#writing and art in general is meant to be done by people not algorithms | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

adventures-in-a-world-of-fiction · 5 years ago

Text

Practicalities of Censorship

Every so often I see a thread cross my dashboard arguing about censorship with relation to AO3 - in particular people claiming that AO3 is bad because it allows basically any story regardless of content, that people are bad for supporting it, or that AO3 should implement some method by which problematic fics get taken down. These complaints are usually met with explanations around the history or AO3, why it was implemented the way it was, and why thinking that AO3 is fine the way it is does not equal being a pedophile. I want to tackle this from another angle - practicality.

Let's assume for the sake of this post that the people making these arguments are correct and that there are some things which shouldn't be allowed on AO3 (or an an alternative fic platform set up to be a better version of AO3 without all the bad stuff - I'll mostly be taking about "fixing" AO3 in this post but the same problems would apply to setting up a new and "safer" fic site). There are a lot of arguments against censorship to do with quality of works produced and whether this results is less good art when people are scared to produce things that might get banned, or whether there is artistic merit to works that display despicable actions. Let's just imagine for the moment that the whole argument is settled and the "let's purify AO3 for the sake of the children" crowd are correct. What would need to happen next? This isn't something I've seen addressed in these posts.

There are a lot of problems with censorship. Skipping over the ethical discussion of whether censorship is good or bad and in what circumstances it should be accepted, let's focus on two practical aspects: deciding what should and shouldn't be banned, and how you would implement such a ban. Let's start with problem one: where do you draw the line?

Let's assume we have some scale of rating from absolutely sickeningly awful deserving of destruction to perfectly clean and innocent with not the slightest thing wrong with it. Somewhere between these two endpoints is a line and everything to one side of it is bad and should be banned/blocked/deleted from AO3, etc. Everything on the other side of the line is fine and should be left available for people to read. Some things may seem easy to define. Fic A is incest porn, where a child is graphically raped in a way that's cleanly meant to titillate rather than horrify and the abuse is glorified and justified in text, and it's full of poor writing, spelling and grammar mistakes, and has no artistic merit as a work (how you judge artistic merit would need a few thousand words to explore as a subject on its own right). Let's stick that on the bad side of the line since that's the sort of thing that people on Tumblr are crying out to be banned. Fic B is a fluff fic where a character makes another character soup because they're feeling ill and they watch movies together. Nothing remotely sexual, just two adult characters being sweet to each other. So we'll put that on the good side of the line, right?

But the problem comes in deciding where that dividing line should be and what should be done about the things that sit close to the line. You could come up with some simple rules. Let's say, "Everything involving underage incest is on the bad side of the line." Seems straight-forward. But what if you have a story dealing with someone's recovery from incest and CSA? The story has a character who was abused in the past and the narrative deals with them getting therapy and overcoming their trauma. None of the abuse is shown in the text of the story, it all happens off-screen as it were, and the story sends a message that incest and CSA are bad but offers hope to former victims. Surely that story would belong on the good side of the line? So maybe we amend the rule to, "Everything involving graphic incest is on the bad side of the line." That would let us keep the story about overcoming the trauma on the good side but block anything that uses incest as porn. But is consenting incest between grown adults treated the same as abusive incest?

And what if you get a story that's more about the trauma but that has a handful of flashbacks about the rape that would count as graphic. These flashbacks are meant to be horrifying not sexually exciting. Would that be okay? Is it the intent of the scene that matters? But in that case, what happens if the author writes a scene that's intended to be horrifying but a reader interprets it as arousing? Would it be okay if the author includes a disclaimer in the notes saying that this is a terrible thing and shouldn't be done in real life? Is it the intensity of the scenes shown directly in the story? In which case, where do you draw the line between something described explicitly and something merely eluded to? Is it the precise terms used? Which terms? Or how many times those terms are use? Is a subtle allusion to an event okay? In which case, what happens with a slightly less subtle allusion?

The stories that are far away from the line are easy to place, but the ones close to it become a challenge. Any attempt to define straight-forward rules starts to fall apart quickly and you get to the point where you have to argue on a case-by-case basis for each story, which would involve a massive amount of time invested to check each of these stories and decide whether or not they're allowed. Once again the practicalities of "how would you enforce something like this?" rear their ugly head but that's a question we'll address later.

We also have the problem that where I might draw the line between the bad and the good might be different from where you would draw the line, and would be different from where someone else would draw the line. Let's go back to Fic B as described above, our perfectly innocent fluff story. I might think that's perfectly acceptable, but if those two characters are both the same gender, there will be some homophobic people who will say that it's wrong and corrupting innocents because it sends the message that homosexual relationships are good. Or even if the characters are different genders, some highly religious people might think it sends a bad message if those characters are unmarried and living together in a relationship, even if nothing explicit happens within the story. Or what if the characters are married but it's an interracial marriage? A KKK member might say that sends a bad message. Different people have a different idea of what counts as bad content.

In the real world, there have been cases of books that address racism being banned because they use the n word. Harry Potter has been banned by religious groups. According to the website www.banned-books.org.uk a sweet children's book about two penguins hatching an egg was banned by a lot of schools and libraries in the US because the two penguins are both male - even though this story was actually based on a true story. The book Black Beauty, about the experiences of a horse, was banned during the Apartheid in South Africa simply for including the word "black" in the title. If you look at that site, a lot of books have been banned for a lot of different reasons and a lot of good literature has ended up caught up in the censorship usually because religious groups objected to in on moral grounds.

You could say "don't let the bigots and racists be in charge of the censorship," but historically, when censorship has come into play in the past, the people who tend to end up the worst for it are minorities. LGBTQ+ groups and people of colour tend to get censored more than straight, white men. Stories about their experiences often deal with problematic issues and therefore they get banned. The groups that generally end up making decisions about what is and isn't okay tend to be the groups that have the most power to begin with, and the end result is silencing of minority voices. This is one reason I'm very wary of anything to do with censorship, because the people who usually end up the worse for it are those who most need their voices heard.

But let's imagine all of these problems are magically overcome and we come up with a perfectly clear set of rules about what counts as good and bad fic and the dividing line is agreed by good, rational people who aren't remotely bigoted and who are able to define the criteria for what should be banned in a way that will only ever block the harmful stuff.

We still have to deal with the practicalities of enforcement we set aside earlier. We've built our perfect set of rules to define good and bad fics and now we want to put them into practice to ban any of the awful stuff. How would you go about doing it?

We could try and get machine filters to do censorship by looking for keywords and particular tags or using more complex algorithms to judge what a piece of content is about, but this ends up with chaos like Tumblr auto-flagging a lot of perfectly clean content, or YouTube blocking videos that just happened to be by/about LGBTQ+ people. Any software based implementation would struggle because someone talking about a thing as a problem contains the same words as someone glorifying that thing, and machines tend not to be great at picking up tone. You would get a massive amount of errors with things being falsely flagged as bad and things being falsely let through despite breaking the rules.

And people would be sneaky. Someone wanting to include their graphic story wouldn't tag it as for over 18s because tagging something as for over 18s would get it banned, so they would tag it as something else. The terms "lemon" and "lime" used to describe fics by older members of fandoms started from exactly this sort of thing. Websites decided to not allow adult content so people continued to post adult content but they used the citrus scale for tagging it so people would still be able to find it. Which works when people know the terms to look for or avoid, but which doesn't work for people not in the know. Is a "lemon" or a "lime" fic more explicit? Do you know what a fic being tagged as "grapefruit" would mean? By their nature, these tags are coded, which is not great for clarity.

Any sort of system that just blanket bans key words or tags would result in people just not using those keywords and tags but posting the stuff anyway. It would actually make the situation worse because there would still be incest porn and the like, only now it wouldn't be tagged. As it stands on AO3, people use the tagging system very well and people who don't want to see the incest porn can do things like exclude that tag from searches, or just not open fics they see that have the tag. If there were rules in place to not allow anything with that tag, then people would stop using the tag, which would actually mean more people would see incest porn they didn't want to because it would no longer be tagged properly, or it would be tagged using code words which only mean something to the inside group. It would be much harder to avoid the things you don't like.

So let's say we don't let a computer decide what's breaking the rules. Let's say there is a system by which readers can flag a fic as being inappropriate to get it banned. Human beings get to decide, but what's the threshold? Does a thing get banned as soon as someone reports it? Or does it need to be flagged by multiple people to be banned? In which case fics written in tiny fandoms might slip through the cracks because not enough people are reading it to them flag it. This is also open for exploitation. Someone who takes a dislike to a particular person might encourage others to flag their fics as inappropriate, regardless of whether or not they are. Someone might create fake accounts or log in anonymously over proxies to spam a fic with flags.

And even if no one acts maliciously to abuse the system, not everyone will be careful about checking the precise and perfect rules defined to mark the difference between acceptable and unacceptable work. People will flag things incorrectly, based on their own viewpoints of what should or shouldn't be allowed, which we've already said is a problem because everyone will draw the line in different places based on their own beliefs.

So what's the alternative to a community-driven method for managing content? You could have specific people whose job it is to go through content and decide whether it adheres to the rules. Maybe a computer system or community flagging could funnel fics into a review channel where human beings check every one carefully. These people would understand the rules and be certain to always judge fics accurately according to the magically perfect rules defined earlier, which are guaranteed to only ever block bad fics but never block a good fic.

So problem solved, right? We have our perfect rules perfectly implemented.

Except where humans are employed to check whether content is acceptable or not, it involves a large number of people checking through basically the worst content out there. Some social networking sites do this sort of thing now and it can be hugely traumatising for people who do that work. It's not good for them mentally to have to be exposed over and over to the worst content being put up online. There tends to be a high turnover in those jobs because they burn out fast, and that's where people are being paid for this stuff.

A site like AO3 relies on volunteers so it would require a large number of people to volunteer to look at the darkest most gruesome content and decide if it breaks the rules or not. Either you have people who hate those sort of fics doing this out of a sense of duty to maintain the purity of the content, in which case they will probably struggle with having to read a load of stuff they really, really don't enjoy. Or you will have people volunteer because they really like those fics and this is the way for them to read them. And that probably defeats the point of doing this, because it means that the people who would be seeking out those stories anyway would be the ones reading them to see if they break the rules.

There are a lot of problems with censorship, both ethically and practically. Even if you are fully on the side of censorship from a moral standpoint, you have to address the practical concerns if you want to propose an implementation.

As it stands, I think the current system works. There is stuff on AO3 that I would not in a million years want to read, but I don't have to. AO3 is brilliant for its tagging system and I can look at the tags and nope past fics that are full of my personal squicks or that I think endorse something terrible. Readers can exclude tags they want nothing to do with or just not click on ones that include elements you dislike. You can curate your own experience, which actually works with the whole idea of everyone drawing a line in a different place. You and I will have different stories we want to avoid, and we can both choose to avoid them based on author's tagging for them, rather than some other person decreeing what is acceptable for either of us to see.

If you still think that AO3 should be blocking or banning certain content, have a think about how this would work in reality. Because when ideas like that are implemented in the real world, all manner of problems happen.

I think the fact that this post is still a couple of thousand words long with me skipping over several parts of the debate is a sign that this is not a simple problem that can be easily fixed.

#censorship #long post

9 notes · View notes

reimenaashelyee · 6 years ago

Text

Inspiration and Calling

“Where do you get your ideas from?” “How do you choose which book to do?”

The short answer is, I don’t know?? Or rather, I can’t explain it. Or RATHER, I don’t think the real answer will be helpful, or even make sense, to anyone else except me.

Inspiration

Personally I don’t think anyone should worry so much over when or where their ideas will manifest. They will come.

But before we understand what I mean when I say “chillax, bro”, let me address a couple of assumptions about inspiration:

Inspiration as a Set, Determined, Concrete Process.

“If I don’t figure out how Inspiration with a capital I works, I will never find it. I will never be a real artist.”

What I’m referring to is this prevailing idea that that there’s a mystical Ideas Machine inside your head you need to find that, once you activate it, will instantly and forever feed you ideas, confirming your destiny as a creator. I mean, isn’t that the core implication behind “where do your ideas come from?”? It implies that there is a routine that all seasoned creators have obtained; a hidden knowledge to be passed down; a videogame-like skill to be levelled up to. Basically, people who ask this question… who don’t ask it solely out of plain, mundane curiosity… are looking for a clue to unlock their Ideas Machine.

What ends up happening is like the hundreds of Pocket articles I have read that tries to crack the code of what makes a start-up manager or self-made billionaire Productive. You wake up at 4 am. You drink the purest herbal tea from the Organic Highlands. You use the Pomodoro. You put robots in your brain. It’s hopeless. How one person finds inspiration or productivity is so individual that really, there is no One True Answer. No guaranteed process. No Ideas Machine.

Equating inspiration as survival or work.

This is the danger zone, imo. You know why? People who draw or write for fun (usually as a hobby) never ask where ideas come from. They just draw. They just write. The first time the question enters a hobbyist’s mind is when they transition from creating for themselves to creating beyond themselves; that is, to put up work for an audience, to get a book deal, to start a creative career. Some people remain stuck in this questioning stage and panic over whether they are a real artist who can make money if they can’t find the mystical Ideas Machine that seasoned creators seem to have. And we already know that doesn’t exist.

Which is why I think there’s no need to worry about the time and place of ideas/inspiration. There’s no need to find a process, or to base your capital value as a creator on the production of ideas. Just chillax bro. Eat a delicious meal. Watch a Netflix movie. Lie down on the grass. Laugh with your friends. Be cheerful, live well. As long as you’re living on this planet and experiencing the joys of society like Uncle Karl says you should, your brain will know what to do. Inspiration will come.

TL;DR be patient. Trust yourself. And eat your favourite dessert sometimes.

Marx recognized that the science of capitalistic economy, despite its worldly and pleasure-seeking appearance, “is a truly moral science, the most moral of all sciences. Its principal thesis is the renunciation of life and of human needs. The less you eat, drink, buy books, go to the theatre or to balls, or to the public house [ Br., pub], and the less you think, love, theorize, sing, paint, fence, etc., the more you will be able to save and the greater will become your treasure which neither moth nor rust will corrupt — your capital. The less you are, the less you express your life, the more you have, the greater is your alienated life and the greater is the saving of your alienated being. Everything which the economist takes from you in the way of life and humanity, he restores to you in the form of money and wealth. And everything which you are unable to do, your money can do for you; it can eat, drink, go to the ball and to the theatre. It can acquire art, learning, historical treasures, political power; and it can travel. It can appropriate all these things for you, can purchase everything; it is the true opulence. But although it can do all this, it only desires to create itself, and to buy itself, for everything else is subservient to it. When one owns the master, one also owns the servant, and one has no need of the master’s servant. Thus all passions and activities must be submerged in avarice. The worker must have just what is necessary for him to want to live, and he must want to live only in order to have this.” (link)

P.S: UNCLE KARL IS TELLING YOU TO TREAT YOSELF. That’s praxis!!

Here’s another quote I like that’s also relevant, but less “destroy late stage capitalism” and more “wow isn’t the world beautiful”:

Develop an interest in life as you see it; the people, things, literature, music – the world is so rich, simply throbbing with rich treasures, beautiful souls and interesting people. Forget yourself.

Henry Miller

That’s my answer for “Where do your ideas come from?”. The ideas comes from being alive. To develop and grow that garden of ideas – that is, life – , you have to immerse yourself in it. Not for money. Not for comments or followers or social media. Not for external confirmation that you’re a Real Creator. But for your own joy. For the love of living. When you immerse yourself in the garden you lose yourself. That’s what Henry Miller is talking about.

When you give in to the garden, it gives back to you. Being alive is inspiration. Inspiration is being alive.

James Webb Young’s five-step technique for producing ideas touches upon how living life is essential to creativity.

Calling

“How do you choose which books to do?” is more esoteric. I think the answer is more a Reimena Yee thing than it is most artists’ thing, though people like T.S. Eliot have come pretty close to describing my answer:

I choose the book which compels me.

This thing is not easy to describe. I don’t know. I am not sure if other comics creators operate primarily like this, or think of their work this way.

It’s different from the feeling

of finding a concept you want to write about

of being overexcited and hyperfocused by said concept

of self-indulging

It’s all of those feelings, but there’s an edge to it.

I have a few ideas in the backburner. Some of them are books I want to do. Some are books I really, really want to do. And one or two of them are books that compel me.

The sensation is like finding the perfect pet in the animal shelter. You see a dog or cat and come back to it over and over again. You can’t explain this feeling you are feeling, this deep-in-the-gut instinct that you’re meant for this animal. Eventually, you listen to your gut, you take the plunge, and you bring it home. Turns out, you’re right.

That’s what I mean by “compelling”.

There are certain books which I return to over and over again. In the beginning, the special book plants an imagery in my mind’s eye, then it plays it repeatedly. If this doesn’t stop after a year, and if I still feel like I’m meant for it, I accept my calling and take it.

But accepting the book comes with the simultaneous feelings of excitement and fear, joy and resignation. When I actually work on it, there’s not really a hyperfocus or overexcitement. It’s more like I’m listening to what it wants to be, and I carve it into existence slowly. When I feel the joy it’s not exactly self-indulgent… more like relishing in a purpose. It’s work. It’s a calling.

Sometimes a calling will be equated to passion. People talk about passion like it’s a feeling that burns and consumes you and motivates you to work through unreasonable hours or expectations. You know, the passion that exploitation thrives in. That’s how you know you are a Real Artist, they say.

But I have never felt passion like that? When I experience passion, I feel that I love the work. That I want the calling to happen. But there’s no anxiety in it. I don’t feel that I must get it done quickly or cater it for mass appeal, though I do have a preferred deadline and a hopeful expectation for an audience who will appreciate my hard work. But even if I break the deadline (maybe it has to be delayed another year) or end up having no support/audience, I am not worried. I just think “Well, it’ll happen regardless.” or “Yay, it’s already real. I am glad I did it.”

