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Create an experience, not just a story.
What do you call a book that reads like a bestseller, sounds like a TV show, and looks like Instagram’s and Pinterest’s secret love child?
The future.
When it comes to creating the world of your story for readers on Wattpad, whether or not you choose to enhance their experience with audio, video, and graphic elements can be the difference between your book blending in with the rest or becoming a smash hit.
You might be thinking, Sure, creating a story that looks, sounds, and feels like a Hollywood blockbuster/Wattpad sensation sounds like a dream, but how do I do it? I don’t know how to cut a book trailer, Photoshop gives me anxiety, and I couldn’t tell you the first thing about adding audio to my story. I’m a writer, not a multi media guru.
This point of preemptive self-doubt is exactly where our journey begins. By the end of this article, you’ll understand how to transform your works on Wattpad into multidimensional, immersive experiences for both you and your readers.
With the right combination of sounds, images, and movie clips, you’ll create the kind of novel that catches and sustains your readers’ attention, and skyrockets to Wattpad success.
We’re all familiar with the brand-name juggernauts plastered across every billboard, magazine, and TV screen around the globe. Take Nike for example. All anyone has to do is mention the catchphrase “Just Do It,” and a check mark coupled with images of sleek athletes in a black-and-white commercial come to mind.
Talk about powerful branding. Something as simple as a phrase or symbol conjures up a series of images, thoughts, and feelings that represent exactly what Nike stands for and establishes a personal meaning for its audience in less than seconds.
Let’s call this the “branding effect.” I’m going to teach you how to do this on Wattpad within the world of your story. But before we begin, we’ve got to figure out your starting point on this branding adventure.
As a Wattpad writer, you probably fit into one of three categories:
The good news is that you can start building multimedia into the brand of your story at any of these stages. All you’ll need to jump-start this process is a clear idea of your story, your characters, and the way you want to present them to the online world. Then it’s all about matching the multimedia to those elements, which in turn create “the brand.”
Branding aside, it’s important for writers, regardless of how far along they are with their works, to create a general summary, outline, and/or synopsis that captures the essence of their stories. This isn’t only the first step in writing a more structured and focused book but also one of the most critical stages in developing your book’s brand.
This first part of incorporating multimedia into your brand doesn’t involve any media at all. It involves you jotting down what your book is about, who your characters are, what your genre is, and what audience you want it to appeal to.
Let’s say you’re writing teen fiction about a high school football star’s struggle to balance first love with his responsibilities as an athlete. Once you’ve plotted the details of how his story plays out, you can move on to the fun part of building your brand— fantasizing.
That’s right, ladies and gents, let your imagination run wild.
Are you picturing one of the Hemsworth brothers as your football star or a dark, brooding Tyler Hoechlin as your story’s sporty hero? Are you scrolling through Tumblr to find the right picture of your fictional high school heartthrob? If so, then you’re on the right track.
Fantasizing is the first step to actualizing your book’s imaginary world digitally.
What does your main character look like? How about the secondary characters? What actors could play your cast? What does the book’s setting look like? Does it take place in beachy California or gritty Texas?
If a single snapshot could capture your story, what would it be? What’s the visual theme of your story?
This is the moment where websites like We Heart It, Pinterest, DeviantArt, and good ol’ Google Images come in handy. This is where you start choosing the images and GIFs that are going to become the “Nike swoosh” of your Wattpad story. This is how you create the signature look and feel of the narrative.
Whether it’s choosing your story’s cast by saving pictures of your favorite actors or finding images of places, props, or other significant elements that represent your book, this is where your brand begins.
Make folders on your computer, start a Pinterest board, or post images on a bulletin board to start integrating visual representations of your story.
Be picky. Not every cast of actors looks good together; some photos might not jell with others, and some locations won’t make sense. But once you narrow down the list of the ones that do, start mapping out how and where you want to plant these images in your Wattpad story.
Should chapter one begin with an image of your dreamy football star that gives readers a glimpse of what he looks like, or should it begin with a photo of an empty field to establish the setting?
