Written By Dave Baxter

Welcome back to the second installment of “Killing the Grizzly”. For this, our first chance to leap headfirst into the nitty-gritty of the e-comics universe, I’d like to discuss the bare bones theory behind the digital publishing model (coupled with online distribution as an actual, sustainable small press or creator-owned business.

The most important thing to tackle up front, especially after reading the comments and emails I received in response to the first “Killing the Grizzly” article, is just what is the actual war between print and digital publishing? Is it a war? A battle? A skirmish? A heated debate? It’s certainly a choice…but what is it a choice between?

While many will treat “old vs. new” tensions forever as a battlefield, as two mutually exclusive venues pitted against each other to-the-death, the truth is that digital and traditional publishing are entirely well-suited to each other’s needs. The choice isn’t (or doesn’t have to be) to go digital or stick to print. In fact, choosing both is the most lucrative and easiest route in maintaining a steady readership. The actual question at hand: which should you do first? Which should be made your chicken…and which your golden egg?

Why should anyone at all bother with digital media? Why aim for a road seemingly disdained by traditional publishers and traditional readers, ignored by professionals in cross-media arenas such as motion pictures and music, video games and more? You want to see your book as a book. You want to see it on comic store shelves. You want a movie deal because you won’t survive as a pro without one. Right?

But wait, this past summer a bell rang out and the universal referee cried “Fight!” as Robert Kirkman posted:

this video on Newsarama and challenged would-be creators everywhere to put aside their dreams of Marvel and DC tenure in order to starve and suffer the slings and arrows of a creator-owned career, so that the comics community could be “saved”. Thousands have weighed in on the debate since, including ex-self-publisher now-superstar Brian Michael Bendis, everyone haggling over the reality behind Kirkman’s claims—can anyone truly, reasonably expect to succeed where he did? And…uhm…didn’t Kirkman admit, during an interview held immediately after he announced his partnership with Image Comics, that his own self-publishing ventures had placed him $30,000 in the red before he (rather magically) happened upon Walking Dead and Invincible? What are the chances of others being able to find “Kirkman Numbers” before bankruptcy?

See the full debate between Kirkman and Bendis here:

Todd Allen of Publishers Weekly researched the questions raised by this great debate thoroughly, and came up with this incredibly detailed report.

Read that and head on back.

All done? Well, so there you have it. You need a readership of (minimum) 10-25,000 to garner Kirkman Numbers. Who in creator-owned waters has these numbers? As Allen found out, not even some of the mid-range superstar creators in the Image-verse. Joe Kelly and Joe Casey straddle that line, coming up even, and Jay Faerber’s Noble Causes, by all means a critical hit and fan favorite with a loyal readership and prominent placement in Previews and known by retailers and regular readers alike, only ranks at literally one-seventh of what Kirkman’s The Walking Dead achieves.

Those who currently manage Kirkman Numbers on a monthly basis are…let’s see…looking at the Publisher’s Weekly chart: already-superstar creators from the mainstream, slumming it in creator-owned territory (Millar, Ennis, Ellis), and…that’s about it. Traditional publishing seems more and more the route only for those who are willing to work-for-hire write anything they’re shuffled over to (a window of employment winnowing every year as the Big Two continue to exclusively sign top-notch talent alone, and rely upon them for their meant and potatoes). Otherwise, you’ll need to be one of those who have already established themselves as talents with a sustainable readership, such as Terry Moore (Strangers in Paradise), or the novelists Brian Hurwitz, Mike Benson, and Brad Meltzer.

Long time fan-favorite and six (count ‘em)-time Eisner Nominee Tom Beland (True Story Swear to God), impelled by the Kirkman/Bendis debate, recently came out and confessed this shocking and rather upsetting bit of news.

Some choice quotes from Beland’s confession:

“I’ve never made money off TSSTG. I made just enough to print the next issue. When I went to Image, I thought there’d be more money for me, since I’ll have a better placement in the Diamond catalogue and, hey, they’re Image!!