It’s got no fireworks. No algorithmic hurrah. No romance. I don’t go Natalie Portman Black Swan over the calling. Is that unimpressive? I don’t know. I only know it’s purposeful. And that it feels right. Maybe the word is not passion. Maybe the word is trust.

Maybe passion and trust are two sides of the same coin.

That’s all part of the “compelling” I feel for some books. They are the ones I don’t worry about because they are the ones I know will happen. So I pick them and give them the love and attention they ask for. It’s not a one-way relationship either. When you give in to the garden, it gives back to you.

So really, the answer to both questions is “I don’t know.” Because like, if you boil down my answers down to their most blase they are basically “Enjoy your life” and “Do what you like” – which are good answers in general, but don’t say anything about marketability or success or finding validation in an external party like a publisher or art director. They are useless answers.

Then again,

Maybe they are not.

#thoughts #inspiration #craft

38 notes · View notes

comicteaparty · 5 years ago

Text

March 7th-March 13th, 2020 Creator Babble Archive

The archive for the Creator Babble chat that occurred from March 7th, 2020 to March 13th, 2020. The chat focused on the following question:

What is your overall marketing/promotion strategy for your webcomic?

Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)

I don't know if this counts as a strategy, but these are some of the things I do to promote my comic or my work in general. 1. Most important from what I've noticed (which I have been failing at due to stress and self-doubt lately) is to post updates to your comic frequently and consistently. It seems somewhat silly that simply putting your work out there is the best way to grow an audience, but it really is. Newly posted chapters frequently get shown on more pages and thus detected by the algorithms and potential readers. It also helps to establish trust with current and returning readers. 2. Participating in art/comic events, forums, and other comicking communities (such as this one). In a way, this isn't really marketing directly, but it is good to build connections with other creators! 3. Conventions! I actually have gotten a several new readers/followers from attending cons. It's also nice just to talk to people, get your name out there locally, and to make a little bit of money while at it. 4. Social media promotion. Tbh, this hasn't been super helpful to me, but more eyes is always a win in my book. I try to post almost every day, even if it isn't art or comic related. Having some kind of social media presence at all, even if it's small, shows people that you are working hard to connect to others. Also finding the right hashtags definitely helps with visibility.

kayotics

Overall, my strategy for marketing is to be authentic and just keep plugging my stuff. People will come if they like it. I work as a marketer for my day job, so I know what I COULD do, but I really don’t do that much since a whole marketing plan would take a lot more time than I have available to me. Some of the stuff I do otherwise: - regular updates. This ones pretty important for retaining viewers I already have. Any good marketing strategy is thinking about retaining people, not just getting new ones - self promo: this usually is on top webcomics or on social media. I get a LOT of traffic from top webcomics, and I get a good handful of people from social media. - conventions, like mentioned before, can be a great way to get people’s eyes on your stuff. I have a postcard that I hand out to people if they come by or they purchase something. - the thing I don’t do enough is post more art outside of the comic, or even just little previews. If I were dedicated to marketing, I’d be sharing sketches or illustrations on social media to grow my audience.

DanitheCarutor

Ah you know, I don't really have much of a strategy. At some point I promoted as much as I could on Twitter, adding my comic to those share/promo thread, getting in on relevant hashtag events, participating on WebComic Chat (whenever I remembered to). I've done a little promotion on forums, but there is really only so much you can do since only so many people hang out there and if your work is super niche like mine, they will pretty much avoid your promos at all cost. Lmao Other than those I don't really do much, at some point I attempted to use Instagram but the site/app is very stingy about offsite links. I also started a Facebook page, although if you don't have the money to boost your promos and don't usually have a lot going on with your comic outside of weekly updates, it won't get a whole lot of attention. I've also tried to be more active, but I'm not a good conversationalist, and I tend to be kind of a thread/conversation/mood killer so I try to avoid talking outside of Q&A prompts like this.

eli [a winged tale]

Same Dani, I used Instagram for a while too and I just don’t think the platform is a good fit for my vertical scroll comic (see exhibit 1) Twitter is a mixed bag as well and I think unless you have a solid following already, it’s hard to gain traction. What really helped was being on Webtoon’s staff pick for a couple days. I’m not sure how Tapas picked up but it’s reassuring that there’s a couple of followers gained every week when I posted regularly. So it really does sound like the first step is to have a steady update schedule (working on the buffer! Got a month’s work down today). It’s just challenging because while I could upload one page a week but on the vertical scroll sites it seems like a longer episode (6-7 pages) is valued more as a solid update. Love hearing everyone’s thoughts and hope to learn from y’all! (edited)

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

Consistency and con attendance were big ones for me, but something I learned worked well (and was really fun to do) was creating really fun, really dumb, non-canon bits of art every now and then. Following meme prompts or funny ideas from other people. If your comic can afford some humor being thrown its way, making people laugh is a great way to get some attention. No one needs to know the details of your story - they just need to relate to the characters/humor somehow. I had more than one person come across my dumb, meme-y ancillary art and go “Welp, I want to read your comic now.”

eli [a winged tale]

Memes to the rescue! What has been your favourite to do? And which one has surprised you in its relatability/popularity?

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

Two shots of vodka.

Also that terrible sweater meme. Everyone is required to do the terrible sweater meme. People eat it up.

eli [a winged tale]

Too good

Ahh I can’t wait till I can actually write silly adult characters

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Now that you mention it, the nice thing about the terrible sweater meme is it works with a WIDE variety of comics.

eli [a winged tale]

I would love to do a meme with y’all

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

"Came for the story, staying for the sick memes"

Spring-heeled Jack

I try to post updates every friday when my new pages go up on Patreon. And then I make my big post when my tapas and website update at the end of the month. Between all that, I have little flyers that I carry with me and if I'm ever in a shop that has a little self promotion section, I plan on tacking up a flyer. I do conventions, and this will be my first convention season while actively making a comic, so flyers will be handed out then as well.

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

My comic isnt very comedy-heavy, and even for the funny scenes, my sense of humor isn't compatible with most people's. So a lot of the memes out there just don't work. But terrible sweater meme doesn't have to be hilarious. It can be just cute, or even weird.

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

For me, uh lmao. I sometimes make some funny strip panels and it was received well even though it's not polished for my liking lmao

Spring-heeled Jack

Keii, I feel you. I'm not good with comedy and my comic isn't meant to be funny, either, so I don't know how well a comedy meme will help me.

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

overall, I try to be honest with just self promo and asking when I have a chance "Hey pls check out my comic lol"

eli [a winged tale]

Or maybe just something relatable? Seen a couple caption this on tumblr

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

I think instead of memes, what I'm gonna do is my characters cosplaying more well known characters from works that have some tonal similarities with my own. This isn't just for advertising purposes; it's something I've been wanting to do for a long time for myself. But I'm realizing it can serve some of the same purposes that memes do.

Spring-heeled Jack

That's extremely cute!

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Keyword being "SOME" Tonal similarities... Some of them aren't very similar but have a couple of parallels, etc.

Spring-heeled Jack

Oh for sure. Even if you could find that 'perfect match', it might not be a great cosplay for them, and give too much away

Are "draw the squad" prompts still a thing? I love those

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

The One White Dude and the Tiger Dude in my comic will definitely cosplay Calvin and Hobbes at some point.

Spring-heeled Jack

LOL

omg please, Keii

eli [a winged tale]

YES

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

Yeah, not every comic will have super memeable humor - but whatever you can do to break down that wall between you and a potential reader and go “Hey! Look at this. Is this relatable? Do you get the reference? Etc” Is a very good bet

Also yes squad memes are PERFECT

You can boil down your comic’s relationships so simply.

Spring-heeled Jack

I have four couples in my comic so those "ship dynamic" posts might be fun

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

What are squad memes?

eli [a winged tale]

I also need to be educated about squad I mean all the memes

Spring-heeled Jack

OH MAN!! They are fun as heck. You can find templates and it's a very simple character design in the template, but the poses are super silly. And then you just draw your characters in place of those simple figures(edited)

If you google "Draw the squad" you will find a bunch

renieplayerone

Oh! Ill have to try that! These squad bases look fun!

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

I still have one of those I need to finish Back when I first started sharing my work, I was surprised and delighted at how quickly people shoved it through a meme filter.

Maybe that’s another thing! If marketing opportunities present themselves as a surprise, try running with them and see where they take you Within reason, of course. Never feel forced to follow anything that people respond to in a particular way. Just take it into account and see how you feel about it.

renieplayerone

(Im here to lurk on this week's question, i have no strategy and need ideas haha)

eli [a winged tale]

Omg draw the squad looks

too many to choose

mariah (rainy day dreams)

I love draw the squad poses so much TuT I wish I had more time to draw within more of them. I think I always get a little dishearten about making memes because I feel like I need to make my jokes full illustrations but I never have time for much extra content beyond ballpoint pen sketches :T

Mei

Honestly I don't have a marketing or promotion strategy for my webcomic. I make updates every week, and I post it on my twitter and kinda plug it there. I'm actually god awful at trying to make people read my comic because I'm a little bit nervous about it, to be honest. So I just sort of leave it there and see if people find it, half the time. That being said, I tried to promote it pretty hard at conventions last year. But that didn't go as well as I'd hoped. I'm hoping to make flyers with QR codes so that people can scan it, and it'll take them to the landing page/tapas for the comic. That might be a bit easier than getting them to just search the title, plus having a flyer is a nice bit of promotion if I get the opportunity?! Making memes and drawing characters in different clothes or in squad things sounds like super fun tho and I might look into that in the future

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

It's nice to hear everyone talk about this topic. TBH I had completely stopped promoting my comic because I got too scared of backlash, being a disappointment, etc. (Initially I'd attracted a number of people who weren't actually my target audience, and that led to some less than ideal results.) But some time last year, it occurred to me that 1) I'm making this comic for my reader self (or my "hypothetical taste twin" as I like to call it)... which means 2) I only have to appeal to people like me. So I started asking myself, "What would I have to say/do to get me to read this comic?" and that made it significantly less intimidating. I haven't actually started doing self promo (though I did start plugging my updates on Twitter at least). But most future self promo I do will be based on that ^ question.

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

(oh god, I was just checking out the latest update for one of the Korean webcomics I read, and the new episode is about a hikikomori... who says "I want to change, but I can't step outside because... maybe there isn't a single person out there who will understand me." THAT WAS ME but with comic promo. Well, I'm getting better and I also hope this character will, too, though knowing this comic his chances aren't so great lol...)

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

I hope that wasn't too awkward to share! Tl;dr I really think the "what would I have to say/do to get ME to check out my comic" is a good approach for anyone else feeling intimidated about doing self promos.

In the same vein, but on the opposite side of the coin: I'm curious to know, what were some things that got YOU to read someone else's comic?

Some of my own answers to that aren't very relevant to what we can do for our own comics: e.g. I'm Korean and when Naver has a new comic in their pro comic lineup, I may check it out. I'm also a member of SpiderForest and I check out the applicants' comics during the app season. Stuff like that aren't really good promo options that we can take. But things that may be relevant: - 'Evocative scenery shot that doesn't show the face/ doesn't focus on the face.' MY WEAKNESS. That kinda pictures feel subtle and kind of lonely to me, even if it's a group shot. And I like stories with those vibes. -Promo includes an evocative quote. Could be from the comic itself, or from something else like a classical literature or whatever. The creator of Ark (https://www.arkcomic.com/) does this sometimes and even though I'm already following Ark, those promos get my attention.

eli [a winged tale]

Definitely the art promo now that I think of it! Merch, posters, banners etc. If the art intrigues me, I definitely take a look at the site/blurb/first chapter

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

I wonder if we can semi-workshop promo art at some point? Not really intensive like "change xyz" because that's not always feasible with art, but just impression feedback like, "this pictures gives me these vibes, and makes me expect this kinda story"

I would be curious to see everyone's even if we don't workshop

eli [a winged tale]

YES

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

Yesssss

chalcara [Nyx+Nyssa]

Yes please. I don‘t promo besides update notices simply because I have no clue to start.

Mei

Sometimes I get really attracted by the style of the story? I immediately started reading Wolfsbane because the art was cool and different from a lot of whta I'd seen on Webtoon up until that point. And then the story was perfect for me. What keii said about writing for yourself is right. Patrick Ness once said you should write the stories your younger self would have loved to pick up on a shelf

and I think that's a pretty evocative thing. At the end of the day, you should be enjoying what you're writing (hopefully). And if you enjoy it and you're having fun making it, that can rub off on the people reading it, or you find the people who like that similar vein of story?

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

(It's also 100% legit to write stories for your current self )

Mei

(oh yes 100% that's what i'm doing HEHE)

Tolkein wrote LOTR because he was like

in love with worldbuilding

was there a market for such a strange type of novel at the time? No. Definitely not. Did he write it anyway? YEAH HE DID

Deo101 [Millennium]

I really wanna do an art workshop yes.

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Aight, anyone who wants an impression feedback from me, post your promo art in #art_help

Warning, my impressions may be totally off lol

Deo101 [Millennium]

Also I don't do much marketing. Mostly I try to get in with communities and learn about making comics, I just want to improve my craft. All I really do is make my updated every week, and share whatever art Ive made on my Twitter or whatever

Okay! I think I only have my cover on my phone, but on my computer I also have my banners and icon. So I'll share all those in a bit when I'm at my computer

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

(off topic but I'm sick, and when I'm sick or very tired I constantly misread words. I read "my banners" as "my bananas" and I was very confused for a couple seconds.)

Deo101 [Millennium]

My bananers

Feather J. Fern

I am terrible at marketing my own work, but I am very good at marketing other people's work. I use the "you would like it for this reason" to grab people. Unfortunately I can't do it for my comic because I am bad at seeing the good in my own work oof. I am getting better at it though.

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

That's a really good way to do it!

And I can relate. My own hangup is a little different, but it can be extremely difficult to be brave for sure, whether in front of other people, or just in front of your own brain that constantly judges you.

Feather J. Fern

Yeah I was talking about a friend's comic and then the person I was talking to was like "Don't you write comics" and I was like "ahfoofjw yeah but don't look at them"

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

I was thinking a lot about the whole "it's like [well known work] meets [another well known work]" approach that was discussed earlier. And I think that could be relevant here. Like, think of something that has either influenced your comic significantly, or just happens to have some core similarities. How would you market that thing? Could you market your own thing using a similar approach -- since there are similarities?

I'd thought of a really good example to compare HoK to. Then I got sad because the said example is extremely obscure outside of Korea. But now I'm like, hey, people don't have to KNOW that work. I can do this differently. I can talk about HoK the way I could talk about it.

('it' as in the other work that's obscure outside of Korea)

Feather J. Fern

I do think that's a good fast shortcut but I don't like using it becuase the shortcut sometimes makes people angry when they don't get what they like out of those two things

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

That's why I said to NOT actually bring up the comparison work

Don't name it

Just list the traits that are shared in common

Feather J. Fern

Oh sorry

I miss read

(And my name changed colours all the sudden?)

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

It's a confusing topic, so no worries

It means you leveled up

Feather J. Fern

OWO!

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Say you want to compare your work to... I dunno, DBZ, because it's got super strong aliens duking it out barehanded, blasting ki-like energy attacks, etc. Don't name DBZ. Talk about your work the way you'd talk about your favorite aspects of DBZ. "My comic has super strong aliens duking it out hand-to-hand! YEEEAH!"

OH MY GOD I NEED TO DO THIS NOW.

Feather J. Fern

Yeah! That's what I would do. (But it also helps for me that my comic has no hard reference points) but for my new comic, people are gonna compare it to Zach Bell, and Angelic Layer i think

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

I'm gonna write up some drafts that I will revise and tweet at a later time

Feather J. Fern

So I jsut got to you know, not promo it as such XD

Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)

I want to do this too for a quick pitch

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Do it (shop talk or story help maybe?)

I'm writing a vomit draft for mine

Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)

Yee

Feather J. Fern

I think I will do it for Story help

(Also so I can help flesh out my new project lol lol)

eli [a winged tale]

Kei I might be suuuuper off since I read only the beginning but I sort of thought inuyasha but Korea and handsome boys

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

Sometimes you don't even realize your story can be marketed as "blah meets blah" until much later down the line - I've only started realizing the number of existing properties I've absorbed unintentionally into my comic. It's not how I'd market it on a serious front, but to a friend for story help, heck yes.

But a lot of people on Twitter seem to do that strategy for PitMAD and it works great for them, so... shrug

I guess it still belongs in a "pitch arsenal," as it were

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Yeah, the one "blah" I just thought of is something I hadn't realized for all these years. But it makes so much sense now that I look at it.

eli [a winged tale]

See that’s where I got confused but I think this is what I’m gonna aim to do: - pitch to readers: inspiration but this awesome unique thing in the comic - pitch to other comic makers: the Logline - pitch to agents: comparison works if requested and longer pitch depending on their format - pitch to family: just read it plzthanksbye

renieplayerone

or alternative pitch to family: Please dear god never read this

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

That's me

Oof... Writing the 'promote your comic by talking about the traits it shares with Another Person's Work,' I made myself cry, and that is definitely a sign I'm on the right track.

eli [a winged tale]

Right track is good!

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

It took me years to even think of an 'other more popular work' comparison for Children of Shadow. XD But at the same time, it's really different from the works I compare it to, so it's hard to say 'Read this if you like X or X because it has a few similarities in theme and tone, but is still very much its own thing'.

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Yeah which is why I'm not even gonna namedrop my X.

