Success in the Online Comics World
If you have the social ability to approach people at conventions to promote your work, to wriggle your way into webcomic social circles, to say the right thing at the right time so that others remember you … well, you are one of the gifted few, and I’m sure your name will be in lights soon enough. Also, as a very shy person who finds it very hard to promote her own work, I am very jealous of you. I would like to be good at promoting my comics too! Teach me.
Faith advocates for outgoing, socially active people use that trait to the best of their abilities. Yet, she claims she is not one of those people. So how did she make it? What is her secret?
Simply put: hard work and determination to become better than you are now.
It’s easier to stand out from the rest of the webcomic pack if your work is exceptional. Some webcomic artists are constantly striving to improve, and their work grows impressively over time. Others are content to sit back and not work so hard. Since webcomics are free (most of the time) and are often done by those who don’t draw comics full-time, it’s very easy to get complacent in your work, to think that what you do is good enough. But if you fight hard to make your comics truly exceptional … you really stand out. It’s so awesome when you find a comic online where the author is really trying his or her hardest to create the best comic he or she can possibly create. That’s a comic I want to read, and down the road, if there’s a hard copy, I want to buy that comic and put it on my bookshelf.
A few days after that entry, she followed up with a link to an entry from Colleen Doran, who has been successful in making the jump from print comics to web comics.
While the entire article is great, the best part is this: “being online is a new form of convention”.
Putting my work on the web alone did not yield results, and neither did chatting on FB: money did. I spent thousands of dollars on advertising, countless hours pushing my work. More precisely, I skipped San Diego Comic Con, and invested that money in the site. San Diego regularly costs at least $8000 to attend and get a booth. Staying home and putting my work on the web has brought me a far higher return on that investment than going to San Diego. If I go to San Diego, it is highly unlikely I’ll pick up thousands of readers at one show. I picked up thousands of readers on the site and got to stay home and avoid convention crud. More importantly, I more than doubled that $8000 investment. If I go to San Diego, there’s a good chance I won’t get my $8000 back.
This doesn’t mean you should not go to conventions. I intend to go to San Diego next year. However, I think being online is a new form of convention. And it costs less. If you can manage your time, keep from getting into foolish internet dramas, then you may realize some serious benefits from your online presence.