“In the eleven, nearly twelve issues I’ve made for Image, I haven’t made money for them in profits. Not a dime. It could come out more, that’s for sure, but this book is just too personal for me to just pump-out to make it a monthly deadline. It’s a very difficult thing to do, seeing how it’s romance AND autobio. So I want it to be perfect before it goes out.

“And Brian was dead-on when he tells you how mentally damaging it is to get that notice and you see the numbers. It’s a huge thing to overcome. It’s so personal that you almost don’t want people to see it, but you know that some people love it and you hope there will be more. But there aren’t.

“They’ve done two trades for me. The last trade loss two grand so far. Again, it’s devastating. I cannot correctly put into words how it kills you inside. Because it’s that personal.”

Then Beland went on to say:

“Now, having said that, I have to say THIS. I work a LOT on my book. It takes me forever to get the thing the way I want it to be. And after all those months and days and hours I pour into TSSTG… I’ve yet to be able to pay a bill from it.

“That’s where Marvel saves me. They’ll contact me and ask me if I want to write a Spidey book about Valentine’s Day or a Fantastic Four book about family. I’ll work at it and, since it’s super-heroes and nothing based in reality and they’re not my characters, I can just chill for a couple of days and write a script that’s fun and I’ll get a check for three grand. Three grand to hand to my wife and pay bills with.

“Which brings me to another point. As much as I love doing TSSTG, as an independent creator, I pay for everything. I pay for the printing, the pre-press, the shipping, the storage, I even pay for that great ad placement. Image doesn’t do it for free. So when I make a book, there’s that much pressure to make it as good as the last issue. Six Eisner nominations haven’t yet allowed me to cash-in on TSSTG, although that was never my goal.”

In many circles, Beland is synonymous with Terry Moore and Dave Sim, yet his numbers don’t measure up. His exposure is superb, his fan base sincere, his output regular, and yet…and yet…

The unavoidable conclusion, from all of the above, in regards to print small press media and to quote Bendis directly from the video:

“You can’t make a living on it.”

Which is…sobering.

That said, here’s the ray of hope: take note of Beland’s speech, and this subtle sub-textual aspect of it—he speaks of Eisners and exposure through Diamond’s Previews and retail outlets and offset publishing costs. What he doesn’t consider, and neither does Kirkman, or Bendis, or many others within this debate, is the place that webcomics and e-comics have in the world of financially solvent creator-owned works. Those who do mention these digital brethren, while others debate merely the battle between mainstream and the small press, are generally ignored or told , politely, that electronic media isn’t the same thing, and not a viable part of the debate.

I’m sure the traditional oralists thought the same thing when monks began to record human history in books. Different form, same basic product. The old guard forever disregarding the upstart new.

So let’s say e-comics not only can be included in the debate, but that they are the true-blue challenger standing in the opposite corner of the ring, while all traditional publishing formats are, collectively, the defending champions. Can e-media bring a creator “Kirkman Numbers”? Can e-media, reasonably be a viable alternative to achieving super-stardom, insofar as being able to create for a living is concerned?

To answer this, let’s take a look at what e-media requires in order to transform into a serious venue for e-comics and books as a profitable business. The first fundamental realization: there are two ways in which any e-comic marketplace or distribution method can be utilized, while only ever one purpose. The purpose is to distribute your book. The two methodologies:

1) To Give.

2) To Sell.

Is it better to give or to sell? To force potential readers to pay, or earn literally nothing in the free dissemination of your labor-intensive, quite literal work of art?

E-comics, while different in format and packaging than webcomics or webstrips, by virtue of being hosted on the same medium—the internet—require precisely the same strategy, i.e. everything must be free…at first.