Where and how you place your images will have a powerful impact on how the reader perceives the story, so choose wisely.
Photos can be easily added to your Wattpad story. Simply find an empty space to place your cursor, and click the photo icon that pops up on the left side of the screen. You’ll be prompted to upload the image of your choice directly from your computer. Select your image or images, and they’ll automatically be embedded into your story.
For a little extra flare, you can also add images to chapter headings. You know the cool, stylized chapter titles you see in published books? Now you can make your own.
Whether you decide to use free photo-editing programs like GIMP, PhotoScape, or the Nik Collection, or professional-grade paid programs like Adobe Photoshop, you can create chapter headings by simply picking a background, finding and downloading an eye-catching font or two (via dafont.com), and superimposing the font onto your background.
To add the header image, click on the photo icon at the top of the screen while inside a chapter.
It takes only a few minutes to create a unique chapter header and an update full of images that add a visual dimension to your story. Whether you’re adding pictures to a new story or going back and revamping an old story that never incorporated images, expanding your story’s reach by including visual media will capture your audience’s imagination in a fresh, new way.
The process I just described for images could also be applied to YouTube videos. Instead of uploading a file, you’d click on the camera icon while working inside a chapter on Wattpad and copy/paste the URL of the YouTube video you want to insert.
As of this writing, YouTube is the only video platform that can be embedded into a chapter on Wattpad.
Videos could contain music, movie or TV scenes, information that further contextualizes your story, content created by fans (sometimes users film themselves reading), or even a message from you. If you can help it, choose videos that are no more than a few minutes long. You don’t want readers to get too distracted.
If the videos run long, such as a fan reading your story for an hour, consider inserting them into a dedicated chapter.
Congratulations! You’ve made it over the first hurdle of making your story a multimedia masterpiece. Why not take things a step further and venture into book-trailer land?
The power of a good trailer can’t be understated. Many of us have sat in the movie theater, scarfing down popcorn, when suddenly the new trailer for an upcoming film appears. The music instantly grabs your attention while you gawk at the heart-stopping footage. Once the joyride is over, you’re already knuckle deep in your wallet, prepared to shell out your cash to see the next installment of The Avengers.
That, my friends, is the beauty of an effective movie trailer. It gives an audience a taste of the characters’ central conflict, it hints at the juiciest scenes in the story, and it leaves them begging for more. The question is, how do you do this for your Wattpad book?
You can attempt to create a trailer on your own, or you can seek out the help of experts on Wattpad who have the technical experience to make your vision come to life.
Should you want to seek out a trailer maker for hire, head over to the Multimedia Designs Club (MDC) on Wattpad and flag down a video editor who can make your ideas come to life. Just check out the “MDC Guidelines” thread to learn how to find the editor you’re looking for.
While the MDC is a great way to scout editing talent, you may prefer to take the plunge into the world of becoming your own trailer editor. Aside from the benefits of learning a new skill set, you’ll also have complete creative control over your book trailer’s look.
However, before you become the Christopher Nolan of book trailers, you’ll need to start off with the right editing software. Applications like Final Cut Pro X (Mac), Adobe Premiere Pro (Windows/Mac), and Avid (Windows/Mac) lead the charge when it comes to professional editing platforms. The downside is that all of these programs cost a pretty penny and require some level of experience (or time to learn the ropes) in order to operate them successfully. If you have some editing know-how, cutting together a trailer in one of the programs listed above is the right path for you. However, if you’re new to the idea of editing and want to jump into an easy-to-use, free program that’ll help you put together a trailer without too much hassle, read on.
For Mac users, free programs like iMovie are your best friend. iMovie makes importing clips fast and easy, and the timeline (the place where you sequence your video clips) makes editing quick and painless. There are a number of tutorials on YouTube (along with the great information that comes with iMovie) that will walk you through the process of editing and exporting your trailer to YouTube, Vimeo, and beyond. For Windows users, free programs like Lightworks and Windows Movie Maker are good alternatives for the beginning editor.
