Now seeing as I haven't even got a chance to start pencils on a single page, let alone had time to start working on the script many people would say this is ludicrous. I have two things to say to this: Crazy works, and it's never to soon for marketing.
Crazy works is self-explanatory in my opinion; you have to be at least mildly insane to want to be doing this. It's drive, determination and the ability to realize what your doing is going to be eating up all your free time, money, and most likely health, and do it anyway. So we're going to go into what's important for this post - marketing.
It's never to late to start 'branding' in the public mind. If you can already have a following before the comic is at the presses, all the better. The more people know your comic, or even you for that matter, the better your chances.
Again this is my opinion. I can not stress that enough. However, at 18, I was a marketing director for a small chain of stores in the Midwest, not an easy job. So let's take it as read that I know a little bit about this particular field.
In the case of Zombie Dinosaurs the blog you're reading is gonna help with this. The more people that are following, the more public awareness, the more a brand is established. If I can have people chompin' at the bit, before I even have an ad in Previews, a large part of the battle's already won. God bless the internet, it's the greatest free tool available for artists.
What I'm doing first, is I'm writing up a simple press release and sending it to popular comic book and pop-culture sites. I've been compiling a list both at work and at home of sites that I think might run the story/have a great media presence. I'm writing up a fairly generic form letter, that I can put the contact's name into, when I send it. THIS IS IMPORTANT. NOBODY likes or even looks at forms that are generically addressed. Come to think of it, it's good advise for job resumes; if you're putting 'Dear Human Resources' you chances are far less than the guy that takes the time, does some research, and writes, 'Dear Ms. Janet Smith'. KNOW YOUR CONTACTS.
Step 2 for me is a unique situation, in that the Anaheim Wizard Con, Comic Con, . . .whatever the hell they're calling it, is going on April 30-May 2nd. I have a color printer and card stock at work. Don't see the correlation? Then you need to learn to USE EVERY AVAILABLE TOOL TO YOUR ADVANTAGE. Here's the plan: Go home, using GIMP (GIMP is a free program like Photoshop. Very like Photoshop, and users put up tutorials for beginners) and on a normal size paper sheet (8.5x11) format set up an image that has 4 to 5strips of bookmarks that advertise this very blog (I recommend 1.5 " X 6"). That's right bookmarks. Why bookmarks? >Sigh< do I have to explain everything? Okay, fine. It relates to the first rule of marketing of which there is none higher: Know your frickin' audience. (Okay technically its 'target demographic' but whatever). You're at a comic-con that means the people here are READERS. That means they will have BOOKS. And what do you put in books? You got it. So I provide a marketing 'tool' that the audience will see constantly. Repetition builds remembrance, remembrance builds branding. So I come to work like I'm going to, work late (like I was going to have to anyway), And I print out a crud load of sheets of doublesided bookmarks. Cut 'em. Stick em in my backpack when I go to con, and I either stick them on the freebie table that most cons have (next to all the other flyers and whatnot), or if I can't do that, I stand in front of the con for an hour or so, saying 'Free bookmarks; Zombie Dinosaurs'. That combination of words should work on most comic nerds. Best of all the cost for me to do this; zero.zip. ziltch. nada.
I did a really quick rough at work. Scanned a doodle, type fonts, basic info so tonight when I get home exhausted, I'll have an idea of what I wanted.
I'll put up a post in the next few days of the sites I contacted (as a list) and the form letter I used.
'Till later kids.
-Trevor
I dig it!
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