Book Cover Judgement Day | How To Find (Great) Indie Books
BOOM - Nailed it.
The Terminator movie came out in 1984.
The movie poster had Conan the Barbarian (the only movies Arnold was known for at that time) on it with a familiar Coppertone tanning lotion golden gleam to his skin.
But there the similarities ended.
Conan now had a flat-top instead of long Fabio locks, and was holding a laser-sighted 1911-type handgun instead of the enormous Barbarian Atlantean sword.
And, of course, he was wearing sunglasses.
Conan had become The Terminator.
The comparison is near ludicrous now. Most people know Arnold “I’ll Be Back” Schwarzenegger as The Terminator and would ask “Who’s Conan?”
I am sorry, Conan fans.
Search your feelings; you know it’s true.
And as the years pass and other actors and movies and iconic characters fill our lives and experiences and everyday shared social interactions, The Terminator and Arnold will join Conan in the dusty remotes of “the past,” large deserts of memory that time slowly wears away as its sands blow in gusts of years and decades to erode what once was into oblivion.
*sigh*
(Red Sonia is my favorite Conan movie.)
But at the time that The Terminator came out, whether you were aware of Conan or not, you knew a couple of things about the movie (even without reading the tiny print on the poster):
- 1) The main character was a badass. (Sunglasses, duh.)
- 2) The movie would be a thriller. (Big gun. Assassin laser sight. And guys in leather jackets and no t-shirts underneath usually don’t have long dialogue-y soliloquies of angst. Especially if they have a gun. Shoot first, conversation never.)
- 3) This is not a Rom-Com, happy, skip-through-the-forest-of-your-feelings character building movie. (The coloring is dark and very shadowed. Character is serious. And see #1 and #2.)
And this Badass Conan guy is the only character on the poster.
This movie is about this guy.
And all of that ended up being true about the movie.
There was a lot more to it, the backstory and acting by the other characters, the writing, was all pretty great. A reason that – arguable after too long – the second movie came out.
And of course, the rest is history.
The poster gave us all we needed to know to get a good idea of what we were going to get if we paid too much money for popcorn and a soda (and Junior Mints if you had any sort of sanity), and sticky-slid our Converses past awkward knees to a faux-velvet covered, creaking spring-loaded seat and starred at the images on a giant white wall for 2 hours.
So with one glance at that movie poster we have a reactive “yes” or “no.”
Yes, when does the movie come out?! I will save up my dimes starting right now.
Or no, I’d rather go see All of Me and laugh my buns off with Steve Martin and Lily Tomlin. I mean, I have no idea what the story is about from the poster, but who cares? It’s Steve Martin and Lily Tomlin. Comedy. Laughing. Sign me up!
So that is the power of a marketing image to tell a consumer what a thing is, or at least giving enough of a gist, the heart of it, so the consumer can say “yes” or “no” and be pleased with their assessment later on.
Yep, that is exactly what I thought it would be.
Next?
But what you don’t want in your marketing is…
But that didn’t even touch the depths of dark within this movie. Even darker since I didn’t expect it. Twenty-six years later I am still angry about it. But, from a marketing standpoint, which is wholly way-over-there away from my personal feelings, what happened to me is...
You Talking To Me?
Getting the message wrong in your marketing is arguably the worst thing.
(But I don’t think so, and I will tell you why.)
Because now you have angry people that thought they were getting one thing and got something completely else.
I watched the movie Happiness in the theatre.
Let me resay that.
I walked out of the movie Happiness, the only movie I have ever walked out of, because it was so completely NOT what I expected from the poster.
Well, the title.
I was twenty, and got hooked by the name. Saw it won an award. And the characters on the front were cartoon drawings. And from a childhood of Bugs Bunny and Tweety Show and Saturday morning cartoons I equated cartoons to happy. Safe. A certain level of expectation. Didn’t catch that the characters on the poster in their small drawn selves all looked miserable.
But that didn’t even touch the depths of dark within this movie.
Even darker since I didn’t expect it.
Twenty-six years later I am still angry about it.
