Catching Up…
I’m amazed with the power of writing lists. Every time I have written down a list of to-do’s on a plain sheet of paper, my day becomes that much more productive. The last few weeks have been incredibly busy for me, and as such, updates on this blog have suffered for that.
Top on the docket for me this morning was to update the Featured Guest-Stars page, which is now current. A total of 31 guest-stars appeared last year, and I’m hoping I can get double that number of guest-stars for 2009.
The good news is, this Friday will feature the very first guest-star of 2009, who will start us off on a brand new Featured Guest-Stars page.
As always, your support makes a difference. There are days when I wonder if all the hard work and toil are worth it. Whenever I get a guest-star order, it gives me just a little more oomph to carry on ‘tooning.
The site numbers have remained steady since I switched to the multi-panel format, but I’d really like to see some growth in readership this year. I’ve debated at length as to why the number of visitors haven’t increased, and there are many times where I’ve questioned my own abilities as a cartoonist as a result. If you have any ideas or feedback on the strip, or promoting it – please share your thoughts with me. Maybe I’m overlooking something that’s obvious…
In other news, I’m planning to sell some original PC Weenies pencil art in the coming months, and I’m also (slowly) working towards a book. I need to make a serious go of earning some money from the comic for all the hours I’ve spent on it.
Even if you can’t afford to purchase a guest-star comic, you can show your support for PC Weenies by linking to it on your website, or simply sharing the link on StumbleUpon, Facebook, or any one of the numerous social networking sites.
Thanks for reading, and as always, for your support.
-Krishna
These beautiful and intelligent people wrote
Tell me what you think!
planobarryb
January 21, 2009 at 3:03 pmI have nothing to offer as such other than saying you must be missing something. I can’t understand why you would not be getting the numbers to make you one of the top webcomics out there. The quality of your writing and art is far above the crowd. Clearly this should be your main source of a living and the teaching gig should be your pizza business. I hope you figure it out, maybe if you published a book or sold t-shirts? PLEASE stay with it man! You do great work and maybe that is the most important part. I hope you soon find the larger audience you deserve.
planobarryb
January 21, 2009 at 3:04 pmOoops, I also meant to say this is my 2nd favorite webcomic. My favorite on right now is Uncubed.
Krishna
January 21, 2009 at 3:42 pmThanks, Barry. I definitely appreciate your support. I hope I’ll figure out how to market the strip better. It’s definitely frustrating for me. I do have plans for a book, and I’ve got some ideas for other merchandise as well. With a small readership, at least compared to other established webcomics, my concern is: will there will be enough interest in purchasing something I create? Guess I’ll have to make the book, shirts, and see what happens.
Dave Bergschneider
January 22, 2009 at 11:48 amI am in agreement with Barry. I think a book or a desk calendar could certainly raise some eyebrows in your direction. You could start with a small production in which I’m certainly willing to help invest both time & money in the production.
I think having an offline medium is a great way to allow for your readers to spread the word by gifting their love for PC Weenies to friends and family. Let me know your thought on this because I spent many years in print production and may be able to summon old contacts for it from my Platt College days.
Krishna
January 22, 2009 at 3:07 pmhi Dave: A printed book would be great. I’m hesitant to jump in, just out of my own ignorance on what goes into making a print edition. Of course, that said, I’m open to any advice. :)
tpiro
January 22, 2009 at 3:21 pmI definitely wouldn’t do a calendar. Its shelf life is much too short. A book might be a good idea, but I can’t tell you how it will sell. It might actually be a nice luxury to go through the whole process of making a book without the pressure of 1000 people impatiently waiting for it to be done. It would make the process that much smoother once your audience is bigger. Plus, Dave is definitely correct that a book is a great way for people to share PC Weenies with their friends and family.
In terms of marketing, I don’t feel like you’ve done enough to get a foot hold into the technology community. Not that I have a good idea how to do this effectively. xkcd gains a lot of new fans by math nerds posting the comics on the doors of their offices. Ideally, if I walked through the office of some tech giant, I should see PC Weenies comics everywhere. Some random ideas on how to do this (just off the top of my head–sorry if you’ve already tried some of these): 1. attend some tech conferences, 2. join some tech forums, 3. make tech-centric merchandise, 4. solicit some tech-focus periodicals to see if they’ll run your strip, 5. put some serious money into advertising on tech-centric websites, 6. focus your blog more on up to date tech news.
Krishna
January 22, 2009 at 3:41 pmthose are great suggestions, Tony. I concur that I’m not doing enough to market the comic towards techies. I guess I was hoping for word of mouth, but perhaps I need to be more aggressive in marketing than that. Adding more tech content into the blog sounds like a great idea – maybe I can get an interested writer to voluntarily participate?
Dave Bergschneider
January 22, 2009 at 7:55 pmAlso a great way would to be attend comic-con as either a visitor or booth and hand them out. Heck I’ve seen artists much like yourself doing personalized sketches and digital illustration demonstration there. You can also make a some $$$ by selling originals, prints etc…
krishna
January 23, 2009 at 5:25 amI’ll be attending MegaCon (as a visitor) in late February, and will stop by the Nightgig booth to promote the Nightgig Sampler #4, which contains (among other comics) the first collection of PCW and UN3. I’m very curious to see what the quality looks like, based on the page layouts I created for the comic. If it looks good, I may go with Ka-Blam and self-publish an issue on my own…
Dave Bergschneider
January 23, 2009 at 3:28 pmThat’s a great start