Cover Design for Free Writing

One of the most enjoyable aspects of self-publishing a book is getting involved in the cover design. I had a clear idea of the type of cover I wanted for my series of non-fiction writing books aimed at travel writers and travel bloggers. I wanted to develop a distinct line look for the series, with a clean, sharp image that conveyed non-fiction, but also had a nod to ready and writing in the imagery.

We played around with the layout to position the Hero image on the cover (my reader relaxing on a office chair).

The guy was initially facing the other way, but we flipped him so that his foot rested on the “T” in my last name.

I also like the psychological aspect of him facing-forward, rather than looking-back.

We used SPECIAL ELITE font for the title treatment – just because it’s similarity to a typewriter font.

We used this image as the inspiration for the title treatment and top and bottom bars. But used the dark orange from my Birds of a Feather Logo for the FREE WRITING part of the book title.

Once we were happy with these key elements, we added in the rest of the text.

Sub-title Text

The sub-title is an important element to help the reader grasp the concept and contents of the book, but it also means that you can get some extra keywords into your Book title description when you list it on Amazon.

By adding this subtitle, I’ve managed to add some variety to my keywords:

I have both Travel Writers and Travel Writing.

I have Free Writing and Writing Technique.

And I have Creative.

I also add a call out about Travel Writing Prompts. Although I’m not planning on using this in my description initially, having it on the cover means that I could add it as a later date to my Amazon book title description and they wouldn’t penalize me for it.

I really love this new cover for my Free Writing ebook. We did try mocking up some variations of the cover to incorporate some additional nods to my company logo, but at the end of the day – I kept returning to this clean white cover.

The Working Title version of my cover

The Working Title version of the cover had a background block of the primary colors added behind the sub-title to differentiate it from the title treatment, and I added my logo.

The final cover version

The final cover version was developed out of a need to create the other branded covers for books in the same series. As we worked on the other layouts and color options, we realized that the title treatment needed to change in order to allow for the title variations in the other books in the series.

We also created a physical connection between the hero image and the footer and sub-title block.

At this point in the process we also changed Free Writing to Freewriting. During the book writing phase I had been flip-flopping between Free Writing, Free-Writing, and Freewriting. Searches online showed different versions so I’d opted for Free Writing, but when I got my beta readers feedback, all of them made a comment about how confusing the Free part of the title was, they automatically assumed it was to do with cost, and at a cursory glance it was a book about getting something for free. So I finally settled on freewriting, although my spellcheck doesn’t like this version of the spelling. The jury is still out on this version of the spelling!

Here’s the covers that were rejected:

New Cover Design

UPDATE: I decided to go a different direction for my cover design, and worked with a different cover designer to create a more retro looking cover.

But I decided to use the original design for the covers of the free PDF workbooks that contain ten writing prompts each. These workbooks can be used in tandem with my ebook, or as standalone worksbooks to practice your travel writing.