But, from a marketing standpoint, which is wholly way-over-there away from my personal feelings, what happened to me is still good marketing.
What!?!
Why?
No, not because I went to the movie and they got a sale.
That doesn’t even matter.
What matters is that I had a strong (though negative) experience and so I will be (and did) talk about it to others. (I am even talking to you about it now.)
I am getting the word out!
I was actively advertising for this movie. And advertising it for exactly what it was.
And that would eventually land on ears that would like that kind of movie.
Or at the very least get people curious to see it. See what all my fuss was about.
And all my fuss was what?
Advertising.
(You’re not welcome!! I am still mad at you. Your poster is still WAY off the mark.)
So wrong can still be beneficial. From a marketing standpoint.
What the worst is…
What The Heck Is That?
Confusion.
Or just not knowing what you are looking at.
Nora Roberts (yep, if you have read my blogs prior you are not surprised I brought her up. Aww, Nora.) is a huge name and people who don’t even read her know about what you are going to get in a Nora book. She is Arnold in his heyday.
You know she will be back.
You kinda don’t need to even have a cover for her books.
She IS Nora Roberts.
And they have rebranded her books into that vein.
Unfortunately.
I recently relistened to and blogged about one of my favorite books by her, The Search (you can read that here) that is about dogs, and search dog training with a romance because it’s Nora. With the cover sitting on my screen that I only glanced at occasionally as I moved about my day with her story words being spoken into my ear.
And it bothered me.
I didn’t know why.
Until now.
Take Nora’s name off the cover and there is nothing about the cover that speaks to the story.
At all.
It is literally a road. Paved highway. With guard rails. Trees on the side. A little hazy.
That’s it.
No dogs.
No couple.
No reference to a serial killer.
The search was always in the woods.
Her driveway is dirt.
They live on an island. Paved highways? Driving? Not really a focus of the story.
At least prior to this cover, there was a dog in, like, a mist and some woods. And an eerie feeling (which nails the serial killer as it’s kind of a periphery thing until the end). Still no character or main couple. No people at all.
But for goodness sake, at least there was a dog! I think that pulled me to listen to this story because that was the cover I saw.
Nora Roberts plus dog?
I’m in! I’ll give that one a try.
No dog and no Nora Roberts?
Is this a book which I see before me? Hence forth within thy pages, where dost thou leadeth me?
And why should I care?
Diamonds In The Rough
That is a very good question.
Because the knee-jerk answer is you should care, and because there are diamonds in the rough of the books that are out there right now.
I have spoken a lot about finding your next new favorite books and authors.
Well, some of them are ridiculously good writers who will knock your socks off!
But since they don’t have Nora Freaking Roberts brand-name recognition that is society-wide, nor are they professional cover artists, they may not nail the cover.
Or even come close.
You may have seen one and walked past, not registering it as a novel. Or even as a book.
Who are these authors and how do you see them and wade into their midst to find the gems?
Come back next week and I would love to tell you just that!
Have a wonderful week, dear people.
Stephanie Writt
Writer, instructor, graphic artist and all around lovely soul, with a generous sense of humor (yes, I am totally writing this myself), takes delight in sharing her geeky knowledge and ridiculous joy in reading, writing and business. As the current Director of Operation at WMG Publishing Inc., she has the privilege and mischievous pleasure in writing this blog every week.
When Covers Go WRONG!!
Here is the Original cover - Do you know what that story is about?
Here is the new NAILED IT cover! See a difference?
Ghost of a Chance
The Poker Chip
by Dean Wesley Smith
Attorney Gail Kelly dies suddenly on her way to dinner and within minutes meets Dan Carson, aka Sunset.
A Ghost Agent for over a hundred years, Sunset offers to help train Gail. But somewhere in their lust for each other (yes, ghosts can be horny) they stumble onto a plan that could destroy the world.
Dan and Gail and other Ghost Agents must join up with Poker Boy and his team and a bunch of gods to try to save the world just one more time.
USA Today bestselling author Dean Wesley Smith brings you the fifth book in the crazy Ghost of a Chance series.
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