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How to Create a Free eBook Cover Graphic (Boxshot) Tutorial Using Gimp

If you want to add a visual component to your e-Book, then you can create a simple cover. Creating a cover (or e-Book image) is completely optional.  I have seen many online e-Book sellers who market their e-Books without a cover image.  Other sellers will use very professional looking cover images to market their e-Book.  Whether you decide to create a cover or not, just keep this in mind: It would be better to have no cover, than to have an ugly, unprofessional looking cover.  If your cover design looks bad, it will probably say to the customer, “This e-Book cover is bad, and so is the content-don’t buy it.”

Also, if you are going to sell your eBook with companies such as Clickbank, Amazon (Kindle), Createspace.com, Lulu.com, or any other company, I would indeed recommend creating a cover.

To create a cover, you will need to use a drawing software program.  There are various programs you can use to do this. Here are some programs you can use: Adobe Photoshop, Corel Pain Shop, Microsoft Paint, and Gimp.  Adobe Photoshop is probably the best software you can use, however, it is also the most expensive & complicated to learn.  You can download a free trial of Photoshop at www.adobe.com. Corel Paint Shop Pro is another great software package you can use to create a cover image.  It is less expensive, and you can also download a free trial by going to www.corel.com. Microsoft Paint and Gimp are both free programs, however, Gimp is a much better program.  You can also create a cover image with this software. You can download and use Gimp. This program is great & I have used it frequently. In fact, this entire tutorial will be using Gimp, and to get your own copy or to find out more, click here.

Now, I will go into a detailed tutorial on how you can create a simple, attractive e-Book cover design.  I will use Gimp for this tutorial since it is available as a free download, however, if you use another software program the process will be very similar. If you are going to use Gimp, go ahead & install it on your machine when you are ready to create your cover.

Before you start to create your image, you should think about the title, the colors you want to use, and any other design aspects you need to consider.  It is a good idea to browse online for a few minutes & study e-Book designs that you like.  Try to see what they have done, how they have placed shadows & reflections. 

This is a great way to gather ideas for your own design.  Also, you may want to sketch a rough design on paper before you use the software.  When you are ready, you can begin to create your cover. The process usually needs to be completed in this order: Insert the background color or image, add any borders, insert any images, and then write the text.  Next, you will create the side of the e-Book, distort the image to make it look 3-D, draw the remaining portion of the e-Book, create a shadow, and finally create a reflection (optional).

First, open up the Gimp software.  Go to File–> New.  You will then see a small box display that asks you the image size.  For the cover, select about 800 width X 600 height.  This should be enough room to create your image.

 

Next, select the rectangle select tool in the upper right hand corner & draw a rectangle in the picture.  This will be the front cover.  Now, at this point you should think about the basic background color that you want to use for your e-Book.  For this example, I am going to use a simple maroon background.  Also, to create a shadow effect, I am going to use a gradient to fill the background. 

To do this, I first select a gradient color. I will use maroon as my foreground, and white as my background.  Then, I select the gradient fill button and click inside of the rectangle that I have already drawn & drag the line & release.  Then it will show the color inside. You may want to drag the cursor a few times at a diagonal angle until you get a nice white glare in the upper left hand corner as you see below.

 Now that I have the basic background color drawn, I will insert a small white line down the far left-hand side of the background from top to bottom.  This makes for a nice glare effect for the edge. To do this, I select the paint brush.  Then, I select a small line, and select the color white as the foreground color. 

Then, I click the left mouse button in the lower left-hand corner where I want to start my line & I release the mouse button. Then, I hit shift to see the line function. To draw the line, stretch it all the way to the top & then click the mouse to draw the line.  Now I have a faint white line down the entire left side of the background.

Next, I want to make a basic yellow border around the top of the e-Book to give the appearance of a trim border.  Again, I will select the paint brush as before, change my color to yellow, use the shift key to draw a straight line, and then click the mouse to draw it from the top left to the top right as pictured below.

I will then draw another yellow stripe on the bottom of the book using the exact same method as described above. At this point, the e-Book is starting to take shape, but it could use an image or two.  Since I am making this e-Book up just to show you how to create one, I will pretend this is going to be an e-Book about vines. 

