Gene Mollica and Sasha Almazan - Beyond Basic Covers: How Professional Design Drives Book Success

Gene Mollica and Sasha Almazan are the creative duo behind GNS Cover Design Studio, a premium book cover design company specializing in photo-based, high-impact covers for authors. With over 15 years of experience working with both traditional publishers and indie authors, they bring their backgrounds in photography, digital art, and styling to create covers that help books stand out in competitive marketplaces. Their unique collaborative approach has helped countless authors transform their sales and careers through strategic visual branding.

In this episode:

• The evolution from traditional publishing to working with indie authors
• Why professional book covers are crucial for sales success
• The detailed creative process behind premium book covers
• How photo shoots and custom imagery elevate book branding
• The importance of genre-appropriate design elements
• Success stories of authors whose sales transformed after cover redesigns
• Strategies for creating consistent branding across a book series
• How to assess if your current cover is limiting your sales potential

Resources mentioned:

• Silvia Moreno-Garcia's "The Seventh Veil of Salome"
• Michael Merson's thriller series
• Michael Anderle's Kurtherian Gambit series
• Lindsay Buroker's urban fantasy series
• R.L. King's series
• C.E. Murphy's Walker Papers series

Connect with Gene & Sasha:

• Website:https://www.gscoverdesignstudio.com/
• Email: admin@gscoverdesignstudio.com

Connect with Teddy Smith:

• @teddyagsmith
• Website: https://publishingperformance.com/?ref=ywm3mtc
• Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/publishingperformance/
• Pinterest - https://nz.pinterest.com/publishingperformance/
• Instagram - https://instagram.com/publishingperformanceinsta
• Youtube -https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHV6ltaUB4SULkU6JEMhFSw
• Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/company/publishing-performance/

Transcript

[00:00:00] Teddy Smith: Hi everyone. Welcome to the Publishing Informant Show. I'm really happy to be here with Jean Sasha from GNS Cover Design Studio, and these guys, the co-founders of the cover Design studio. So thank you very much for joining me. 

[00:00:17] Sasha Almazan: Thank you. We're so be here. 

[00:00:19] Teddy Smith: We're very excited. Good. Yeah. I absolutely love your covers.

[00:00:22] I mean, they're absolutely amazing. I've been going through your website and some of them are really incredible. So why don't you tell me a bit about your background? What led you into doing specialized photo covers for books? 

[00:00:34] Gene Mollica: You gonna start? You, 

[00:00:35] Sasha Almazan: you go right? 

[00:00:36] Gene Mollica: I'll start. Okay. Well, we started off, you know, we were located in New York, so the publishing market made a lot of sense for us to approach and years ago, it was basically a photo process.

[00:00:49] So, that all, the whole photo process and how we concept covers, we just simply brought over to the indie community as they came to us. So it's it's a practice that we've been developing and refining for, 15 plus years. 

[00:01:05] Teddy Smith: Yeah. All right. So you've been doing book covers for 15 years or something?

[00:01:09] 15 plus. Actually, 

[00:01:12] Gene Mollica: if we we're gonna be truthful, but we don't wanna get into numbers that, that 

[00:01:16] Teddy Smith: into age. 

[00:01:17] Gene Mollica: Yeah. We've been doing this, we've been in this a long, long time. And not just books. I mean we've done advertising campaigns, we've done all kinds of work. The process is very similar no matter what it's for.

[00:01:29] So we're both, photographers and digital artists and, and that's why we choose usually to start with a photo if we can, or our own stock. 

[00:01:39] Teddy Smith: Oh, cool. So that's what I was about to say. Your, so your background is your photographers and that's kind of what led you into doing the cover design as well.

[00:01:46] Painters and photographers, 

[00:01:47] Sasha Almazan: painters and, yeah, asking us more about like how we got started. 

[00:01:52] Gene Mollica: Okay. Well, so when we, okay. So. I, you know, we were both working independently of each other and then we met and then, you know, I was, I was, in publishing and, needed help needed, needed someone to, I was just looking in the back of my head.

[00:02:09] It wasn't real conscientious, but I was in the back of my head. I was looking for a little help and Sasha also does a lot of styling, Harry makeup work and that's a huge aspect to any photo shoot. If you've ever been on one and so I had, you know, hair and makeup specialist for years. And I started getting more into heavy, heavy, you know, requests from these indie authors who were coming in who had more control and a lot of specifics and it was getting really intense.

[00:02:38] And then we met through friends and they suggested I call her. And I begged her to come and, and do a shoot together. And she eventually said yes after me maybe asking five times. He finally came and it, and it, it really opened up the world. 'cause that particular shoot was a historical shoot. It was super sensitive.

[00:02:57] The author was a historical author of, you know, it was a, it was fiction, but it was historical based and very, very detailed. And so if 

[00:03:05] Sasha Almazan: you pick up any of Lucinda Brant's covers. you will see our work, and it is, it's histor, it's a historical, she is down to like the, where the placement of the necklace is.

[00:03:17] Like, it's very epic. I mean, I was building wigs for her and she had costumes built in London, some in India, like very, very specific. So it was, it was a big project and so. You know, from that, I feel like that may be whatever, how many years was that? Like eight years, 

[00:03:34] Gene Mollica: eight years 

[00:03:35] Sasha Almazan: ago was when we started to see a big turnover from authors going independent, like more and more indie authors from that point, we're doing like larger projects and really coming to us.

[00:03:47] So we were getting. If you were calls from publishers 

[00:03:51] Gene Mollica: are we used to just have nothing but trade and then around the summer of 17, you know, 16, 17, it went way up on the on the Indy side. And we're developing and they wanted everything at once. They wanted to think about the whole series once. Something we could never convince the trade to do.

[00:04:08] Right? 

[00:04:08] Sasha Almazan: Yeah, right. No way. 

[00:04:09] Gene Mollica: And so it became even more important to, you know, me. And we, we did. It was like, you know, without sounding corny, you know, we met at the right time. 

[00:04:20] Sasha Almazan: Yeah. 

[00:04:20] Gene Mollica: And, and the first case was Lucinda Brandt. She's real, they're a very serious couple over there. And and the day that Sasha came in, the model she was working on, her mother was a theatrical set designer of historical pieces, specifically in New York.

[00:04:39] So she was confirming that everything Sasha was doing was perfectly accurate and blowing her mother away. I was like, this is absolutely good to hear. Yeah. Photos of the environments are very much like that. They're very about last minute energy and, and that was a, that was a big one. So then I, I just, you know, after that, honestly, I have to say in short, we just took off like a rocket.

[00:04:58] Yeah. We never stopped talking and working together. 

[00:05:01] Teddy Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Amazing. So that's Lucinda Brunt. I'll get those, um, I'll get links to that, but those books in the show notes so people can 

[00:05:07] Gene Mollica: check out your work. Really brilliant and the, and I think the other person who was in our lives at that time, roughly the same time was Ella 

[00:05:16] Sasha Almazan: Summers, who 

[00:05:16] Gene Mollica: represented, you know, a category, a category in the market that we're very, very strong in, but she came in with just a lot.

