That being said, a good book cover is not just an expression of the idea behind a book, it’s the way the audience first engages that idea. It’s marketing. And that is how you measure an objectively good book cover: A good book cover shows what’s in the book, and makes the audience interested in reading it. WHAT TO DO BEFORE YOU HIRE A BOOK COVER DESIGNER Now you understand what purpose a cover serves and why a pro- fessional book cover is important, you’re ready to find a good book cover designer and hire them, right? Not so fast. The main problem book designers have with authors is poor com- munication. The author has no idea what they want, or has vague, ambiguous cover ideas, and the two never get on the same page. You can avoid this problem by doing some work prior to finding a book cover designer. Not only will this result in a better cover, it can save you a lot of money. 1. LOOK AT LOTS OF BOOK COVERS, BOTH IN YOUR FIELD AND OUT The first thing to do is get an idea of what other books in your field are like, and maybe get some ideas from them. Go to Amazon books and search in the category your book falls into. Search Pinterest for artsier titles if you’d like. If you want a classic, look to Bookcoverarchive.com for the best, most avant-garde titles. Once you spend some time looking at a lot of book covers in your genre, you’ll be shocked at how repetitive they are. That’s common. 282 · ThE SCriBE METhOD