Since it is going to be about vines, I will try to incorporate an image that relates to vines.  Remember, you do not necessarily need an image.  I am just doing this to show you a few things with the software. It is very possible to create a dazzling looking cover graphic using only Gimp & no images at all.

For the image, I am going to use Gimp’s built-in paint brush with the special vine tip.  To use this, I simply select the paint brush tool from the menu, and then I click the brush button at the bottom.  Then I size the vine brush using the scale.  After that, I simply click the mouse button on the e-Book cover where I would like for the vine to be shown.  This is super simple & only takes a couple of seconds as pictured below.

You can also use this same technique with any picture you want. If you want to use another picture, you simply open up a new picture by clicking New–> Open as layer –> and then open the picture you want to insert on your graphic. You can delete any portion you want, and add neat effects to your images.

At this point, I have created a simple background, added a nice trim look with yellow, and inserted the vine image with the paint brush.  Now, I am finished with the graphics & I would like to add my title.  To do this, I will simply click on the A symbol to write text.  Then I will choose the color, font size, and style.  For the main title, I will use white text, 39 font, and Sans Serif type.  For the subtitle at the bottom, I will use yellow font (size 24) with staccato222 BT font style.  I simple click on the part where I would like the words to appear, and then type them in the box as pictured below.

Now I am going to flatten the image.  This simply compresses all of the different layers  that have been used (text, vine, & background) into one simple image.  To do this, you go to the top menu & select Image–> Flatten Image.

Let me just stop right here & tell you that this could be used as an e-Book graphic.  Most online bookstores (such as Amazon.com) use simple one dimensional images to represent books.  You could use this image in a similar way.  If you want to stop here & use this image, just go to File–>Save As and save the image in a location where you can easily find it (and in a format such as .bmp, .jpeg., or .png.  For this tutorial, however, I will keep going to show you how you can create the nice 3-D look.

Now the front cover is completely finished.  So what I need to do is create the 3-D look. First, I will use the perspective tool to change the shape of the front cover.  I will do this by selecting the perspective tool, and then clicking on the e-Book image.  This will select the image, and I can then click on the four corners & drag the image with my mouse.  Try to drag it so that it is slightly bent upwards toward the upper right as shown below.  When you are finished hit “transform.”

When you have finished changing the structure of the picture, you can create the side image.  To do this, I will use the rectangle select tool that I used at the beginning to draw the background.  This time, however, I will draw a much smaller size.  I will then use the gradient fill tool just like I did earlier when I created the maroon background.  Make sure to have the lighter side facing the front cover.  Next, I will add the yellow lines on the top & bottom as pictured below.

Now I will add some text to the side bar. This is also optional, and the e-Book will look fine without the extra text.  To do this, simply select the text button just like earlier.  Then select the font size, color, and style.  When you are ready, type out the text you want to appear.  The text will be in a horizontal position, but it needs to be vertical so it can fit inside the long rectangle. To fix this, select the side bar first & use the rotate & move button to move it away & rotate it on its side.  Then use the text button to write your message as shown below.

When you have finished writing your text in the sidebar, go to the menu & select Image–>Flatten Image.  This will then compress your work thus far.  Then, use the rectangle selector tool to draw an outline around the side bar.  Then click the rotate button on the side menu, and rotate the bar to its normal vertical position.

Next, we will want to skew the side bar using the perspective tool.  Do this by selecting the perspective tool, and then dragging the side bar until it is in a position where the upper left corner is up higher than the right corner and the lower left corner is higher than the lower right corner as pictured below.  When you have got it in a good position, click the transform button.

Okay, after that you can move on. Click the link below to see how to finish up this eBook cover using Gimp, and so you can list it for sale right away!

Finish the eBook Cover Using Gimp: Part 2

How to Write & Sell an eBook Free- Introduction

All About eBooks-Why Write an eBook?

