Welcome to my Domain

techacolyte42

So, I like to doodle in class, and a number of people are mildly amused, I kind of want to make a less cool version of PA, get some advertising money to spend on a new computer, etc.

Trouble is, I really don't know much about doing any of this.

SO, any advice? I need to know good places to buy the domain, what to do for hosting (godaddy, yahoo?) and that kind of stuff. I can probably figure out how to put it together, but any advice you have about that would be helpful as well. Other areas I have no knowledge in: donations, advertising...never mind, I know nothing.

Thanks

Andorien

I suggest before dumping money into it, you just grab a blog somewhere. I know blogspot actually has advertising options for you to make a little side money. You can always move if you outgrow it.

It would go like this:
1. Get blog
2. Get domain name, point at blog
3. Get true hosting, point domain at new location

Kate of Lokys

This isn't advice, it's God's own absolute truth sent down from on high: you cannot ever expect to make money from a webcomic, no matter how good you or your friends think you are. *Much* less enough money for a new computer. The indescribably vast majority of webcomics do not so much as break even: hosting isn't much, but income from ads or Paypal donation boxes is even less.

Gabe and Tycho make money on Penny Arcade because they got in on the ground floor of webcomics, got good publicity by working with other networks, attracted a devoted following, kept to a rigorous schedule of updates, and *worked their asses off for years*. PA is a fulltime job to them. It has to be, if they want to continue making money from it.

So, just to reiterate: you will not make money from your webcomic. But, if you want to go ahead and work on it anyway, it can be a great learning experience. Try posting a couple of example comics over in the Artist's Corner if you want some helpful critique on the quality of your artwork (please read the rules first, they're strict in that neck of the woods). They could also probably recommend you a basic free comic hosting site. If not, it doesn't really matter where you host... a lot of people use Dreamhost (the first year is ridiculously cheap, and comes with a domain), and I haven't had any problems with it myself.

Once you've got hosting sorted out, you'll want to try to attract some visitors. For that, you can tell all your friends about it, participate in link-sharing programs on dedicated webcomic forums, post a link to it in your sig on this forum, et cetera.

Eventually, if your art and humour are good enough to make your comic interesting, and you manage to attract some readers through judicious self-promition, and you actually maintain and then increase the number of readers over time by updating regularly without fail for months on end... then maybe you can think about loading up the AdSense, or setting up a Paypal donation account.

You will not make money on your webcomic. Not unless you put a *ton* of work into it, and get very, very lucky. But you shouldn't let that discourage you from having fun. If you genuinely enjoy writing comics, then by all means, jump right in.

(But for the love of God, please do not make your webcomic be another talking-heads three-panel strip involving the hilarious gaming-related humour of two wild and crazy nerd guys. Please).

techacolyte42

I think its pretty normal for me to have overexpectations.
It should be fun anyway...