I'm just straight up gonna talk about 'My comic has [this trait]' (and X shares that trait, but no one needs to know for the purpose of that pitch)

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

To answer the weekly question... I really don't have a marketing strategy. Marketing is my achilles heel, so I generally just throw pages up and hope someone sees them. I don't really understand social media nor do I have the energy to sink tonnes of time into it, which seems to be one of the biggest requirements for being picked up by algorithms. So my marketing strategy is just.., keep making comics and talking to other creators and hope for the best

eli [a winged tale]

I think that’s still solid Capn

Ultimately you need a product to promote

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

It's something that helps me, because while I can talk about my favorite works done by others, I feel stuck when trying to do the same with my own. So it's basically telling my brain, 'hey, you already know how to do it with other stories. Do the same thing with your own.'

eli [a winged tale]

So true Kei

renieplayerone

thats my strategy too. best case you market it great, worst case you've made a new friend so win win :3

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

My incredibly low numbers after 14 years of making webcomics beg to differ but... maybe someday I can hire someone to help me market.

eli [a winged tale]

I’m using the comic platforms rather than my own site so... sort of relying on their algorithms. I imagine it can be harder if you just post on your own website?

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Sometimes the platforms don't help much if their audience isn't into the type of comics you make

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I post on both my own website and on platforms, but the algorithms for WT and Tapas don’t seem to like me, haha.(edited)

renieplayerone

yeah same

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

One of my top favorite webcomics got a front page feature on Tapas once, but it wasn't the kind of a story that gets a lot of traction there, so it still didn't get very popular. And that was in no way a measure of its quality. It is an excellent comic, just not a good fit for that particular place.

renieplayerone

I get far more views on my site, but I get way more engagement on Tapas and WT

I actually treat those two mirrors AS marketing for the main site(edited)

eli [a winged tale]

Exactly renie! Good perspective!

I never know what different platforms tailor to...

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Yeah, what Keiiii said. I make dark fantasy comics and both WT and Tapas favour romance, especially comics geared towards a female audience and drawn anime style. My comics aren’t particularly feminine and romance isn’t much of a focus, so they’re just not what that demographic is into.

eli [a winged tale]

I’ve been trying to remember how I came across my favourite comics and usually it’s through the art (interesting characters, unique dynamic style that I enjoy) and the first chapter holding promise (able to see what the character wants/will have to change into)

Romance has always been the best seller in the story world I think

Oh and most recently hiveworks and other web publishers have great recommendations too per genre

And comic conventions are always fun to meet creators. Sometimes If I feel I jive with someone I’m an instant fan

renieplayerone

I absolutely need to get better at having confidence enough to make friends at conventions x_x

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I have noticed my audience grow a bit since joining Spiderforest. They’ve helped me get a bit better at promotion, though marketing just isn’t my talent, lol.

renieplayerone

im always terrified haha

eli [a winged tale]

It’s a big step for sure renie! It took me like... three years going to VanCAF as an attendee before actually exhibiting and making friends(edited)

Mei

I know i'm late but i personally detest the 'this book is X meets Y!!', even though I get why people do it. I just wish they'd describe it to me like what if I'd never read either of those books......

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I would really love to get out to cons, they sound like a great opportunity for connecting with other creators. One of these years I’ll be able to get to one!(edited)

Deo101 [Millennium]

yeah im usually kinda like "okay, well are you doing anything new or are you just doing those things :/"

renieplayerone

I exhibit with the Boston Comics Roundtable and I still havent gotten the courage XD

Mei

yeah, cons are really fun even to attend or to make friends! I find it really tough though, I'm so intimidated;;

yeah Deo... same... it's like

sure, I could pitch a story as two things. Like I don't know "The Walking Dead meets Shaun of the Dead" which is semi redundant anyway

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I only use it to give people a framework for the kinds of tones and themes they can expect from my work when I have to keep my explanation short and sweet.

renieplayerone

they should have badges that say "Hi i want to make friends but you are all so awesome its intimidating be kind"

Mei

or you know... use those words to just describe the story? It may be a personal preference, some agents LOVE comparisons

Yes renie, yes!

i'd love a badge like that like

pls talk to me i'm scare

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Sometimes a few words can’t fully describe a story as well as saying: ‘It’s a little bit like X meets X but if you add [insert unique thing your story does]’

Mei

I personally find that it depends a bit too much on people having read those books or stories before. BUT if you're pitching to an agent, they've usually read those books

so then they get a sense or vibe of like, what the genre is

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

It’s all down to preference, really. Your own and the person you’re pitching to. If you don’t want to use comparisons to describe your own work, that’s valid, but try not to dismiss people who do.

Mei

so I get it, I just don't like it personally xD I think a lot of the times it takes away from your own voice and story

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

That too is part of the reason why I'm not namedropping the works

Just having my self-promo self learn from my 'promo other people's stuff' self

Mei

yeah for sure, it adds that level of excitement to your own work that you'd give to others?

eli [a winged tale]

I think a cool exercise might be to check out someone’s work here and see how you would promote it

It’s always good to see from someone else’s perspective

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

yessssss, all of my friends have been much better at promoting than I am

mostly because they have no shame regarding it but they also just... know what sounds cool

Mei

Oh i'm very good at promoting my friends' work

I sold his DnD book to a kpop stan who doesn't like DnD and doesn't play, and it was a crowning achievement

eli [a winged tale]

Like for yours I’d probably say... Manta Ray princess finds herself very much dead but is given a second chance to revive her friends and save her kingdom... just need to find someone very much living and very much not afraid of the seaghosts they have become

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

SOLID

though now I imagine Phaedra as a Manta Ray in a dress which is... not entirely untrue

eli [a winged tale]

LOL omg I haven’t even thought of that! Just thought manta Princess is a hook

Mei

Me, pointing at Cheth "I mean look at him, LOOK AT HIM and tell me you don't want to read this"

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

I guess for my work I market it from four potential angles: 1) The princess is cool and has a sword, 2) The villain is the best character, 3) The environments ain't bad, and 4) THERE'S A DOG

again, you gotta know who you're talking to and what they already like

eli [a winged tale]

In a world where a fallen god became trapped in the sea, a dead princess is given a second chance to fight for her life with a mysterious sea-bitten boy and undo the sea ghost curse that plagues the world.

Dammit I repeated world

Mei

hey... the environments are GREAT

eli [a winged tale]

Yeah Lady your environment shots are

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

ok I do try BUT BACK TO MARKETING

The number of times I see someone marketing their comic with very epic-sounding descriptors or broad generalizations... then that one day where they're finally like "oh, I have a character who turns into a hamster at nighttime" and people are like 'I'M SOLD'

And then they go ".... THAT'S WHAT YOU ALL WANTED???"

often it's those little weird details that get people interested

Deo101 [Millennium]

I wanna read about the were hamster please

Mei

sometimes I think the simplest and maybe slightly silly lines are what grabs people?

when things sound TOO epic i feel a bit intimidated

eli [a winged tale]

takes notes

Mei

but if someone were to sell me a big adventure epic as "it's hamsters and they fight the forces of evil" i'd read it

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

god yes

"Four small creatures band together to defeat a great darkness overwhelming their homeland."

No.

"Hamsters fight evil."

YES

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I.... I have no idea how to snappily describe my comics. XD

eli [a winged tale]

Same... I got to kids with wings for hair then my brain short circuits

Mei

i'd say it's the way you'd tell the story to a close friend

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

The best I came up with was 'Teenagers with supernatural powers team up with woodland critters to defeat monsters' but it sounds more adventure-y and doesn't really get at the fact that it's a dark story with horror elements and everyone's mentally ill.

Mei

like they come up to you and go "what's your comic about" "oh you know, my stupid comic's about mutant hamsters that take over the world" or something

(don't call your comics stupid none of your comics are stupid they are great)

Deo101 [Millennium]

"plant man and his goth boyfriend babysitting a ton of bozos" would probably be mine then

Mei

BEAUTIFUL

i'm sold

Deo101 [Millennium]

ghsakgjhgkhkgahgk my target audience...

Mei

i do think tho like this form of comedic one-lining may not work for something dark?

Unless you go "Spooky horror about cats that become humans at night!"

would need experimentation

eli [a winged tale]

It’s a balance I think.

Kids stranded on an island with weapons explore the darkness in human nature - Lord of the Flies

Mei

ooh yeah that's a good one!

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

A space explorer stranded on a foreign planet must join forces with the indigenous population and save his ship before his life support runs out.

Alternately

Small man goes to war with small carrot people

Pikmin

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

@Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios) I wonder if one could describe CoS the way how people might describe Evangelion, but with magical powers instead of mechs.

Teens, monsters, mental illnesses

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Probably. Though I've never seen Evangelion, but those three words work very well.

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

The relationship dynamics are way different, but yeah, those three things...

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Also add trauma and cute lil animals and you have Children of Shadow. XD

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Evangelion also has trauma (though I don't know if you'd like it; this isn't a rec, just a promo discussion!) and it was refreshing to see at the time

A teen trying to fight huge monsters, even if he was doing it inside an equally huge mech, could lead to traumatizing experiences, and it was the first time I saw that seriously explored

Hmm, so I guess "teens, talking animals, monsters, mental illnesses feat. trauma" ?

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I don't know if it's similar at all, but that description reminds me strongly of Eureka 7. Wow, was that series intense,

🌈ERROR404 🌈

I really liked how the end happened - it was a nice solution to the lack of budget issue and told the story of his psyche reall well

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Though Eureka 7 was intense in a good way. I found the ending kind of unsatisfying, but admittedly I find the endings of 90% of animes unsatisfying (probably a cultural clash). But I enjoy them for the journey more than the ending.

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

I haven't watched Eureka 7, but the storyboard artist (one of the storyboard artists maybe?) for that anime is one of my favorite artists.

DanitheCarutor

Ah, a little late, but regarding the snappy promos I'm in the same boat as Cap'n with not knowing how to make one. At least one that would be ridiculous and totally not fitting the darker themes. I agree with all the people who have a generally hard time coming up with a pitch for their work, while having an easier time promoting other people's comics. Honestly my comic can be super boring to people who don't like pretentious, non-fantastical, angsty, character study types of stories. So it's really hard to think of a way to make it sound interesting without spoiling anything. Man! That thing when people come up to you, asking what your comic is about! Me: "Oh! Ah, it's uh, kinda sad and it has uh mental illness" -trails off with uncomfortable laughter- Them: Oh cool. -has a look of complete disinterest- Someone was actually extremely enthusiastic about the vague description of my comic, which somehow made me a mix of uncomfortable and excited.

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

I saw the conversation about blurbs and I just thought of one for a comic I'm working on! "An ecologist and a bird have a conversation about ethics"

I haven't started the comic yet so please send your critiques(edited)

and first impressions

(of the blurb)

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

"Angsty character study with a heavy dose of mental illness" <--- Could this descriptor work? @DanitheCarutor

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

kei said exactly what I was just typing

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Great minds

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

oh, i just realized i've read dani's comic

I think your description is fine?

The artsy, angsty comics I follow all have kind of short, tongue in cheek descriptions

it's hard to capture the tone of an emotional comic in one sentence so they either joke about it or make it intentionally misleading

for example Drop Out's description is something like "two friends go on a road trip" and Fritz Fargo's description is "a human dumpster fire in the 90s"

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

The dumpster fire one is insta-effective

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

Dani, maybe make your description shorter if anything?

Something like, "An emotionally stunted alcoholic attempts to make amends"

and then follow it up with kei's line about it being an angsty character study

RebelVampire

Im not gonna stop the convo cause it is on topic. However, i do want to remind ppl these #creator_babble chats are permanently archived. So thats something to keep in mind if youre gonna workshop.

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

I asked before in this discord about making my own blurb better. The main critique I got was that I included too many things that I thought were interesting and unique that a new reader probably wouldn't care about. Like how the mc's powers work. But though it's unique and important to the story, it's not going to be a main reason someone reads the comic. I revised the blurb to remove extraneous info and make the tone of the comic more apparent, and I think now I didn't lose anything and made it more concise.

I think maybe agtahr could also be summarized a bit more succinctly

DanitheCarutor

Yup, you did once upon a time but said you stopped reading it a while ago. (which is totally fine, the reason is understandable.) The mix of yours and Keii's descriptions do sound a lot better than mine. Lol Thank you Fish and @keii’ii (Heart of Keol)! I've noticed people really like the word 'angst' when you describe heavy stuff. At least when I was a teenager everyone found it appealing. I'll tinker with it a bit and use Drop_Out and Fritz Fargo as a reference. Anyways, I'm going to stop talking now, don't want to bog down the main topic.

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

That's a good point; 'the best things about this story' and 'things that should go in its blurb' have an overlap, but they aren't always the same.

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

Yeah, I did but I'll probably pick it up again eventually. I remember enjoying it. If you do want to keep talking, we can move to shop talk?

mirandalorian

babbling I have the first three episodes of my webtoon ready to post tomorrow and I’m really excited and feel kinda proud that I made it this far...even though it’s not very far. It’s far for me without posting immediately end babbling

Feather J. Fern

I forgot to ask, but if people are tabling at cons, do you guys have promo stuff at your con tables for your comics?

Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)

Mostly a business card, but yes

carcarchu

i never did but my table partner one year had free postcards she gave out with purchase / to passerbys with her comic info and an illustration on it

kayotics

I always keep free postcards to advertise my comic on the table right next to my business cards.

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

Yep, the free postcards did wonders for me last year. They disappeared quickly!

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

Buisness cards and postcards~

Feather J. Fern

Seems like Business and Postcards are the way to go.

Mei

business cards!!

i might be making flyers/postcards for my comic next time though! :D

sagaholmgaard

I haven't done much to promote my comic but I've gotten some good ideas reading through this, thanks! I currently plug my updates in twitter and instagram with a cool/fun panel from the new page. I do also share WIPS and try to engage through my instagram stories (Asking things like, 'what type of benders would the Reclaim squad be in an avatar au' and making doodles for the answers), but that only reaches those who follow my IG. its good fun tho. I've done memes with the characters a few times but I didn't get much attention, LOL. But it's fun so maybe worth trying again

Spring-heeled Jack

Today I went into a locally owned comic shop and went to the guy that owns it and said "I'm a local artist and I'm writing a comic. Could I give you some small flyers to let people take?" And he said yes, and then asked if I have any physical copies. I don't yet but told him I'll bring some by when I have them. He then let me know he carries other local artists! Something cool to think about if you have a local comic shop.

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

ooo that's good to know

I droped off my zines at my local comic shop but maybe I'll drop flyers of my webcomic too lmaooo

Spring-heeled Jack

I also just ordered a business card carrier so I can tote some around with ease. I carry my flyers in my sketchbook. You should totally ask, it never hurts! Carry a few extra just in case you find yourself in a new area and find another cafe or comic shop.

I ran mine off on my at home printer on some nice quality but regular weight paper. I might need to get some more professionally done.

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

I keep a handful of business cards in my wallet -- that way, any time someone says "hey, that looks cool, what are you drawing?" they get a card with the title and URL. Slowly but steadily burns through the supply.

DanitheCarutor

Seeing if my local book shops will carry copies of my comic when I print them eventually is something I'm kind of excited about! My town is hardcore into supporting local artists and writers, so that'll be something neat to try out. Although I'm a little nervous that the rating might be a little too mature for what the vendors want on their shelves.

I know of using postcards to advertise, but never heard of fliers. Maybe I'll give that a try.(edited)

Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)

I use double sided business cards, so on one side, it showcases some of my art, and the other side has contact info, a link to my comic website, and a QR code. It's been pretty helpful so far at conventions.

Nutty (Court of Roses)

You guys have all these sophisticated answers to this and my answer is just "scream on every social media platform I can reach and every person I meet about my comic."

Though I may not scream at people irl,,,

snuffysam (Super Galaxy Knights)

Let's see... I have a twitter where I repost my comic pages, and a couple mirrors that help reach different audiences. I've also carried around business cards that have my comic's URL on it. One fun strategy I've used is doing review-exchange things, in an I-critique-your-comic-if-you-critique-mine way (with the assumption that most people who read all the way through Super Galaxy Knights end up liking it). Though, that isn't really viable anymore now that the comic is 600+ pages, cuz nobody would ever agree to that trade lol. And... that's pretty much it? Though, I should note that my goal with Super Galaxy Knights isn't to make the most popular comic I can so that I can make a living off ads or patreon or print sales or whatever. If I ever do manage to make money off the comic, it'll be in "spinoff tech" (basically, video games or other media based off it). (it's the reason why a bunch of early Starstuff Stories fleshed out the abilities of the characters they focused on) I would like people to read the story because I think people would like the story, but it's not like my future depends on its popularity.

Holmeaa - working on WAYFINDERS

We (me and Q) are gonna (hopefully) tabeling at cons this year! I thought about doing free non permenant tattoos with our comic things. Also we have beautiful zines of the first chapter to sell. but a free postcard is also good

Desnik

promotional strategies...ah...the biggest thing I did for my first webcomic, RAWR! Dinosaur Friends, was simply update on a general platform (tumblr), using a consistent schedule and the same tags every time. That allowed some of the bigger biology/humor/critter blogs on tumblr to find me and I got a lot of people reading from their generous reblogs. I found some more niche crossover from sci-comm blog comments and dinosaur toy collector forums, because sometimes I'd have a comic that would coincide with paleontology news. It was mainly about finding my niche and bringing my stuff to that niche. To those struggling with finding readers, I would recommend distilling the contents of your comic and then reaching out to people who buy/read things like your comic. I've definitely made friends from general 'webcomic' forums and discords, but in terms of building a readership it's all about finding the niche and catering to it in a human way

In general I highly recommend shopping around for stuff like hobby blogs/forums/groups/discords that have some relation to the content of your webcomic. Those people DO want new content related to their hobby, but they don't really deal well with salesy pitches. Just be human and also a nerd for that hobby, too (nerdy enough to make webcomics about it)

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Yeah, it's like fan comic for an existing IP with an existing fandom, except it's a fan comic of a 'thing' rather than an IP (e.g. you make a pirate comic? Great! Nobody owns pirates, but there are lots of pirate fans out there!).

