Are Book Covers Important?

I know it has been awhile since I last posted and I am sorry about that but life got in the way, you know how it is. So there is a difficult part of writing that I never realized until after I had finished novel and I would like to talk about it. It is on the subject of cover art.

So I finish my novel and I am on cloud 9 soaring with dragons and dancing with elves and it is amazing. I begin the process of getting my novel published and after looking over contracts and other ways of publishing and I finally decide that going independent is the way for me. I start trying to get my novel edited and so forth and soon all my money is gone and it wasn't all the way. So I had to cut corners because, well you know no money.
One of the areas I thought it best to skimp on was on my cover art. I thought meh if the book is good then the cover would not matter plus you remember the old saying, don't judge a book by the cover. That saying had to come from somewhere so I assumed it was true.
First thing I learned was that they do judge a book by its cover, everyone does. You might be saying oh no I would never look at a cover of a book and say nope not for me. That's probably full of poo. There have been many times in my reading career that I have looked at a book and the cover was something that mad my stomach turn and I just knew that that book was not for me. None of those thoughts crossed my mind at that time.
The second thing I learned was that my cover art sucks, but it is almost $1,000 for good Profesional art work. That's a large hunk of cash especially for a new author. But it something that is so worth it and by having attractive and gripping art work more people will be willing to look at it, and possibly read it. If you don't take your cover art serious then readers will not take your book serious. But like I said these are things that is a I have learned over my writing career and please leave comments bellow!