Let’s say you’re a writer, or an artist, or both—a creator, then. You have a product, something you’ve worked on and want to find ways in which to get them into readers’ hands. The first thing to understand is that there are READERS and then there are FANS. The majority of start-up self-marketing creators mistakenly relegate both to a class called “customers”. But in truth, there are no customers in digital media.

This is because the product, by old-school standards, is ephemeral and non-existent. The only thing as formless and non-physical as an e-book or e-comic that is sold as “products”…is software. And these always involve a visible and executable functionality; or, in other words, something that’s value is demonstrable in its use. Not so with e-media. Which isn’t to say that people will never ante up for electronic entertainment in any form or at any time. iTunes, more than any other, has proven that people will pay for media which they cannot, in any hands-on way, seize and tangibly own. But very few movies or music files are purchased outright, if the musician or movie in question is unknown to the buyer. “Customers” are casual buyers. They browse, they shop, they purchase products. People rarely take a chance on something entirely unknown if in e-format. They buy an e-product because they already know they want it, and e-media is cheaper and faster (usually instant) to procure. It’s a decision made long after they stumble upon the e-product itself. They aren’t “Customers”, because they don’t shop, they hunt—they look for precisely what they want online, and then they buy it. They are a new breed of consumer created from the effect of an internet-savvy global environment.

So if there aren’t any “Customers”, what precisely are “Readers” and “Fans”, and how does one find them and keep them?

Readers are those who will download your product or read it online…for free. Perhaps they’ll return for future installments/chapters, should they like what they see, and if they remember to do so (usually a problem if you’re next offering occurs too long after the latest—regular content is a must!). Readers are those who don’t know who you are, they don’t know what you’re producing, they don’t know if they like you or even want to like you. They certainly aren’t going to waste any money on you. But without Readers, you’ll never have Fans.

Fans are the percentage of those who begin as Readers, initially, and enjoy the experience enough to financially support your future works, or the inevitable print or Print-on-Demand (POD) editions. They’ll buy the t-shirts, the coffee mugs, the graphic novel collections, the special print-only editions, the soundtrack, the wall clock, the anything, because they’re Fans.

Okay, okay, fine: so you’ll put the first issue out for free than second issue at full price, right? Or maybe the first chapter of a GN for free, then they’ll need to pay for the whole thing? I mean, you gotta make money on this thing, right?

Well, yes, but one issue, chapter, or partial preview does not a “Readership” make. You need constant product, regular, on schedule, as is expected and demanded of from any traditional print product…but you won’t find a hungry fan base just waiting for your book to drop out of the World Wide Web’s sky. The internet is saturated with product, even e-comics, even e-comics the quality and appearance of your own.

So what to do?

Kevin Kelly of “The Technium” put it best when he wrote:

“The Long Tail [the over-saturation of product on the market] is famously good news for two classes of people; a few lucky aggregators, such as Amazon and Netflix, and 6 billion consumers. Of those two, I think consumers earn the greater reward from the wealth hidden in infinite niches.

“But the long tail is a decidedly mixed blessing for creators. Individual artists, producers, inventors and makers are overlooked in the equation. The long tail does not raise the sales of creators much, but it does add massive competition and endless downward pressure on prices. Unless artists become a large aggregator of other artist’s works, the long tail offers no path out of the quiet doldrums of minuscule sales.

“Other than aim for a blockbuster hit, what can an artist do to escape the long tail?”

And then Kelly coined the term, this sweet, sweet phrase that has since proved a clarion call of hope for aspiring creators everywhere:

“One solution is to find 1,000 True Fans.”

And just what, Mr. Kelly, is a True Fan?

Kelly: “A True Fan is defined as someone who will purchase anything and everything you produce. They will drive 200 miles to see you sing. They will buy the super deluxe re-issued hi-res box set of your stuff even though they have the low-res version. They have a Google Alert set for your name. They bookmark the eBay page where your out-of-print editions show up. They come to your openings. They have you sign their copies. They buy the t-shirt, and the mug, and the hat. They can’t wait till you issue your next work. They are true fans.

