Under some extraordinary circumstances I had to at the last minute give a talk on self publishing a few weeks back. I wanted to compile these notes for the reference of those at the presentation and others who stumble upon them.
As far as Brisbane goes, you are not alone in the self publishing/small press scene. If you don't live in Brisbane I think you're in luck as well as there will invariably be a small press scene in any major city. This scene is also good for fledgling writers and artists for getting your work in front of people, to find places that will stock your work, and simply to network. It also looks good on a resume to show that you have produced work, had it published/stocked, and that you can collaborate with others. It may only be in a magazine of a few hundred copies distributed by hand, but being printed is being printed. Below are generic examples of what can be found in small printing scenes so you can look for their ilk online and in your local area:
Ashcan
Pulpfaction.net
Drink and Draw
Phatsville (adult material warning)
Altabe
Ozcomics
Errant Story
The Edge
Claytons Comics
Ace Comics
Comics.net.au
As far as other ways of getting your work out there, events like
Supanova are good for this. Any con your city holds will do. Quite often everyone that is anyone in your local small press scene will be at your local con. Which also makes these events great for networking. If you're a writer looking for an artist, speak to some people in artists alley. If you're looking to have work published speak to the small press scene and even the big press scene that's in attendance. Celebrities, if you can get a hold of them at cons, are full of contacts. If you do what they do, write, draw, whatever, they may be willing to pass your name along or give you some contact details. You never know what will come up when speaking to someone unless you speak to them, so be sociable at cons!
Now I'm sure you're thinking find contacts is all well and good, but I've got no money! I'm broke! What do I do? You will have to raise funds. This can seem like an impossible task, but do not be defeated by that thought, it's wrong. Having the option for people to donate to you on your site is one way to bring funds in. You don't have a site? Get one. You need a digital presence. If you have a look at the examples of Altabe and Errant Story above, both have donation tabs. Another thing you can do is publish ads on your site. If you have a look at this blog and the Errant Story example above, we both run ads through
Project Wonderful. There are many ad providers available online, and you will need to do your research to find out which one suits your site best. Another thing you can do is whip up your government website and look at what grants are available for up and coming creatives. Australians can look
here. Bare in mind you can apply for arts grants and small business development grants if you're looking to make a business out of your art, but you will need to research grant writing if you want to stand a chance of receiving a grant. Merchandise is another option for raising funds. Ashcan sells badges that we made at events we attend. If you have a look at Errant Story again you will see merchandise, and if you donate a certain amount to them they have unique wallpapers as gifts for people. They put new ones up regularly to encourage regular donations. Finally, you can hold events. Ashcan holds a launch party for each issue where we charge a small price on the door and we also have our comics on sale for people to buy. The proceeds of each launch party goes to the next round of printing and the next party. Some of these examples are easy, some are quite difficult, so how much money you can make to put back into your projects is down to how committed you are to making the money.
Enough about making money. How do we make sure we don't spend more money than we need to? Cost minimisation is important, and digital formats bypass a lot of costs, so this may be the best option for you if you don't have much in the way of funds to put towards your project. You must go digital if you are also going physical print, and you can go solely digital, but you cannot go solely print, not in this day and age. For printed comics the largest overhead is often the printing itself. Make sure you get lots of quotes from different printers. Printers are happy to quote, it's their job, and feel free to tell a printer you got a quote from another for cheaper to see if they can beat it. When getting quotes ask for quotes of multiple quantities. If it's only a little bit more and you get a lot more, it might be worth it if you can shift the extra stock. The larger the print run the better deal you'll receive. Printers also post, you can speak to printers interstate and overseas don't forget. For Australians, you will need to ask for GST to be factored into your quote, quite often that price is not included in a basic quote. Colour is always more expensive than black and white but check the colour price. Quite often it's exorbitantly expensive compared to black and white, but if you happen to find a place that prints colour for only a little more it may again be worth paying that little bit extra. A comic is also not a standard size, you will need to specify the exact size you want printed. When cutting costs it also pays to be resourceful. Do you know someone that has access to a printer? Can you get mates rates from somewhere?
So your work is printed/uploaded and you're ready to market it. How can you do that on a budget? Digital distribution will be king here. You can speak to local magazines and newspapers about advertising, but you will be bidding against companies with advertising budgets, so be warned that physical advertising is as a general rule very expensive. Digital advertising, however, is not, and it's really quite easy. As an example, most artists will have a
Deviantart account. Writers can make an account as well. It makes a great free portfolio and again is a great networking tool. Facebook, believe it or not, is also great for advertising. You can advertise directly with Facebook or you can make a facebook page for yourself. As an example of a facebook page of an artist, check out
MyAmbeon. Alternatively you can make a Tumblr account for yourself and upload images, or a whole comic that way. Blogger, which I'm using for my blog, is another way to attract people to your work, or you could purchase a whole website and run a webcomic on your own site. Wordpress and Comicpress are great tools for this, if slightly technical. If you have physical work you want stores to stock, you will need to email the store and/or speak to them in person to find out what the next step is. This is a hard route for fledgling artists, so bare this in mind. If you live in Brisbane, places like The Edge, Claytons Comics and Ace Comics are very supportive of stocking local artists. You will find some places however that will tell you they stock local work but then will never get back to you. You need to persevere and keep trying. Comixology is something to look at if you feel you're producing high quality work and want to go for international distribution.
Self publishing and marketing is all down to searching for outlets for your work. Here are a list of questions that I want you to answer if you are seriously considering marketing your work.
Who is your audience?
What are you trying to say to them?
What do they do already?
How will you market yourself?
Who will you talk to?
What events will you attend?
How will you show off your work?
Are there any ways you can cut costs?
What are your short, medium and long term goals and how do answers to the above questions support them?
I'll leave you with a little script from
xkcd.com that will hopefully dispel all fears about taking the plunge and chasing your dream.
And if you wanted to take the dream chasing a little further,
here's something for you :)
