ComicLab Ep 417 — Print on Demand… When There’s No Demand

ComicLab Ep 417 — Print on Demand… When There’s No Demand

Cartoonists Brad Guigar and Dave Kellett discuss the nuances of print-on-demand services. As Brad says, "It's a good place to start,...
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Maximizing the potential of Bluesky Starter Packs

Maximizing the potential of Bluesky Starter Packs

If you've been sharing your work on Bluesky, you're probably becoming familiar with Starter Packs. This was a significant innovation...
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Webcomics Confidential: What size should your webcomic be?

Webcomics Confidential: What size should your webcomic be?

Beginning cartoonists often ask what size they should make their comic. Many are looking for "standard" sizes. The answer is...
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Give Yourself the Gift of Time Off: Low-Impact Holiday Content Ideas for Cartoonists

Give Yourself the Gift of Time Off: Low-Impact Holiday Content Ideas for Cartoonists

The holiday season has a way of sneaking up on us — and suddenly we’re juggling year-end deadlines, family commitments,...
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ComicLab Ep 417 — Special Guest Rick Kirkman and Jerry Scott from “Baby Blues”

ComicLab Ep 417 — Special Guest Rick Kirkman and Jerry Scott from “Baby Blues”

Syndicated cartoonists Jerry Scott and Rick Kirkman share their journey of collaboration that spans over 35 years, focusing on their...
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How Many Social-Media Posts Per Day?

How Many Social-Media Posts Per Day?

According to a Very Popular Influencer, one should post on social media six to eight times daily. I disagree, and...
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Social media and behavioral modification

Social media and behavioral modification

B.F. Skinner's research showed that rewards and punishments can alter a subject's behavior. We can use those same simple techniques...
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Webcomics Confidential: You’re wasting money on advertising

Webcomics Confidential: You’re wasting money on advertising

Unless you have a granular knowledge of advertising, demographics, and much more, you're probably wasting money on "plug-and-play" advertising and...
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ComicLab Ep 416 — What’s the Best Platform for Audience Building?

ComicLab Ep 416 — What’s the Best Platform for Audience Building?

Where should you post if you want to build an audience? Substack delivers unbeatable audience-building tools... but it has some...
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Does Your Comic Have to Be in Color?

Does Your Comic Have to Be in Color?

If you’re starting a new comic project, one of the first artistic decisions you’ll face is deceptively simple: color… or...
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Photoshop tricks without Photoshop:Tracing-paper transfer

This post was kindly submitted by Tara Tallan.
If you work with traditional media like I do, as much as you love it you may occasionally find yourself envying the digital artists who can copy or move images around with the swipe of a tablet pen. But if you know a trick or two, you can do all this stuff almost as painlessly as those digital artists and still have a nice-looking piece of original art to sell– all without Photoshop!

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by on May 23, 2012
Posted In: Art
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3 Comments

Webcomics.com: Community Expectations

As we roll through the third year of Webcomics.com, I wanted to take a moment to codify a few expectations for members of this community. That way, when new members join, I can simply point them to this post so they can see some of the DOs and DON’Ts that have been established here along the way. If you’re relatively new to the site, this will be a good review.

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by on May 22, 2012
Posted In: Site News
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Pew Charitable Trusts report on Economic Mobility

The Pew Charitable Trusts Center on the States has released a study on economic mobility in the United States. Among other things, it uses national earnings distribution and aggregate results from three mobility measures (absolute, upward and downward) to identify those states in which economic mobility is most distinct from the national average. The map below is interactive, so feel free to click around. For a larger version, click here.

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by on May 17, 2012
Posted In: Conventions
9 Comments

Mailbag: More information on designing books?

Q. We’ve already had the ten-minute InDesign layout article… But, what I’m looking for is a little more along the lines of odds and ends in making a book come across less amateur and more professional.

Tips on indicia information, including a table of contents and whether or not it’s really needed, extras like cast pages…

Strip commentary, too much or too little… is there a proper balance? Should you include it below the associated strips?

How much extra/premium content/stuff not included on the Web already… Is a six-to-nine-strip story worth pimping that you have exclusive never before seen material as a selling point?

So, I’m basically just looking for a little bit of an odds and ends “protip” style article on polishing a book design based on things you’ve figured out.

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by on May 15, 2012
Posted In: Mail Bag
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Three to Get Ready Hot Seat: Scotty Odyssey, Keeping Up with Jones, and BlueStar Blues

Here’s the fourth of several “Three to Get Ready” Hotseats. The rules are simple. I go to your site, post the three most recent updates below and list one thing I like and one thing I don’t. Members are welcome to discuss the points I make or to post their own thoughts.

Click the header for a link to each comic in question. Click on each comic for a larger version.

Scotty Odyssey

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by on May 10, 2012
Posted In: Mail Bag
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Selling ads on your site

I was approached by a member who has started actively selling ads on his site (as opposed to running ads from an ad network like Google AdSense or Project Wonderful). The exchange was enlightening, so, with his kind permission, I’m sharing it here.

Q.: I have three ads on my site (a Leaderboard and two Skyscraper ads). All of the ad slots are being taken by companies that “own” that ad slot for that month (they have the option to submit up to five ads of their own to rotate throughout the month). Currently, in total, I am making $250 per ad slot for a total of $750 per month. Am I charging enough for these ads?

In my opinion, I think you’re making a big mistake.The content you are trying to access is only available to members.

by on May 8, 2012
Posted In: Advertising
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Understanding Facebook’s Edgerank system

In a thread on Facebook Fan Pages, member Zachary Smith provided some excellent information on Facebook’s Edgerank system — the system that determines what you see (and from whom) when you sign into your Facebook account. I wanted to pull it out front to make sure you didn’t miss it.

Facebook has internal algorythms, called Edgerank, that determine which of your fans see your posts in their feed. They do this with your friends too. You may have noticed that once you comment or Like a friend’s post, you start seeing a few more posts from that friend. If you comment on or Like those posts, you start seeing more and more and more. They didn’t suddenly become more active at the same time you starting Liking and commenting on them. Facebook specifically serves you people that you take more action on. It makes sense to try to serve you things you find interesting as much as possible.

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by on May 7, 2012
Posted In: Marketing / Social Media
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5 Comments