If the description isn’t compelling, the book isn’t selling
I get asked every day, “How can I write an excellent book description?” Believe it or not, there is no magic involved. You all understand a website has under ten seconds to engage a user. You know that if your book doesn’t grab the reader in the first paragraph or so, it’ll get tossed aside. So why would it be any different for a book description? People are fickle and in a hurry. There is a ton of media out there to seduce them into spending time.
If your book description fails to make the reader click that “buy it” button in the moment, you probably won’t get a second chance. Read that again.
Here’s the primary thing to remember — the description has to create a desire for the book in 150 to 200 words. Writing all about yourself isn’t going to cut it. Exception: If you’re something like a National Book Award winner, that credential should be bolded in or near the headline.
Overall strategies to write an excellent book description
- Make the headline zap the reader.
- Choose words and descriptors that apply to your book, not just to any book of your genre. Skip overused adjectives like sexy, exciting, breathtaking, shocking, etc.
- Use keywords and descriptors that you (or your reader) would use to search for the book. “If you loved Harry Potter, you’ll be drawn into Lulu Smith…” “…how to make money at home.”
- In the title and body, mention genre, subgenre, and major themes like social justice, historical intrigue, or self-help. Don’t spam them.
- Name a title you share readership with. Prospective readers look for these relationships.
- Add just a little formatting – a bit of bold, an italicized line. It adds visual breaks so the text is inviting, not intimidating. Formatting is most helpful toward the beginning.
- Make every word powerful. Avoid cliches like rippling muscles, dripping with passion, unbeatable, can’t fail, gripping, or saga,
- Don’t forget to end with a call to action.
Write an attention-grabbing opener
Why did you write your book? If it’s fiction, what succinct idea or feeling spurred you to write this particular book? If it’s non-fiction, what did you want to help people understand?
Contemplate this for a few moments, don’t just jot down the first thing you think of.
Craft a punchy, clear, irresistible headline that shines a light on the big things that matter about your book, and do it from the reader’s perspective. This is not the time for flowery language or esoteric hyperbole. Punchy means straightforward — something unambiguous that can’t be mistaken. Carefully crafted questions are great. “How do you know your neighbor is a murderer?“
A strong, solid claim is equally as effective. “With this book you will never diet again.”
That headline has to take the reader directly into the description and compel them to keep reading. Verbiage like, “I’ve always wanted to write a book, and now I have,” doesn’t help you. And I promise you, that sentence is taken right from a book description that failed.
Empathize with and articulate your reader’s source of pain
Write short, clear sentences that don’t have to be pondered. Each sentence has to move the reader toward your goal: buy this book. Use third-person, not first.
Your headline pulled them in; now describe the reader’s pain. All humans suffer. Some of us hurt physically, some mentally, emotionally, financially, spiritually, psychically, or just pain from boredom. We may not be consciously aware of a pain or problem, but we respond when a solution is in front of us. It’s human nature.
Don’t go all maudlin and graphic. Just articulate which particular human problem or condition your book addresses. And all books address a problem. What is your reader seeking? What’s holding them back? What have they missed out on, and how can they happily reach their goals? Even novels solve human problems. Craft a perfect sentence that articulates exactly the pain that your target audience shares.
Harry Potter’s pain stemmed from trying to figure out why he felt unloved and why he didn’t seem to be in step with the rest of the world. Have you ever felt that way? Well, that’s why Harry compelled us to buy millions of books.
Offer the hint of a solution, but no spoilers
When you write an excellent book description, you offer hope. You’ve heard that sex sells, right? I’m here to tell you that hope outsells sex, and a great book (and description) offers compelling hope. If you succeed at this step, effectively giving a glimpse into how the reader will be changed after reading your book, you will forge an emotional bond. The prospective reader will nod their head as they read the description, and that nod is a buying signal. Reel them in.
Emphasize this idea as you write an excellent book description. Focus on benefits rather than on benefits to the reader, not features of the book or of your skill. As your reader, all I care about is what’s in it for me. Will you transform me, change my life, take me on an adventure, answer a burning question?
Effective messaging, which is what you’re trying to craft, magnifies what the reader will gain by buying this book. It might make them happy or wealthy. Some books offer to make us younger and more beautiful every day, ensuring we’ll make friends and influence people. It’s your task to focus clearly and truly on how the reader will benefit. Don’t be vague about this. If you can’t say clearly and unambiguously how your reader gains by reading you, you’re not ready to sell this book.
To write an excellent book description, you must establish your expertise
Why are you the person who should have written your book? At last, we’re at the point where many author’s live — the “me” part. But keep this under control. Unless you’re Barack Obama or Danielle Steel, your potential book buyer is not all into you. This section should be relatively short but long enough to establish your credibility so they’ll keep reading.
