'm interviewing Katia B from Millbart. Millbart is a team of professional book cover designers who create marketable book covers for indie authors and publishers. Their mission is to create a book cover that turns into an author's number one marketing tool. Katia works as an account manager handling client outreach, education, and promotion. In her free time, she enjoys engaging in outdoor activities, reading, playing computer games, and meeting new friends.

SPEAKER_00 2:04

Hi Katia, thank you so much for being on the show today. I am so happy to be here and talk about book cover design in our amazing company, NickelArt.

SPEAKER_01 2:13

I gave you a bit of a bio, but could you please share a bit more about your journey to working in book cover design with our listeners?

SPEAKER_00 2:19

Certainly, my friend worked at NickelArt before, and she kept sharing all those beautiful book covers she made on her work page on Instagram. And I never thought about any company that would do book cover designing because, like, why would they? But here stories, they really kept me curious. And I got my degree in business administration, and shortly after I saw that Mabel Art had an opening for an account manager position. Now I'm celebrating two years working in this wonderful company. And I adore the design industry, to be honest, since I do graphic design myself, but as a hobby. I still love working with people, helping them out, and it's like a great part of my job.

SPEAKER_01 3:03

It's amazing that when we get to do things that light us up and help other people with our work. So you work as an account manager. You had to explain to me what that meant and what that looked like. And that is you doing outreach and education in the writing community to help writers better understand how to approach book cover design. And you put up a lot of fantastic information and resources, both on social media. And then MibelArt also has a fantastic resource library on their website. I perused through it all and was really impressed. So tell us a little bit more about how Mibbleart works with writers and what makes it different from some of the other design companies out there.

SPEAKER_00 3:52

I love MibelArt for its dedication in providing the most client-oriented conditions out there. This is especially important for new writers who don't know much about book cover designing. They can basically reach out to MibelArt and we take care of any design needs they have. For example, book cover designing, marketing materials for their book publishing, logo design, interior formatting, merge design, and even some custom offers they might need. We also can provide that. Most of our services don't require any prepayment, and we provide unlimited revisions. So, as we like to say, we work until you're completely satisfied with the design. And this approach builds trust and shows our full transparency. Another direction Middle Earth takes, as you mentioned, is educational materials. We post a lot of useful articles on book cover designing and also self-publishing in general. For example, marketing side of a book and some case studies, some success stories, which include tips for which are important for everyone, especially new writers. So I highly recommend to subscribe to our uh newsletter because we share a lot of information there, as well as special promotions or holidays. We normally have at least one or two promotions per season. And also, we are working on a project. I cannot share too many details here, but it's related to charity. So you really want to subscribe to our social media and newsletter to be updated about these things. Also, we are launching an email course, which is absolutely for free. It's about book promotion and marketing channels you can use for your book promotion. And this course is for anyone who wants to learn the marketing side after the book is published.

SPEAKER_01 5:55

That sounds awesome. Well, I'll make sure that we include links to all of that in the show notes. So a big part of this podcast is helping writers find and learn the tools they need to craft and publish stories that they are proud of. And so that is why this topic of conversation has come up today about book cover design. So you know, one of the major things a writer needs to consider when they are thinking about designing the cover for their book. Where do they start?

SPEAKER_00 6:25

Kia, let's first talk about when they should start thinking about book cover design, and then we'll look to the type of book covers they can get, what kind of direction. So first you should start thinking about the book cover as soon as possible. I know this is not a very useful answer, but I will explain. It's a good approach to start looking for options just in case when the time comes, you have the choose good options to choose from. And also if something goes wrong with uh the designer you choose, you can easily switch to another plan B, plan C, and it will not affect your book release because the cover design is uh delayed. Um additionally, if you find an artist who works in the style you really love, you need to make sure this artist will have an availability for your project. Because some uh artists, especially famous ones, they can be booked years in ahead. So if you really want to work with this person, you need to make sure they have availability. And the best timing for beginning to work with the cover designer, I would say if the cover is made, for example, out of stock images, it's not so complicated. At least give it at least three months before the book release. And if you are working with the artist, so the cover is fully illustrated, it means it's drawn from scratch, it will need much more time. So give it at least half a year or even a year before the book release. In this way, you can have this paid margin just in case there is some change of plans. And uh uh so you first need to understand what kind of message you want to send. You need to have a really clear idea what you want to get out of this project. So, talking about the book, the types of book covers, they we will talk about do-it-yourself covers, the pre-made covers or custom covers.