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

The very first customer I had at the first con I tabled at, came over and said "I like ghosts! I like the ocean! I'll take it!" And wrote me later saying it was exactly what they were looking for.

And honestly it's all because I make sure every cover has something spooky and something watery, and the genres are in the title I make it very easy for people to understand what it might be like.

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

omg the genres are in the title

that's genius

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

Definitely not planned But it helps so much!

I think if authors have a rule on certain symbols/motifs they MUST make sure come across on covers/posters/etc, that can be a good marketing strategy. With some wiggle room, of course.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I... I feel like I can barely even describe what my comic is, which makes it so hard to market. 'Do you like comics with cute animals and eldritch horrors and angsty teens that have superpowers and hidden religious symbolism everywhere?!? Then my comic is for you!' What even is that demographic, because I sure don't know.(edited)

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

@Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios) If you take away the cute animals part, that actually sounds like stuff a lot of teens are into/ a lot of people were into when they were teens. And most people love cute animals, so adding that to the mix, in theory, shouldn't reduce the accessibility too much. Buuuuut CoS has its unique flavor that's decidedly different from all the "angsty teens, eldritch horrors, religious symbolism" stuff I consumed when I was younger. I don't know how to describe that flavor, nor how to utilize it for marketing. But yeah, maybe some food for thought?

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

I've used short phrases that are sort of representative to describe my comic. Examples include "consensual mind control" "a guy whose ideal life is not being entirely alive" "friendship" and "anticlimactic conversations"

I have no idea how effective any of those are

someone tell me pls

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

As someone who just started reading your comic last night I think consensual mind control is a really cool descriptor. I haven't heard that too much before.

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

that makes me happy

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

@keii’ii (Heart of Keol) Heh, I'm not sure what that unique flavour is, either, but it might have something to do with me avoiding the typical 'chosen one' structure that most teen fantasy literature has. The characters are all (except Fawna) a part of the hidden world already rather than discovering it, and everyone's pretty much running around like chickens with their heads cut off rather than having any power over their situation (which is kind of a huge part of the theme of the comic). It's definitely different than the typical urban fantasy, so it's been really hard to find which audience that appeals to. From what I've gathered based on the people who comment on my website, it's mostly academics in college or beyond, for whatever reason. XD

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

Honestly I think for almost all comics their first pages were what convinced me to keep reading. Even with Phantomarine I was ambivalent about the description but then I saw the first page, and though, yeah, I'm into this.

Maybe my own comic can be the same way

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

Exactly the same with me and your comic - I was also all about that first page It's a powerful thing! I think for anyone about to delve into a comic - which is, by nature, a very visual thing - it's going to be that visual that ultimately pushes them over the edge.

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

maybe my description should just be ascii art of my main character O-O | -(edited)

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

^ It's why I tinkered with the first page of HoK soooo many times even after it went live. But it wasn't enough; it still gave off the wrong impression as to what kind of a story one should expect. Finally, more than a year after I started posting it, I redid like 1/4 to 1/3 of chapter one from scratch. Even though it will never be perfect, I can live with it now. chapter 2 on the other hand... It's an imperfect intro to the right story, rather than an intro (good or not) to the wrong story.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

To be honest, my intro probably doesn't hit the right notes to explain what my comic is about, which may be part of my problem. It starts out seeming more like an anthropomorphic fantasy than a dark urban fantasy / horror story. That's just something I think I'm going to have to live with, because I'm tired of reworking old pages (I already do it far too much). I think my best solution is drawing a new cover that showcases the tone and subject matter better than the one I'm using now.

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

oh god, you reminded me of the 3 cover pages I spent hours on only to later scrap. Then my current cover page I did in one hour after it came to me at 4am(edited)

and it was perfect

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

and my page redoings were after the reboot.

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

Cap, I don't know how representative it is of the story but I looked up the Ashes cover page and it's very impressive

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Yeah, I already redrew my intro once.... and this is the third iteration of this comic. And I'm currently redrawing the first two chapters of my other comic. I'm so sick to death of starting over. -_-

@Eightfish (Puppeteer) Oh, thank you!! I like to go all-out on covers, heh.

Kabocha

Promotion... ... is that a thing you can eat? ... A few things I've tried is business cards -- tweeting about it -- posting about it on dA... I try to stay away from services like Tapas and Webtoon because I'm not formatted for those sorts of things, and I fear I'll probably just frustrate myself. It's a delicate balance right now between remaining happy with my work and getting it seen, but overall, I guess I'm not too stressed about it since it's not a source of income for me... I just... like making comics. I've also done conventions -- Conventions are fun, don't get me wrong, but nowadays they're a really low return on interest for many shows for original stuff (except slice of life and "oh no I did a bad" types of zines -- people seem to really enjoy things like that since it's often pretty easy to relate to). They feel like they used to be easier for selling original work, but the market's gotten rougher because there's so much competition and only so many dollars. if I ever print, I'm probably going to have to lean on some marketing-savvy friends for help... Hopefully things haven't changed too much by then. I think the tool that's worked best for me in the past few years has been doing guest comics here and there, as well as using topwebcomics, oddly enough. TWC was pretty good for referrals when I started doing comics way back in 2006~2007...

sagaholmgaard

Since the topic is about promotion... Do yall know if there are any twitter hashtag events for webcomic creators? My friends in the indie game industry have certain hashtags that people can post in during specific times every week - do we have anything similar?

Kabocha

#Webcomicchat!

https://webcomicchat.com/for-creators You may also find this page helpful

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

#webcomicchat is great because you get to talk shop while talking about your own work! It's not just "look at my comic"

sagaholmgaard

Ahh!! Thank you!

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

I know some people do #WebcomicWednesday - not sure how official it is, but it gets some attention!

sagaholmgaard

I'll check that one out as well!

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

There's also #comicartistsunite too

chalcara [Nyx+Nyssa]

webcomicchat always looked like fun, but I definitively am on the wrong side of the globe for the times it's going on

mirandalorian

Promotion is difficult. I always feel like I'm being too pushy, even for something that's free. I also feel like I built up a following that had nothing to do with comics or art and so when I switched directions to head that way, i don't get the response I would like. Reading all the thoughts here has been really helpful tho. Just got to put them into practice

Feather J. Fern

I think my current attempt for promotion is at least being more willing to promote. I have to force my fear of "I shouldn't tell people because it's not as good as (blank)" and just shove my comic into a spotlight

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

If anyone is worried about bothering people, putting variety into your promotions will make things more palatable for people for sure. I have one person on my timeline spamming the same exact post over and over again, almost daily, and it doesn't seem to be doing them any favors There's no need for a promotion every day. The people I see that do a more-obvious promotion tweet, like, weekly, or every two weeks, seem to get good results from that Sometimes less is more

mirandalorian

I need to get to that point Feathery. And ya, daily is a bit extreme imo. But I have to figure out the good balance

Feather J. Fern

Even weekly I don't do it because I feel like I am spamming and I feel awkward

Oh! Speaking of promotions, one way I found I got my comic promoted was by doing guest comics for other people! I got lots of viewers after each guest comic I did

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Yeah, for social media promo, e.g. on Twitter, you want to make your actual tweets have value -- not just things being linked off the tweets. (This is where gag-a-day kinda comics have an advantage, because each strip has entertainment value and you can just post the whole strip in a tweet.) Obviously this doesn't apply to every promo tweet; so like, weekly promo tweet that's solely about the links, as mentioned by others, is fine. But yeah, aside from those, you wanna make your promo tweets fun to read.

Feather J. Fern

Also cameos! Cameos are a great promo

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Not gonna lie, I am lowkey paranoid about doing cameos. Someone I know had to remove their cameo of someone else's character, because that other person objected to their character being in the print version of the comic.

chalcara [Nyx+Nyssa]

Uff

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

oh rip

Feather J. Fern

Oh man, that's rough.

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

I'll never even print HoK but I can still imagine someone being all "NOPE, I CHANGED MY MIND" at a later time

Feather J. Fern

I am planning to do some cameos for other people, not that Go Figure will ever be in print but I can see that problem. I think what I would say is that if you want a cameo you have to be 100% certain

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Might be a good idea to have a very simple agreement thing you can have them sign

Feather J. Fern

Yeah I was going to have a written consent form

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

"I agree to let you do a cameo of my character, and to not be a jerk about it at a later time. Signed"

Feather J. Fern

Signed and dated by both parties XD

Tantz Aerine (Without Moonlight)

There's also the broad hashtags like #webcomics and even things more geared to genres like #drama and #fantasy and so on. Doing art memes helps sometimes, too.

mirandalorian

What do you think the best hashtags to use are? Is webcomics too saturdated?

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

I'm not sure about the best hashtags, but my biggest thing about hashtags on Twitter : don't use a bunch of hashtags in a single tweet!

For broad hashtags like #webcomics or #fantasy, I gotta wonder if anyone's actually checking those out...

mariah (rainy day dreams)

Yeah, I usually tag my update posts with #webcomic and my comic's name, but honestly I have no idea if #webcomic has ever helped out my post ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

mirandalorian

Ya, I typically keep it to two or less, but i always wonder if webcomic is actually useful lol

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

takes note to use something more specific than #webcomic in my next update tweet

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

I think it may potentially be useful as a label for someone who's just found you on that platform, and is not sure what you're promoting. But beyond that...

Tantz Aerine (Without Moonlight)

I usually use #historicalfiction and #webcomic. Not sure which one helps more, but well, there it is.

mirandalorian

Ya, I should use the genre tag too.

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Do people even search genre tags for that matter lol (a bit pessimistic, but still a genuine question)

like, I'll be the first to admit, I don't hashtag search to look for new comics to read. I don't think I ever hashtag search ANYTHING, unless it's like..... a very active trend that I am interested in (e.g. an upcoming video game that I'm looking forward to)

Tantz Aerine (Without Moonlight)

Well, the tags are popular enough to be suggested by twitter so I'd think some use them, probably likeminded folk.

mariah (rainy day dreams)

Same keii. I mostly use hashtags to look for fan art, exclusively on Instagram.

Tantz Aerine (Without Moonlight)

There's also a trend of "art sharing" tweets. I have found a couple of artists and webcomics through that kind of event, but again, the turnover isn't anything to write home about.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I wonder if readers make use of the search more than us creators do?

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

I doubt it, Lee

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

I never use it as a reader, at any rate, though I don't know if others are like that.

mariah (rainy day dreams)

Though, actually that's not true, I have used hashtags to look at more things being posted within art events. So inktober, mermay, hourly comic day, etc.

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

But art event hashtags are useful, because -- like I mentioned before -- those tweets provide entertainment value without anyone having to click on offsite links. e.g. the #StartToFinish tag that's hot right now.

mariah (rainy day dreams)

I have followed new artists from those tags though and then checked out their off-site stuff. It's definitely a more round about way than someone specifically looking for comics to read via hashtag

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

From my limited observation, when people are looking for comics to read, they tend to ask for recs rather than do hashtag search?

"Anyone know of some good magical girl webcomics?" etc

which is a bit of a bummer for us creators, because that is completely outside of our control. Nothing we can do about it.

Tantz Aerine (Without Moonlight)

here's the popularity for the #webcomics tag

So SOME people use it.

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

@Tantz Aerine (Without Moonlight) I'm gonna guess it's mostly creators using them to promote, rather than readers using them to search.

Tantz Aerine (Without Moonlight)

Also it seems to be peak in popularity in the USA

@keii’ii (Heart of Keol) the graph implies interaction, really.

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

What counts as interaction?

Tantz Aerine (Without Moonlight)

tweeting it and searching it

what I'm saying is we can't know.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I don’t so much in Twitter, but I personally DO search hashtags on Insta to find new art.

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

It's true, we can't know. I just personally can't imagine anyone searching for #webcomics to find stuff to read

mariah (rainy day dreams)

Insta is definitely hashtag game city.

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Yeah, IG is a different beast

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Comics don’t generally gel so well with Insta’s format, though, so I’m usually seeking art and not comics.

Tantz Aerine (Without Moonlight)

just to be safe, occasionally use it

To be honest, I'm probably more likely to find and become a fan of webcomics here on this server than any social media

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Yeah, I wouldn't say "don't use #webcomics" -- use it if you have no other, more specific tags to put. But on Twitter, you don't want too many hashtags, so if you got more specific ones... use those instead!

Tantz Aerine (Without Moonlight)

I feel somewhat self conscious in getting an instagram. But I'll get one most likely.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

It might be a good idea to switch up your tags regularly? Choose two or three from a relevant list each update and see if any of those tweets get a noticeable boost in engagement.

Tantz Aerine (Without Moonlight)

Yeah that sounds a good strategy

speaking of, any other creators into historical webcomics?

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

I don't seek them out, but there's some that I read.

Tantz Aerine (Without Moonlight)

yours is touching upon the historical keii with the joseon-style elements.

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

It's definitely not historical but yeah, got the aesthetics going for it!

Tantz Aerine (Without Moonlight)

Yeah!

I must admit, I'm a bit starved for like-minded creators. I mean people that create historical webcomics. I know and follow a few but that's not nearly enough.

(if I'm babbling too much for creator babble please tell me!)

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Babbling is fine! But this might be better for #general or possibly shop talk as it's not related to this week's topic?

Tantz Aerine (Without Moonlight)

oh sorry, there's a specific topic here too?

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Yeah, all the channels under CTP Activities have a... topic thingie that changes weekly

Tantz Aerine (Without Moonlight)

okay got it. I'll take it there. Sorry :/

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Don't be sorry, be glad to chat about this stuff in another channel

chalcara [Nyx+Nyssa]

With insta please be mindful that if you‘ll always post with the same hashtags, their algorythmn likely will assume you‘re a bot.

mirandalorian

Oh really?

I definitely did not know that.

chalcara [Nyx+Nyssa]

Yup, it‘s a big annoyance. At least it was that way half a year ago, how is the algorythm now? Nobody knows.

I kinda hate insta, but it‘s the platform with the most interactions for me, although I don‘t know if it goes beyound liking my panel cutout.

chalcara [Nyx+Nyssa]

Instagram does it‘s darnest to lock the user into theor own ecosystem.

mariah (rainy day dreams)

Yeah, hard same. I definitely get the most likes there, but I get very few referrals from insta.

chalcara [Nyx+Nyssa]

Funnily, the only social media where I KNOW I got at least one reader from is pillowfort and their teeny-tiny webcomic comunity!

mariah (rainy day dreams)

I keep wanting to hop over there, but also starting a new social media sounds exhausting TuT one day.

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

I need to start using PF

chalcara [Nyx+Nyssa]

It‘s pretty chill, reminds me of the hey-day of livejournal, with great filtering - more intended to create many small communities than one giant pot like twitter.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I don’t think any platform’s algorithms like me. I get very low engagement no matter where I post. I’m just not good at figuring out what these platforms pick up.(edited)

chalcara [Nyx+Nyssa]

I still have three invites left for this week.

Tantz Aerine (Without Moonlight)

Does cross promotion work for you guys at all?

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

A little bit? But I think my comics are a hard sell, so I generally don’t get a lot of referrals when I cross-promote with other creators.

chalcara [Nyx+Nyssa]

It‘s how I found this community; but otherwise, nope.

Tantz Aerine (Without Moonlight)

Now I need to check out your comics Lee. I'm intrigued!

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Haha, if you want to! If they’re not your cup of tea that’s a-okay.

mariah (rainy day dreams)

I still have three invites left for this week.

@chalcara [Nyx+Nyssa] if you don't have plans for those invites, I would definitely take one and follow you first

Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)

About the hashtag thing on Twitter..... I have found the hashtags #webtoon #webtooncanvas and #celebrateCANVASday to be particularly useful for those of us publishing on Webtoon Canvas. I have gained a few new readers from this, and the official Webtoon Canvas page often retweets when these hashtags are used.

mariah (rainy day dreams)

That's good to know. I'm planning to start mirroring on Webtoon so I'll have to be sure to remember to use those tags.

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

I need to fix my series on WT first. But I'll give those hashtags a try once that's been done

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I tried using webtoon hashtags a few times, but their page never retweeted me. It seems either random, or there’s some hidden requirement for getting a rt.

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

i use the tag sometimes but I found it more responsive if you have a vertical scrolling format comic

then they're more likely to respond to you

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Oh, yeah.... I use a traditional page format.

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

same rip

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I do combine all my pages into long episodes at the ends of chapters, so it’s kinda scrolling, but they’re just traditional pages stacked on top of each other, lol. WT definitely doesn’t like that, but I don’t have the time to reformat hundreds of pages.

Feather J. Fern

Also promo thought, I randomly joined people's streams before and then got hooked on their comics after seeing them draw on twitch or something like that

Pistashi

I struggle a bit with promo stuff, because I get too self-conscious about self-promoting and I'm the type of person that ends up doing too much of it or none of it

at the moment I'm working on making a press kit and sharing it with some blogs and networks about comics

but still, what I usually do is join groups and try to talk with people that works with art and comics

this is kind of more inclined to networking and meeting new people to talk about what we like than promoting my work to potential readers

nothing wrong with that, but looking with a more critical eye I still have a lot to learn about building an audience and reaching people who could become future readers

chalcara [Nyx+Nyssa]

I wonder HOW much a large social media following is worth. Insta‘s shown me that it isn‘t necessarily translating into readers.

carcarchu

in my experience followings on different platforms are non-transferable. same goes with having a large following on your comic itself, doesn't necessarily mean having a lot of followers on your art accounts. that's why they say "don't build your sandcastle in someone else's sandbox"

Pistashi

that makes a lot of sense

kayotics

If you’re building your following around your own content (original art, comic updates, etc) then the likelihood that the following is transferable is higher, but it’s still not 100%. You’re competing with everything else on their timeline too.