Now that you’ve figured out your editing interface, you’ll need to download the clips you want to use from films or TV shows (unless you plan on shooting your own trailer). Websites like Clip Converter are great for pulling clips from YouTube and downloading the footage you’ll import into your editing program. Make sure to note in your finished trailer’s description that you do not own the copyright to the footage you used (unless it is footage you filmed and created yourself) and to assign credit where it is due.
Wattpad book trailers are almost always made with found or borrowed footage of people’s favorite actors, films, TV shows, etc., so it’s important to state that you don’t own such footage. In addition, never attempt to use your trailer commercially for any reason. The same is true with any images or music you incorporate into your trailer or elsewhere within the story as part of the multimedia experience. If you’re not sure whether including certain content is permissible, omit it.
Moving forward, here are some editing tips to keep in mind:
Now that you’ve posted a jaw-dropping trailer, your book not only comes to life on-screen but also appeals to a larger audience. If you’ve used well-known actors in your trailer, your book might appeal to fans of the celebrities you’ve featured. Fandoms are a powerful force, and if you feature public figures with large fandoms, your trailer and book might just be shared in larger circles on and off Wattpad (example: One Direction).
Trailers can make or break a reader’s perception of your novel, so it’s critical to keep it short, sweet, and engaging all the way through. Use your trailer to summarize the best parts of your story, highlight central conflicts, and grab your audience, and you’ll take your book’s popularity to the next level.
The final step in building your story’s multimedia brand is incorporating sound. Adding musical suggestions or embedding YouTube videos with music into your stories can certainly help immerse your reader in the narrative, but what about bringing your characters’ voices to life?
In 2017, Wattpad partnered with Hachette Audio to turn a series of stories into audiobooks that would appeal to readers in a new way. Suddenly, select Wattpad authors’ characters were voiced by Hollywood actors and professional voice actors who transformed each story experience for audiences around the globe. So how can you accomplish this in your book if you’re just starting out or don’t have an audiobook deal in the making?
Try recording your own audiobook! Now, having a studio complete with an awesome sound engineer and Morgan Freeman on tap would be fantastic. But realistically you don’t need any of those elements to create a good audiobook.
Many Wattpad authors have used free programs like GarageBand, Windows Media Player, or even the voice recorder on their phones to record readings of their stories. Some authors choose to narrate their stories themselves, and others ask friends, family, or voice actors on and off Wattpad (such as on ACX) to bring their characters to life.
The best way to add audiobook recordings to Wattpad is via YouTube.
Here’s how to format your audiobook file for YouTube:
Adding an audiobook YouTube file to your chapter header instead of embedding it into the text will allow Wattpadders to listen and read at the same time.
Finding the right voices for your characters is an exciting process, as is learning how to make a recording clear, clean, and enjoyable for your listeners. Adding an audiobook element to your story can completely transform a reader’s experience as well as solidify your book’s signature imprint on Wattpad.
Adding multimedia depth to a story is exciting, but be mindful of what Wattpad does not permit:
Don’t push your luck. Readers can report inappropriate content, and you don’t want your story (or your user account!) booted from Wattpad.
Taking the effort to use multimedia to immerse your readers in your book will make all the difference in how engaged your audience will be and how passionate they’ll become about supporting the story.
Next time you log on to Wattpad, take a look at the digital canvas you have in front of you, and explore the full potential of what you can create.
Don’t just write a book. Write an experience.
Jenny Rosen is a YA author who has been a proud member of the Wattpad community since 2011. She’s a UCLA graduate, film editor, and music enthusiast. Her novels The Runaways; Cheater, Faker, Troublemaker; and its sequel, Find Her, Keep Her, have amassed more than nineteen million reads on Wattpad. The first two books in the Cheater, Faker, Troublemaker series were published as audiobooks by Hachette in 2017 and 2018.
Her literary work has been commissioned by and incorporated into major brand and film/TV campaigns for companies like Cadbury Chocolate, Soundcloud/Android, E! Networks, USA Network, and Lionsgate Films.