Zwol.org

losttoy · Posted: Mon Feb 03, 2003 6:39 pm Post subject:

Okay ... here is the age old question: How do I get readers? I have done the whole forum hype stuff, as well as submiting to search engines, and link trading, and even those top 100 places (which great, I'm #523) but it seems I don't get too much traffic. A lot of the reason is because I had a gap in posting anything new for a while, but now I'm posting regularly, three times a week. Advice? Where do you get your audiance?
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Tha_Pig · Regular Poster Joined: 22 Sep 2002 Posts: 24

If you really want people to see your page (as opposed to an error message telling them "this page is temporarily unavailable, try again in an hour" you can start by getting out of Geocities...

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ragtag · Posted: Sun Mar 02, 2003 6:51 am Post subject:

Agreed...get out of geocities. I hate it when I find nice online comics, and after reading 5 pages I get a message telling me bandwith limit something or other and come back later.

I just had my site posted on the front page of a gay norwegian web portal, and it boosted traffic like crazy. I actually didn't do anything to get it there, they had just found my page and linked to it. If you can get other sites that have a lot of traffic to review or link to your site, that's a very good way to get traffic. Hype it with your target audience, and know who they are.

Get a web service that offers detailed feedback, like what search words were used to find your page, what page people came from to your page, how many viewed what part of your page, and so on. Helps to know what part of your "marketing" is working.

Oh and keep updating your site....I guess I should do that with mine too

Cheers,

Ragnar

Wikkit · Posted: Mon Mar 03, 2003 2:31 pm Post subject:

Greg Stephens · Posted: Mon Mar 03, 2003 3:09 pm Post subject:

Or, if the comics aren't necessarily about things that people are interested in, put a blog-like area on your page and blog about stuff people are interested in. My hits soar when something newsworthy happens and I put up a news post about it, especially when I link to something else that's relevant. As Wikkit noted, search engines love text, but can't do a thing about content of images other than ALT tags (most comics).
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Greg Stephens · Posted: Thu Mar 06, 2003 3:46 pm Post subject:

Here's an essay about the topic of this thread:

http://topwebcomics.com/articles.php?which=secretwebcomic
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Good morning! That's a nice tnetennba.

fredirc · Regular Poster Joined: 21 Nov 2001 Posts: 21

Damn good essay, that.

Alexander D. · Posted: Wed Mar 19, 2003 1:38 pm Post subject:

losttoy · Posted: Mon Mar 24, 2003 12:24 pm Post subject:

Thanks for all the suggestions. The link that Greg put up doesn't lead anywhere for me.

Well I have actualy never had a problem with geocities. Never once have I actualy gotten enough readers to actualy have that message of page unavailable. I was planning on finding a better server sometime in the future, although, I do not get enough traffic to justify paying for server space ... and geocities does have all that refferer information with keywords and such.

I do put in meta-tags, although it's not the text of the comic. I usualy put in keywords of what the comic vocus is. I guess now that I am reconstructing my page, I could go back and write all the text in the meta tag. Although putting the dialogue in the Alt tags also might work.

I was planning on getting other online cartoonists to review my site and this FlatEarth once I do the big relauch. Right now I have a page of comics that I have drawn that I have not officaly posted on my site yet. Is there anybody here that would like to review my site?
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Darrin Bell · Guest

gazorenzoku · Posted: Thu Aug 07, 2003 7:17 am Post subject:

doing something outside of the online world might help get noticed. Fliers around town, etc. Yeah, you will be limited by physical distance if you do that, but who knows? Somebody with a grossly popular web site might see your flier, check your site out, and decide to link to you. In which case, make sure you have a host that doesn't charge you when a whole bunch of people come to your site! You should go to a server that gives unlimited bandwith now, while your site still isn't as popular as you would like. Now is the time. Try out Self Web Hosting at: http://www.selfwebhosting.com/index.shtml

This is a Canadian company. They're really good at responding to questions, they provide unlimited bandwidth, and they are fairly cheap too. I use them.

My plan is to publish some print comics and then advertise my website in those comics. But that kind of gets away from the whole reason most people are doing online comics. I just happen to want to do print stuff too. But I really think that doing something not online is a good way to get more online readers. It seems to me that a lot of people who get online look for stuff that gives info/pics about stuff they see in the real world: real bands, real print comics, real novels, real movies, etc. So get their attention before they turn on the computer. But what do I know? I probably get less hits than you!!!

Good luck!
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Vince Coleman
www.vince-coleman.com
comics and stuff...

Tim Tylor · Posted: Tue Sep 16, 2003 2:25 pm Post subject:

Sell Shelbys!

Pity that essay's gone - it sounded interesting.

Right now because of BitPass there's a lot of attention on how to make webcomics pay, and thank goodness there is. But I'm wondering if we ought to start making the same fuss over how to boost audiences as well. I can think of several webcomics that I suspect would really take off with a bit more exposure.

DecafSilicon · Posted: Mon Sep 22, 2003 12:32 pm Post subject:

Google puts little value on text, no matter what color. Google instead tracks what words others use to link to you. I recommend building a network with other artists and bloggers.

If you mention my blog (http://decafsilicon.blogspot.com) in your comic, I'll link to you.

Yeah, I'm a tool.