Ep 052: “Make Your Book More Appealing”

Welcome to the 52nd episode of The Author Hangout, a podcast designed to help authors, especially self-published and indie authors, with marketing their books and improving their author platform. Authors struggle with various aspects of marketing and we are here to help!

“First I look at the cover and look at the picture and see who it’s by and read the title but then if I think the front cover is interesting, I go to the back and I read what it’s all about… Because sometimes it’s really funny or interesting or maybe I just want to read it because I want to read it. “– Lauren May

Make Your Book More Appealing

In this episode, we switched it up a little bit. Our host, Shawn Manaher, interviewed his 10-year-old niece about her thoughts on books, what appeals to her, and someone who screams a lot (don’t worry, no ear drums will be harmed listening to this episode). Get some great insights from someone who has only been alive for a decade, but who has great insights for all authors to hear.

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Intro

She’s a ten year old with a dream to become an FBI agent. She has a dog named Montana, a cat named Cookie, she likes the color teal and loves to swim. Her name is Lauren May, and she is Shawn’s niece. She’s down here from upstate New York visiting us for a couple of weeks and we wanted to bring the perspective of her thoughts about books and what she’s reading, special reading programs she’s doing this summer and just to give you authors an idea of what kids are thinking about when it comes to books and what they like about them, what they don’t think about them.

Tell us about your summer reading program

“I have a little pamphlet where you have to read 8 books, 8 chapter books and then you walk into a store and give them the pamphlet and you get a free book… I’ve done 6 books already.”

What are some of the books you have been reading?

“Junie B. Jones, Supper Emma, Ivy Bean, Jake and Lily, Judy Bloom, and Nancy Clancy and stuff like that.”

What are you looking at when deciding what books to buy?

“Well first I look at the cover and look at the picture and see who it’s by and read the title but then if I think the front cover is interesting, I go to the back and I read what it’s all about… Because sometimes it’s really funny or interesting or maybe I just want to read it because I want to read it. So yeah.”

What can authors do to make their book more appealing?

“The picture could be more interesting, the back cover could be,…one book I checked out at my old library, it said that something was going to go on which was really funny but that was only a small bit and then there was the rest of it. In the story, it was a chapter book and just one chapter was about the back cover. I didn’t find it interesting so I put it back to the library.”

Here’s Shawn’s take on it:

“That’s a really incredible tip from Lauren May who’s talking about, if you’re going to put something on your back cover to get people enticed to the book and be interested, you want to make sure that you live up to the promise of what is going to be inside the book because otherwise they’re just going to put the book back or they may not buy or worse yet, they may think of you as an author who’s not going to live up to your promises.”

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