[00:05:23] And again, you know, Sasha and I got to experience working together, working out our process together. And one of the things that really blew my mind with working with you was. Versus any other hair and makeup artist. First of all, Sasha does the hair, does the makeup, did the styling, but also thought about the concepts the author had, the colors, what the world was representing.

[00:05:44] So before we even had the talent come visit us, Sasha was already working on mannequins with hairstyles and costuming and designing all these things, and it totally blew my mind. I was like, okay, please just continue collaborating. 

[00:05:56] Sasha Almazan: Yeah, and that ended up turning into a shoot that we were also shooting in on green screen.

[00:06:01] Teddy Smith: Yeah. So, 

[00:06:03] Sasha Almazan: yeah. And that turned into, um, we'll send you the short video. We can get into that later, but she ended up using that campaign for a Kickstarter that she's, she's doing right now. And she, I think there were seven, separate stories in that whole, universe. What is that one? 

[00:06:18] Gene Mollica: yeah. Legion.

[00:06:19] Legion of 

[00:06:19] Sasha Almazan: angels and the, the something, which I've been working with Ella summer. So I. 

[00:06:26] Gene Mollica: Yeah. 

[00:06:27] Sasha Almazan: Yeah, it's been 

[00:06:28] Gene Mollica: like five or six. I, it's a huge universe. When we 

[00:06:30] Sasha Almazan: say these years, how many years? I'm like,

[00:06:36] Gene Mollica: yeah, and that's, that's, yeah, man, that's been going on 

[00:06:39] Teddy Smith: for a long time. Yeah, yeah, it's amazing. That thing you just said about working with Indy and how you used to do trade. And now it's all Indy. A lot of quite serious authors I speak to now, even publishing their own books. Just directly to customers because of it's been a bit of a change in the market where people have much more access So I think services like yours where you can help people have that more premium products are quite important now 

[00:07:02] Sasha Almazan: So that's absolutely correct and a lot of them that also have work with the big pub, and maybe they have, my gosh, like, you know, a Sapphire, I don't know, 

[00:07:14] Gene Mollica: what's her name?

[00:07:15] Talcott? No. No. The woman. Oh, yeah. I don't know. . Oh. Yes. Les Alona, 

[00:07:26] Sasha Almazan: Alona Andrews, Andrew, Alana Andrews. So she, yes, she does both. That took a minute. Sorry. . 

[00:07:32] Gene Mollica: I know, 

[00:07:33] Sasha Almazan: but that's a really great sign because we have a lot of clients. I'm amazing. So yeah, that was Amazing's 

[00:07:38] Gene Mollica: one thing I got right this morning.

[00:07:39] Yes. . 

[00:07:39] Sasha Almazan: So, um. With, with Ilona Andrews, she still is published by, I don't even remember. I think 

[00:07:46] Gene Mollica: she's with, she was Harper Collins. 

[00:07:47] Sasha Almazan: She's Harper Collins. And then she comes to us for her indie stuff, but also when she works with Harper Collins, she I don't know if she has it in a contract or what, but she still comes to us and they use us for the shoot.

[00:07:59] And what we do is we'll shoot like one cover, but when she comes to us, let's say she comes to us, you know, separately, like she could do three. And and he's not held out like that's what happens. A lot of the authors are held down to one book a year and the Indies, you know, they put a book out. They, we, we encourage them to have, you know, book two, if it's especially if it's a series to have book two done as well so that they put that on preorder right after they release.

[00:08:28] So let's say they release their book. We want to make sure that we're, we're already ready for the second book. So I could get that on pre order. So you're like stacking your money, right? You're stacking your opportunity to be a success. 

[00:08:38] Gene Mollica: Yeah. Publishers, they have a totally different way. They sell books.

[00:08:41] They sell books to stores. So they have release schedules that are all about their own. The reason why they do one author at a time, I believe, is because they're looking at their whole list, not just that individual author, 

[00:08:53] Sasha Almazan: right? 

[00:08:54] Gene Mollica: Authors going into Amazon themselves as Indies have to consider their own campaigns.

[00:08:59] You know, we were thrilled because it's the way we wanted to work with our trade people, but they would never do 

[00:09:04] Sasha Almazan: it. 

[00:09:05] Gene Mollica: Yeah. So we were excited. 

[00:09:07] Sasha Almazan: Yeah. Really exciting opportunity and to grow with these authors that we've been working with for a while. And then, you know, it was introducing a lot of authors to us.

[00:09:17] because they would see our name out there. Yeah, definitely. So I think we've touched on a couple of the concepts that you've worked on right now, such as having the makeup, the models, the design, all the extra stuff that goes into it. But a lot of people that listen to it will be looking at some of the less premium options, you know, maybe a hundred covers or even getting someone like five or up work to do their covers.

[00:09:39] Teddy Smith: So why do you believe that authors should be investing in a premium cover rather than doing a standard one? And also Who are the sort of authors who this would really appeal to? Could you repeat that? Sure. So, uh, sure. So a lot of people, we talked a lot about, we touched on this a little bit with your covers just now, where you, it's so involved.

[00:10:03] You get the photographers, you have the historical pieces, you have the, you know, the mum of the author who is a historical expert coming in and making sure it's, you know, there's loads of steps to it. You know, you can see how much work goes into professional cover. But a lot of people listening to this are maybe starting out, they can't afford that entire process and they're looking at something like 100 covers or Upwork or something a bit more affordable.

[00:10:25] So why do you believe that authors should be working with a premium business service like yours and what sort of authors do you want to work with? 

[00:10:34] Sasha Almazan: Okay. So this is, this is a really, thank you for asking that question. This is really important. So let's say you're an author and you've been working on this book.

[00:10:43] Maybe it's been in your, in your head for years. Let's say, you know, 10 years, let's say five years, even if it's one year, it popped into your head and you're like, you know what, I have this book, but you spent time on that book. You spent years on this book. You've been outlining it. You've gone to an editor.

[00:10:57] You've done all of these things. Who's going to read that book if you don't have something on the cover, that's representing. What you have on the inside. So if you just go out there and you're like, Oh, it's this is an urban fantasy and I'm just going to go out there and throw this on here. It doesn't make sense.

[00:11:12] If you go on Amazon, it's saturated with that. So when you come to our studio, we have a conversation with you in the beginning. And whether you reach out to us by email or read Z or just find us and. You know, shoot us an email or if you're at Vegas, you're in Vegas. And because there's a lot of indie authors there, it's a whole, a whole thing that we go to, it's called author nation this year.

[00:11:34] Yes. 

[00:11:35] Teddy Smith: Right. 

[00:11:36] Sasha Almazan: Yeah, exactly. So, you know, we get approached by a lot of new authors and they're asking that exact question. We have a stock photo site that we then would send out to you. And if you see a model on there that fits. The bill. Fantastic. We will work with you. It's at a different price. When you come in for a photo shoot and you know, it's a huge process.