How to Prepare Writing an eBook-Chapter 2

Using a Wordprocessor to Write Your eBook

Adding Images, Pictures, and Screenshots in Your eBook

Tips on Writing Your eBook: Grammar, Spelling, and More

Putting the Final Touches on Your eBook

How to Create an eBook Cover Graphic Boxshot Free Tutorial

Creating a Free eBook Cover Graphic Using Gimp: Part 2

Adding Links, References, Footnotes to Your eBook

Converting Your eBook Into a PDF Product

How to Copyright Your eBook or Self Published Book

How to Get an ISBN for Your eBook or Self Published Book

Where’s the Best Place to Sell an eBook or Self Published Book?

How to Market and Sell Your eBook Online

Perfecting Your eBook Sales Page (Copyrighting)

How to Setup Digital Delivery Instant Download Free

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Posted under Write an eBook, eBooks

How to Set Up Digital Delivery with Clickbank Payment Link

Clickbank is another payment processor similar to Paypal that you can use to sell digital products. In fact, clickbank is really made especially for digital products (whereas Paypal can be used for anything). Clickbank has a great built in redirect script. Once a buyer pays, Clickbank simply redirects the buyer to your download page.

To set up Clickbank, first you need to get a publisher account. Affiliate accounts are free (to promote other people’s products & earn a commission), however, publisher accounts (to sell a product yourself) will cost a fee of around $29.99-49.99. So if you don’t already have a Clickbank account & you want to sign up, go to Clickbank.com & sign up for an account. You will have to submit your product, & they will review & approve it. This process usually take about a day or two.

Once you have been approved, you can upload your products. To do this, login using your login information. Then click on the “Account Settings” tab. Then click the small “my products” link just below the tabs.

You will then be able to add new products to your account. This is a really simple step. This is all you have to do: Enter the thank you page URL, set the price, and you’re done! Yes that easy. Remember, the thank you page will be the page you create on your website thanking the customer & you should have all download links on that page.

So, to give you an example, you would create on html page on your website. You should make the “thank you” page link long & hard to guess. Something like http://www.yourdomain.com/ae39asla_ao23af_2l3j.htm On that thank you page, thank the customer & then link to each product you have uploaded on your website. Each link may look something like http://www.yourdomain.com/your_product_here.pdf. Make sure to make the direct link to the actual file hard to guess as well. By the way, most html editors will have a built-in link button to easily create links for you, but just in case it doesn’t here is the simple HTML code to create a link:

<a href=”http://www.your-product-url here.com”
target=cb>Type What you Want the Link to Say Here (such as Product 1)</a>

For ClickBank to sell your product you must direct customers to follow a payment link on your Pitch Page. The payment link will automatically take the customer directly to a ClickBank product order form. After the buyer pays, Clickbank will redirect them to the thank you page you entered (as mentioned above).

Your payment link should be targeted to a new window, and should be in the following format:

http://ITEM.PUBLISHER.pay.clickbank.net

Here it is in html:
<a href=”http://ITEM.PUBLISHER.pay.clickbank.net” target=cb>CLICK HERE TO PURCHASE</a>

Here’s how to make it work…

Replace ITEM with the item number of the link (product) for sale. As you set up products to sell in your ClickBank account, you will need to assign each of your links an item number: 1,2,3, etc. If you are setting up your first product, the item number is 1. Replace PUBLISHER with your ClickBank account nickname. Replace CLICK HERE TO PURCHASE with any promotional text or image you prefer.

That is all you have to do to set up a simple system with Clickbank. Again, it costs money up front, however, they do have built-in affiliates that could help you make more sales, so it will most likely be worth the cost.

Other Things to Consider When Using Digital Delivery:

Aside from the technical aspects of digital delivery, there are a few other things you may want to consider such as:

1. What file format will you use for your digital item? Obviously, you should consider a format that most users will be able to use without any trouble. For instance, e-Books are most commonly sold in PDF format, etc. By using a format most people are familiar with, your customers will feel more comfortable buying & downloading your products.

2. Keep your files secure. If you are selling a product & you don’t want people to be able to access the product, you should take some necessary steps to keep it secure. A simple & cost effective way to do this is to simply have your item located in a secure file on your website, create a robots.txt file &/or meta tag to prevent search engines from finding it, and by changing your URL to a more complicated one (such as
www.yoursite.com/eBook89_32DoWnloAd_32.pdf). By adding lots of numbers & characters you make it nearly impossible for someone to guess the download URL. Also, make sure to create a robots.txt file.