SPEAKER_01 8:20

Let's dig into each of those, like maybe the pros and cons of like the DIY versus the pre-made versus you know the professional working with an illustrator.

SPEAKER_00 8:28

Yeah, so tell me about each of those. Yes, of course. When you do the cover yourself, it's advisable that you have some graphic skills already. Otherwise, there's a possibility that it will not be good. Like, sorry for the hard truth. This option is more might be more time consuming or less time consuming, it depends. It can be more time consuming if you want to learn how to design book covers and you need to spend time on studying graphic design, uh like Googling a lot a lot of information, spend some time like researching. In this case, if you like learning new stuff, maybe you don't care much about book sales, you're doing this project for pun, then it's a great playground. It's fun, wonderful to learn new skills. Talking about premates, as I said earlier, they are ready for sale, maybe they need some changes there. But some people like getting premates and they don't have story written. Like they just like the how the cover looks like, and they say, okay, I will write the story for this cover. If you're into these things, also it's totally fine. However, if this is a very important project you care about, you spend a lot of time working on this project, why would you cut costs on the cover in this case? Of course, you want to get some very personalized customized service, which is a customly created cover, which Mible art does. In this case, you are work closely with a book cover designer who shares their experience, their professional vision, they know what sells in the market. And in this case, you get a cover which is totally perfected towards your needs, towards your request. And it's like hiring a tailor who like gathers all the measurements of your body and makes perfect folders for you. It's the same thing with custom covers.

SPEAKER_01 10:36

Got it. So when we talk about cost and time commitment, DIY sounds like it's less costly depending on the tools that you have available to you, right? If you're already into graphic design and you already own some of that tech to be able to help you. And also depends on if you're doing this is just to learn for yourself, or if yeah, it just depends. Tell me the the cost difference between pre-made and working with a designer. What are you looking at there?

SPEAKER_00 11:09

Premates are normally cheaper than cost of work. I would say up to 200, up to 300 USD for a pre-mate. By the way, Mabel Art is one of the company of Mabel Group. So we also have a pre-mate shop. You can check. It's called Get Premates. You can see some of other our works for sale there. And talking about the custom cover, you can find a very cheap option on Fiverr, for example, for $5-10. But like I don't advise doing this because if the person charges that little for such work, you need to check like is it legit or not? Like if this person really can produce the kind of work you want, like a professional one. Still for well-designed custom covers, I would say the price would go up from $300 and it can reach thousands of dollars actually. If it's a really famous book cover designer, they will probably charge up to $1,000 for the cover.

SPEAKER_01 12:16

Well, that's good to know. I mean, because you have to be able to budget and manage your expectations around this. So I was very curious to a writer would go about doing some target research. Let's say that they are either looking to purchase a pre-made or they're going to do a custom cover. How do they want to approach this when they start with their target research? Are they uh what would you what advice would you give? Like looking into genre, looking into bestsellers, what do you have authors do?