[00:11:59] It's a huge process to get us all the information that you need. So that we can get the world that you want to create onto those books. When you are starting out, we still will ask that of the author, but on a, on a different level, a much smaller scale. But if you are coming to us, we can create something for you.

[00:12:19] By using stock photography. We do a lot of compositing. We make it happen for you, but it doesn't have to be. It's not one and done. It's not. You can only come to us if you have a series of five. We work with every type of author because we want them to be successful because the more successful you are, then you come back to us and that and it becomes, you know, it's a process, but it's a relationship that we develop.

[00:12:46] With these authors and then, you know, if you're looking to market, that's a huge process is you have to brand yourself because you don't have like Del Rey or Harper Collins or anything there. They're going to do all that marketing for you, but you come to us and we're going to help you understand the process.

[00:13:04] Teddy Smith: And I think that 

[00:13:05] Sasha Almazan: that's where a lot of the authors are missing. If you do that on your own, you're like, okay, I have this one book. I'm going to put it out there. I think my name should look like this or I don't know. It just this is what everybody else is doing and you throw it up there. And then let's say you write another book and you use a different type.

[00:13:21] for your author name, it doesn't match up how you got it. It's a branding process. We really give our authors a lot of attention, a lot of attention at the beginning to understand the process that goes into this. 

[00:13:33] Teddy Smith: What does that process look like with working with you? So what are the steps you'd usually go with, for a new author who's wanting to work with you?

[00:13:41] Gene Mollica: We usually start off with creative brief 

[00:13:43] Sasha Almazan: creative brief, 

[00:13:44] Gene Mollica: something we develop. What does that mean? What does that mean? Okay. So, so what we, okay. So what we decided to do with our clients long time ago was to, you know, first of all, we like to meet them either by phone, usually talking by phone first, and then we'll, um, go and send them a brief, which kind of outlines how you should think of visually about your book.

[00:14:04] A lot of authors are very descriptive in writing worlds, but when they have to actually tell you what they want on a cover. It falls apart very quickly, 

[00:14:12] Sasha Almazan: very quickly. We actually end up sending it back to, so they get it over to us and then we send it back to them and say, let's try this again. 

[00:14:21] Gene Mollica: We're just looking for it.

[00:14:22] Cause they know, you know, a lot of times they were looking for the key visuals as artists, you know, and we always imagined it on the shelf with other coppers. So I always had imagined that them in a, in a competitive environment, how are we going to separate you from the book next to you? Even if you're in the same genre and that's where they're going to park you and so, you know, they know We know they have it in their book but a lot of times they may not mention or see the significance of that element or that magical element or a region or so we just help them kind of develop it with focus on the uniqueness of the characters in the world.

[00:14:53] You're in And then that allows us some visuals to work with, right? 

[00:14:57] Sasha Almazan: So we usually send them a creative brief from an author that did a really great job, right? So like they break down the character. What color hair does the character have? What color eyes does the character have? What are they wearing?

[00:15:10] What time of day is it? Is this, does this taste take place on earth? Like, where does it take place? Like we, a lot of details. We're going to pull all that out. And if they break, if they have one book, they give it to us that way. If there's a series, we, you know, try to help them break it all down. Like book one, book two, book three.

[00:15:28] What is the color palette? What is the season? those things are, are really important because we're trying to get your story. As a snapshot, right? So we're trying to get the story that you have in your book on the cover of the book. So that sounds, yeah, with great branding, but yeah, so we're trying to get that out there for you.

[00:15:47] So it's like, it really makes them think visually. 

[00:15:50] Teddy Smith: So you mentioned just now about you think about how it would look on the shelves. That's actually quite an interesting point. I hadn't thought about that when, when you're designing a book cover, do you do research on things like. Amazon or Barnes and Noble to see what are the books that come up in that category to be like, what would this yeah.

[00:16:05] We're obsessed 

[00:16:06] Gene Mollica: with that. 

[00:16:07] Teddy Smith: Oh, yeah. 

[00:16:07] Gene Mollica: So we, you know, we will spend hours in a bookstore. I mean, so if you go to a bookstore, the whole day is shot. 

[00:16:13] Sasha Almazan: The goal is like, let's go see if we have a new book on the 

[00:16:17] Gene Mollica: shelves. We will peruse them for shelves and shank them apart and analyze them to death.

[00:16:22] And we do the same thing on Amazon. Yeah, absolutely. Amazon for 

[00:16:25] Sasha Almazan: sure. We've got a UK Amazon, uh, US Amazon. We go on both because they are different. They are different. And what might be trending in the UK may not be trending in the US. that's very interesting. 

[00:16:36] Gene Mollica: Very much. And you know, I think a lot of our authors, Should spend more time.

[00:16:41] I know they don't wanna hear this, but they should spend more time in bookstores, even though they feel like there's two different worlds out there. We don't really look at it like that, you know? And, and by going to a bookstore, you'll, you'll sort of get a better visual idea of, well, how would I, you know, see my book out there and how, what would make it stand out next to my competitors?

[00:17:01] Or, yeah, because, you know, then the other thing is, you know, because our, our process and like SAA pointed it out earlier, we do all kinds of genres. So we can't, you know, we, we, we, we, we really customize it to the author of the genre. Let's say it's a Western. Let's say it's a mystery. You know, we have to switch gears and go to that, that style and thinking for that audience.

[00:17:23] Sasha Almazan: Yeah. 

[00:17:23] Teddy Smith: So, you know, what, what are the genres you generally work in? 

[00:17:28] Sasha Almazan: Epic fantasy 

[00:17:29] Teddy Smith: fiction. 

[00:17:30] Sasha Almazan: Yes. not always. But mostly yes. Yes. Epic fantasy, urban fantasy, historical romance historical Western thrillers. 

[00:17:41] Teddy Smith: yeah, 

[00:17:41] Sasha Almazan: Christian Romance. Christian thrillers. Sci-fi. Sci-fi. Oh my god.

[00:17:46] Sci-fi like, 

[00:17:47] Gene Mollica: yeah. Love sci-fi. Alternative history. Alternative 

[00:17:51] Sasha Almazan: history. . 

[00:17:53] Gene Mollica: And we love, 

[00:17:54] Sasha Almazan: oh, space, opera Space. We love working space opera too. That's where you get, it's like, it's fun because it's creative, you know? Yeah, definitely. And if you're feeling dark, you hope that someone's going to send in a thriller.

[00:18:09] Teddy Smith: Are there any, are there any particular elements that you often go back to, to use in order to make a book stand out? Like, do you have like a signature thing? You say, Oh, this is, I often use this particular element to make my book stand out on the page. 

[00:18:21] Sasha Almazan: I know what Jean's going to say, fire 

[00:18:25] Gene Mollica: wasn't going to say explosions, 

[00:18:28] Sasha Almazan: explosions.

