The making of the cover for Sembook. Ingate SEO Encyclopedia by Natalia Neelova

Looking for the main idea. This book is a handbook for SEO people and for those who don’t know anything about SEO and want to get maximum knowledge in minimum time. The main topic is website promotion—everything you need to do to put your website to the top of the search.

First ideas: a tattooed muscle head, a big encyclopedia made from pixels, a pulley system lifting a cursor.

Art director Let’s make the sketches more presentable.

The client doesn’t approve. He sends us examples of book covers that he likes and tells us to stick to minimalism.

Trying another approach. Designing a cover depicting a book icon with pop-up prompts. Wondering how the book would look on shelves.

No, that’s not what we need. Looking for new ideas: a man with a torch in a deep forest, a hound trained to find new users, a fisherman, a book of wisdom.

Still not quite right. We need something more respectable and business-like. Designing a black encyclopedia with SEO coat of arms, and a shooting cursor.

The client chooses the encyclopedia and sends us a list of things that should be included in the coat of arms: a search engine logo, images of a panda and a penguin (the names of Google and Yandex algorithms), TIC and PR, link, top ten list, magnifying glass, cursor, spider, 404 error, <titlе>.

Making a sketch.

Seems ok. Making a detailed drawing.

Art director: We need to use one style for all elements. And maybe make the coat of arms more opulent.

Drawing, scanning, adding opulence.

Choosing a type. We suggest Bingley, but the client wants a typeface with more massive serifs. Agreeing upon Walbaum.

At the last moment, deciding how to write the name: SEMBOOK, SEMbook, Sembook, Сембук or СЕМБУК.