RebelVampire

i think a thing to consider with webcomics especially when it comes to social media is that a good portion of people who follow comic creators on social media are other comic creators, not people who are just readers. and the good majority of comic creators do not have a lot of time to read other webcomics. While there are certainly exceptions, I see those very few and far in between. So the conversion rates for social media right now are super low until the dynamic of the communities on the platforms changes.

kayotics

I’d agree with that, but also having a social media presence has definitely opened up some doors to being seen by other creators, many of whom are professionals. It’s good for networking, might not be the best for gaining and retaining readers.

RebelVampire

Oh yeah for sure. My point was about conversion factor

its factor in networking is a whole other matter entirely

and is indespensible

kayotics

One thing that I didn’t mention for myself is that networking has helped a LOT with getting new readers. Word of mouth, is always the best way to advertise, and other webcomic people giving you a plug can see some really strong results

#ctparchive #comics #webcomics #indie comics #comic chat #comic discussion #comic tea party #ctp #creator interview #comic creator interview #creator babble

1 note · View note

douchebagbrainwaves · 4 years ago

Text

EVERY FOUNDER SHOULD KNOW ABOUT WAY

When you're an outsider, don't be deterred from doing it. I'm optimistic.1 You don't release code late at night.2 But there is no apparent cost of increasing it.3 The CRM114 Discriminator. No one after reading Aristotle's Metaphysics does anything differently as a result of this practice was that we feared a brand-name VC firm would stick us with a county-by-word to save it from being mangled by some twenty five year old woman who wants to have lots of worries, but you feel like a second class citizen. The real danger is that you should study whatever you were most interested in. Half the time I'm sitting drinking a cup of tea. Chair designers have to spend on bullshit varies between employers. Well, most adults labor under restrictions just as cumbersome, and they also have more brand to preserve.4 Html#f8n 19.

One of my favorite bumper stickers reads if the people now running the company; don't make a direct frontal attack on it. And it can last for months. Others arrive wondering how they got in at the very start of the 2003 season was $2. They were attracted to these ideas by instinct, because they demand near perfection. No one seems to have voted for intelligence.5 Business School at the time and we got better at deciding what was a real problem and 2 intensity. Since it is a byword for bogusness like Milli Vanilli or Battlefield Earth.

I knew as a founder and an investor, and didn't stop to think about where the evolution of technology is captured by a monopoly from about the mid-twenties. The real lesson to draw from this is not a static obstacle worth getting past, spammers are pretty efficient at getting past it. I know of zero. But don't give them much money either. Work in small groups. Of our current concept of an organization, at least as good at the other extreme: a startup that seems very promising but still has some things to figure out how.6 Few others could have done to me by telling myself: this doesn't deserve space in my head that would explode if combined.7 We're up against a blank wall. If startups become a cheap commodity, more people would do. When you raise a lot of people.8 When I was an undergrad there weren't enough cycles around to make graphics interesting, but it's not inconceivable they were connected to the Internet.

Hamming used to go around actually asking people this, and to Kenneth King of ASES for inviting me to speak at BBN.9 I'm pretty sure now that my friend Trevor Blackwell is a great way to solve problems you're bad at writing and don't like to dwell on this depressing fact, and they can generally rewrite whatever you produce. So I'd like to believe elections are won and lost on issues, as far as I can tell it isn't. People in America. Should you add x feature? So which ones?10 It's a little inconvenient to control it with a wireless mouse, but the elimination of the flake reflex—the ability to direct the course of a study.11

Because I thought about the topic.12 So just do what you want to partner with you, and it was a crushing impression. It's what a startup buys you is time.13 In either case the implications are similar. Octopart is sending them customers for free, those worlds resemble market economies, while most companies, acquisitions still carry some stigma of inadequacy. Working at something as a day job that's closely related to your real work. Here are some of your claims and granting others.14 Knowledge is power. A few years before by a big company. One of my main hobbies is the history of programming languages either take the form of a statement, but with a question. Though in a sense attacking you. For founders that's more than a couple weeks.

Maybe if you can afford to be rational and prefer the latter.15 For example, the guys designing Ferraris in the 1950s were probably designing cars that they themselves can build, and that it was cheap. Yet the cause is human nature. Particularly in technology, at least, nothing good. But when you choose a language, you're also choosing a community. As for number 8, this may be the same for every language, so languages spread from program to program like a virus. It's like calling a car a horseless carriage.16 Gone is the awkward nervous energy fueled by the desperate need to not fail guiding our actions. 9889 and. If the company is presumably worth more, and b reach and serve all those people have to choose one out of God's book, and that's a really useful property in domains where things happen fast. Either the company is already a write-off.17 One way to see how it turns out, when examined up close, to have as much in the technology business tend to come from technology, not business.18

And for a significant number. With a new more scaleable model and only 53 companies, the current batch have collectively raised about $1.19 Rise up, cows! The results so far bear this out.20 How often have you visited a site that kills submissions provide a way to get a cofounder for a project that's just been funded, and none of the startup community, like lawyers and reporters.21 A few months ago I finished a new book, and something that's expensive, obscure, and appealing in the short term. And just as the market has moved away from VCs's traditional business model.

Notes

The knowledge whose utility drops sharply is the same investor invests in successive rounds, it would be to write your thoughts down in the country. I suspect the recent resurgence of evangelical Christians.

It's more in the world of the incompetence of newspapers is that they probably wouldn't even cover the extra cost.

If you're good you'll have to mean the company.

Eighteen months later Google paid 1. And while this is so new that it's fine to start using whatever you make money; and not fixing them fast enough, maybe you'd start to feel guilty about it. It requires the kind of method acting. It doesn't take a small seed investment in you, they sometimes say.

Yahoo. They therefore think what drives users to switch to OSX. 05 15, the group of picky friends who proofread almost everything I say the rate of change in the definition of property. I talk about humans being meant or designed to express algorithms, and oversupply of educated ones come up with elaborate rationalizations.

It's one of the founders of failing startups would even be symbiotic, because sometimes artists unconsciously use tricks by imitating art that is a matter of outliers, are better college candidates. If the rich paid high taxes?

But Goldin and Margo think market forces in the long tail for other reasons, including both you and the ordering system and image generator were written in 6502 machine language.

We did not become romantically involved till afterward.

They'll have a better education. Norton, 2012.

If Paris is where people care most about art. Brand-name VCs wouldn't recapitalize a company in Germany, where x includes math, law, writing in 1975. Com/spam. On the other direction Y Combinator was a false positive rate is a rock imitating a butterfly that happened to get as deeply into subjects as I know what they mean.

Big technology companies. I'm not making any predictions about the difference. These range from make-believe, is he going to be an open booth.

There should probably be the more corrupt the rulers.

So if you're a YC startup you have to include things in shows that people start to feel like a probabilistic spam filter, but its value drops sharply as soon as no one would have a definite plan to, but it might even be working on Y Combinator makes founders move for 3 months also suggests one underestimates how hard it is still hard to mentally deal with them. And that is worth doing something, but it might make them want you. Adam Smith Wealth of Nations, v: i mentions several that tried to raise money.

So if you're college students. Some introductions to other knowledge. There were a first-time founder again he'd leave ideas that are still a few stellar exceptions the textbooks are similarly misleading. You can get for free.

94 says a 1952 study of rhetoric was inherited directly from Rome. Sites that habitually linkjack get banned. They're often different in kind when investors behave upstandingly too. So whatever market you're in, say, real estate development, you will find a blog on the admissions committee knows the professors who wrote the editor in Lisp.

In fact the decade preceding the war on. I mean efforts to manipulate them. Though they were forced to stop raising money from mediocre investors. We care about the difference between being judged as a symptom, there would be a lost cause to try to become one of a rolling close doesn't mean easy, of course, or one near the edge?

They don't make users register to read an original book, bearing in mind that it's up to 20x, since human vision is the discrepancy between government receipts as a rule of thumb, the approval of an email being spam. Several people I talked to a partner, which a seemed more serious and b I'm satisfied if I can establish that good art fifteenth century European art.

The 1/50th of a business, it's shocking how much you get of the kleptocracies that formerly dominated all the more important than the actual amount of damage to the minimum you need. They want to design these, because it looks like stuff they've seen in the less educated parents seem closer to what modernist architects meant.

I don't think it's roughly correct to say that IBM makes decent hardware. Copyright owners tend to be actively curious.

So if you're a loser they usually decide in way less than the others. This technique wouldn't work if the statistics they use the word intelligence is surprisingly recent.

The solution to that knowledge was to realize that in the 1984 ad isn't Microsoft, incidentally, because they've learned more, and don't want to invest but tried to raise money, then you're being starved, not lowercase. The air traffic control system works because planes would crash otherwise.

0 notes

mbaljeetsingh · 5 years ago

Text

Layoutit Grid: Learning CSS Grid Visually With a Generator

Layoutit Grid is an interactive open source CSS Grid generator. It lets you draw your designs and see the code as you go. You can interact with the code, add or remove track lines and drag them around to change the sizing — and you get to see the CSS and HTML change in real time!

Add some tracks and see how they’re made in CSS

When you are done with a layout, you can create a CodePen or grab the code to jumpstart your next project. The tool brings the code to the forefront, helping you learn CSS grid as you work directly with it.

CSS Grid is a whole new way of thinking about layouts

We can now create robust responsive layouts for our web experiences. We can finally learn to design with a coherent set of layout tools instead of memorizing piles of hacks to force elements into position.

Now, I’m not saying a generator like this excuses us from knowing the code we write. We should all learn how CSS Grid and Flexbox work. Even if your stronghold is JavaScript, having a solid foundation in CSS knowledge is a powerful ally when communicating your ideas. When sharing a prototype for a component, a UX interaction, or even an algorithm in an online sandbox, the way in which your work is presented can make a big difference. The ability to develop proper layouts — and define the styles that create them — is fundamental.

Crafting layouts in CSS should not be a daunting task. CSS Grid is actually quite fun to use! For example, using named grid areas feels like an ASCII art version of drawing a design on a piece of paper. Lets create the layout of a photos app, a feed of pics and the people in them side by side for its main content and the typical header, footer and a config sidebar.

.photos-app { /* For our app layout, lets place things in a grid */ display: grid; /* We want 3 columns and 3 rows, and these are the responsive track sizes using `fr` (fraction of the remaining space) */ grid-template-columns: 20% 1fr 1fr; grid-template-rows: 0.5fr 1.7fr 0.3fr; /* Let's separate our tracks a bit */ gap: 1em; /* We now have 3x3 cells, here is where each section is placed */ grid-template-areas: "header header header" /* a header stretching in the top row */ "config photos people" /* a left sidebar, and our app content */ "footer footer footer"; /* and a footer along the bottom row */ } .the-header { /* In each section, let's define the name we use to refence the area */ grid-area: "header"; }

This is just a small subset of what you can build with CSS Grid. The spec is quite flexible. Areas can also be placed directly using line numbers or names, or they can be placed implicitly by the browser, with the content distributed inside the grid automatically. And the spec continues to grow with additions, like subgrid.

At the same time, working with grids can be difficult, just like anything that requires a new way of thinking. It takes a lot of time to wrap our heads around this sort of thing. And one way to help do that is to…

Learn while playing

When you are learning CSS Grid, it is easy to feel intimidated by its notation and semantics. Until you develop some muscle memory for it, kickstarting the learning process with visual and interactive tools can be an excellent way to overcome that early trepidation. A lot of us have used generators while learning how to create shadows, gradients, Markdown tables, and so on. Generators, if built with care, are great learning aids.

Let’s use Layoutit Grid to recreate the same design in our example.

Open Layoutit Grid

Generators like this aren’t meant to be leaned on forever; they’re a stepping stone. This particular one helps you experience the power of CSS Grid by materializing your designs in a few clicks along with the code to make it happen. This gives you the early wins that you need to push forward with the learning process. For some of us, generators permanently remain in our toolboxes. Not because we do not know how to craft the layouts by hand, but because having the visual feedback loop help us to quickly convert our ideas into code. So we keep playing with them.

Sarah Drasner has also created a CSS Grid generator that’s worth checking out as well.

Learn by building

Leniolabs recently open-sourced Layoutit Grid and added new features, like interactive code views, area edition, history and offline support. And there are several more in the making.

View on GitHub

If you have ideas to improve the tool, get in touch! Open an issue and let’s discuss it on GitHub. Going into meta territory, you can also learn about the CSS Grid spec by helping us build the tool.

We use the app to keep track of best practices in creating performant interactive web experiences. It is now powered by the newly released Vue 3 using <script setup> components and built with Vite, a new dev tool that doesn’t bundle the app while developing, which gives us instant feedback during development. If you are curious and want to build with us, fork the repo and let’s learn together!

The post Layoutit Grid: Learning CSS Grid Visually With a Generator appeared first on CSS-Tricks.

You can support CSS-Tricks by being an MVP Supporter.

via CSS-Tricks https://ift.tt/2H4YMD7

#IFTTT #Feedly

0 notes

suzanneshannon · 5 years ago

Text

Layoutit Grid: Learning CSS Grid Visually With a Generator

Add some tracks and see how they’re made in CSS

CSS Grid is a whole new way of thinking about layouts

Learn while playing

Let’s use Layoutit Grid to recreate the same design in our example.

Open Layoutit Grid

Sarah Drasner has also created a CSS Grid generator that’s worth checking out as well.

Learn by building

Leniolabs recently open-sourced Layoutit Grid and added new features, like interactive code views, area edition, history and offline support. And there are several more in the making.

View on GitHub

The post Layoutit Grid: Learning CSS Grid Visually With a Generator appeared first on CSS-Tricks.

You can support CSS-Tricks by being an MVP Supporter.

Layoutit Grid: Learning CSS Grid Visually With a Generator published first on https://deskbysnafu.tumblr.com/

0 notes

webillapage · 5 years ago

Text

Layoutit Grid: Learning CSS Grid Visually With a Generator

Add some tracks and see how they’re made in CSS

CSS Grid is a whole new way of thinking about layouts

Now, I’m not saying a generator like this excuses us from knowing the code we write. We should all learn how CSS Grid and Flexbox work. Even if your stronghold is JavaScript, having a solid foundation in CSS knowledge is a powerful ally when communicating your ideas. When sharing a prototype for a component, a UX interaction, or even an algorithm in an online sandbox, the way in which your work is presented can make a big the difference. The ability to develop proper layouts — and define the styles that create them — is fundamental.

.photos-app { /* For our app layout, lets place things in a grid */ display: grid; /* We want 3 columns and 3 rows, and these are the responsive track sizes using `fr` (fraction of the remaining space) */ grid-template-columns: 20% 1fr 1fr; grid-template-rows: 0.5fr 1.7fr 0.3fr; /* Let's separate our tracks a bit */ gap: 1em; /* We now have 3x3 cells, here is where each section is placed */ grid-template-areas: "header header header" /* a header stretching in the top row */ "config photos people" /* a left sidebar, and our app content */ "footer footer footer"; /* and a footer along the bottom row */ }   .the-header { /* In each section, let's define the name we use to refence the area */ grid-area: "header"; }

Learn while playing

Let’s use Layoutit Grid to recreate the same design in our example.

Open Layoutit Grid

Sarah Drasner has also created a CSS Grid generator that’s worth checking out as well.

Learn by building

Leniolabs recently open-sourced Layoutit Grid and added new features, like interactive code views, area edition, history and offline support. And there are several more in the making.

View on GitHub

The post Layoutit Grid: Learning CSS Grid Visually With a Generator appeared first on CSS-Tricks.

You can support CSS-Tricks by being an MVP Supporter.

Layoutit Grid: Learning CSS Grid Visually With a Generator published first on https://brightcirclepage.tumblr.com/

0 notes

dalanmendonca · 6 years ago

Text

Lull

After struggling for survival in Term 6; Term 7 was the exact opposite. A complete sleepy lull. Winter was expected to leave us and bring on some sunshine, but that didn’t happen. Far from it. Mohali remained cold, rainy and sleepy. I started understanding why people in cold countries celebrate when they see the sun; humans (generalising from me) have a thing for sunlight and warmth, it brings optimism and energy.

But here we were. It remained cold AF which was very demotivating if you wanted to run around and play stuff or generally be more physically/socially active. Despite people on campus having more time, parties actually slowed down; people slept a lot and watched unwholesome amounts TV. Some pursued trips to nearby places and enjoyed the snowy landscapes in the north of India.

Personally I read a lot, wrote a little and got earnest about planning my wedding. I tried to bring in a morning schedule of waking up early, meditating and writing; finding only partial success in that endeavour. Oodles of time meant I did long overdue personal chores like fixing my broken backpack which had been pending since 3 terms. I also watched quite a few seasons of the “Peep Show” a british cringe comedy show about two struggling dudes.

Despite having more time and a (likely) desire to know more of their batch-mates; socialising actually goes down during the last few terms. Apart from the comfort of your already-established group, there are also some logistical reasons; you have different electives, people majoring in the same areas take the same courses, different courses have different timings so you end up seeing the same people everywhere.

BUT people are more vella, so you can have nice extended conversations whenever you bump into someone. I made a list of people to network with and was able to cover some part of it just because of overlapping breakfast timings! Unexpectedly nice. I continued to use lunch/dinner to sit with different/less frequently met folks and chat them up; totally enjoying the same.

On the academic front from I had four courses: Public Finance, Brand Management, Rural marketing and Data Analytics in Finance. This choice stems from me majoring in Marketing and Finance. Always wanted to learn the ins and outs of marketing/consumer behaviour. I was weary of doing dry finance courses but the subject caught my eye after I studied Portfolio management.