[00:18:29] It just, it depends on the genre, actually, usually a lot of rim light and some people can take that too far because they think, Oh, rim light, it's going to bounce off the shelf. Actually, it's the opposite. If it's not placed properly, it really distorts the figure. What's rim light? Really, it's 

[00:18:50] Gene Mollica: a photo term.

[00:18:51] Sasha Almazan: Oh yeah, 

[00:18:51] Gene Mollica: it's a photo. 

[00:18:52] Sasha Almazan: It's a photo term. 

[00:18:53] Gene Mollica: Three lights on up, you know, you have a, 

[00:18:55] Sasha Almazan: you 

[00:18:56] Gene Mollica: have a what do they call it? Key light. And then you have a rim light to separate something from the background. And then you may have a, you may have a third light, a background light. 

[00:19:06] Sasha Almazan: And then what happens is, on a cover, let's say we didn't take that photo in the studio, but we had taken it like earlier, or we composited a figure, which we can get into later.

[00:19:17] and we use the head and then we, we built a body and, or maybe it was armor. And so then you, you, you color the light behind it. So we, we bring that in, we actually bring that light in, whether we go and search up like an explosion, for example, if we want like red, and then you put it behind the figure and then it highlights the figure from the background.

[00:19:39] So, if we don't get that, like on a shoot, if this is something that we're just creating something, like it's a one off or like someone is like, I don't want to do a shoot, but I want to use your stock fine. And then we just create the rim light where we don't have it. Sometimes they have to remove it and then replace it.

[00:19:55] But we definitely, that is a huge. Technique that we use. 

[00:19:59] Teddy Smith: Yeah, 

[00:20:00] Gene Mollica: I mean, yeah. Okay, It's quite interesting 

[00:20:03] Teddy Smith: hearing you like nerd out over these particular points, because if you like, if you were getting a cover, just like using your, your own skills, like using Canva or something, or using one of these cheaper designs, like none of this is going to be done.

[00:20:16] So just by explaining your process, you're explaining what the difference is between getting a premium cover and getting something a bit more standard. 

[00:20:22] Gene Mollica: Yeah, yeah. In fact, I'll be right back. So, so, you know, people still come to us for photo shoots. This is a huge book. It's out right now. Yeah. 

[00:20:35] Sasha Almazan: It's the seventh veil of Salome and it's 

[00:20:37] Teddy Smith: what's the name of the 

[00:20:38] Sasha Almazan: Garcia 

[00:20:39] Teddy Smith: Sylvia Marina Garcia.

[00:20:40] Okay. We'll put it in the show notes as well. 

[00:20:42] Sasha Almazan: Yeah. So this right now is like, good morning, America's book club of the month. Like it happens to be, we're reading that in my book club right now. But go ahead. What were you going to say? 

[00:20:53] Gene Mollica: No, go ahead. 

[00:20:54] Sasha Almazan: No, no, 

[00:20:54] Gene Mollica: continue. You shot it. So, but that, you know, that's a photo shoot.

[00:20:58] So, here, the woman is in a chair. We always have some sort of, not this chair, not the chair you see, but the woman's in a chair, a historical chair, just because That's what we have in the studio. We always have objects in front of her in the studio. And so, you know, our director comes in, they may not have a real clear idea of where they want to go.

[00:21:17] They have a general idea. So we select the model, we select the costume. Sasha does all the hair and makeup and styling and costuming, and we both do the photography. She's been doing more photography lately. I've been doing more of the lighting lately. So, you know, but Sasha's really great with working with art directors and positioning and concepting the style of the shot and look at the shot.

[00:21:38] And So this is just an example of a straightforward photo shoot. I mean, with quantity, you put the chair and you put the background and put all these details in later. So a lot of this skill level we bring to. 

[00:21:50] Sasha Almazan: Right. So then let's say we go to this, which is Michael Enderly. We redid the Katherian Gambit.

[00:21:57] Maybe it had been done one or two other times, but we went all the way between we did one through 21. For him, so 21 books and he had a photo shoot done. I don't even know how many years ago, like maybe 10. It was 

[00:22:11] Gene Mollica: quite relevant. Yeah. 

[00:22:13] Sasha Almazan: And then he gets that photo shoot and said, could you just create it from, from here?

[00:22:17] We're like, sure. Okay. So this is a perfect example of using the rim light because that was cute, but she also wasn't wearing that. What we use from that shoot was just the head. And then we built whole body the armor, the Cape, all of that. And then we made the rim light and the color behind it. Lindsay broker, who is one of our favorites.

[00:22:39] I also do enjoy reading her books. Lindsay broker, she had a photo shoot, but there was not a motorcycle there. So you have to composite everything. And, you know, she, this is always in Seattle. She's, you know, it always takes place in Seattle. So we know the background. That's what we mean by the rim light, like this jumps off.

[00:22:58] Yeah, it 

[00:22:58] Teddy Smith: does. 

[00:22:59] Sasha Almazan: So there's a, there's a big process that goes into that and you have to know where to highlight. So let's say you are an author and you're like, it's my first time out. I'm just going to do it myself at home. You go on, I don't even know where they go. Um, and then they put it together and you know, you invest that much time in writing that book, you invest money in your editor.

[00:23:31] I feel like you should. From the beginning, start setting money aside, even if it's a little bit, set a little bit of money aside when you start writing that book so that by the time you get ready that you need that cover and you want to get that book out there, you know that you have a little nest egg and that is going to pay for your cover.

[00:23:49] Cause you know what, if you invest all that time into writing that book, you want to make sure that people are going to pick it up. You want to make sure people see it on Amazon because they're going to fly past all of these books. If you have. You know, I don't know if I can say it's like a half assed cover.

[00:24:05] No one's going to stop on that. They're going to, they're going to stop on the one that grabs the eye. And if it's not complete, no one's going to stop on that book and click. You might have written the best book ever, but no one's going to know. 

[00:24:18] Teddy Smith: I have, you're right. I have seen some great covers that have been done by like cheap companies, but the the consistency is definitely never there.

[00:24:25] Like I've, I've used the same cover designer for two books before and one was great and the other one was really bad. And, you know, you've kind of already spent this money to get this cover. You want to work with someone that is going to get consistency rights, then that, that is, you know, that's the bit that's missing, I think.

[00:24:40] Sasha Almazan: And we know we don't turn people away. I will say that I'll try to shorten this story. So, um, we met. We were a pro. I was approached by an author in a very bizarre way when it was still 20 books to 50k in Las Vegas, and he kept like stalking us like he came to our presentation and he was listening and then he came up after and he was like, How much does it cost?

[00:25:05] And we're like, well, what do you have? And he's like, well, I'm going to come back. We're like, okay. And then he like came back again. I mean, days that we were there, this guy kept coming up and like, well, I don't know. I'm not going to pay that. My wife's not going to let me drop that money and blah, blah, blah, blah.

