Never judge a book by its cover. You probably heard that before right?

I think I first heard about that saying in first or second grade. Anyways, it was always ingrained in the back of my head.

However, when you’re selling erotica eBooks, short stories, or romance books on Amazon Kindle, you need to throw adage away.

Book covers DO matter!

Selling a ton of books on Amazon is always a combination of:

• Book title/subtitle
• Book cover
• Description
• Price
• Actual book content

Fellow authors will disagree as to how much each of those contribute to sales. However, all would say each step is very important.

To be perfectly honest, I have seen books with poor covers do well.

However, that’s because the author has been writing for a long time and created a cult following through his/her newsletter and great book content.

That’s not the norm. A good book cover will do more good than harm to your sales!

Why eBook Covers Matter!

Let’s go through an example of what goes through a customer’s mind when they’re scrolling through smut books on Amazon.

They’ll probably type in the type of genre they’re looking for…say Billionaire BDSM or Gay Biker stories.

After that, a huge list of hundreds and thousands of books will pop up.

Like the average customer on amazon, the person will scroll through maybe 3 or 4 pages until he/she finds something that catches the eye.

What’s on his/her mind first? Well it’s a combination of the book title and the book cover.

Here are some things that are going through his/her head:

*That title sounds weird.

*That doesn’t even sound like what I searched for.

*Oh this one has something about billionaires, which is exactly what I searched for. Maybe I should click on it and find out more.

*The cover looks cool, let me check it out.

*Wow this girl/guy on the cover is hot. I want to see more.

*The cover looks weird and like some 3^rd grader made it. I’m staying away.

You see what people are thinking? They’re superficial! They only want books that sound and look nice!

Your title and eBook cover design should be focused on grabbing attention!

Only when someone clicks on your book can they read the blurb/description. That’s when the second sales cycle kicks through.

Here are 5 eBook design tips to make your covers more professional and help boost sales.

1. Pen name and book title are highly visible.

Make sure your pen name and book title are highly visible in the thumbnail of the Amazon search results. If people have to squint to read the content, you need to make the font bigger.

Your book will shown next to hundreds (and thousands) of other books. As a result, make it stand out by having big letters.

I’ve seen way too many books where the font color blends into the background so readers can’t even see the title or the author name on the cover.

Take a look at this book cover:

It’s hard to read the title on the book cover because the golden color blends into the girl’s skin very well. Also, the background is very light so the white text of the author’s pen name is very hard to read.

Finally, the font size of her pen name is also very small. As a result, most readers will probably skip over this book.

In contrast, check out this book cover:

This is a GREAT cover. The title of the book (Steal Me) is very clear and easy to read. Plus, the author’s name (Natalia Banks) is very visible and contrasts against the background.

2. Color and tone

If you’re a horny Amazon customer looking for Billionaire BDSM erotica, you generally have an idea of what you’re looking for.

Make sure the color of font and the color of the stock photo match the tone of the (1) book title and (2) genre.

For example, if you’re trying to sell a BDSM book, don’t use light colors like pink, green, or baby blue.

Instead, you want a “darker” done such as black, grey, red, or purple.

Do you think someone is going to want to read a BDSM book that has rainbow colors and some weird title? Nope!

They want to read something naughty and raunchy like “The Billionaire’s Pet”!

3. Study other top authors

It is always a great idea to study other top authors in your niche.

Check out other top books in your niche and see what other authors have done to their cover. Be sure to check out their font and what they included in the illustration.

Where do they place book title and pen name on the cover? Is it all at once? Or do they spread it around? Take a look at the covers of their entire book collection. You’ll be able to get some insight into why they’re successful.

Typically, most books in a particular genre will have specific fonts most authors use. Try to blend in by using those same fonts.

Studying other authors will also give you great ideas.

4. Shadows and brightness/contrast.

Playing around with font shadows is a really great way to make the letters on the book stand out. I typically like to incorporate some kind of shadow (using black) in order to make my title and pen name stand out.

This can be easily accomplished with most image software.

My favorite image software service is PicMonkey by far. It only costs $3.99 a month, which is MUCH CHEAPER than photoshop.

Brightness and contrast are also fun tools to play with. Sometimes a stock photo is perfect…but it’s just too dark or too light.

This is when playing around with the brightness and contrast settings is useful. Play around and make the light on the picture darker or lighter and it’s like you just bought another stock photo!

This is great if you’re writing a story in a darker genre where you might want a “darker” light on the stock photo.

5. Consistent cover design

This is not a requirement, but try to keep all of your book cover styles in the same genre the same.—by same I’m referring to the font, color, and overall design.

This is really useful because if you have a unique design, potential customers will be able to know it’s your book without even clicking through and reading the description.

They will automatically assume it is “a good book” and buy it! This is a very powerful sales tactic.

While this author isn’t in the erotic a genre, he uses a very consistent eBook cover design and sells very well!

Final Thoughts

Getting a great eBook cover design is incredible important if you want higher sales.

This is especially important for self published authors who want to design their own book cover.

Get these tips down and you’ll be nearly guaranteed to increase sales!