Have you ever thought about creating your own comic book?
If my experiences in the industry reflect the population as a whole, I’d guess that hundreds of thousands of people have. And many of them have actually attempted to do it, whether they’ve created an amateur book to print at Kinko’s or gone through the process of putting together a professional-quality series. Every time I go to conventions, I’m struck by how many new faces I see… and how many people I don’t see again because they’ve quietly exited the industry.
I’ve devoted quite a bit of this blog to talking about the creative side of comics through my Comic Book Writer’s Guide. But I’ve noticed that there’s a real lack of advice out there pertaining to the business side of comics. That’s partially due to the fact that most of the companies who do succeed are tight-lipped about their best practices for fear of helping out future competitors. I get that. But it’s mostly due to the fact that most comic book publishers aren’t run like businesses at all; they’re run like hobbies. Thus, there’s a lot of bad advice out there from people who really don’t know what they’re talking about.
In my 6 years in the industry, I’ve been exposed to some of the worst practices, and I’ve learned quite a bit about how not to run a comic book company. And so today, I’m going to offer a quick survey of the business side of the comic book industry… and some tips on how emerging publishers can actually survive amidst all the problems they’re going to face.
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Today’s article: Comicscape: 5 Problems With American Comics
by: Kurt Amacker
via: Mania.com
I just noticed this well-written little article today, and I think it does a great job of summarizing the problems that today’s comic book industry is facing. And though I’m going to touch on the author’s views here, I’ll be adding a full original article of my own to approach the problem from a business perspective.
The article lists five reasons why the American comic book industry is in trouble. To be fair, the article should be titled “5 Things Wrong With Marvel and DC,” but since they control 75-80% of the market in any given month, they are representative of the entire industry. The author’s five points are thus:
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As I’ve researched the publishing industry over the last year, I’ve been struck by two things:
1) Manuscripts being developed into books are typically given a long lead time – often 12 to 18 months – for “marketing” purposes.
2) Most of the “marketing” being done in the publishing industry seems to be lacking when it comes to strategic planning.
As I’ve said before, marketing is much more than making sales and scheduling author signings. Marketing begins when a product idea is conceived, and doesn’t end until the product is retired. It affects products, product lines, brands, companies, stakeholders, and even the individuals involved with any of the things I just mentioned. It’s very, very important.
So, why do so many publishers seem to rush through it?
Clearly, a lot of small publishers are run by people who have the entrepreneurial spirit, but who lack formal training. A lot of mid-range publishers are run by people who have editorial knowledge and publishing experience, but not necessarily formal business knowledge. And many trade publishers are structured like corporations, separating the marketing department from the editorial department and relegating marketing decisions to sales and advertising instead of allowing the marketing department to be involved in all stages of the process.
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Today’s Article: “The Rep Route to Nontraditional Sales”
by Linda Carlson
via Publisher’s Marketing Association
As I said in Sunday’s article, one of the smartest things you can do as a small publisher is to look for a variety of channels in which to sell your product. In the article, I recommended finding four phases for your initial rollout, and then searching for a fifth, sixth, seventh, and so forth. But chances are good you felt daunted by the task, especially since the least obvious channels, such as independent bookstores, gift shops, organizations and book clubs, require the most work. But what I didn’t focus upon was the availability of specialized sales reps who will sell your books to these channels for nothing more than a commission. And today’s article is full of tips on how to work with a rep to reach those extra channels.
The article begins with a often-asked question, along with a practical answer:
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Today’s Article: “The New-and Disimproved-Meaning of ‘Self-Publishing’”
by Norma Lehmeier Hartie
via Publisher’s Marketing Association
I’ve railed before about how the word “marketing” has been misappropriated by pyramid schemes and sales scams to give my profession a bad name. It drives me crazy, especially when I’m searching the want ads. But something similar has been going on in the publishing world over the last few years — subsidy publishers, also known as vanity publishers, have appropriated the term “self-publisher” and used it to confuse the masses. See, there’s a difference between being a publisher (which I defined here as being the owner of a book’s ISBN and assuming all the risk of producing a book) and someone who’s paid someone else to publish a book. But subsidy publishers realize that there’s money to be made out there, and they want to take advantage of those who have dreamed about seeing their work in print, but who don’t have the patience, skill, or contacts to persuade a publishing company to publish their manuscript.
What’s happening now is that subsidy publishers are playing a PR game, convincing sources such as Publisher’s Weekly that they’re the future of small publishing. After all, the internet has made books of every sized print run available to the masses, and print on demand (POD) technology makes it easy to print books to order for customers. Where self-publishers used to be authors who published their own material, now the subsidy presses are claiming that it’s not necessary for an author to go through all that hassle. They, after all, are in the business of self-publishing, right?