[00:25:18] And I've already had them out there. And we're like, okay, well, you know, reach out to us when you get home. Maybe you'll change your mind. You know, do a little research. Let us know. he finally reached out to us and he said, I can only spend this much. And we were like, how many books do you have? Send us what you have.

[00:25:34] And we like fainted. 

[00:25:38] Teddy Smith: fainted. I 

[00:25:39] Sasha Almazan: was like, what genre are you writing? Are you having any success with this? And he's like, well, what genre do you think it is? And I said, you know, beach Romance? And he was like. It's a 

[00:25:49] Teddy Smith: thriller 

[00:25:51] Sasha Almazan: murder. Yeah, 

[00:25:52] Teddy Smith: we 

[00:25:54] Sasha Almazan: can send you these graphics because the following year we used it in our presentation and I said, okay, everybody show of hands.

[00:26:04] I want to know what you think this genre is and they were like romance beach romance like quick read, cozy, we're like, and then we clicked the next slide and it was like, what genre is this? They're like thriller. Uh, what is it? That psycho thriller. 

[00:26:23] Gene Mollica: Forensic, uh, thrillers. Forensic 

[00:26:25] Sasha Almazan: thrillers. 

[00:26:26] Gene Mollica: Because he's a police detective.

[00:26:27] Yeah. 

[00:26:27] Sasha Almazan: Yeah, 

[00:26:27] Gene Mollica: yeah, yeah. 

[00:26:28] Sasha Almazan: And he likes to hunt us in like weapons and stuff. And this 

[00:26:31] Gene Mollica: is dark stuff. It gets dark. Yeah. You know, he often teaches at a university. Yes. 

[00:26:35] Sasha Almazan: So this is 

[00:26:39] Gene Mollica: This is Michael 

[00:26:39] Sasha Almazan: Merson. Check it out. I've got to see 

[00:26:41] Teddy Smith: these covers now. Michael 

[00:26:43] Sasha Almazan: Merson. He's 

[00:26:44] Teddy Smith: a genius. He 

[00:26:44] Sasha Almazan: is, and guess what happened after that?

[00:26:46] He went from selling very few books, people said they accidentally picked it up, a lot of women readers were clicking on it because they thought it was Pumas, giving him great reviews and saying, this is not my usual genre, but the writing was so great, I'm going to give it a review. And then he took off.

[00:27:04] After we recovered those. Books, he took off straight up, even when we saw him the following year, he 

[00:27:14] Teddy Smith: we didn't recognize him. 

[00:27:16] Sasha Almazan: He was like, 

[00:27:18] Teddy Smith: yeah, 

[00:27:20] Gene Mollica: his confidence was like a hundred percent. I was like, dude, that's Michael Mercer. Well, even though we worked with him the whole year.

[00:27:31] We didn't see it again. 

[00:27:32] Sasha Almazan: Yeah, he's great. And then the third year, he came up on the panel with us and told his story. And how this guy's making money now. He's written so many more books. Yeah, he 

[00:27:44] Gene Mollica: speaks. 

[00:27:46] Teddy Smith: I'm going to catch him because he's, this sounds like a really interesting 

[00:27:48] Gene Mollica: person. 

[00:27:49] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:27:49] Gene Mollica: He's really a joy to talk to and smart.

[00:27:53] I mean, that was the best example. it was really a terrific example. Uh, you know, I think, you know, he's not the only one. We've got so many authors who have just no idea what to even expect from a cover designer, 

[00:28:05] Teddy Smith: which 

[00:28:05] Gene Mollica: is why we said earlier, go to a bookstore. That's what you should expect. Just because now, let's say you have 100, 200.

[00:28:13] First of all, those budgets are too low for anything serious. If you start to get up a little higher you should still expect a great product. If you go up a little higher, most of the best, better designers are turning around 1200, I'd say, right? 

[00:28:25] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:28:25] Gene Mollica: I mean, those are our fees now for some like Michael, we actually met his budget, which was a lot lower to help him get started.

[00:28:34] And, you know, we work with our Indies and it depends on the cover project, you know, not all of our prices are that hard. 

[00:28:40] Sasha Almazan: Right. So we, I'm going to, I will say this and Because he came to us with multiple books and through a lot of conversation, we started him at 550 for his cover and that was an agreement that then he would pay, you know, the, the standard price that we would charge for a thriller like that.

[00:29:02] And that was nine and that is nine fifty. So he started at that and he saw the increase on the money he was making and like, it was. It was within like two weeks. I mean, he could not believe when you really do it. Right. And he was so afraid and we're like, why are you so afraid? You've already put so much time and you have lost time.

[00:29:24] And now, you know, I mean, it's, it's, it's a question that these, these authors need to ask themselves, like, how much time have you put into that? Just. Yeah, a lot of them 

[00:29:33] Gene Mollica: just don't even know what to expect, you know, from a cover designer and, you know, and then he went audio. Then his audio sales took 

[00:29:41] Sasha Almazan: him.

[00:29:41] Gene Mollica: Yeah. Yeah. Which is something, you know, so we want to see the same success with everybody who comes through the door. Absolutely. And we can cite other examples of that. 

[00:29:49] Sasha Almazan: Right. 

[00:29:49] Gene Mollica: Yeah. 

[00:29:50] Teddy Smith: I mean, it's so interesting hearing you speak about the covers because obviously a lot of people just, they, you know, they kind of leave the cover till last.

[00:29:57] And I think everyone thinks, oh, no one judges a book by their cover, but they absolutely do. I was speaking to Mike Mike Kurigan, who's one of my first episodes on here and he's from Wrists and Word Media, which is a book promotion company. They do, if you're launching a book for free or for cheaper, they'll launch it for you.

[00:30:11] And it's really, really great service. And one of the quotes he said was People say you shouldn't judge a book by its cover, but people do and I've got data to prove it. So that's right. 

[00:30:21] Sasha Almazan: Yeah, 

[00:30:22] Gene Mollica: absolutely. 

[00:30:23] Sasha Almazan: You know, 

[00:30:23] Gene Mollica: another author similar to not quite where Michael was, but another author, Justin Leslie.

[00:30:29] And, um, And so we're not just mentioning male names, but Robin King 

[00:30:34] Teddy Smith: RL 

[00:30:34] Gene Mollica: King both had come to us when their series was about nine books in five to nine books in, and they knew they could probably be getting greater sales or greater audience and they weren't sure. And they brought them in. We almost had to drag them through the door.

[00:30:51] We went through the same process. We did the creative briefs. We had the discussion. In this case, we did go with photo shoots as the process that those characters really become solid and so forth. Let 

[00:31:02] Sasha Almazan: me just interject here. That was because that was an investment. RL King was like, I'm going to write 30.

[00:31:08] Plus books. So we were like, why would you just keep trying to fight? Cause she, her complaint was that she couldn't find enough of that stock image. So we said, a photo shoot is for you the absolute most economical way to go, because you will, we're going to shoot five, 600 shots for you and you can write as many books as you want and you can use any of those photos for any of your marketing.

