Cover Reveals as Publicity: An Open Book Blog Hop Post

 

Welcome to Open Book Blog Hop. You can find us every Monday talking about the writing life. I hope you'll check out all the posts: you'll find the links at the bottom of this post.

Does anyone do cover reveals as part of your publicity for a new book? Do they work anymore?

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I'm still quite fond of cover reveals, but I'm probably not the most "on trend" author you'll ever meet. After all, I'm still blogging here, and I started back when blogging was more hip and cool--2009. So maybe I'm old-fashioned. 

Still, if I stay old-fashioned long enough I become retro and cool again, right? 

image source

Book covers are still the best opportunity authors have to succinctly let readers know what their books are about. In that instant of seeing an image, you can get so much information. A picture really is worth a thousand words! 

By color palette, font selection, and type of image, a reader can instantly gauge if a book is more dark or light, what genre umbrella it might fit under, and sometimes a hint at the plot. Honestly, it's a lot of pressure on a piece of art, to convey all of that. 

I'm always excited when I get to the book cover part of the process. So far, I'm traditionally published (meaning I work with a publishing company, rather than putting out my work myself in an independent capacity), so the cover part comes later in the process. I know a lot of indies who start with the cover and use the cover as inspiration and pre-publication publicity. 

But in traditional publishing (at least in my corner of it), the cover comes after the book is accepted and going through editing. My publishing house uses a mixture of in-house and freelance artists and does a GREAT job branding so that books of a feather flock together well. 

Here's what they've done for my Menopausal Superhero series so far. The top row are the novels and the bottom row are the novellas and shorts. Both use the silhouettes with pops of color. In the novels, we've using more vibrant colors as we've moved through the series, and choosing positions for the heroines to show where they are in their journeys. The comic book feeling stripes on the short works are one of my favorite features. 

Each time I got a new cover, I'd share it first with friends and family, and get feedback to see if we want to request tweaks or changes, then I'd share it with my newsletter subscribers and social media followers trying to build up some excitement, especially if I can announce the release date, too, or share a pre-order link. Then I use the image in all my publicity. 

They say people have to see an image seven times before it sticks with them, so I put it out there a lot. 

Does any of this help my sales? Heck if I know. I'm not spending my time crunching numbers or evaluating statistics to figure that out. What it does do is keep up my enthusiasm and excitement. In short, it brings me joy, and that's at the heart of why I do this at all. So hurray for cover reveals! 

Are you fond of cover reveals? Do they help you decide what to read? I'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments. 

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