Public Finance was all about how you would think about things if you were the finance minister of the country. Through the lens of economics, it introduced us to the concepts of market failures, public goods,social welfare, public health systems and public insurance schemes. We learnt the pros and cons of each using primarily economics or mathematical arguments. Our Professor was Shiv Dixit, a fresh new faculty who was teaching for the first time in his life; but nonetheless brought interesting perspectives to the table. One of the fun components of the course was a class debate on public policy issues; something similar to what might be happening in government meetings. I enjoyed this course doubly because my knowledge of government systems and public policy is very minimal. It was fun to add a new branch to my tree of knowledge.

Brand Management was all about the science and art of creating brands. The key takeaway was that brand is like a heuristic to a consumer, you don’t have time to research the best toothpastes and compare their ingredients, so instead you use a cognitive shortcut and just buy Colgate. Why did you buy Colgate? Because through Colgate’s ads, packaging, observances of your friends using Colgate and more; you associate good things with Colgate. An interesting exercise was surveying people who knew me to discover my own brand and create my own brand road-map. It’s an exercise I’ll try to revisit every year or so.

Rural Marketing was about … take a guess. But beyond trying to sell stuff to those who may have not have heavy economic might, the course brought some interesting perspectives. Firstly, who/what do we call rural? And what is the definition of modernity? Is being modern the same as being industrialised? Then the USA is a lot less modern today than it was in the 50s. Can we call Japan, a country with high economic progress but equally grotesque patriarchy, modern? Tough questions without a good answer. What exactly is the goal we’re striving towards when we want to bridge the urban/rural divide. Second realisation, urban consumers are idiots. The data shows that urban consumers pay a huge brand premium; we aren’t nearly as sensitive to price as the rural folks and enable much higher profits for businesses. My resolution of this was that urban folks (time-poor, money-rich) prefer velocity in transactions, while rural folks (money-poor, time-rich) prefer value in transactions. Economically, rural folks get a better deal but that doesn’t factor in the opportunity cost of time which is higher for urban folks. We also had a rural market visit as part of the course. Punjab is amongst the most prosperous states in India, there are almost no poor/rural places left. Instead you have problems of excess, with the pampered kids getting high which lead to the drug epidemic here.

Data Analytics in Finance was a mixed bag of a course. While I enjoyed getting my hands dirty on the R-terminal again, between learning finance theory, understanding statistics and learning R itself, the course got overwhelming. I was left confused. A tangential takeaway was that the world of finance embraced computers early and it has turned their shit upside down, eliminating some sorts of jobs (equities trader) and creating new ones (trading algorithm designer). The embrace of computers is spreading to areas like marketing now. Hopefully, it’ll get to public policy and organisational behaviour soon too.

While I was chilling, some of my batchmates were sweating it out profusely in the ISB Super League (ISL).

ISL is a full on sports extravaganza, encompassing every sport playable on campus with added fanfare of actual money at stake and player bidding. Students pool up to bid for teams, becoming team owners. This gives them points to bid for players. Players are both students and alumni, who graciously offer to come play at ISB’s cost! The events are accompanied with usual sporting fanfare of cheering, close-calls, rivalry, injuries, food stalls (yeah!), etc. I wasn’t too involved in the ISL, my team was the Punjab Hukums and I played my part as the backup runner during the on campus relay. Thankfully, my services weren’t needed.

While some were sweating it out, others were taking chilling to the next level. The pretence was over; “I got placed, I’m done” went from being under the surface to being a visible acknowledged truth. Now I understood why ISB wants to keep all its major events before placements. This was the term when anyone and everyone studied as little as they can. Except for a few folks chasing academic honours like the Dean’s list and the merit list, academics was not a priority,

The cohort started putting together it’s yearbook. This meant the pain of getting your yearbook photo clicked, of getting your testimonial written, of writing a testimonial for others. Some folks used elaborate props like guitars, footballs, books, etc. to create yearbook pictures that represented them/their time at ISB. Such care was not taken by me. I stood in front of the one my favourite spots on campus – the ISB Mural, a giant colourful work of art representing learning, struggles and growth – and pretended to be a modern enlightened saint.

Other things that happened:

The Business Technology Club (my club) got rated by students as the best club on campus. Thus becoming the highest rated professional club. Sweet.

Net Impact Forum and Policy Conclave happened.

ISB got declared the 24th best B-school globally (the only Indian B-school in the top 25 and and the programme with the highest percentage of women). Super darn cool.

#lifeatisb #journal

0 notes

topicprinter · 6 years ago

Link

Last year I started working on an AI Art Generator app. This is the story of how I came up with the idea, decided it was worth working on, and validated the concept. All without building an actual app.Note: the original article is on Medium. I've stripped all the self-promotional links and references to comply with this subreddit's rules.Mid last year, my girlfriend and I had a house guest who commented that our walls looked a bit bare. It’s not something we’d really noticed before, but once it was mentioned, we realised they were right — we needed some art. I thought finding some interesting art online would be a pretty quick, easy process, but I soon found that the sheer volume of available art turned me into a critic and I couldn’t find a piece that had meaning to me.I wanted art that reflected something about me — even if that just meant a landmark from my city, or a subject based on one of my hobbies or interests. After scrolling through hundreds of pages of artworks on every wall-art store I could find, I was still left unsatisfied.Then I had an idea — one of my interests is technology, and in particular AI. What if I could buy some AI-generated art? Wouldn’t that be a conversation starter! Even better, what if I could create some AI generated art myself? It could be ultra personalised — based on a photo from one of my holidays, or a picture of my dog, or a landmark from my city. Why didn’t I think of this sooner!? AI generated art has been around for years now, there must be plenty of places I can generate and buy AI art.So I Google “Buy AI Generated Art”. Hmm, I get one shop with a handful of pre-generated pieces, a heap of articles about AI and art in general, the guys who sold that AI generated portrait for $432k (a bit out of my price range), and Deepart.io — which is the closest thing to what I was imagining, but buying prints seems like an afterthought. Further searches didn’t reveal any better options (although there are other art generators out there, none offer much in the way of buying your artwork as a poster or canvas print).To this point I hadn’t been considering building my own AI Art app. I thought for sure it must already exist. But when my continued Googling didn’t yield what I was looking for, the wheels started turning. I jumped on Slack and messaged some friends who are also into startups and side projects. The idea started to excite me.I’ve been working on side projects and startups my entire career, so I knew the first step wasn’t to build the app (a mistake I’ve made before — more than once), I first had to validate the concept. Would other people want to decorate their walls with AI-generated art, or was it just me? Would they pay? How much? These questions all needed answers, ideally before writing a single line of code. So I started thinking about how I could answer these questions as quickly and confidently as possible.What I came up with was simple! All I had to do was find an open-source Neural Style Transfer algorithm on Github, generate some interesting art with it, throw it up on a Shopify store and point some Facebook ads at it. If people buy AI art that they didn’t even create themselves, surely they’d buy their own personalised creations.I was too busy to do it right then, so I decided to sit on it for a while. I had to finish a contract job, then I had a holiday booked where I planned to propose to my girlfriend. I figured if I was still excited about the idea after all that, I’d throw the MVP together to validate the idea. If it showed some promise (I.e. if people actually bought some art), I’d think about building out my vision — an AI art generator focused on creating personalised art to decorate your house with.A few months went by. I finished my contract, got engaged (!!), added some features to another project, and suddenly I had some free time again. I hadn’t forgotten about AI Art. I decided to go for it.I found some Neural Style Transfer libraries on Github and tried to get them running. I don’t really know Python, so it was a bit of a challenge, but I eventually managed to run one on my Macbook. It took about 50 minutes to run and the result didn’t look that great. I needed to be able to run them much faster to be productive. A bit of Googling led me to Google Colab — a Jupyter Notebook in the cloud that runs on GPUs. The library I’d chosen was written for use from the command line, so I needed to do some refactoring to get it running in Google Colab. Thankfully Python’s syntax is pretty easy to learn, so I managed to get it working pretty quickly. On Google Colab it ran in 5–7 minutes, which was still pretty annoying, so I built a queue system where I could drop the inputs and styles in Google Drive, and define the jobs as rows in Google Sheets. That let me queue as many jobs as I wanted and leave them to run. It might sound impressive, but Google Colab made it really easy. With this system I quickly got a feel for what would work well and what wouldn’t, and was able to make some interesting artworks that I thought had a good chance of selling.Now that I had some artworks to sell, I needed two things: a shop to sell them in, and a printer to print them. I found a printer that would suit, ordered some samples and was happy with the results, so the next step was to build a store. I knew from the start I was just going to use Shopify. I threw the products up on the default Shopify theme, added a few essential plugins, spent about an hour coming up with a business name that had a domain name available, and I was ready to sell.Because I’d visited every poster and canvas art store on the internet, Facebook had been serving me ads for artworks for months. I’d picked up on some of the tactics they used and noticed that I’d been flicking through a lot of the carousel ads to see if there was anything good, so I decided to make a carousel ad on Facebook to bring some traffic to the site and hopefully make some sales. I had to learn the Facebook ads manager and read about how to make good ads, but it didn’t take long before I was serving carousel ads to people who were interested in art and artificial intelligence.It took almost a week — and a few hundred dollars of ad budget — to make the first sale. The sale didn’t come close to paying for the ads, but it proved that people (well, at least one person) were willing to pay for AI generated art. Optimisation could come later.I spent about a month trying to optimise the website and Facebook ads. The most important update I made to the website was an exit-intent popup (those annoying popups that come up when you move your mouse towards the close-tab button) that surveyed the user about why they were leaving without buying anything. I usually hate those things, but they have their place, and I learned a lot about what people wanted through that survey.I also quickly learned that I was doing Facebook ads totally wrong — I should have made 20 ads and given them a budget of $5/day each, then kill the ones that didn’t perform and slowly ramp up the ones that did. What I had been doing was running one ad with my entire budget. I started again from scratch and had a bit more success, making about 20 sales over the next two months. The Facebook ads still cost a lot more than the sales I made from them, but by this time I was convinced that there was a market for my vision — an AI Art generator oriented around creating art for your home.In the past I would have leapt into building something like this before doing any kind of idea validation. I’ve always known you need to validate your ideas before diving in, but it’s so easy to make excuses, or trick yourself into thinking you’ve done enough validation because you just want to start building. It’s taken a lot of side projects — and many failures — to really learn the importance of validating an idea before committing to building a product that no-one really wants. I’m happy with the process I followed this time. I’ve proven that people are willing to buy, which means the challenge now is to build a great product, and get it in front of the right people.I've since built the actual product, but that's a post for another day. Hope you guys found some value in reading about my process!

#/r/entrepreneur #reddit

0 notes

sheilacwall · 6 years ago

Text

Velvet Negroni is Trying to Make Music That’s Built to Last in an Ethereal Digital Age

When we chat his most recent record, NEON BROWN (via 4AD), has been out for less than a full week. But it’s already beginning to add layers to an increasingly mythological narrative. It’s not just Nutzman’s background being gradually woven together with each new review and published blurb, but it’s also the behind-the-scenes contributions that penetrate larger swaths of popular culture. The track “Waves” from Velvet Negroni’s previous release T.C.O.D. was played by Justin Vernon at Kanye West’s famously rural writing camp in Wyoming, resulting in a contribution to opening track “Feel the Love” on Kanye and Kid Cudi’s collaboration album, Kids See Ghosts. More recently, he’s lent vocals on both “iMi” and “Sh’Diah” from Bon Iver’s new album, i,i.

READ: First Look Friday: Meet Donavon — the Soul of the Algorithm & Disciple of D’Angelo

These high-profile contributions aren’t just Wiki-friendly Easter eggs and fine print liner notes; they’re a clear indicator that both Nutzman’s voice and creative direction possess a unique resonance that is parting the seas of an oft-impenetrable musical kingdom.

NEON BROWN offers an accessible entry-point to hear Jeremy Nutzman’s evolving artistry at work. Album highlight “Wine Green” is an instantly recitable, dancehall-esque anthem awash in peppy adlibs and ascending jabs of bass. “Poster Child” showcases a catchy, iridescent love-song-hook that glows vividly while the downtempo “Feel Let” spins out soft, palatable utterances that feel as if they’re being belted from a woozy, late-night cab ride home.

We talked with Velvet Negroni to explore the album, his creative inspiration, and a rapidly changing music landscape.

Title: Girboix Carmelo Artist: Velvet Negroni

Can you walk me through your contributions on Bon Iver’s album and Kids See Ghosts?

Justin Vernon played [Kanye West and Kid Cudi] “Waves” and it was the first thing that perked their ears that day so they got into it a little bit. There’s a part of the song that goes, “I can feel it in my bones!” I think it was basically just that little snippet that they just took that energy and vibe into “Feel the Love.”

So the inspiration was more cadence than lyrics or production?

Yeah, there wasn’t a sample. While Justin was in Wyoming, I was at his crib working, I was there rehearsing to perform a couple of dates with him. He had helped to work on the record a little bit previously.

How did you two originally link?

I play in a band with a couple of cats that he grew up with essentially and so that’s how that intro went long ago. It was kind of fun. We were just around sometimes, and we got to know each other a little bit. And then my friend Ryan Olsen had played what I had so far of the record for him, he was really excited by it and the next time he saw me he kind of just opened up his place as a base, like “If you need somewhere to finish this or work on it you should come out.”

Source: Artist

Can you tell me about the recording process and what went into your new album, NEON BROWN?

A lot of different things but mostly just good vibes, a good schedule and good hours. We would at least kind of sketch out one or two tracks, at least two things every day. Then after a little bit of that, circle back to one that we had worked on previously. The ones with real potential kind of just flowed out of the fucking mess and felt kind of obvious-ish, I guess. It’s like sifting for gold, eventually you keep whittling it down into a body of work that’s ready.

How do you feel now that it’s out?

It’s just exciting that people are listening to it. The album has been done for a pretty sizable chunk of time, that happened long ago it feels like, but now it’s just, knowing that people can listen to it…that’s exciting.

There’s a wide range of sounds on the album, some heady and stirring but also lighter notes. It’s interesting to see you do both.

It’s a natural thing in the songwriting process. Especially when I’m working with Elliott (Tickle Torture) and Simon (Psymun), there’s no off-limits. There’s that many more influences, like each person has a toolbox. Then there’s that added onto the writing process. So, we’re taking from a pretty wide range of shit just in everybody’s own mind and then putting them together. I don’t think any of us think about the style of the song as it relates to the album until after the fact.

youtube

What new artists inspire you right now?

I’ve been excited about Yves Tumor on Warp and listening to this cat Mk.Gee. I can’t think of anything else off the top of my head that I’ve really been jacked on. I’m kind of just stepping back into remembering that I can listen to other people’s music you know, like on my own, really just listen to music. Usually, I’m just in such a creative mode in my headspace, or I’m not listening to anything, or I’m working on my shit.

When you were first discovering music at an early age, finding discarded records on a neighbor’s lawn, which albums were especially formative for you?

In that pack of CDs that I found, I remember some 311, Soundgarden, some Metallica, Lords of Acid. I think there was a Crime Mob CD, some Tupac and even Marilyn Manson. Those were my youngest memories of having music that wasn’t church music.

That was huge for me. But I was so young that when I was playing music, I wasn’t coming at it from a composing aspect at all. It was beyond me how you could even make something like that. I didn’t have any of the experiences that I have now to desensitize me to the wonderment of music in general.

Photo Credit: Rachel Kauffman for Okayplayer

What was the original intention of keeping you from being exposed to that music?

I mean those were just my parents’ rules. They were religious and didn’t think that anything else was worthwhile except for Christian music. I was practicing playing piano for at least one hour every single day and my mom would sit on the bench next to me, there was no getting out of it really.

We’re now living in a totally digital age. How do you feel the streaming era is changing music?

Oversaturation is a real thing, but there’s also so much more of a platform. I think that, eventually, for the most part, good stuff will be discovered. Like there’s too many people listening, seeing and talking amongst themselves deep in the Internet at all times that I think that the good stuff, the truth will prevail. It’s just a different style with music in general, because it used to be the furthest thing away to just go to a bedroom somewhere and record. Most people couldn’t afford to even rent studio time, let alone rent a studio and then then take their time writing songs in the studio as they go. People used to write a song, arrange a song, figure it out, get really good at it and then go record it. Now, it’s pretty much the norm to write a song as you’re playing and then you have the ability to manipulate audio. It changed the format.

When I first got into recording on my own, an amazing feature of it was that it moved so fast and I found myself making a couple of happy accidents. It was really exciting. Like, wow, what happened there? It went from writing songs and then finding happy accidents to just showing up and relying on happy accidents, rather than really spending time with the chord progression of the arrangement ahead of time.

youtube

I think from the critic or audience’s perspective, you also have less time to win over an audience with a shrinking attention span. Not everyone is even really around for a full album to listen from front to back.

That’s huge, yes. You can grab your albums out of thin air. There was no way to pirate an album unless you stole it from a store. So, it was physical, and I think it meant more just inherently then. It meant more on a tangible level. Like, I paid eleven bucks for this album, I’m not sure if I like it yet, but I’m gonna listen to it and keep listening.

The attention span is so fast that I think there’s more people trying to just jump on a wave or catch a wave and make stuff that’s relevant right then, instead of thinking like a whole album. Instead of maybe making a piece of work that is supposed to stand the test of time.

What’s it like to be a musician in 2019? Especially considering it’s increasingly rare to make a living off your art.

You’re correct with that being a rarity, it also depends on what one person’s definition of living and what you’re satisfied with. I’ve been making music for a real long time, but only recently have I even taken into consideration, oh yeah, I guess there’s a chance I could make some money from this. Really. I can only try and imagine what it was like doing what I’m trying to do right now when the Internet wasn’t the Supreme Being.