You’ll focus on what you published before and how it was received. Talk about career milestones that directly relate to this project. “Sarah Book Author sold over a million copies of her first book, and now you can be mesmerized by her third.” Bullet list the accomplishments that brought you to this book project or milestones that make you the expert.
If you write an excellent book description, you won’t spill the beans
As Kenny Rogers sang, “Know when to hold ’em.” You’re about to finish writing a compelling book description that will have readers lining up to buy. Don’t tell all!
Your prospect is with you, reading through to the last thoughts of your description. They’ve nodded their heads as they follow your irresistible prose. Now stop right at the edge of the cliff. It’s essential that you’re quite specific about the benefits of reading your book. Show the reader how they will be forever changed. But don’t tell them how the change happens.
Meticulously craft a call to action that can’t be ignored. This is essential for the last paragraph. “Don’t wait; start reading this essential book right now.”
You surely don’t want the prospective buyer to struggle through the description. Keep polishing your description until it performs exactly the way you want it to. Then ask someone else, perhaps someone who has not read the book, to read the description. Watch their reaction, and you’ll know clearly if you have done your job.
Book description examples:
Here are a couple of examples, one fiction, one non-fiction, that have sold many, many books. Note how the descriptions conform to or diverge from our template.
The Silent Patient in 202 words (260,000+ copies reviewed)
The Silent Patient is a shocking psychological thriller of a woman’s act of violence against her husband – and of the therapist obsessed with uncovering her motive.
Alicia Berenson’s life is seemingly perfect. A famous painter married to an in-demand fashion photographer, she lives in a grand house with big windows overlooking a park in one of London’s most desirable areas. One evening, her husband, Gabriel, returns home late from a fashion shoot, and Alicia shoots him five times in the face and then never speaks another word.
Alicia’s refusal to talk, or give any kind of explanation, turns a domestic tragedy into something far grander, a mystery that captures the public imagination and casts Alicia into notoriety. The price of her art skyrockets, and she, the silent patient, is hidden away from the tabloids and spotlight at the Grove, a secure forensic unit in North London.
Theo Faber is a criminal psychotherapist who has waited a long time for the opportunity to work with Alicia. His determination to get her to talk and unravel the mystery of why she shot her husband takes him down a twisting path into his own motivations — a search for the truth that threatens to consume him….
Invisible Women Data Bias in a World Designed for Men in just over 300 words (10,000 reviews)
NOTE: We feel this description could have been edited down to keep readers’ attention a bit better. We might have replaced some f the modifiers with a little more about benefits to the reader, which may have resulted in more sales. Still, it’s not an exact science.
#1 International Bestseller
Winner of the 2019 Financial Times and McKinsey Business Book of the Year Award and Winner of the 2019 Royal Society Science Book Prize
A landmark, prize-winning, international bestselling examination of how a gender gap in data perpetuates bias and disadvantages women, now in paperback
Data is fundamental to the modern world. From economic development to health care to education and public policy, we rely on numbers to allocate resources and make crucial decisions. But because so much data fails to take into account gender, because it treats men as the default and women as atypical, bias and discrimination are baked into our systems. And women pay tremendous costs for this insidious bias, in time, in money, and often with their lives.
Celebrated feminist advocate Caroline Criado Perez investigates this shocking root cause of gender inequality in the award-winning, #1 international bestseller Invisible Women. Examining the home, the workplace, the public square, the doctor’s office, and more, Criado Perez unearths a dangerous pattern in data and its consequences on women’s lives. Product designers use a “one-size-fits-all” approach to everything from pianos to cell phones to voice recognition software, when in fact this approach is designed to fit men. Cities prioritize men’s needs when designing public transportation, roads, and even snow removal, neglecting to consider women’s safety or unique responsibilities and travel patterns. And in medical research, women have largely been excluded from studies and textbooks, leaving them chronically misunderstood, mistreated, and misdiagnosed.
Built on hundreds of studies in the United States, in the United Kingdom, and around the world, and written with energy, wit, and sparkling intelligence, this is a groundbreaking, highly readable exposé that will change the way you look at the world.
And how not to write an excellent book description
The following is how not to write an excellent book description. The text is too wordy, and the words used don’t reflect ideas readers would search for. This could be pared down to about half; see if you can spot verbiage that isn’t helping. Do you understand quickly the specific benefits to you? The writer might have included a few examples of the steps or the secrets, so you would want more.
It’s terribly important that the writer proof his description so the text reads well and conveys real benefits. Errors and misstatements don’t sell books (we didn’t correct the writer’s errors). We couldn’t identify any keywords, and the writer doesn’t mention the title until the third paragraph. In this sample, we’ve added our edits in bold.
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Libby Fischer Hellman on How to Market and Sell Your Writing
