Trailer Tips

Book trailers are practically required these days for book releases.  Those who have the money spend big making videos to rival major movie studio trailers.  The rest of us do what we can with what is available to us for free.  Take a look at the trailer for SheMarches Through Fire here.

This is my third time making a book trailer, and I’ve learned a few things along the way that I thought I would share with you. 

1) Keep it short.  You don’t want to go much over a minute.  You don’t need to describe the whole plot.  Just tell people enough to get them interested and give them a feel for the book.

2) Find good pictures.  Pixabay is a great source for royalty free images.  Think about the images you want to represent your work.  Learn to use a simple photo editor like Canva or Picmonkey to tweak the details to match what you need.  For instance, that green gem up there was pink when I found it.

3) Find a good song.  I sing, so I usually record something in the public domain, like a folk song or spiritual.  My microphone of choice is the Yeti.   Recording your own music may not work for you, but there are plenty of sites with royalty free music available.

4) Get your friends to critique it.  Are the words going by too fast?  Does the music work?  Are you lingering too long on some images and not long enough on others?  Are there typos?  Get some feedback before you share it with the whole world.

With this final volume of the November Snow Series, I wanted to give potential readers a sense of the dire nature of November’s situation and just what is at stake for her, her companions, and the world at large.  What do you think?  Does my latest trailer pique your interest enough to make you want to order She Marches Through Fire?  What are your book trailer tips?