Photo Credit: Tim Saccenti

Adam Isaac Itkoff is a freelance writer living in New York City. You can follow him (and us!) on Twitter.

The post Velvet Negroni is Trying to Make Music That’s Built to Last in an Ethereal Digital Age appeared first on Hip Hop World Music.

from Hip Hop World Music https://hiphopworldmusic.com/velvet-negroni-is-trying-to-make-music-thats-built-to-last-in-an-ethereal-digital-age/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=velvet-negroni-is-trying-to-make-music-thats-built-to-last-in-an-ethereal-digital-age from Hip Hop World Music https://hiphopworldmusic.tumblr.com/post/187545891383

0 notes

kivircikedebiyatii · 7 years ago

Text

The Story Of SEO 2019 Has Just Gone Viral!

I use huge news for anyone currently inside the niche website and SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION business. This particular SEO model is called the "topic cluster, " and contemporary search engine algorithms rely upon them to connect users along with the information they're looking intended for. Your own SEO strategy likely involves content material designed to be shared upon social media. Take this article regarding example, if you search with regard to reverse engineer Google, ” seo secrets, ” reverse engineering seo, ” this short article is on the particular first page for every associated with those search terms. Social media marketing and SEO ought to be working together, sharing content material or utilizing engagement metrics since data for future article advertising. Simply put, SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION is marketing through an knowing of how search algorithms function combined with a knowledge associated with what human users might research for. The results furthermore underscore the value of creating new content with your SEO online marketing strategy. Once you create new content structured on your priority keywords, a person have several advantages with the SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION marketing strategy. Both SEO and content material marketing converge in numerous places; these people do not work in solitude. Free to show up at SearchLeeds covers everything from technological SEO and analytics, to ADVERTISING, content marketing, paid media in addition to more. Following technical mobile SEO greatest practices (e. g., image marketing, redirects, JavaScript and CSS) is usually a necessary barrier to entrance in today's digital world. If a person's business does not have SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION Internet marketing strategies, she or even he will need help through SEO experts. One of the particular most commonly asked questions, Light hat SEO in layman's vocabulary is applying the right methods along with a legal method to boost your ranking plus increase your popularity. To help the client's future-proof their businesses plus maximize online Return on Expense (ROI), we have individuals our own global partners to develop a good SEO methodology that aligns along with Google's recommended best practices. Off-page SEO will assist make your website most well-known and visible on the internet, so you can get even more traffic and users for your own website and product. You might be the proprietor of a growing and growing business, the webmaster of the dozen sites, the SEO expert inside a Web agency or the DIY SEO ninja passionate regarding the mechanics of Search: this particular guide is meant for a person. On their organization blog, Demand Wave also provides a great article about 2016's tops trends in B2B electronic marketing and SEO. Why don't explore some roles that cultural media plays in SEO. You will craft the SEO strategy around the key phrases that will lead customers to be able to your most profitable products. Google for example, states that will the no follow link become taken literally as well since the link will not become followed at all however within reports done for SEO reasons it shows some conflict in order to this. Because her business, web traffic, and even customer base grow, Sue will certainly require some outside support with regard to keeping her SEO on trail so she can certainly still sell this best shoes on the prevent. Whilst links continue to be essential and it's incredibly difficult in order to rank well without links through other websites, content and on-page SEO has become increasingly essential. For businesses searching to raise their search search positions, what this means is that will a comprehensive social media technique may be in order - within addition to all of the particular usual SEO tactics. Because of criteria changes and the trend in order to more local searches, it actually is no longer an tremendous cost to implement good SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION. Whether you're killing it along with SEO, or struggling to split the very first page, a good SEO audit will help give your own rankings a shot within the particular arm. According to web marketing experts, the impact associated with AI and Voice Browse SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION can be expected in 2019 after that. Which it. If you'd like in order to speak to us about a good SEO campaign, or even multilingual SEO marketing and keyword study then get in touch associated with just start a live conversation if we're around. Moreover, Google will keep on to elevate the importance associated with usability and technical SEO elements, like site security, page rate, mobile friendliness, and navigability. As a consultant, he or she has helped many different businesses—including, Lonely Planet, Zillow, Tower Information, and literally numerous medium plus small businesses—with SEO and online-marketing advice. But definitely, the acronym many people ask about is SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION, or search engine optimization. Between this plus 2017's Best SEO Campaign honor from the UK Search Honours, it's clear the world will be starting to recognize Elephate since one of the most reliable SEO and Content Marketing firms in Europe. To understand how SEO functions to improve search rankings, we will have to break it lower a little. Whichever way you choose in order to categorize keywords, one of the particular most important steps in SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION does keyword research. Some illustrations of White Hat SEO consist of optimizing META tags, putting key phrases in URLs, submitting sites in order to directories, making sitemaps, obtaining hyperlinks on related sites, and generating keyword-optimized content. An SEO Executive optimizes sites to generate them show up increased on search engines like search engines and gain more website site visitors. Nevertheless, the fresh trend in SEO is ideal for long-tail keywords and even more conversational searches. SEO is the great marketing tool for the particular websites promoting their businesses on the internet. Still, the keyword factor of SEO is becoming significantly difficult with Google Adwords concealing volume data. Making use of advanced Search engines semantic search algorithms, we link the gap between old college SEO and the new articles marketing. Tug has been appointed specifically to roll out a multi-lingual search engine marketing techniques campaign using its experience in international SEO and PAY PER CLICK. A reputable SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION company carries on together with your Company Profile and then do all those profile building and then Regional Business Listing Optimization. Our first five steps had been dedicated to on-page SEO strategies Link-building is the primary goal of off-page SEO, and will be also an enormous factor within how search engines rank your own web pages. So far because I know, this only functions for HTML or CSS web pages - I don't go significantly for Flash websites, and We am unsure how that pots and pans out regarding search engines plus SEO. In fact, a huge part of SEO in 2018 is writing for humans PLUS search engines (also known because: SEO copywriting”). SEO is the significant part of any web marketing strategy. Canonical: This connect to handles content syndication, which basically allows other blogs to submit your job (similar to franchising) with out hurting your website's SEO ranking—simply with the addition of a rel=canonical can obtain your brand and content out there on the web in several outlets, ensuring a greater get to and bigger audience without harming your own search results. We are usually offering affordable search engine search engine optimization SEO services to clients throughout the globe. If you want the strong social media strategy, a person simply can't ignore SEO. Another SEO-related plugin, W3 Total Cache is used to boost the performance of your Wp blog or a website simply by integrating features such as content material delivery networks to be capable to reduce the loading periods for your pages. The Technical Audit Checklist Produced For Human Beings — Within this post by Distilled, a person will find a link in order to a Google sheet that offers an technical SEO audit guidelines and links to resources upon how to complete each checkbox. Then each time the phrase SEO appears on your web site, it's automatically changed into the link you specified. Keyword Analysis for SEO: The Definitive Guidebook — This comprehensive guide simply by Brian Dean teaches you the number of strategies for locating keywords and determining intent intended for your target market. On-page and off-page SEO function together to improve your research engine rankings in complementary style; however, SEOs generally advise obtaining your on-page SEO ducks within a row before focusing as well much on off-page SEO. Within 2019, web-based businesses will follow Ten Features Of SEO 2019 That Make Everyone Love It more voice-to-text technology to boost engagement and search activity. There are many SEO internet sites suggesting that they can offer a service to make the website LSI friendly, or meet up with ‘LSI requirements'. The particular art of web SEO is situated in focusing on how individuals search for things and knowing what type of results Search engines wants to (or will) screen to its users. Social press SEO would encourage your present customers to come back whilst helping you develop authority with regard to potential ones. He is an expert in SEO, Content Marketing, plus Pinterest Marketing. An SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION expert plays a huge function in helping companies build their own businesses and attract new clients through website traffic.

Upon the subject of speed, in the beginning of 2017 right now there was still much resistance in order to AMP in the SEO neighborhood overall, but as we mind toward 2018 that feels in order to be dissipating now somewhat along with a reluctant acceptance that AMPLIFIER looks as though it's not really going away sooner. The biggest way that individuals misuse SEO is assuming that will it's a game or that will it's about outsmarting or deceiving the search engines. Both are crucial to the particular success of an SEO advertising campaign, but they're on completely different edges of the fence when this comes to improving your search motor rankings. A lot more than 50% of mobile phone customers started using voice search correct from 2015, and so we all can expect that in 2019 and after that not much less than 50% of searches may be in the form associated with voice search. Within the past, getting a great SEO was only about making use of keywords. Just remember that , SEO will be about targeting real people, not really only search engines. When you do these on-page plus off-page elements of SEO from least along with your rivals, you can achieve higher lookup engine ranking positions in the particular organic section of search motor results pages and have the quality website capable of preserving your revenue goals. In my opinion that 2018 is going to be the particular year where voice search changes how users search and SEOs need to optimize. SEO or Search engine marketing is a term coined collectively to describe the techniques that will the website should use in order to boost its rankings on the search engine. Ranking aspects can be divided into on-page SEO factors (including technical SEO) and link building or off-page SEO factors. Take the 10 pillar subjects you came up with within Step one and create the web page for each 1 which outlines the topic in a high level - making use of the long-tail keywords you arrived plan for each cluster within Step 2. A pillar web page on SEO, for instance, may describe SEO in brief areas that introduce keyword research, picture optimization, SEO strategy, and additional subtopics as they are recognized. On our blog we all chronicle current trends in on-line marketing and SEO and existing interesting studies, statistics and tendencies. Increased site usability - Within an effort to make your own site easier to navigate intended for the search engines, SEO at the same time helps to make your internet site more navigable for users mainly because well. You are capable to host your video upon YouTube for your foundational SEO greatest practices, but link and focus on the embedded video on your own own website. Image SEO is actually a crucial part of SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION different types of websites. Max DesMarais is definitely an SEO plus PPC Specialist for Vital, some sort of Digital Marketing & PPC firm that specializes in PPC supervision services. But this also has an incredible roundabout benefit to your bottom series: boosting your search engine marketing (SEO). It may be the scenario (and I surmise this) that this introduction of a certain SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION technique initially artificially raised your own rankings for the pages within a way that Google's methods never approve of, and as soon as that is actually spread out all through your site, traffic starts in order to deteriorate or is slammed within a future algorithm update.

Voice research is going to be a single of the main parts of concentrate for SEO in 2019 plus beyond. By 2019 mobile advertising will represent 72% of all US digital advertisement spending. They will should realize that SEO Internet advertising mandates a business website, given that it is a necessary on the internet marketing tool. Eventually you can publish these pages on various SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION sites or simply submit the particular web page so that the particular search engine spiders can examine on your created content. The history of SEO will go back to the 90s whenever the search engines emerged intended for the first time. High quality content material is critical in any lengthy term SEO strategy. Successful SEO includes on-page strategies, which use intent-based key phrases; and off-page strategies, which gain inbound links from other web sites Blog9T. So, along with content advertising, SEO now ought to be deeply aimed with your company's PR attempts. Information will be a good introduction to and summary of research engine optimization (SEO), a greatly important tactic for driving visitors to your blog. There will be a lots of misinformation about exactly what an SEO campaign (company) may accomplish when it comes in order to search engines engine rankings. But using the particular SEO analysis tools, you may increase the chances of your own website's high ranking that may provide you with more traffic and ultimately, more business and revenue. Those who have the many to get are small businesses that will before a new harder period breaking into the snug SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION world.

There are usually lots of ways to discover keywords for SEO. SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION article writing guidelines number two. Keywords, they are little concealed subliminal messages within the composing which are to be within conjunction with the topic which usually is being written on. Key phrases are extremely important to the particular SEO article writing guidelines. SEO is often component of an overall internet advertising strategy and complements other strategies like social media marketing, content material marketing and more. The conference brought together thirty eight speakers, 15 sponsors and above 1500 of the search industry's brightest and the best associated with search for a day associated with actionable SEO advice and marketplace leading content. A principal benefit associated with SEO is its cost-effectiveness since there is no payment toward the search engine for getting placed within it. This is usually very important for the 'search head', high volume low intention searches that are expensive within paid search. In 2019, I believe that will Google will continue to drive paid search ads and declare the majority of the over the fold organic SERP. Since, paying a search motor to put your business internet site at the top of the list doesn't come cheap, the particular next smartest thing one may do is to use lookup engine optimization or SEO methods to increase the clicks in the direction of the website and help this work its way up the particular search engine's results page. If you are nevertheless sticking with old SEO formula strategies and searching optimized key word for the article, Sorry!

PeepCon (which stands for The Householder's Conference”) seeks to teach workable SEO and digital marketing classes. See how Matthew required a website from zero in order to one million visits in much less than a year, using the mix of blogging, content advertising, and SEO. Solid being familiar with of the keywords, questions, and even phrases your ideal customers work with to find your products in addition to services is critical to successful SEO. 34. Applying SEO practices (such keyword optimization) to social networking improves discoverability when users search interpersonal platforms like Facebook and Youtube . com. Onsite SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION Guide — If you the particular actual link, you will notice a opt-in button where a person can download the Onsite SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION Guide. ” Matt Diggity will a lot of testing upon his own sites, and this guideline reflects what on page techniques are working best for your pet. One important aspect associated with taking care of SEO is usually identifying issues that are harming search engine ranking positions plus reducing the traffic you obtain through SERPs. User-generated content like reviews assist SEO through SMO, because this often comes in the type of social shares, likes, or even commenting, or common threads such as hashtags that point back toward a brand. Local SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION services offer a very focused online marketing approach, (it's not really like dropping off brochures upon front-porch steps or paying for a good ad in a local newspapers that could or may not really be seen by a feasible client that is actually fascinated in your products or services). A greater number associated with people will stick to tone of voice search, so SEO specialists will certainly need to adjust to this particular relatively new kind of research. Seo or SEO will be a powerful method to generate targeted traffic to your site and hopefully increase your bottom part line. Whilst many marketing tactics rely upon you reaching out to your own audience, SEO gives you the particular power to achieve people whenever they are actively searching out there information related to your providers and products. White colored hat SEOs the actual suggestions of Google and other research engines like google. As Google's search engine outcomes become increasingly monetized and various other platforms such as Amazon plus YouTube gain more SoV plus search volume, I think we are going to overdue for the focus associated with SEO to shift far through Google. Traditional SEO will be focused on building (keyword relevant) links and (keyword relevant) articles. The main reason these kinds of are sometimes misunderstood is because you will find a whole Internet underbelly of alleged SEO companies that you may pay to link to your own site on their networks associated with low-quality articles. However, before we obtain to our main event, We must note that after the 2017 edition of SEO styles launched last year on Lookup Engine Journal, we heard the couple of complaints about simply how long it was. After that your boss tells you most likely accountable for search engine optimisation (SEO), too. Michael jordan Harling, SEO Specialist at Roman Blinds Direct, agrees with the particular consensus that voice search can be the trend in 2019. "SEO" is a term that is definitely used to describe the procedure by which visitors a specific site is increasingly generated simply by search engines through search results. These white-hat cellular SEO tips will help a person to avoid internet search motor penalties and maintain better on-line visibility. SEO or lookup engine optimization techniques will tackle these requirements of a web site. AI and tone of voice search have already begun in order to impact SEO, and as these types of technologies continue to develop, we all can expect to see a lot more changes in the way SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION is performed. In the second chapter of our SEO guidebook, you will learn how research engines work, how people make use of them and what type of lookup queries they submit. You need in order to provide regular posts either daily or at least several periods a week in order in order to gain a following and offer enough unique SEO content in order to keep your search engine rankings high, attract new viewers plus convince people that you are usually the expert in your industry. Voice lookup will change the way you interact along with search engines and it can make SEO even more aggressive and vital to online achievement. Our SEO outreach team connect your brand and curated content with key on-line influencers to get people speaking about you & sharing your own message. Yet, with the research engines like google continually modifying their rules SEO may appear confusing and overwhelming. Understanding what these words really indicate, and how SEO analysts make use of them to boost your home page's search engine results, may become a whole other story.

Our six experts discuss their favorite SEO tips and even tactics for building big visitors in 2018. Yes, all of us know it's still June plus we know it's only 2018 but if you haven't began planning and researching key styles which will affect you SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION in 2019 you could currently be falling behind. We furthermore take a look at just how new technologies like AI plus Voice search will begin in order to impact more on SEO since we move nearer to 2019 and beyond. Whenever every nation across the globe is busy in making their own due contribution within the growth sector in their own method by taking the route associated with SEO service and online advertising, Singapore cannot stop stand nevertheless in one point. By 2019, content material marketing is set to turn out to be an industry worth $300 billion dollars. Off page SEO pertains to the strategies performed past your website that can become used to improve your lookup engine rankings. Due in order to the success of inbound advertising and SEO, more marketers are usually dedicated to improving their position over other tactics. The best way to focus on these customers is by delivering high-quality SEO content that offers genuine and useful information in the direction of the readers. Another method provides a different page based upon whether the page is getting requested with a human website visitor or a search engine, the strategy known as cloaking One more category sometimes used is greyish hat SEO This is within between black hat and whitened hat approaches, where the strategies employed avoid the site getting penalized, but do not take action in producing the best content material for users. This particular means that SEOs spend the lot of time working upon getting links in a procedure called link building Link-building strategies can range from simply asking for a link to writing the guest post - and presently there are many others. Basically, SEO plans the keywords that will are to be delivered plus content provides them. So, when you are considering about applying SEO in the particular broad sense, you need in order to channelize its technical specifications by means of content marketing. In 2019, you can wager that White Hat SEO can have separated itself even more from Black Hat SEO, plus that above all else, supplying quality content will be the particular most important factor for companies ranking in search. The outcomes are not instant, you can use the time on attempting other Internet marketing techniques whilst SEO would go to function. The third major SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION ranking signal is Google's synthetic intelligence search ranking algorithm. Sometimes SEO is definitely simply a matter of producing sure your site is organised in a way that lookup engines like google understand. SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION involves a number of modifications towards the HTML of person Web pages to attain a higher search engine ranking. As a result associated with technological advancement, SEO is in order to undergo more drastic changes, plus the two latest technologies that will are expected to influence SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION to some very great level are AI (Artificial Intelligence) plus Voice Search.