“To raise your sales out of the flatline of the long tail you need to connect with your True Fans directly. Another way to state this is, you need to convert a thousand Lesser Fans into a thousand True Fans.”

But how does one accomplish this? How does one so much as get noticed and gain “Lesser Fans”, let alone those of the “True” varietal?

There are two primary strategies to approaching the establishment of an e-comic’s Readership:

1) TO GIVE: The first, and most likely strategy to succeed. Everything must be FREE until your numbers are obvious. “Noooo!” you cry. “I can’t give away my baby for free!!! I worked hard on this! I should be getting paid before it’s even a gleam in a printer’s eye, let alone offering it to readers and still not getting paid! What kind of advice is this? Who are you again?”

These are fine arguments, but rather weightless. If a book comes out through a publisher, then that is by default one single quality check in place—the publisher had to accept you, produce you, and make certain your product wasn’t something that would embarrass them. Even then, if the publisher is small enough or has too small (or poor) of a track record, this will likely mean little to potential Readers. And absolutely anyone can produce their own work. Everyone thinks their own creation is worthy of demanding money for. But the fact is, no one asked you to create it, no one requested it, no one is looking for it, no one is waiting for it, and no one cares that you care. However, by offering the work for free, as e-format entertainment, you allow your work to be READ.

Okay, so you’ll go through a publisher, right? Well, don’t forget (and returning to Mr. Kelly again):

“Direct fans are best. The number of True Fans needed to make a living indirectly inflates fast, but not infinitely…while this moves the destination towards the left on the long tail curve, it is still far short of blockbuster territory. Same is true in book publishing. When you have corporations involved in taking the majority of the revenue for your work, then it takes many times more True Fans to support you. To the degree an author cultivates direct contact with his/her fans, the smaller the number needed.”

Going through a traditional publisher requires unlikely Kirkman Numbers of 20-25,000 True Fans per MONTH. Obviously, as Kirkman exists, this is within the realm of the possible, but not the probable. Creators as talented, respected, and long-lived as Joe Kelly, Joe Casey, and Noble Causes’ Jay Faerber do not sell the Kirkman-derived sustainable numbers as needed through any traditional publisher. But in True Fan territory, if these creators had full control over their own work and published their books through themselves alone, via all venues available, they would be earning a solid living that measured near-equal to Kirkman’s, with a literal fraction of his readership base. This is true of anyone. Establish a readership, and then True Fans, can be yours.

Once your work is read, word of mouth can begin. Once word of mouth and exposure spreads, feedback and reader interaction can roll across the websites, forums, and blogs. If a creator begins with, say, a static website offering a free download of the issue or book, attached to/linked to a blog, with dynamic and regularly updated content, and this creator bothers to befriend other bloggers, reviewers, creators, and keeps the spam and useless link-to-my-book-only comments to a minimum, exposure can grow. This is by no means a way to overnight fame or riches, but it can move you into sustainable numbers financially, to where you can (*gasp!*) create for a living.

There’s no single way to go about it, and no definite path to finding a quality readership that will support you—a lot will depend on the quality of the work, the lack or existence of a potential audience in the first place, or rather (as is more often the case, being the psychological entities we are) the lack of proper marketing to a potential audience that doesn’t, before your marketing endeavors, know they care about such a work as your own.

It’s a fine line to walk: marketing consistently without coming across aggressive or annoying. Free things are usually the best way to mollify our natural knee-jerk reaction toward an ad. “Oh, wait, you’re advertising something I can click on and just TAKE?!? Oh, okay. Why not?” And so your work is sampled. After that, it’s up to the quality of the work to speak for itself, then the regularity upon which you can produce it (your Readership will forget you even exist unless you produce enough, and quickly—few readers were diehard fans of Spider-Man after his first issue, but after fifty full monthly installments…there was never any going back).