[00:31:32] Like, whatever you want, that's, that's your man, that's your guy, that's your character, that's, that's Stone. Same with Justin Leslie. He, uh, was like, I don't know how many books I'm gonna write, I'm already at book He was starting at book 

[00:31:43] Gene Mollica: 5. Yeah, 

[00:31:44] Sasha Almazan: and then we went back and recovered 1, 2, 3, even though he kept writing 5, 6, 7, then we went back and then he could release 1, 2, 3.

[00:31:52] Four and so forth. So we just, we're actually, you just sent him over a book. What was the book? We just finished it yesterday. Sent it over and blew his mind and he's happy as can be. Yeah. What are the, are there some of the elements with your process that make it a more expensive process? For example, I'm assuming if you do a full photo shoot, that makes it more expensive than using like a stock images cover.

[00:32:16] Yeah. So you would pay the. The photo shoot is a separate price from the covers. So because you have a model, you have studio fee, you have customer design. And that could run, usually it's about 2000 between two and 3000. 

[00:32:35] Teddy Smith: Yeah, for the shoot. But you can, as you mentioned, you can get loads of shots from that, that you can use in all different things as well.

[00:32:40] Sasha Almazan: Yeah. As many, as many. We'll even 

[00:32:42] Gene Mollica: bring it, you know, it also helps conceptually too. We come up with a lot of creative ideas. We bring a lot of props and weapons in and a lot of things that the author never, I mean, we hear this all the time. If the author is like, Oh my God, I have so many more ideas now.

[00:32:54] And they almost rewrite the whole brief on the set, which is fine. Now we're just there to get ideas and they love it. 

[00:33:01] Sasha Almazan: So, you know, we love going to the photo shoot because we do, like Jean just said, we actually bring, you know, a lot of weapons, whether they're swords guns that are not real, they're props, but they're really heavy and they're really cool.

[00:33:17] We've had a bow and arrows. We had I mean, like you name it, we bring it real costumes because when you have an outline of, let's say eight books and in those eight books, you have all these thoughts, right? So your model is out there like moving with the weapon so that we're not. Putting those, sometimes you see the hands that someone definitely, you know, composited, and they're like barely holding a thing.

[00:33:41] And it looks like it's floppy, like that's a sword, but that's not how you hold a sword. So some people get very specific about that. So if you're an author that, you know, you, you've got your heart and soul into this series that you're writing just like, Lisa Phillips, she's a Christian author and this is a thriller and her character is amazing, but she's like in a winter jacket.

[00:34:02] Right. And she's like bent down, like, you know how hard it is to find a stock photo like that, like coach, she's got, she has a very specific gun that she uses, like all these things, 

[00:34:12] Gene Mollica: big series, 

[00:34:13] Sasha Almazan: it's a big series 

[00:34:15] Gene Mollica: and we can, you know, those costumes sort of lead you to a, whoa, it's a winter seat. So you're going to have more blue light.

[00:34:19] And sometimes we'll add some color, you know, just to, again, getting back to the branding and making each book look different. And you know, you, you, you know, that's one of the things that can really help in a photo shoot. 

[00:34:30] Teddy Smith: Yeah. Amazing. And when people, people listen to this, they'll be thinking now, Oh, it might be, it's probably my cover is the reason that my sales aren't good, which isn't always the case.

[00:34:39] But do you have any tips for people who are trying to assess whether their cover is possibly the reason why their sales might not be as good or whether a cover is effective as they want it to be? 

[00:34:48] Sasha Almazan: Yes. Let's say you go on Amazon and you type in top 10, top 20 selling urban fantasy. What comes up? So do you 

[00:35:00] Teddy Smith: mean go to the bestsellers list on the, on that section?

[00:35:02] Yeah. Yeah. Okay. 

[00:35:03] Sasha Almazan: And take a look at those books and then look at your cover and ask yourself does it look like anything up there? Do you feel that that is best representing, even if it's conceptual, like, yeah. is it the same vibe? Is it the same color palette? Is it a similar color palette?

[00:35:21] even your type, your type can also tell you, like, let's say you're doing an epic fantasy and you've got block letters. Well, that's not going to work. Yeah. Like it's not even the right genre. So if someone's like scrolling through and maybe they're on their phone, think about it, people who are commuting or just like sitting around their couch and they're on their, their iPhone or their whatever, you know, their cell phone and they're scrolling.

[00:35:43] Like it has to pop out, like, if it just looks like a a dark cover, they're certainly not going to click on that. If, if you see an apple with, some highlights around it, because it worked for Twilight, well, that might not work for you if you're writing a thriller, right. Or, or like, I don't know.

[00:36:00] Gene Mollica: Yeah. 

[00:36:01] Teddy Smith: Yeah. Yeah, I do. 

[00:36:02] Sasha Almazan: It's like. It makes me crazy. 

[00:36:04] Teddy Smith: I guess there is a bit of a balance to be struck between like, fitting in and also standing out though. Because 

[00:36:09] Sasha Almazan: Absolutely. 

[00:36:10] Teddy Smith: You're right. Yeah. You don't want to just draw an apple because obviously you'll just look like a Twilight cover. But do you want to keep those like black and red colors or would you want to have something that was like completely different so you stand out on that page?

[00:36:19] It's a bit of a balancing act, I think. 

[00:36:21] Sasha Almazan: It is a very, and that's why we encourage people to come to us because we are on top of that. And, and that's what this is like, you're the author, you, we don't write the book, you write the book, you come to us to make the cover because this is what we specialize in and we're not trying to tell you how to write the book.

[00:36:40] That's what you specialize in. So you go to someone who specializes. In what you're looking for, right? I feel like you wouldn't go to the dentist to fix a broken leg. I wouldn't. Mine doesn't work. Um, 

[00:36:55] Teddy Smith: everybody has a different thing. Well, yeah, it's 

[00:36:57] Gene Mollica: likely we've come across the problem before. You know, it's likely to come across a challenge before, you know, we had a woman come in who was, again, historical Western writer, writing fiction, but set in very, you know, history.

[00:37:11] We love that stuff. Yeah, we knew exactly what to do. You know, I mean, there's not a lot of examples to find out there, 

[00:37:18] Sasha Almazan: right? 

[00:37:18] Gene Mollica: So naturally, she didn't know where to go. 

[00:37:20] Sasha Almazan: Right. 

[00:37:21] Gene Mollica: And it was really struggling. And 

[00:37:23] Sasha Almazan: she paid for two covers and she sent it. And I was like, Oh my God, do we have to tell her? It's painful, but you, we have to be honest and say like, this is going to get no one.

[00:37:35] Like you're going to get, I don't even know. This looks like a, like a book, like a college book or something. Like, I don't even know. Like I've had no idea. Even where to place was as 

[00:37:45] Gene Mollica: bad as Mike Marson's, uh, exam. Totally off. 

[00:37:49] Sasha Almazan: It was, it was, I was just like, I have no idea what if she just sent this over, I would have zero idea of what is a pamphlet for I don't have any idea.

