The Making of a Viral Book Trailer
You’ve seen them on TV. James Patterson’s book commercials touting his latest release. The commercial only runs 15 seconds, yet makes an impact. From that 15 seconds, we see the cover of the book, get an idea of what the book is about, and where to buy.
A made-up example:
Everything in her gut told her not to follow the stranger, yet she wanted to change her destiny. Read [Famous Author’s Name] “The Wicked.” Now available at…
Short, right to the point and intriguing. So how do we, as authors duplicate something like that? It’s not easy, but we should give it a shot if we want to give our readers a reason to buy our book.
Creating a book trailer for the web is a little different. I’ve seen book trailers anywhere from one minute, to ten minutes. And I have to say, I loose interest when the trailer comes up on the three minute mark. And I’m not alone.
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I created my first book trailer which has over 10,000 views in less than six months for, THE UNFINISHED and UNFINISHED2. Because I have a background as a screenwriter and filmmaker/director, I already knew how to create short, compelling stories. I also knew what images I needed to convey the overall feeling of the book. The right actor’s voice over certainly helped as well.
My story of the UNFINISHED is about a guy who is brought back from the dead in the year 2232 to face his killer in court. The story is very film-noirish, with hard-boiled dialogue from the 1940’s (even though it is set in the future).
I wanted the audience to get a feel for the character, the story set up, as well as leaving them wanting more. But most important, I didn’t want to lose my audience from being too long in the tooth. The video is under 2 minutes. Check it out and let me know if I accomplished my goal.
One think I’ve noticed about bad trailers is that the author just linked photos together with text and loud music. When I see one like that I more often than not, move on within seconds.
I’m currently working on my next book trailer for my book, Hacking Kickstarter, Indiegogo: How to Raise Big Bucks in 30 Days. This trailer will have an entirely different feel than The Unfinished, as this is a fun, how-to book, as compared to a thriller.
The new trailer will feature a James Bond type monkey (cartoon).
For those of you wanting a head start with your own slick book trailer, consider purchasing a template. That’s what I did for both of my trailers… and they look professional, polished, cool.
Try www.videohive.com and do a search under PRESENTATION, or TRAILER. You will find many cool templates for your trailer, no matter the genre. Pick one, buy the template, then ask the creator of the template to customize it for you. You’ll have to come up with the script and visuals and music, but having a template to work within makes it much easier. And if the creator doesn’t have time to customize, you can always post a job on www.elance.com and find someone else who can do it for you. Or better yet, contact the creator before you buy and get a quote. Let that be the deciding factor.
Need an actor to do voice over to make your trailer more professional and viral-worthy? Try www.voice123.com . Very cool website where you can listen to actor’s voices, or have them send you a sample. You can even include a sample script for them to record. Then pick the best one for your project. The service is free, but you have to pay the actors. If you find an actor just getting started, they may volunteer to do for free, or for as little as $50.
You’ll be miles ahead of the crowd with your professional trailer. Then once you have it done, head over to www.virool.com and open an account for as little as $10. They will post your youtube video on tons of sites and get you immediate views. By immediate, I mean in SECONDS!
I just completed the script for my new trailer and have handed it over to the voice over actor to record, as well as my template designer.
Once it’s ready to reveal, I’ll let you know! Good luck with your own viral book trailer.
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