My first month in indie
publishing was an active one, and I didn’t even publish a book. Last month, I
took a five-day Amazon Ad challenge with Bryan Cohen (he has another challenge
coming up in April that I highly recommend,) started a website on WordPress,
and wrote one-third of a new novella for Barbour which will satisfy my last
traditional contract. So, out of all of this, what did I learn?
A good cover matters.
As I said earlier, I took The
Five-Day Amazon Ad Challenge with Bryan Cohen, and as part of it, I had to make
several different types of ads—automatic and keyword—then watch how these ads performed
over several days to see which were more productive. For this project, I
selected Courting Doctor Clark, one of the books Harlequin gave me back when
the Love Inspired Historical closed down.
I was excited to advertise
this book. It was part of the Heartsong Presents division that LIH bought out,
but never promoted. But as the days drew out, I was getting clicks but no
sales. When I asked Bryan about this, he asked me some pointed questions
regarding my cover. Did my cover attract the kind of reader I wanted? Was it in
line with my genre? If I saw my cover, would I want to buy the book?
So, I went back and looked at
my cover:
Though I liked this cover, I’m
not sure it appealed to my audience which is a thirty-five to forty-year-old
woman who loves to read as an escape and enjoys history. It looked more like a
regency than the American historical romance I wrote. If I was completely
honest with myself, I probably wouldn’t buy it if I saw the cover alone.
After studying the one hundred
best sellers in my genre, I contacted the new cover designer I’m working with,
paged through her ready-art covers and found one that answered most of the
questions Bryan had asked me. It’s not the perfect cover, but in order to see
if my Amazon ads worked, I needed to change it fast.
Here’s the new cover:
Within twenty-four hours, I
saw a dramatic difference in my sales and KU page read-throughs. I continued my
ads through this month and to date, my sales/read-throughs have gone from the
single digits to triple digit sales, a 3000 percent increase as of February 14.
So, what did I learn? Covers
matter, particularly when you’re using Amazon to distribute your book. Think
about it—when someone types in ‘historical romance’ into Amazon’s search
engine, they’re presented with a list of books. No blurbs or reviews, just
covers.
Like I said, covers matter!
What do you find appealing in the covers of your favorite books? Do you buy a book because of the cover? Why?
Covers matter, particularly when you’re using Amazon to distribute your book. via @pattywrites #SeriouslyWrite #amwriting
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Patty Smith Hall lives in North Georgia with her husband of 36+ years, Danny. Her passion is
to write tender romances based in little-known historical moments. The winner of the 2008 ACFW Genesis award in historical romance, she is published with Love Inspired Historical, Barbour and Winged Publishing, and is a contributor to the Seriously Writing blog as well as Journey magazine. Patty is represented by Tamela Hancock Murray of the Steve Laube Agency. 
Crinoline Creek, Texas, 1868
A Cowboy of Her Own by Patty Smith Hall
A Cowboy of Her Own by Patty Smith Hall
Bookish southern belle Madalyn Turner knows what she wants—to be a cowboy and own a Texas ranch. But books are far different from real life and soon she realizes she needs help.