[00:38:01] Teddy Smith: Right. Really? Right. Right. It's like that. 

[00:38:04] Sasha Almazan: And now, if you look at the cover that we made for her, I think she almost cried. And she sent, and it wasn't through, she sent it around to her beta group and they were like losing their minds. They just couldn't decide if there should be more dirt on the, on the, on the wagon trail.

[00:38:21] Right? Like that was their only critique. Like, should there be more gravel or more dirt, right? 

[00:38:26] Gene Mollica: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. They were, it was like, fine, you know, fine. We get your point about the gravel. No problem. Yeah. Dirt. Yeah. 

[00:38:35] Teddy Smith: Rim light. Rim light sounds to everything. So tell me a bit more. Have you just, just last question.

[00:38:47] Have you what, have you got any exciting projects that you're working on at the moment that you want to share with us and tell us a bit how they've gone. 

[00:38:53] Gene Mollica: exciting 

[00:38:53] Teddy Smith: projects? 

[00:38:54] Sasha Almazan: You know what? We do have one that is really cool. and we met last year. 

[00:39:01] Gene Mollica: Do I know about it? 

[00:39:02] Sasha Almazan: Yes. Oh, 

[00:39:03] Gene Mollica: yeah. 

[00:39:04] Sasha Almazan: So we met this woman, Lisa Mitchell, and she came to hear speak and then after she just waited and was like, I, I just love what you did for Thomas Carpenter, you know, my husband, he's written a lot of books.

[00:39:17] He's published. He's It's huge 

[00:39:21] Gene Mollica: epic fantasy, epic fantasy, 

[00:39:23] Sasha Almazan: and we have been working on this series for almost a year and they have not released it yet because they want to recover what they did and he launched and then we, they gave us another series that he's working on and we're into book three on that one and that has been released.

[00:39:43] And he's up to what, what are, I think we're at like 13, 14, maybe 16. He did release a few, just, they wanted to just put it out there to see if people are going to respond to it. And they are going crazy for it. And they're waiting. So we're really excited because we have all of these stepped up and we did the logo, we've done color changes for the logo.

[00:40:06] I mean, it is epic. It's massive, this project. And I'm just, I'm so excited. 

[00:40:11] Gene Mollica: figurative. It's all landscapes. 

[00:40:13] Sasha Almazan: Yeah, a lot of them are landscapes. We did not do a photo shoot. I mean, it's just, it's really exciting. And at the same time, I'm like, I just want them to release more. Just let me look at 

[00:40:24] Teddy Smith: it. It's been, 

[00:40:25] Sasha Almazan: it's been like, It's definitely been like a fantastic project to work on and I will be so sad when this, this, 

[00:40:32] Gene Mollica: I don't think it's ever gonna end.

[00:40:33] Sasha Almazan: Yeah. , 

[00:40:35] Gene Mollica: you think it's gonna end? 

[00:40:35] Sasha Almazan: We're we're still going and we're doing like banners for them. We're doing a plus content. We're like just loading them up with all of this social media banners stuff. Game of Thrones. Yeah. I mean it's, it's huge. If this, if this doesn't get picked up for a series or like the next like huge HBO series, I would be sure.

[00:40:51] Gene Mollica: We're excited for a lot of our authors. I mean, um, John Corwin, just somebody we work with, just passed through a fantastic idea. Something we do see getting picked up by HBO. I mean, Michael Merson. I mean, we've worked with Michael Underley, Shane Silvers. You know, we, we, we've helped so many, we've worked with so many and had the joy of seeing so many of these brands grow.

[00:41:12] It's really exciting stuff. Ella Summers is back in with a huge amount of stuff. 

[00:41:16] Sasha Almazan: Yeah. And C. E. Murphy. So here's a, here's a, yeah, 

[00:41:20] Gene Mollica: that's a good one. 

[00:41:21] Sasha Almazan: Yeah. 

[00:41:21] Gene Mollica: Go ahead. 

[00:41:21] Sasha Almazan: So, Gene. Actually did these covers for C. E. Murphy years ago. No, the old ones. You didn't do any? 

[00:41:27] Gene Mollica: I didn't do 

[00:41:28] Sasha Almazan: any. In the publish? 

[00:41:28] Gene Mollica: Nope. No, I just admired them.

[00:41:31] No, I had nothing to do with them. The original ones through Random House had nothing to do with them. 

[00:41:36] Sasha Almazan: Oh, I take it back. I just admired them. So C. E. Murphy. 

[00:41:40] Gene Mollica: But they were done by really great photographers. They were really thought driven and really accomplished. And, and she called like, uh, what, last January or February?

[00:41:50] And I, I was like so excited. I think I hung up on her and called Sasha. 

[00:41:54] Sasha Almazan: Yeah. So guess 

[00:41:57] Gene Mollica: what? 

[00:41:58] Sasha Almazan: We end up doing a photo shoot with her and she said, I'm getting my rights back, isn't it? Like all of her publishing rights back for this whole series, the Walker papers and this, they have, her fan base is like loyal.

[00:42:12] Like they, they have their own like, it's like. Over the time, it's like Hayley Edwards, like, you know, working with Hayley Edwards, her fan base, like, they have tattoos, like, it's, it's incredible. Same thing with C. E. Murphy. Very specific. It has been a joy. And this is a huge project, because it's how many 

[00:42:30] Gene Mollica: Gosh, you got big, what is it, 12 

[00:42:32] Sasha Almazan: books?

[00:42:32] 12 books. And I think we're on, uh We're 

[00:42:35] Gene Mollica: on, uh, five. We're on 

[00:42:37] Sasha Almazan: five. Yeah, same thing. So very specific and she'll send it out there to her fans and just like a little nibble of what we're doing. And then she'll send it back and say like, oh, you know, they're really happy about it. Or the car needs to be this color.

[00:42:53] It's not the right color. So people get really specific. But I did think that great about putting the name of the car. 

[00:43:01] Gene Mollica: Oh, yes. Yes. 

[00:43:02] Sasha Almazan: I love that. 

[00:43:03] Gene Mollica: Oh, yeah, no, no, that's who we shot. I mean, some of these examples were citing, you know, we did shoot. It depends on the nature of the project. I heard her photo driven originally.

[00:43:13] We did a photo shoot again. 

[00:43:14] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:43:14] Gene Mollica: And uh, we're just having a great time. She's also, I did do, You 

[00:43:20] Sasha Almazan: did, you showed me. 

[00:43:21] Gene Mollica: I did do covers for Seeing Murphy through Random House years ago, but it wasn't that series. Not that series. Another series. It's uh, really quite epic fantasy. It was, it was, it was wonderful.

[00:43:31] Sasha Almazan: Yeah. Cause I, yeah. Thank 

[00:43:31] Gene Mollica: you for reminding me. 