With a Readership in place, it’s time to produce an affordable print collection ($15-20) of your work, either offset or POD, plus perhaps a cheap ($1-3) electronic PDF version of the collected edition. Then merchandise, which surprisingly sells if clever enough. How many times a day do you think: “That would make a great t-shirt! I’d buy that!”? Well, now’s your chance you turn a profit on these random stray thoughts. A percentage of your readership will prove to be True Fans. If you can nab 1000 of them, out of the entire world, you’ve got yourself a career.

2) TO SELL: You can always start right out the gate charging for your work. Some artists have had success in this, though usually they come with Readerships already attached from print media days (old-school independent black-and-white press creators, now online, for example), and some small press folks, such as the creators of Defending Tavyr, has sold cheap digital copies of their work at conventions, downloading it off their laptop and using said laptop to offer a tech-savvy display for curious passerby.

However, none of these folks are subsisting off their work, at least not yet. And the question remains how possible it will ever be for them to gain an online Readership through means that demand a fee from any potential Fan.

Kevin Kelly concluded his magnificent “1000 True Fans” article by stating:

“The usual alternative to making a living based on True Fans is poverty. A study as recently as 1995 showed that the accepted price of being an artist was large. Sociologist Ruth Towse surveyed artists in Britian and determined that on average they earned below poverty subsistence levels.

“I am suggesting there is a home for creatives in between poverty and stardom. Somewhere lower than stratospheric bestsellerdom, but higher than the obscurity of the long tail. I don’t know the actual true number, but I think a dedicated artist could cultivate 1,000 True Fans, and by their direct support using new technology, make an honest living. I’d love to hear from anyone who might have settled on such a path.”

As follow-up, Kelly heard from one professional musician and a slew of other bloggers. In both cases there were two weighty, outstanding arguments against the “True Fan” scenario, against the plausibility of unknown artists managing a career on his or her own merits via the online social sphere.

To wit: the musician, Robert Rich, found the “True Fan” success Kelly spoke of, but confessed to having such a fan base only because he’d worked the traditional circuit first, selling 20,000-50,000 copies of his professionally distributed CD’s.

Robert Rich wrote in response to Kelly’s initial article on the True Fan:

“Thanks to the internet, I am making more money now, selling directly to 1000 True Fans, than I was during the days on Hearts of Space selling 20,000 – 50,000 copies. But had I not benefited from the immense promotional effort that it took for HOS to sell those albums, I probably wouldn’t be surviving today as a full time artist.”

He made less then, with huge numbers, than he does today with a mere (approx.) 1,000 True Fans, but he doubts highly his ability to achieve such a supporting fan base if he’d never gone the traditional route in the first place.

The second argument against the True Fan: no one knows of many, if any, that agree that they are living successfully on the “True Fan” business model sans having tackled traditional publishing first.

So…is there no hope? Can True Fans really beat The Long Tail for modern-day creators?

That’s half the journey we’ll be taking with this column. But I will say this: hope exists and it is strong. There are numerous reasons that the “True Fan” model is absolutely, in some permutation or another, the way of the future. What this realization awaits are creators who understand how to achieve it, and, more importantly, perhaps most importantly, who want to achieve it. The world may have changed, but we’re slow to catching up. In future articles, be ready to take a closer look at the reasons for the Long Tail’s overextended oppression of independent and small press creators, and how e-comic creators can wield the awesome ability to at long last triumph over it.

NEXT: Be sure to come back in two weeks time for our first E-BOOK SPOTLIGHT, in which we’ll be “Inter-Reviewing” an online comic that’s doing something rather daring – http://www.miserydepot.com . See you then, friends!

Dave runs the THE GILLIAN’S HEART BLOG (http://www.gilliansheart.com/blog  )
And writes for BROKEN FRONTIER (Latest: http://www.brokenfrontier.com/lowdown/details.php?id=1576  )
http://worstwriterintheworld.blogspot.com

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