1. I took time and did not hurry the
process
2. I studied a lot of book trailers on
You Tube – some good, some not so much, some done by pro teams and publishers,
others by authors.
3. I had a small budget so needed to be
creative
4. I worked with a professional designer,
Klaus Hartleben, who I trust, respect
and who designs my kindle covers. Yes, you can do it yourself – all of it – but
I am not a designer so I would rather pay someone else to do this bit so it
looks as professional as possible
5. I wanted specially written original
music so commissioned a professional composer to do it. I love Barry Seaman’s music and knew it would
be good. Music really enhances the storytelling in the trailer and brings out
the emotion.
6. I chose the words for the trailer –
this took time and a lot of careful thought.
I made several drafts before I was totally happy. Did it tell a story? Did it engage the viewer?
7. I picked stock photo images – again
carefully chosen. I did change a few
after my original selections.
8. A book trailer is like a mini
film. It has to intrigue people above
all else and engage them emotionally.
9. I asked the opinions of two people
not involved in the process for a more objective view. It’s too easy to fall in love with your own creations
and lose sight of their purpose!
10. After seeing the first draft of the trailer,
(without the music) I got even more picky, and edited words and images again –
just subtle changes.
11. I made sure the trailer info on You Tube had the book
links and my blog links.
12. After the final version was complete,
I waited and reflected for a while, to make sure I was totally happy, before
loading onto You Tube.
13. After it had received around 50 hits,
I added it to my Amazon author pages for the UK and US.
14. I sent it out – in individual messages
(not a mass email) – to friends, colleagues and associates, plus all organisations
that might be interested.
15. I did the same with my Linked in
networks.
16. With Facebook groups, I also sent individual
messages – never assume it’s okay to just post on someone else’s page without
asking permission.
17. After a week, I checked my book sales
to see what effect the book trailer might have had.
18. I did the same with my blog to see if
any viewers were finding it via You Tube.
19. Between 20 and 28 October it had 344
views. I had the search title as Coming Home by Jane Ayres. There are lots
of other book trailers for the same title, ie, plenty of other books called Coming Home. Was mine getting lost? So on 29 October I changed the search title to Norwegian Forest Cat Adventure
book trailer to see if it improves the visibility.
20. If having a book trailer results in more books sales, I
plan to do a trailer for another title in the near future – possibly more. A book trailer is an investment of time and
money. So is it worth it? It's too early to say yet.
I couldn’t figure how to embed clickable
weblinks into book trailers, and I couldn’t find any that do this. So if you know how to do this I would love to
hear from you! In the fast, impatient world that we live in, with instant clicks to
anything we want, I wonder how many
people will want to scroll to the info after viewing the trailer to click on the Buy links? Any feedback on this very welcome!
I’m happy with the result of all our work with the trailer - what do you
think?
If you enjoy Barry's music you might also like http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIyhg8e04cI