0 notes

mctvcker · 7 years ago

Text

Five SEO 2019 Tips You Need To Learn Now

Good SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION articles increase a website's SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION traffic because articles are listed online. If a person's business does not have SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION Internet marketing strategies, she or even he will need help through SEO experts. One of the particular most commonly asked questions, White colored hat SEO in layman's vocabulary is applying the right strategies along with a legal method to boost your ranking plus increase your popularity. To help our own client's future-proof their businesses plus maximize online Return on Investment decision (ROI), we have caused the global partners to develop a good SEO methodology that aligns along with Google's recommended best practices. Off-page SEO will assist make your website most well-known and visible on the internet, so you can get even more traffic and users for your own website and product. You might be the proprietor of a growing and flourishing business, the webmaster of the dozen sites, the SEO expert inside a Web agency or the DIY SEO ninja passionate regarding the mechanics of Search: this particular guide is meant for a person. On their firm blog, Demand Wave also provides a great article about 2016's tops trends in B2B electronic marketing and SEO. Let's take a explore some roles that sociable media plays in SEO. You will craft your current SEO strategy around the keywords and phrases that will lead customers to be able to your most profitable products. Google for example, states that will the no follow link end up being taken literally as well since the link will not become followed at all however within reports done for SEO reasons it shows some conflict in order to this. The much better you get at SEO, the particular more traffic - and even more leads - you're likely in order to attract over time. To find away more read our 2019 tendencies in SEO marketing report. Are voice searches plus it's expected that by 2019, 67 million voice-assisted devices is usually going to be in make use of in the U. S. These types of kinds of changes and provide on your website shouldn't become a problem logistically — the particular overall practice among the greatest web companies nowadays is making sure that websites are flexible sufficient, especially for SEO purposes. Whether you usually are a marketer, webmaster or company owner, it is very crucial invest in voice SEO marketing to reap benefits in 2019. We said earlier that cultural media isn't a direct SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION ranking factor, so you're possibly wondering why we're even bringing up it. The particular effects of Black hat SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION are temporary, it shouldn't take the particular search engine long before this spots these illegal strategies plus then penalizes you; the research engine may spam your hyperlinks and if you continue making use of these malpractices the search motor will altogether block your web site and links. Algorithmic chasers, technical SEOs, plus Google Doodle followers should develop their technical skills to concentrate on emerging voice search systems and AI applications. Single Grain is a electronic marketing agency in order in order to companies like Uber, Amazon plus Salesforce grow their revenues on-line using SEO and paid marketing. SEO & Content Marketing Software for eCommerce Business, Agencies and Enterprises. Calib Backe, SEO Manager for Walnut Holistics, writes that mobile plus voice are going to keep on their domination of importance because we rely on desktop much less and less. If much associated with your competitors has hired SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION firms to 10-20 keywords within a moderately competitive industry, after that you will have to spend a small more. The Google Lookup Console could be the most essential SEO tool on the earth. No BS. In the event that you're done with the worn out cliches told over and above again at SEO Conferences, after that you're prepared to experience UnGagged - an UnConventional SEO in addition to Digital Marketing conference that provides real-world results. SEO is a good acronym for the phrase "search engine optimization. " Search motor optimization is focused on doing specific issues to your website to operate a vehicle even more traffic to it so that will you can increase online product sales - and traffic. By 2019, the method we search might not alter completely, but these new technology will definitely change the way all of us build links, engage users, plus generate leads through content advertising. Site Champion® increases site visitors by helping shoppers find your own products in search engines via increased keyword rankings using SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION automation. While link quantity is nevertheless important, content creators and SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION professionals are realizing that hyperlink quality is now more essential than link quantity, and because such, creating shareable content will be the initial step to earning valuable hyperlinks and improving your off-page SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION. Content written simply by customers gives sites legitimacy plus it earns SEO juice each from manual and automatic ranking systems. Inside 2018, this trend is about the rise and if a person invest in making your web site mobile friendly you will delight in higher search positions in 2019 as well. When making a internet site for Google in 2018, a person need to understand that Search engines has a long list associated with things it will mark websites down for, and that's generally old-school SEO tactics which are usually now classed as ‘webspam‘. Besides getting social plus having a good time, your own social media profiles can favorably affect your SEO efforts. Since so many people trust in voice search being the tendency in 2019, I, Nicole Bermack (this article's author), am coining the phrase VSO - voice research optimization. Intelligent brands and agencies are changing new SEO, social and articles marketing strategies to join their own customer conversations. Search engine optimisation (SEO) is the art plus science of getting pages in order to rank higher in search motors such as Google. A person can audit your page's SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION health, compare SEO metrics intended for a number of pages, plus analyze both external and inner links on any given internet page. Content companies that will offer SEO content creation providers are experts in creating content material that are not only improved for search engine rankings yet also add value for your own business in terms of brand name awareness, customer engagement and enhanced sales. Carrying out technical SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION for local search engines will be really a similar process. Search engine optimization (SEO) is definitely a way to generate even more (and desired) traffic to your own site with the help associated with better search engine rankings with regard to a keyword. SEO had gone through drastic changes over the many years and getting higher rankings upon search engines by stuffing the particular information with too many key phrases is a thing of the particular past. This should become a essential part of any local SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION checklists, as reviews and rankings could make it easier to stand out in search engine results. Research Engine Optimization, or SEO, need to rank in as one associated with the biggest part of your own finances for online advertising. SEO or even Search Engine Optimisation is the particular name given to activity that will attempts to improve search motor rankings. Search engine optimisation (SEO) is the procedure regarding affecting the visibility of the website or a web web page in a web search engine's unpaid results—often referred to since " natural ", " natural ", or "earned" results. Regional SEO utilizes a variety associated with strategies — getting your web site ranked on search engines such as Google, business directories such because Yelp, Superpages, Foursquare, Yellowbook, Search engines My Business listing, Bing Locations for Business page, localized content material on your website, online evaluations and other strategies. We frequently create in-depth analyses on the method SEO and digital marketing will be used to boost the traffic in order to various websites. There are usually lots of ways to discover keywords for SEO. SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION article writing guidelines number two. Keywords, they are little concealed subliminal messages within the composing which are to be within conjunction with the topic which usually is being written on. Key phrases are extremely important to the particular SEO article writing guidelines. SEO is often component of an overall internet marketing and advertising strategy and complements other methods like social media marketing, content material marketing and more. The conference brought together thirty-six speakers, 15 sponsors and more than 1500 of the search industry's brightest and the best regarding search for a day associated with actionable SEO advice and marketplace leading content. A principal benefit associated with SEO is its cost-effectiveness since there is no payment in the direction of the search engine for getting placed within it. This is definitely very important for the 'search head', high volume low objective searches that are expensive within paid search. In 2019, I believe that will Google will continue to drive paid search ads and declare the majority of the over the fold organic SERP. Since, paying a search motor to put your business internet site at the top of the list doesn't come cheap, the particular next smartest thing one may do is to use research engine optimization or SEO methods to increase the clicks toward the website and help this work its way up the particular search engine's results page. If you are nevertheless sticking with old SEO criteria strategies and searching optimized key word for the article, Sorry! If you understand you might have VERY lower-quality doorway pages on the site, a person should remove them or think again about your SEO strategy if a person want to rank high within Google for the long expression. One of the difficulties engines like google and Bing have often attempted to overcome is knowing which external links exist exclusively for SEO purposes and which usually links represent a true indicator that the source content is usually of value to the visitors. 2018 has currently seen some particularly significant SEO paradigm shifts from Mobile First” in order to the ever-advancing Rankbrain machine-learning formula. Content marketing is usually a bigger approach which along with SEO forms a part associated with your digital marketing strategy. What You Should Know: Typically the future of search engine optimisation is Semantic SEO. Links plus technical SEO are the biggest pieces of the pie, yet multimedia efforts such as movie, photos, and podcasts will become the game changer and differentiator in many competitive markets. Occasional, and I actually do more occasional and not really frequent, usage of keywords plus keyword phrases in these hyperlinks may also help very somewhat in your SEO processes. Excelling at SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION means serving your visitors—not simply search engines. Here arrives the idea of SEO or even search engine optimization. The particular fact remains that SEO providers assure clients that even in the event that the site will not position among the top search motors like google, the money can not be a waste credited to the refund. Search engines regard metadata plus meta keywords as less essential than they used to, thanks a lot to many years of dark hat misuse, however the name of your page and the relevancy towards the content can always be a highly essential factor in SEO. SEO is important because this helps you get found simply by improving your ranking online research results. Inorganic SEO will be good for populating links regarding your website, even on additional websites which signed up regarding online ads to be proven on their web pages. Of course, finding the period for you to write your own SEO articles every single day can end up being difficult in light of the particular fact that you still possess a company to run. Social media provides its perks aside from SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION value. So when Blog9T you think about it, SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION is really just a procedure of proving to find engines that will you are the best web site, probably the most authoritative, the most reliable, the most unique and fascinating site that they can provide to their customer - the particular searcher. SEO professionals employ the variety of different ways associated with make websites appear higher inside your list of results and create it much more likely that will you'll click on them in order to find what you're looking regarding. SEO more usually talk regarding domain trust and domain power in line with the amount, type and quality of inbound links to a site. SEO requires attaining a higher ranking within search engines via changes in order to your site content and program code to make it more related and therefore more search motor compatible. SEO focuses upon rankings in the organic (non-paid) search results. SEO hence helps you get traffic by search engines. With Ahrefs, a great kick off point for keyword research regarding SEO is the Keywords Explorer tool. Topics: SEO, backlink, content material marketing, social media marketing plus advertising, analytics, and more. 60+ sessions on hot topics, achievement stories and strategies in SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION, SEA, PPC, Social Media, On-line Marketing and SMX Future Observe. 2018 (I believe) will be a lot associated with catch up on current SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION themes, with the biggest trends” occurring around voice queries to look results. Therefore, SEOmonitor tracks all of the related data that could influence SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION performance and displays it within the Keyword Events Timeline. If you forget that will quality content is a best priority, then you can definitely forget about having an SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION strategy. The particular way we asking the device is different from person in order to person. therefore, optimizing your site 100% mobile friendly to accomplish cellular voice search is very essential to SEO 2019. We am just newbie and significantly i do get frustrated whenever articles doesn't rank on best or near top, but individuals like you and many various other also inspire me to never ever give up. There are various points that i wasn't recognized up to now but say thanks to to you, you are usually make us learn important points about seo. Selecting the most appropriate key phrases is critical for successful SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION and it is easy in order to choose the wrong ones through falling into the trap associated with optimization. Research engine marketing, or SEO, is the procedure of enhancing your site's position in search results. Web Marketing SEO, and in specific, Google SEO is the essential. Get into your competitor's URL into the particular SEMRush search bar and you should become provided with a list associated with SEO keywords, with their ratings and traffic. About: Brighton SEO is made up of courses and a one-day search marketing conference. Before this change, the greatest practice was to avoid concealed content at any cost since it wasn't as effective regarding SEO (it was either as well much to crawl for the particular bot in some instances or even given less important by Search engines in others). This is due to the particular fact that you will require contents to be submitted in order to the websites for whom a person are working as an SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION, when you build the hyperlinks, you will need to offer the profile information, and a person will also have to produce articles for submissions as properly as numerous other types associated with written work. If you've actually searched for something online (and most of us have), a person already know read more regarding SEO than you think a person do. We all already see this trend within several places, like extremely exact targeting of social ads -- some brands still approach SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION and content creation with the one-size-fits all attitude. If you speak about search ranking in SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION, you're talking about the placement of your content on lookup results pages (SERPs). Kent Lewis, Originator, and President of Anvil, the performance-based firm based out associated with Portland, says that in 2019 voice search and Amazon research will end up a lot more notable than they were in 2018. Google Search Console (Webmaster tools) is one of the particular SEO basics. If you need to find out how We actually do it, visit Post Czar for the free gift plus details of could use write-up marketing and SEOcious to get top Google listings. It really is geared towards SEO professionals (in-house and agency), marketing managers, and company owners. But now SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION considers tweets, retweets, Google+ authorship, as well as other social signals. Besides rating the web site, the SEO team turns into fault Client's marketing or product sales team by converting surfers or even visitors into buyers. Because therefore much sharing now takes place on major social media systems, social signals may become simply because important to SEO as period on page, editorial linking, plus content quality. Using social mass media marketing in PA with SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION tactics can help boost the website's ranking and popularity. This may create friction and the impact that most well-designed websites are usually very poorly optimized for SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION. They have impacted SEO during the past as well by bringing inbound links, and today it's even even more. Our six experts discuss their favorite SEO tips and even tactics for building big site visitors in 2018. Yes, all of us know it's still June plus we know it's only 2018 but if you haven't began planning and researching key tendencies which will affect you SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION in 2019 you could currently be falling behind. We furthermore take a look at just how new technologies like AI plus Voice search will begin in order to impact more on SEO since we move nearer to 2019 and beyond. Whenever every nation across the globe is busy in making their particular due contribution within the growth sector in their own method by taking the route associated with SEO service and online advertising, Singapore cannot stop stand nevertheless in one point. By 2019, articles marketing is set to turn out to be an industry worth $300 billion dollars. Off page SEO pertains to the strategies performed past your website that can become used to improve your lookup engine rankings. Due in order to the success of inbound advertising and SEO, more marketers are usually dedicated to improving their position over other tactics. The best way to focus on these customers is by delivering high-quality SEO content that offers genuine and useful information in the direction of the readers. Another method provides a different page based upon whether the page is becoming requested with a human guest or a search engine, the strategy known as cloaking An additional category sometimes used is greyish hat SEO This is within between black hat and whitened hat approaches, where the strategies employed avoid the site becoming penalized, but do not behave in producing the best content material for users. You've added even more relevant content to your website blog post and increased the on-page SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION targeted against your focus keyword(s). Before my first ISS, My partner and i had always thought I can just learn everything by me personally about global online marketing matters like International SEO just by means of doing online investigation and playing, but honestly nothing beats this efficiency of attending a meeting like ISS where one could share your experiences and rapidly gain a treasure trove regarding learnings and best practices coming from other international marketers. That method, you and your SEO may ensure that your site is definitely designed to be search engine-friendly from the bottom up. Nonetheless, a good SEO can furthermore help improve a current web site. If you desire to know what kind associated with SEO trends are going in order to develop in 2019, look simply no further than the trends that will are developing in search within both 2017 and 2018. Webmasters are usually going to remain competitive within the online business when these people stick with SEO experts. SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION and social media marketing make sure that one's site has the particular best SEO Online marketing, which usually means that their company may remain competitive in the on the web market. An SEO ("search engine optimization") expert is somebody trained to improve your presence on search engines. From an SEO perspective, a person want to have more inside links pointing to your almost all important content. Without the doubt, one of the greatest trends that has already started to take place and may continue well into 2018 may be the consolidation of niche MarTech gamers by larger content cloud suppliers, with the role and significance of SEO increasing significantly all through this transformation. SEO Internet marketing offers major components, which develop the particular website traffic, and top research engine rankings. SEO is brief for Seo, and there will be nothing really mystical about this particular. You might have heard the lot about SEO and exactly how it works, but basically exactly what is a measurable, repeatable procedure which is used to send out signals to search engines that will the pages are worth displaying in Google's index. Topic clusters possess been lauded since Never Mess With SEO 2019 And Here's The Reasons Why the future associated with SEO and content strategy, yet are widely underreported on (so now's the time to hit! ) 93% of B2B companies use content marketing. Teresa Walsh, Marketing Professional at automobile site, Cazana, forecasts that hyper organic targeting will probably increase its importance in 2019 with more location search plus more voice search. We get to the particular bottom of on-page SEO issues in order for search motors to clearly see what your own website is all about. SEO requires you to continuously become a student because of just how quickly the algorithms of lookup engine companies change. Google's punishing methods probably class pages as some thing akin to a poor UX if they meet certain detectable criteria e. g. lack associated with reputation or old-school SEO stuff such as keyword stuffing a site. Search engine optimisation (SEO) is one of the particular most important marketing considerations upon your studio website. SEO might generate a sufficient return upon investment However, search engines are usually not purchased organic search visitors, their algorithms change, and right now there are no guarantees of ongoing referrals. An excellent starting point whenever using keywords for SEO is usually to identify existing pages that will may use some optimization. These are called keywords, plus as you will see, these people are an important part associated with SEO. In fact, this particular will actually hurt your home page's SEO because search engines such as google will recognize it because keyword stuffing - or the particular act of including keywords particularly to rank for that key word, rather than to answer the person's question. Just before we get going, one thing a person want to keep in brain when using some of the following SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION elements is not to overdo it. You might be enticed to shove a lot associated with keywords onto your pages, yet that is not the objective. In situation you create links to various other websites and reverse, it will certainly improve your SEO ranking. In fact Cisco predicts that globally, on the web video traffic will be eighty percent of all consumer Web traffic by 2019 (a amount that is up from sixty four percent in 2014). I've bookmarked therefore many SEO websites and assets that it's overwhelming to also look at. Link authority is the major component of SEO, yet purchasing links is forbidden simply by Google, Bing, and other research engines.

0 notes