How to Make a Book Trailer

Categories: Books & Authors | Books | Childrens Books

  • Trailers have been a fairly recent invention on the scene for book promotion. When you learn how to make a book trailer you'll realize they are, essentially, similar to movie trailers. In this instance, however, the trailer advertises a book instead of a film. Book trailers are teasers--using video, sound or picture stills and text--to describe the high points of the plot of a book and help a reader decide if they want to make a purchase.

  • Tips

    • Use only public domain, Creative Commons or licensed use videos, pictures and music.
    • Summarize your plot's conflict in the book trailer.
    • Leave the viewer with a question that can only be answered by reading your book.

  • Copyright Warning

    Be sure to check all the licensed rights the photographer grants for the use of photos in your book trailer. Some require notification of where and how the photo is used, and some require written consent. If the photo has a watermark on it, it's not permissible to use publicly without purchasing or acquiring a license to use it and receiving a copy without the watermark.


    At the end of this guide, you will find a list of websites where you can find stock photos. Also included is a list of stock video footage sites and music sites.

  • Introduction

    Authors can benefit from book trailers because readers get to see a snippet of what to expect from the plot of the book. This can help readers determine if they want to purchase the book, based on the given information.


    The goal of a book trailer is to entice the reader, so you want to hit the high points of the plot without giving away any conclusions or the ending of the story. Use still photographs, video and music (much like a movie trailer), and keep it at an advertorial length of about 30 seconds to one minute.

  • Step 1: Summarize the Plot of the Book

    The most important part of creating a book trailer is to advertise the book itself, and that means you need to summarize the plot. Every book plot has a conflict of some sort, and it's the conflict you want to highlight. If it's a romance, perhaps the conflict is, "Will Jenny ever return Jason's affections?" If it's a thriller, the conflict could be a government conspiracy being covered up. Whatever the major conflict of the story is, that's what needs to be focused upon in the trailer.


    Then you need to decide if you want to do a video book trailer or a pictorial book trailer, and whether you will use voice over or text. Either way, you'll want to write the 'script' of the book trailer; that is, the text that is either shown to the viewer or spoken by the voice over artist. The script should summarize the plot and leave the reader with a question that can only be answered by purchasing the book.

  • Step 2: Create the Visual Portion of the Trailer

    If you're wanting a video book trailer, you have options of either producing your own video, hiring someone to produce the video, or purchasing stock video footage. You can find some limited stock video for free on the internet by searching for it in search engines, but the quality will be limited.


    For pictorial book trailers, you can use a series of free stock photo images or inexpensive licensed use stock photos. This is the option most book trailers use, because they are easier to create and much less expensive than video.


    If you have your own video equipment and some willing friends and a lot of creativity, you could probably record your own video footage and manipulate it with your editing software to portray a plot teaser for your book trailer.


    You can see the links below this guide for a listing of places where you can purchase stock photography, license use for free stock photography, purchase video footage, or find free video footage.

  • Step 3: Edit and Create

    Most PCs come with Windows and thus will have the Windows Movie Maker software installed free with their system. You can use this free video editing software to make your movie, of you can purchase video editing software of your own.


    The next step is to add your video or your photos to the editing software, putting them in a logical order to go along with the script you have written.


    If you're doing voice over, you'll want to complete the pictorial or video portion of the video first, so the narrator can do the voice over while watching to time it with the right pictures. It's easier to time the voice over narration to the pictures than to try to fit the pictures to the narration after the fact.

  • Step 4: Add Music

    The last part of the book trailer will be the music. You need music that fits the theme and tone of the book. An amusement park ride carousel music won't fit for a book about a serial killer and an ominous sounding minor chord tune won't do well on a lighthearted chick lit book either.


    You want to be sure not to violate copyright infringement laws by using music that is copyrighted to someone else without their permission. This means most of the music on popular radio stations will not be legal to use.


    There are some excellent free sound clips websites that let you download public domain or Creative Commons music or sound clips to use for your book trailer. Below is a list of some locations where you can find free or inexpensive music clips.


    Remember that music, even sampling, cannot be used if you don't have permission from the copyright holder. Don't use popular music or portions of it, or use music clips from other video you find on the internet. You must either purchase the music for use, license its use, or find music under Creative Commons or public domain. Below you will find links to stock music websites.


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