If you've joined Wattpad a few months or days back, great and if you've been here for more than a year but want to start writing or haven't gotten your books noticed at all, this could also imply to you as well.

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1. How to write a Book Summary/ Blurb:

Write a good summary for your book, it doesn't have to be bomb but it has to grab the reader's attention.

If you're just gonna write "Mary Elizabeth Isabella Swine was a goody-two shoes really beautiful, tall, blonde girl with an IQ of Bill Gates. Larry Piles was a bad boy with black hair, tattoos and piercings covering his body, blue eyes and is a part of a band. Read my new super awesome Bad Boy story guys! Also like and follow me!!!"

Trust me.

My cat wouldn't bother to read it. He would just click off to the next story.

But of course we don't care about what cats are reading on Wattpad , we want some really engaging audience of humans to notice the book and for that you need an engaging summary, one that makes the readers add your book to their "reading list and their private libraries"

Read some blurbs from published books or popular wattpad books and practice. Work with the words, ask your friends if they liked it, or if they are interested in the story.

As a reader what type of summary grabs your attention? When you have that figured out, write down the main points. When readers pick your book, they are supposed to feel interested in your story by reading your book summary. If your summary is boring, no one, literally NO ONE is going to bother reading the first chapter no matter how amazing your book is.

A summary should be a tease, they should feel compelled to read the book.

We will use an example of my own book.

Summary Example

Jack in the Box

Jackson Wolfe is WoodVille Asylum's most notorious patient with a history of atrocious violence. The doctors and the nurses are aware of Jacks previous history. Jack is the ring leader in the institution. He is also handsome and charming, doesn't hurt with the fact that he is a psychopath. He wants something done, he gets it done.  No questions asked.

    Riley Frazer is the hospital nurse who gets assigned as Jack's nurse. At first Riley is just curious about Jack, but soon curiosity gets the better of her and Jack maybe a bit infatuated with the nurse.

   And that's when the murders start. Someone is carving up the patients in the asylum. Could it be Jack getting creative?

If you noticed what I did in this summary, I gave my readers a brief introduction about the characters, not everything but just enough to create mystery. You already know Jack is a psychopath, but could he be killing people again? Readers get a hook and they click on the first chapter.

In the upcoming chapters, I'll be elaborating more on how to keep the readers interested in every chapter.

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2. Book Covers

Make a damn good cover. I've seen some people take that for granted with some really "meh" covers and complain how they don't have enough readers even though their story is the next super hit but a good cover is the key to getting more Reads. This one time a reader suggested a book to me and when I saw the cover, I was utterly discouraged from reading it. The girl said it was a romance book but all I saw on the cover was a sunset. A freaking "sunset" guys!

You can always use Pinterest, We Heart It or just plain old Google to find pictures. Make sure they aren't copyrighted. You don't wanna end up in jail folks (jus kiddin ;P) You can also google 'Royalty free images' and you can find some sites that offer pictures that are free.

After you've had a nice picture saved, you don't need Pro photoshop skills to make a cover.

I use Canva to make my covers. They have the wattpad book dimensions so you don't have to worry about that, they also have some free cover templates that you can use.

Another website is Picmonkey. You can register a free account and start making your covers.

If you literally can't make a cover to save your life, there is Forums and the Multimedia Club section on wattpad where you can request covers from graphic artists and that works too. I do that all the time.

If you're using your laptop, go to —> Community —> Forums —> Scroll down to Multimedia Designs.

Or just type "Cover Shops" in the search engine. You will find some Cover Shop books that says "Open" that's the place for you to request a cover. But please don't forget to credit the designers on your books if you use their covers.

If you have a budget and wouldn't mind spending a few bucks for the cover then you can also try 'Fiverr'. It's both a mobile app and a website accessible on a computer. Fiverr has some professional cover designers. They charge 5 $ for a simple cover, 2$ extra for service charges so the cover would cost you about $7 in total. My cover from Jack in the Box is done from Fiverr, while the cover for The Bad Boy & The Mermaid is done by yours truly using Canva. If you not have a job, I wouldn't recommend Fiverr. Instead, use Pinterest and Canva. Your best options.

A couple kissing or something aesthetic works for a cover. Maybe pictures of celebrities or models in general.

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3. Story tags

Tags are not a joke. It's the hardest part about uploading your book on wattpad. (My sarcasm sucks)

If you do it properly with a few years of strategic planning, it will work. You should add tags that are suitable for your stories.

For example, if your story is a teen fiction surrounding high school, then you might want to add tags like #love #highschool #teen #teenromance #badboy #drama #friends

If it's a thriller or some other genre, then you want to add some tags that are relevant to the genre. If you're still confused about the tags, you can try looking at the most popular books of the genre you're writing and put some of those tags on your book. (It works)

These are the basics to start a book, I won't be going into depth for this because I know most of you how to start. Instead we're going to focus on writing that book now and get it noticed.

If you have any questions or things you want me to cover in this book, write your questions  below and the comments and I'll be covering the questions as chapters in the upcoming updates.

In the next chapter we're going to talk about Plotting your novel.