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The Business Model
The basic business model for webcomics is that you give away the comic and sell tie-in merchandise, like t-shirts, to make a living. Webcomics, merchandise design, running an online store and order fulfillment are closely related.
Most comics try to build a substantial circulation before investing in a merchandise line and operation. Some dabble by using Print-on-Demand services like Cafe Press to test the waters before investing in a large merchandise order.
The business model may include other types of merchandise, such as plush toys, reprint collections and buttons. Original artwork if often included. Some comics use PayPal donation jars and special fund drives, but these are in the minority, and some claiming outstanding success seem doubtful upon analysis.
Lying about sales appears to be quite common. This falls into the "Fake it until you make it" mind set," in which one imitates being a minor celebrity until most are convinced you are one.
At this point a split emerges. Some comics artists appear to be motivated by fame, whereas others seem motivated by the desire to tell a comic story. The former are convention regulars and are often prone to hyping their news. The latter are often very uncommitted to business practices such as promotion and advertising, preferring instead to let the work speak for itself.
That's noble and admirable until you consider what a small dab of advertising can do for a comic, and then it seems reckless. But it sometimes works.
The business model for a successful web comic enterprise was described by Todd Allen's "The Economics of Webcomics, 2nd Edition," and HalfPixel's "How to Make Webcomics." These two books are on the shelf of many serious webcomic artists, but they are not without flaws.
The Allen book is cheap for the money, but reads like a term paper and the first half is outdated.
The HalfPixel book is controversial. Among its faults: a erroneous business model, hucksterism and an incorrect reading of what types of comics are most successful. Worse, the authors are defensive in even normal interviews, vacillating about one's prospects using their plan, often calling people who question their model "bitter failures" and mocking those who are unsatisfied.
Their response to journalistic inquiry suggests that they are not reliable, and the level of writing within the book compared to outside it suggests an editor did the heavy lifting. Each author plays a role within the collective: Guigar, who rarely discloses his day job, sprinkles answers to questions with tense evasion and emoticons; Straub plays poor me; Kellett relies on anecdotal evidence to back up his assertions, which have been described differently to so many people it's hard to guess what's true; and Kurtz, a notorious hothead, plays attack dog, and outdoes Kellett in insults and vulgarity by a huge margin. He's even been known to attack authors of favorable reviews, which is explained by something I have observed: he's not much of a reader. This has gotten him into hot water on plenty of occasions, but though his circulation continues a steady slide, he still has many fans. Don't be jealous: these are not the kinds of fans you want.
Nonetheless, HalfPixel was among the first to offer up the standard business model in a digestible form, defend it loudly against critics despite a lack of credible evidence, and distribute it to a large audience. As it appears in the book, however, the model is rendered unusable by overly convenient statistics from Kellett, which disagree with the majority of cases studied and under ideal circumstances make webcomics appear quite lucrative.
They are not. A handful of people will ride a runaway train, a middle class, measurable in the dozens, will make a living, and a portion of small comics will supplement their incomes from other sources. The potential to increase the number of small comics earning significant part-time wages seems high, but the same factors that keep these comics from being full-time successes often keep them from reaching part-time success. You must appreciate how truly grim the economic landscape for webcomics is before you can attempt to defy it, and a lot of middle-weight titles are in a sort of dreamland, unable to recognize their deficiencies or solicit sound advice.
In an ideal world, with continued market expansion, economic turmoil of limited duration, a reduced fascination with micro-celebrity jive talk, greater professionalism among successful authors and other factors, it would be reasonable to conclude that perhaps 70 authors stand to be self-sufficient or able to receive a significant portion of their income from a webcomic. The actual number might be 90 or 50, but arguing the case for adjustment is a waste of time. There are perhaps 7-8000 titles in webcomics mega-sites like SmackJeeves. Another 1600 or so roam free and offer the bulk of serious contenders.
Culling these titles down to the most promising few hundred still reveals strong deficits in essentials characteristics that will limit most of them from ascending. Your ability to detect and describe these deficits is a good indicator of your prospects for success. So is your ability to grasp the creative landscape, to see what others are doing and detect their errors. This requires a large investment of time scanning comic listing sites and learning sources for key information, such as how to verify what others are claiming.
Future segments will discuss your business model in more detail, whether you know you are up for it, decision about courses of action large and small, data, and more.