SPEAKER_00 12:48

First of all, to decide what type of book cover you want to get, you need to decide your goals and make a strategy. If you want to make sales, if you want to like make money out of this product, you need to invest money. So it might be hard to not invest any money and get and drive sales, you know. It it works with everything. So if this project is just for fun, pre-mates DIY is a great option. It's a project uh for fun, or premates also. If you can find a pre-mate that resonates with your story, that's great. If you cannot find it, you want to write a story for it, it's for fun. So, first of all, you need to plan this. And if you don't have a budget strategy, it's easy to just spend all the money on the first stages of your book publishing process. Like you go to the editor, you spend all your money there, and then book coverage designer, formatter, marketer, they get no budget. And this is a really wrong approach. So you need to distribute your finances so you can get all the professional services. So, yeah, the research is very important as well. Even if you decide to work with the professional book cover designer, of course, they already know the market, they know the genre standards, everything. However, it's important for you to also know what you want, to train your eye, and go to the bookstore, see what kind of book covers are already there in your genre, and also just try to notice some similarities. What components of a design define this genre? You might notice that the colors are similar in a certain genre or the composition of the book cover. Maybe there is some trend, for example, for young adult book covers. There's a trend that there is no like people on the cover, what's the objects? And this will help you to have a clear understanding on the market. So when you work with a book cover designer, you can understand why they're doing certain things. And it's also important to prepare references for the cover designer. So while you're doing your research, you can save covers you like and covers you don't like and write down why, why you put this cover on the list. Otherwise, if you send a cover for a book cover designer, just like maybe you like the color of this cover, right? But the designer might think that you like something else in this cover because you haven't specified why did you put this cover? So this is all very important.

SPEAKER_01 15:26

So if you're writing a series, and let's say you have your first book in series done and you're ready to put it out there in the world, does that impact how you think about designing your covers? The fact that it's maybe an unfinished series? Do you have any advice for writers writing in series?

SPEAKER_00 15:44

This is really important to mention to a cover designer if this is a series or not, because the first cover in the series it will determine the whole direction for any other books. And if, like on the book three, you want to suddenly change, it will cost you a lot of money to change the covers for any every other book that was before. So the aesthetics are set to the rest of the series, and they should be consistent and defined a unique series branding to make it clear that these books are part of the same universe. Also, it's important for a designer to plan ahead because if you will, for example, want a character on your cover, the designer has to make sure that they will have enough materials to put this character on each cover. For example, unique post or facial expression. They might be you might find some stock images website. You might find a person you want to put on your cover, but there will be only one picture of this person. So what do you do for the rest of the series? In this case, it's important to let designer know what they want to see on the cover or like talk with designers so they share ideas. Also, no matter how many books will be in a series, the effort of creating a unique design must be equally distributed. This ensures that each book stands out and not just the first one. You put all your creativity, all your ideas to these first two books, and then you don't know what to do for the rest. So to eliminate this, it has to be discussed beforehand if this is a stand-alone novel or it's a series. That's a good tip.

SPEAKER_01 17:29

Thank you so much. So do you have any advice, any pitfalls that writers should avoid when they're coming to think about their book cover design?

SPEAKER_00 17:39

One of the most significant pitfalls is when the book cover fails to accurately represent the content within. This can confuse readers and lead to disappointment. Because they expect one thing, but when they read the book, there's the whole another thing. Writers and designers must collaborate closely to ensure that the cover reflects the essence of the story, its themes, and its uh target audience as well. And it's the author's responsibility to provide enough information for a designer to make sure that the designer understands the heart of the book so that they can create visuals that invoke the right emotions and intrigue potential readers. Some might think that designers have to read the book in order to understand the essence, but this is not true. Usually it's enough for a detailed creative brief from the author to let the designer know what are some important aspects of the story. And because a book cover is just a visual tool. It ha it shouldn't explain the story. The purpose of the book cover is just to attract attention and let the potential reader look at flip the book and look at the the back cover text so they can learn more about the story. It's like there are some people that think, oh, I need to explain my story on the book cover. Like the characters have to be 100% accurate, or there should be like this detail and that detail, but this may mislead the message. The reader will get confused. So there are lots of methods. How can you effectively uh show your story through visuals? And good thing that designers they uh they know how to do it. So to avoid any pitfalls working with a book cover designer, it's important to prioritize effective collaboration and communication. Writers may have a vision for the their book cover, but they they can struggle to effectively convey it to the designer. While designers, they uh they may face challenges in understanding the author's preferences and expectations. So this can result in misaligned expectations and dissatisfaction with the final design. So both parties have to establish open and clear communication during this process. So the writers they provide detailed information, detailed feedback, their preferences, and designers they listen to the author's feedback and incorporate it into the design, offering guidance and expertise along the way. Also, it helps to present clear milestones or deadlines to ensure that the project is moving somewhere and both parties are satisfied.

