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Networking Tools
Gravatar is great if you use one of your characters for an avatar on forums. Register your avatar for free and it will automatically accompany you to Gravatar-enabled forums around the web.
TouchGraph displays a diagram interpretation of links to a site, based on Google search results. I've tried it on numerous sites and found it a bit quirky but often informative. There's also a Facebook version.
Blogs focused on webcomics can be hard to find amidst the many print comic blogs and blogs abandoned by their creators. This list, a condensed version of our Blogs chapter, contains blogs that update daily, weekly or just occasionally. They have different needs and focuses, so you should examine them before sending off review requests and press releases.
Don't just view them as drop spots for things you want publicized. You will make out better if you focus on a few, visit them as you can, and comment on posts that interest you. Include your comic's link when you sign your post, so that the blog's author builds awareness of you and your work.
More discussion of blogs is on the previous page. ______________
Twitter is a way to announce updates that will cost you some followers who don't care. Once that settles down, you'll find tolerance if you are an interesting member, and some people will pounce on the link and visit your comic. ______________
EntreCard is a networking system for blogs and recently added webcomics. It's one of the quickest ways to pump up your daily page hits, but there are several problems: being a promotion tool for blogs, a big part of its membership is failing blogs. A subset of these people are bitter, and have found common ground in their misery, leading to troll-like behavior that has steamrollered the naive site owner. Avoid the forum, used to detect your outlook and select targets.
Also of concern is quality of traffic. You will gain readers, especially if you do a light-hearted gag comic, but at a much, much lower rate than more direct methods. Artificial traffic is a weird thing, because it tells you false things. It might be useful for convincing potential advertisers you are more widely read than you are, but they will quickly learn the truth and drop you.
The system is very time consuming, requiring daily visits to dozens or even hundreds of blogs to build your status and earn credits to buy ads on people's sites. Even though you are trading time for value (ads), you are at best being paid under $3/hour, and could do better with a real ad serving company.
After an initial rush to give it a go, a lot of webcomics have put their accounts on the back-burner. At one point, I would have said this is at least a good way to network with other member webcomics, but disillusionment has set in, and the time sink is unlike anything you've seen at other social network sites. Verdict: probably skip.
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