[00:43:32] Sasha Almazan: You pulled the, you pulled the book down. You're like, look, 

[00:43:35] Gene Mollica: yeah, yeah. Right. I don't know. I don't know. It's early in the day. It's 

[00:43:41] Teddy Smith: really amazing hearing the way you guys work, because obviously it's so much more involved than it would be with one of the, a normal cover designer, because obviously you really, speak to the authors, you get involved with the characters and basically you help them with that entire creative process.

[00:43:54] It's not a case of just like, these are my requirements. Let's do your picture. It's more, let's, let's do this together. Yeah. We sat 

[00:44:00] Gene Mollica: down. I'm sorry. 

[00:44:01] Sasha Almazan: You know, it's, We really like to work that way because we feel like you just get a better product. And, and some, some cover designers might say, say the opposite and maybe they don't like that and they don't want to do that, but I feel like, and, and that's fine.

[00:44:16] That's fine. That's just their process. Not everybody's going to say, 

[00:44:20] Teddy Smith: no, we 

[00:44:21] Sasha Almazan: don't box any of the authors in it. And also we don't, not for any of the other cover designers who we are friendly with. But their processes. Maybe just different than ours. We did a panel, we were on a panel last year and we, all of us were very different in our process and it was interesting to hear it.

[00:44:40] And I know internally just being creatives we were all judging because later on we had a conversation like, why would you do that? And I'm like, I know that's just how it works. And I'm like, why would you not ask them these questions? And they're like, because then they just want us to keep, you know, And I'm like, no, I feel like if you, if you get it down, right, then you, then you get like one or two come back.

[00:45:04] Like that's it. 

[00:45:05] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:45:05] Sasha Almazan: Because you already asked all the questions. Like I want all the information. I want the information. We want the information so that we can make it happen. And then you spend less time on it because you get it right the first or second time. Okay. Second time. It's the first, but you know, the second time.

[00:45:25] Teddy Smith: Well, thank you so much for coming. So I think everyone's going to get a lot out of like hearing how your process works. And it's like seeing what the difference is between a premium cover like that and working with someone. No, I think it really explains how involved the whole process is and what the advantage are of getting someone who really knows their, what they're doing.

[00:45:40] And you can see from all the case studies that what a big difference it makes and how much difference it makes to your sales overall. If people want to get in contact with you, what's the best way for them to do that?

[00:45:51] Gene Mollica: GS cover design studio.com 

[00:45:54] Sasha Almazan: or you can email us 

[00:45:56] Gene Mollica: and Yeah, I can email us too. 

[00:45:57] Sasha Almazan: Yes. And our email address is 

[00:46:00] Gene Mollica: GS stock photo 

[00:46:02] Sasha Almazan: admin@gsdophoto.com. 

[00:46:04] Teddy Smith: Brilliant. We'll put, we'll put all that in the show notes, plus we'll put all the books you've mentioned during this show That'd great. In the show notes as well, so you can, so that people can check out your work like in real life.

[00:46:16] Yeah, you can just use our names too. Just Google our names. The word comes up. 

[00:46:20] Sasha Almazan: Yeah. 

[00:46:20] Teddy Smith: Yeah. Great. Gene and Sasha from GNS club designs. 

[00:46:23] Sasha Almazan: Yeah. And if you're going to be at author nation, we're going to, we will have a table there. Please. If you're an indie author, do not be afraid. We do not bite. 

[00:46:31] Teddy Smith: Yeah. You 

[00:46:31] Sasha Almazan: know, 

[00:46:33] Teddy Smith: we love 

[00:46:34] Sasha Almazan: drawing.

[00:46:35] I love making dragons. It's like one of my favorite things to do. But. Please come by and just say, 

[00:46:41] Gene Mollica: yeah, we answer questions all day long, 

[00:46:44] Sasha Almazan: all day long, all day long and show us, even if you like some, some authors come up and they show us what they did on their own, what do you think of this? I mean, we'll be honest and it won't be, you know, like if it's good and you're, you're seeing success, you know, if we can encourage you or help you out in any way, we're happy to do 

[00:47:00] Gene Mollica: that.

[00:47:00] We practically hold a class. It's almost like that trade day. They have. I mean, it's amazing. 

[00:47:06] Teddy Smith: Yeah. Well, I'm looking forward to come meet you in person. But just before we go, so we've got one final question. So what is the book you recommend everyone should be reading at the moment? You go. Hmm. We could just go with some of your books that have just come out.

[00:47:19] We'll go with those two books that came out. If you'd like. 

[00:47:23] Sasha Almazan: Well, The 7 Fails Album is great. But I'm actually let's see, Lindsay Broker. I'm, you know, and I'm Shane. Shane Silvers is a really. If you want to just grab a book and like get sucked in his, his series, like any, like, right now I'm reading Sarah J mass because she's got, I think she has three different series.

[00:47:44] So right now I'm reading 

[00:47:46] Teddy Smith: like 

[00:47:47] Sasha Almazan: four or five books. Kevin Hearn. 

[00:47:50] Gene Mollica: Kevin Hearn. You know, he's probably our longest running customer client, but he goes to the major pubs, so we don't directly work with him, just the Arch Archers at Random House. And this is the second series that we worked on for him through Random House.

[00:48:05] But 

[00:48:06] Sasha Almazan: a blight of black wings, that's, that's a great book. It's a long read. So you're going to, you know, 

[00:48:10] Gene Mollica: yeah, I might want to start with his original series too. And those are big, I would say, definitely check out seeing Murphy's, you know, relaunch of her series. and 

[00:48:23] Sasha Almazan: it's, it's, it's, it's hard for you to ask book cover designers.

[00:48:28] Teddy Smith: Well, that's all right. We've got, we've got loads of things to work with there. So thank you very much. Yeah. 

[00:48:33] Sasha Almazan: Of course. Anyway, 

[00:48:34] Teddy Smith: thanks for joining us. It's been great to chat to you today. It's been a really good chat. So, hopefully we'll speak again soon. 

[00:48:40] Sasha Almazan: Oh, thank you. Thank 

[00:48:41] Teddy Smith: you. Thank you so much for tuning into the Publishing Performance Podcast.

[00:48:45] I really hope you found today's episode inspiring. I love chatting to authors, writers, and people in the publishing world. Now, I'm Just before we wrap up, let me tell you about publishing performance, the number one platform for authors who want to increase Amazon book sales, but I'm not really sure where to start.

[00:49:01] Now, this show is all about helping you to sell more books. And if you're looking to boost your publishing game and to maximize your books potential on Amazon, then publishing performance is designed to help authors just like you to grow your readership and to reach a much wider audience. Now, I know that Amazon ads can be slightly complicated, which is why publishing performance.

[00:49:22] is like having a personalized ad account manager to create your ad campaigns, to choose your best keywords, and to make adjustments in real time. Now, if you're investing in ads, you really want to make sure that your investment is being used effectively, and Publishing Performance does just that. It aims to make your budget go further, improve your organic rank, and target keywords more effectively.

[00:49:42] Just go to publishingperformance. com to get started with Amazon Ads for just 1.