SPEAKER_01 20:43

I would imagine that that would be really important to line out in the beginning is what the expectations are around communication and how often and when we'll be expected to be at a certain stage along the way. Does Memphis have a process for collecting all of the information that the designers need to know before they begin on a project?

SPEAKER_00 21:05

So, first of all, general information about your book, like title, subtitle, genre, then some technical aspects like where are you going to publish this book? If you know the size, how many pages, is it cream or white pages? Because it affects the wide the width of the spine. If you have a clear idea already what you want to see on the cover, there is a question. What do you want to see in the cover actually? If you don't have ideas, it's okay. We will help you with generating some, but you will need to provide us a detailed description of your story. It doesn't have to be the manuscript. It takes too much time to read it. You can just describe your story in details and highlight important important events or key themes, maybe what is the content of the book, and it will help to design. And the cover that will visually tell about uh the information you provided.

SPEAKER_01 22:05

Cool. Yeah, I know for myself as a c consumer, I am drawn into a book when I get a sense of the atmosphere and tone that the book will provide from the cover. So if it's, you know, if it's eerie or scary or light and fun, like I feel like the or sentimental or whatever, I feel like that kind of have an expectation in my head already built up just from looking at the book for a second. And then, you know, if I'm interested, then I will pick it up and I will flip it over and I'll read the blur. And then if I'm still interested, I'll open it up and I'll read, you know, the fur the opening lines. And then that by that point, I'm pretty much sunk. Like I'll buy it. So are there any myths about book cover design that you would like to bust?

SPEAKER_00 22:52

Some people might think that book cover is solely about aesthetics. Uh, in reality, while having an eye-catching cover is important for grabbing a reader's attention, it's equally crucial for the cover to effectively communicate the essence of the book and its target be appealing to a target audience. And a well-designed book cover should show the tone, genre, and themes of the book, acting like the visual representation as the content. And even though we can talk about the importance of book cover for hours, there is a book cover directly affects the representation of your book, but it doesn't guarantee sales. That is another myth. The quality of the book's content plays the most significant role in determining its success. Also effective marketing and promotion, positive reader reviews and understanding genre standards and audience preferences are also an essential component. While a great cover can grab attention, is the combination of these factors that ultimately drive uh book sales and the success uh in this uh competitive market. Yeah, that I think that's a great place to wrap up.

SPEAKER_01 24:06

It is a vital factor, but it is not the only factor in whether a book is successful or not. Thank you so much for all of your time today. Where can listeners find you and MibbleArts if they are ready for book cover design?

SPEAKER_00 24:21

Please find me on Instagram. It's Katya.and for the company. You can find it as it's M-I-B-L-A-R-T.com. And just go to our website, browse around, you can get the free cover idea, or you can go ahead and place the order for cover, or if you contact us through the website, our project managers will reply. We can also contact me about the project. I will reply to you from my Instagram page.

SPEAKER_01 24:51

Thank you so much. And I would I agree that there is just a host of fantastic resources on the MibbleArt. That word is really hard for me to say, on the Mibble Art website. I've perused through them all and I did subscribe to the email sequence, and it was very, very helpful for educational purposes about how to think about target research. And so I'm always into promoting other people who are giving out, you know, useful tools and education to writers so that they can move forward on their writers' journey. So thank you so much again, and we'll see you next time. Thank you for listening to the Ride It Scared podcast. If you enjoyed today's show, please make sure to hit the follow button so you never miss an episode. And please leave a review. Reviews help other writers like you find the voices and messages they need to hear to continue to write their stories. Let's lift each other up. Remember, you can be scared and still be unstoppable. I'll see you next week.