But … BUT …

That doesn’t mean you should unthinkingly go with your designer’s choices either.

Back in March, Elizabeth Gilbert of Eat, Pray, Love fame was battling her publisher over the design of her latest book, The Signature of All Things. The situation was somewhat unusual. While traditional publishers have final say over book design, Gilbert has a bit of leverage as a bestselling author. They wouldn’t want her running to another publishing company as soon as her contract was up. Still, they didn’t think Gilbert’s first choice would compel readers to buy, and that was a problem.

With three covers up for consideration and no resolution in sight, Gilbert and Viking Press agreed to let the masses decide. From Gilbert’s Facebook page, March 21, 2013:

I got so tired of debating over “what the reader wants” that I decided instead to just try asking you guys directly.

So tell me, valued readers … what do you want?

Which one of these three beautiful book jackets do you most like?

Which design would most draw you in, if you were browsing a bookstore?

Which is the one that makes you say, “My goodness, I will certainly have to buy THAT book!”?

You can see the choices here.

Gilbert preferred the beige cover in the middle. So, as it turned out, did most of the 8,500 people who voted. By a ridiculously wide margin.

The takeaway: It doesn’t matter what I think. It doesn’t matter what you think. It matters very much what your readers think. Find out, and everybody wins.

      (a)  Introduce yourself and say you’d like to meet for coffee
      (b)  Propose marriage

It sounds like a silly question, but file it away. We’ll come back to it.

Not long ago on a LinkedIn discussion group, a bunch of writers were talking about how to obtain a professional-looking book cover on a budget. One participant—we’ll call him Lloyd—said his strategy was to figure out exactly what he wanted his cover to look like before he hired a designer. The more specific he was, the easier and cheaper it would be for the designer to do the work.

Jim Hayes of Ha! Yes! Graphic Design had this to say about Lloyd’s approach:

Lloyd mentions that he got a good deal by having already mentally designed the cover. In my 30 years designing, I’ve found this to be a dangerous talent in a client. I love to hear and utilize their ideas and integrate their desires when possible, but designers come up with several ideas, some of which will not work out. Non-designers typically come up with one idea. When I used to accept that type of job, I often found myself trying to make a dead-end idea work. Designers come up with dead-end ideas, too, but they get thrown away.

Yes!

Jim nailed it.

I’ve produced many design drafts that, despite my best efforts, were never going to look as cool in print or onscreen as they did in my head. Those drafts got tossed onto the scrap heap.^* Frustrating, but no biggie. Ideas that don’t work are part of the creative process.

When a non-designer only has one idea and it doesn’t work, that’s okay. The problem arises when the non-designer refuses to consider any other possibilities. When the cover needs to look just like they mocked it up in MS Word, sometimes right down to the fonts, and they will not budge from their vision regardless of how many other ideas you pitch.

Let’s replay that initial scenario in a publishing context. You rack your brain for cover ideas until you hit upon one you like. In your head it looks professional, accurately represents your book, compels readers to pick it up, the works. Do you:

      a)  Have a designer mock up your idea so you can see what it really looks like
      b)  Decide this will be your cover no matter what

By no means are all amateur cover ideas destined to fail. If you have a concept in mind, you should absolutely share it with your designer and see how it goes.

Just don’t be married to it, is all I’m saying.

^{* This works in reverse, too. I’ve had clients pitch ideas that sounded awful at first, but kicked serious butt when I played around with them in Photoshop.↩}

A few days later, the author did something unusual. He sent e-mail to the editors he didn’t pick and offered detailed feedback on how he’d gone about choosing one person out of many qualified candidates.

He said he was pleased with the responses he received … mostly. The exception was a woman who provided “discouraging” comments and told him the story needed more work than he thought it did. At first this distressed him quite a bit. Then he shook it off. The majority of other bidders had said the manuscript was in pretty good shape—that, in fact, it looked better than most. Why believe the lone naysayer?

His logic was sound. Just one problem: the naysayer was right.