Wrong. And today’s article discusses the fact that what seems like a subtle distinction is, in fact, incredibly bad news for traditional self-publishers.
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Over the last year, I’ve spent a lot of time researching the publishing industry and trying to figure out how I can make my own products successful once they launch. There’s a steep learning curve in the world of publishing, and it’s clear that most of the people who get into this game don’t stick around too long once their initial investment money wears off. That’s probably because, due to the Pareto Principle, 80% of all new products fail within three years. I had trouble believing this statistic when I first heard it, because it would seem to me that the release of a new product is often accompanied by months of planning and refinement. But looking practically at the world of business, it’s clear that many products are introduced at the wrong time, or in the wrong way, or at the wrong price, or to the wrong people, or any combination of the four. The real question is not whether or not a product makes it to market; it’s whether or not a product can remain in the market by making enough profit that it’s worth the manufacturer’s while.
We can talk about return on investment, and we can talk about profit margins, but what the business of publishing really boils down to is profitability — the money the publisher rakes in after everyone else involved in the process has gotten his or her cut. If a publisher is making a profit of 5% or less, the firm is going to have trouble staying in business, because inflation renders such a small return almost meaningless. No, a publisher needs to shoot for a higher return, to the tune of 10-15% to be considered healthy, and it needs to generate at least 15%-20% to be able to grow.
But those sorts of returns are extremely hard to find in the bookstore market. And that’s why I’ve become convinced that the most valuable type of marketing work a publisher can do is not sales or promotion. It’s in building a better plan for distribution.
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Today’s Article: “Five Pieces of the Press Release Puzzle”
by Marsha Friedman
via Publisher’s Marketing Association
I wrote an article the other day about how to write a press release, but I thought it’d be good to offer an outside article about the topic as well to give a slightly different perspective on writing this crucial piece of communication. Today’s resource presents a format that’s a little more author-centric than the format I detailed, and it’s good for a publisher who’s trying to publicize a name, not necessarily a product.
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Today’s Article: “Get Booksellers on Board with Publicity and Marketing Plans”
by Elisabeth Malzahn and Jen Wisnowski
via Publisher’s Marketing Association
From the day a book is signed by a major trade publisher, there is usually a 12-18 month gap between the sale of a manuscript and the release of the book. To anyone outside the industry, this probably seems like an incredibly long lead time. After all, editing should only take a week or two, and typesetting and cover design shouldn’t take much longer. Why would a publisher want to sit on something for a year longer than it needs to?
The answer is marketing. Publishers use that time to make sales and build awareness. Most trade publishers adopt a “push” strategy of marketing, focusing on building sales through their supply chain and then telling consumers that the product is something they need to buy. But trade publishers can also simultaneously use a “pull” strategy to get consumers interested in the product so they’ll place pre-orders, thus forcing retailers to order more. The timeline in today’s article is centered around the “pull” technique, but its aim is to also increase the effectiveness of the “push.”
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So, you’ve written a press release, and you’re ready to get it out to the public. But you don’t have a lot of media contacts, and you’re not sure who’s going to pick up your news. What’s a small publisher to do?
First, you need to consider how you want to put your releases out. I’d suggest email, since it’s inexpensive, though e-mailed press releases can get caught in spam filters. Your most important sources should also receive hardcopy releases, whether they’re in the form of a fax or a press kit. And you should most certainly post any official announcements on your company’s website, if for no other reason than so that the search engines will pick them up.
Once you’ve determined your plan, you need to find a way to get people to actually see your release. Here are 10 tips that will help you get your press release out in front of the public. And while they might not all be practical for your promotional plans, the more of these tips you employ, the better exposure your news will get!
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If you’re thinking about launching a product, chances are good you’ve considered putting out a press release – a simple little announcement intended for members of the press to pick up and use as the basis of a story. But unless you’ve got a background in marketing or journalism, chances are good that you have no idea how to write a press release. And, judging by the press releases I’ve seen from many small publishers out there, chances are also good that even if you have put out a press release, it wasn’t written properly.
Fortunately, you’ve come to the right place: I’ve been writing press releases for almost a decade, and I’ve developed a style that works very well. By the end of this article, you’ll have a good understanding of the mechanics of writing an effective press release. And if you don’t, don’t worry – you can always hire me on an affordable freelance basis to write your press releases for you. (Contact me for details!)
But first, it’s probably a good idea to explain what a press release is actually for.
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Articles, Business Planning, Comic Book Publishing | SeanJJordan | 
May 29, 2008 12:43 am | 
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