What is a robots.txt file? A robots.txt file is a text file you can place on your website to instruct robots on where to craw, or more importantly where not to crawl. This is important because unless you want all of the pages & files in your site to show up online in search engine results, you will want to learn how to create a robots.txt file. Also, some SEO gurus have argued that having a robots.txt file can attract spiders & increase your search engine positioning.

So how does a robots.txt file work, and how do you create one on your website? Well the robots.txt is a simple file (mostly created using notepad) that includes a set of instructions for the search engines. These instructions can tell the spiders which pages they are allowed to crawl for indexing, and which ones they should not crawl. You can also give specific instructions for specific search engines, and you can include different commands.

Below is an example of common instructions used: To allow All search engine spiders to crawl your site & to all ALL files to be indexed, use this command:

User-agent: *
Disallow:

The command above means all spiders can crawl your site & they can include all files in their index. The * means “attention ALL spiders” & by leaving the Disallow field blank it means you are telling them they can crawl all files. To instruct ALL search engine spiders to stay away from certain files (for instance your /images/ folder, you would simply use the following command:

User-agent: *
Disallow: /images/

This instructs ALL robots that visit your site to not “crawl” or include all of the files in your /images/ folder to be included. If you would like to include more folders, just keep adding more Disallow commands:

User-agent: *
Disallow: /images/
Disallow: /PDF/

Create a Robots.txt File Using Notepad

To upload a create & upload a robots file to your site, open Windows Notepad. Then type the command in Notepad that you want to instruct for the Robots (use an example above).

Then save the name of the document as a “robots” and make sure it has the .txt file extension. Now, go to your website & import (or “upload”) the file. Then publish your website. After you publish your website, your robots.txt file should show up.

To check, just type in www.YOURSITE.com/robots.txt and see if it show up. If it does then this should be working & it will prevent robots from viewing your files/folders that you do not want to be seen. This is a great way to keep secret files, e-books, personal documents, PDF files, etc. from being indexed and placed on search engines.

Creating a Robots Meta Tag

Robot.txt files are a great way to prevent search engines from viewing entire files or folders, but what about keeping them out of individual web pages? The solution is to use a special HTML Meta tag that will keep your webpage from showing up on search engines (such as Google, Yahoo, etc.).

To use an HTML Meta Tag to prevent you page from being indexed, simply type the tag below into your HTML code between the <head> tags.

<meta name=”robots” content=”noindex,nofollow” />
This will allow you to keep individual pages from being included in search engine directories. This is important because you don’t want your “thank you” page to be crawled & indexed by spiders because it will have your download link on it.

Misc. Digital Download Troubleshooting:

Also it is worth mentioning that even though digital delivery is a great feature and works 99.99999% of the time, occasionally there may be a technical difficulty preventing the buyer from downloading the product. Either the buyer will not see the link on the download page (yes it happens) –or eBay®, Paypal®, Clickbank, or the hosting company you use could experience a technical difficulty or their server can be down.

In this case, the buyer will probably contact you to let you know that they didn’t receive the item. I usually simply apologize to the buyer & send the digital item via email as an attachment as soon as I get the message & answer any other questions they may have. Again, these things happen to every seller from time to time & there is nothing you can do about it. After emailing the buyer, you may want to check the link to make sure it still works, and/or see if there are any problems that need to be corrected. If the link ever expires on a free hosting site or you want to change it, just follow the same procedures mentioned earlier to re-host your file.

Again, usually if the buyer contacts you it is usually because they didn’t know that they had to click the link to download the item, or there was just technical difficulty preventing them from downloading the item. And even though these problems can’t be avoided 100%, if you have 2 or 3 methods working together, it will be best. For example, set up email responder & have the buyermredirected after purchase.

Also, it is very important to always check to make sure the digital delivery works before you actually start selling the product. Whether you use a free file hosting company, host on your own website, use emailing, or use an online company you should always do a “test run” to make sure that the download works properly. This may take a couple of minutes, but it can save you a big headache later on if you take to time to make sure it works perfectly the first time.

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