teh hchano wrote:LOL I have one chara I am totally gonna do that for too...her room is supposed
to be covered in posters and shit lol... also, she is an artist, so I am gonna see if
one of my friends wants to doodle some pics as her. xD
And duuuude it happens sooo often that these ads are so false. It really pisses me
off... on TWC it happens a lot. I'll vote for one of the comics I am reading and it
shows me the avatar for another comic. I'm like "oh that looks hot." and then the
rest of the comic is drawn in this really shitty shakey line art or like you said, just
pencils. Like I said, it's immediate results [getting people to look at your site] but
then people are pissed and leave due to the false advertisement. I am normally
willing to give comics even with subpar art a try, as long as the story is good,
but tricking me into looking? Thanks but no. Fuck you. LOL
Speaking of ads, I need to make more... I only do the buttons atm on PW and I need
to do some of the skyscraper ones... but as it is, I don't get a whole long of PW money
so I don't want to spend like over a dollar for adspace. A lot of these places have a
minimum of a dollar for their skyscrapers!! @_@ It's harsh... and I'm a bit too ADD
to join a buncha other forums to help spread the word lol...
Yeah, no kidding about the TWC... T_T I bet we've probably clicked some of the same buttons, then, since we feel similarly on this topic. I hate it when there's pretty colored realistic art and then crappy lineart on the other side. It's okay if it's GOOD lineart! I don't mind GOOD lineart! I like good black and white comics and don't feel cheated if they color their art! (Say... Darken. Ads for Darken are usually colored but they look like the comic art!) It's when you get the Mona Lisa and click to find Bob and George that really pisses me off. I'll read a comic with crappy art if the story's interesting and even the other way around... >_> But don't lie to me to get me there. D:
And ads...
If you put a skyscraper on the right and or left of your site you'll get more money than just having the row of buttons. The deal is with all the buttons there's not as much competition to get an ad up on your site. With one skyscraper people will have to fight for it. I make enough money from having one skyscraper and three buttons to cover most of my advertising--I haven't put money into there for months, and as long as I'm careful with advertising I've been making enough to break even.
Don't bid on the sites that want like, 20 dollars a day, or have a minimum bid of 1 dollar or whatever. (Also remember you don't have to leave the ad up all day--you can cancel at any time and it won't charge you a dollar. If you left it up for 12 hours it would charge you 50 cents.) It might seem advantageous to bid on these huge sites but I find my best bids are when I make longterm low cost bids. Say, I put an ad on this one site for 20 cents a day and leave it up for a month. Maybe sometimes it gets pushed up to 50 cents a day and I'm not winning but sometimes it drops down and my ad is displayed. It works pretty well. I have a button on The Phoenix Requiem and though it doesn't usually show up, the cost drops sometimes and then my button goes up, and I get some pretty decent traffic from that for a pretty low cost.
But remember: your best visitors will come from things like joining other forums, even if you're ADD, and commenting on other people's comics. It will give you LESS vistors but people more likely to read through. And if you're already on other forums, SIG BANNER. If it's not a webcomic forum, add 'a webcomic' to your sig banner. Twitter and DeviantArt are also good for both building connections and traffic--follow other artists, link whenever you update on Twitter, post art on DeviantArt and link to your comic in your sig and from EVERY PICTURE YOU EVER POST. Link exchanges are good too if you're not morally opposed to them--networking is good. Joining places like Palace in the Sky and Tomgeeks also give traffic. You don't have to buy advertising to get traffic. ^_^ It just gives nice, big immediate numbers. Ego boost, really. =P
But yeah, you're only making a few cents a day, I see... if you're not going to switch over to say, maybe, a leaderboard where the buttons are instead (that would give you more money) or add a skyscraper to the side, your best bet with Project Wonderful is definately low cost buttons, long term bids in the one cent a day range... and keep an eye on them to make sure they're giving you at least two cents or less a click. (I can get .002 cents a click on buttons; I'm cheap and won't settle for paying more than two cents a click... and I've found I'm more likely to get this on smaller sites. Better bang for your buck!)
Anyway, there's my bit of thoughts on advertising from personal experience... I've found the better readers come from forums, and commenting on other webcomics... and you don't have to spend much on Project Wonderful if you're careful... and there are excellent free ways to advertise your webcomic if you know where to look. Collectives, webcomic lists, art sites, social networking... mmm... traffic.
But you know you don't have to draw new art? Just use art from your comic. 