It’s not uncommon for writers to tell prospective editors that their manuscript needs “just a light edit.” It’s not uncommon for them to be overly optimistic. When that happens, we as editors have a couple of options.

1. Point out the flaws.
2. Say nothing.

#1 is the more ethical response. Authors expect publishable work out of the editing process. If the level of editing they’re asking for won’t get them there, they need to know that. They need us to tell them.^*

Unfortunately, there’s a sort of natural selection at play that favors option #2. Writers are more likely to hire us when we don’t hurt their feelings, and option #1 will hurt their feelings no matter how diplomatic we try to be. Furthermore, option #1 may lead them to suspect that we’re being mercenary, pushing more expensive services than (they think) they need. This is why I won’t outright condemn those who don’t press the issue. After enough authors refuse to hire us because we’re honest, it’s understandable for some of us to conclude that we shouldn’t bother.

It probably sounds as though I’m blaming writers for this state of affairs. I’m not. In the example above, the author had good reason to believe his manuscript didn’t need substantive revisions. He’d done his due diligence by getting it edited once. He likely had a group of first readers, friends and family, who were more eager to focus on the genuinely praiseworthy aspects of his book than have an awkward conversation about things that could be improved.

Sometimes the people who seek our services really are egomaniacs who believe they can do no wrong, but that’s rare. Most overconfident authors simply aren’t getting enough accurate feedback early in the process.

What does all of this mean for you, the writer? How can you ensure that you’ll get an honest assessment from potentially gun-shy editors?

Ask for it.

Instead of “I only need proofreading” or “How much do you charge for a light edit,” say, “What kind of editing do you think this manuscript needs?”

Do this even if it’s been professionally edited seven times.

You may not always be happy with the answer, but I promise you, you’ll be happier with the results.

^{* Though I didn’t inform this author that he needed more than proofreading, I did offer him a free three-page sample edit. If he’d taken me up on it, I would have shown him what a higher level of editing could do for his book. Telling him before he requested a sample edit, I predicted, would end badly—as it did for the other editor.↩}

Shotgun!

I recently experienced this for myself. My business, Cover to Cover, needed a website. There were a couple of ways to bring this about: build the site myself, or hire somebody to do it.

Part of me was tempted to dust off my long-neglected HTML skills and go with option #1. I could save a lot of money that way. True, I wasn’t a web designer, but I’d been doing book covers for years, and I could apply my knowledge of aesthetic principles to another medium. And it was my site promoting my business, which meant I should make it with my own hands. Right?

Wrong. So very wrong.

When it helps to get help

My ability to create professional book covers and interiors didn’t make me an HTML guru. In fact, the most useful thing I knew about web design was that it’s really hard to make things look the way you want them to. Furthermore, every medium has its own special conventions to learn. Either I’d end up creating something subpar, or I’d spend months and months trying to do what a pro could do in three days.

So instead of letting my ego drive, I took the following steps:

1. Mocked up a couple of web pages in Photoshop (no HTML coding, just visuals).
2. Asked a web designer if the mockups were good enough for him to work with (he said yes).
3. Gave him the mockups and said, “Please make this better.”
4. Waited.
5. Received a design similar to mine, but better.
6. Asked for minor revisions.
7. Received minor revisions.
8. Had a fully functioning website.

Was it scary to hand this project over and hope for the best? Maybe a little. But I had a good grasp of my abilities, and I’d seen the web design company‘s portfolio. I knew whatever they turned out would be superior to what I’d produce on my own. And it was.

Takeaway message

You don’t have to do it all. If you’re publishing a book, it’s OK to stick to what you’re good at (like writing) and let other professionals do what they’re good at (like cover design).

That said, being in the passenger’s seat doesn’t mean you have to relinquish all control, or even that you should! The driver, your designer, knows the terrain and how to operate the vehicle. Your job is to have an idea of what your destination will look like—however vague or specific that idea might be—communicate it to the designer, and provide feedback on how close you’ve gotten.

The collaboration is where the magic happens.