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This tweeterview was between:

Tweeter: @agent_x

Tweetee: @dogeatdoug

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Promoting webcomics with social media
Date: Aug 25, 09
Time: 14:00
Category: Art / Design

The tweeterview as recorded:

Q1:	"Hi Brian. Thanks for joining me in this tweeterview. "

My pleasure.

Q2:	"To start, can you tell us if there was a particular comic or artist that made you get the urge to be a cartoonist?"

That's a long list. In the beginning it was Schultz and Jim Davis and Walt Kelly.

More on Q2...

They are great comic artists.

Q3:	"Now as you publish in print & online, so what role does social networking play in creating or maintaining your audience?"

It's a big part. Twitter by far has been incredible. I don't really focus on any other SM sites now.

Q4:	"So, you have found that Twitter has offered you a better audience response that the others? Eg: facebook?"

Definitely. When you can chat in real time with your audience it's really effective.

Plus, you can meet so many more cool people quicker via twitter.

Q5:	"What benefits do you see with retweeting and how do you personally encourage followers to retweet your posts?"

RT'ing is like viral campaigns. They can go really far and reach people you can't by just tweeting.

And the best way to get people to RT is to ask them to.

Q6:	"How do you feel that automation tools for posting links (such as Hootsuite) are useful to a webcomic creator??"

Yes. But you can't just become an auto tweeting bot. You need to engage people in conversation.

The way to view automation is that it's the same as tweeting your stuff manually except you won't forget to do it.

Q7:	"Talking about engaging, do you find your followers cross over from twitter to comment on your blog, or just comment on the posts directly?"

There's a bit of crossover. But just like all comments the quantity is usually based on that day's strip.

Q8:	"Do you still use sites such as Digg, Redditt, Stumbleupon etc, or do rely on your syndication tools to promote your comics more?"

I have used all of those. Really I can only focus on one or two. For now it's twitter and facebook.

I guess the syndication tool would be the newspapers. Recently I've been putting my twitter url in the print strips.

So far not much of a spike.

The other problem is that my strip appears in many places online like comics.com and msnbc.com. I wish I could concentrate the online...

...audience in one place.

Q9:	"So, if you had to concentrate the online audience, and were forced to choose, would you have the comic only on a blog, or just via twitter?"

I'd like to have all the readers going to my site. And obviously post links on twitter.

Q10:	"Your artwork sales give a percentage of sales to the Wounded Warrior Foundation. Can you briefly explain what this is?"

It's a foundation to help wounded soldiers. I hope to have a new project soon dedicated solely to raising money for WWF and...

...the SEAL fund.

Q11:	"I look forward to finding out more, via twitter, when you have that ready."

Q12:	"I also wanted to ask if there are any webcomics by other creators are you particularly enjoying at the moment?"

Man there are a ton. I try to retweet all the ones I read. Someday's it's hard to keep up. Obviously I love my fellow tooners at...

...http://www.talltalefeatures.com. You can search through the people I follow for a bunch of brilliant toonists.

Q13:	"I understand you are also working on a new comic called “the conjurers”. How is that progressing?"

There will be another book/comic project before that. "Fussbucket" will be a chapter book series with a companion web comic.

Hopefully I'll have a finalized deal for "The Conjurers" by end of year. That's a novel plus the web comic.

Q14:	"Sounds great. I can't wait to see it. Briefly, any advice for newbies trying to break into webcomics?"

Focus on your strip. That's your foundation. A great strip will find an audience. Once you have that keep to a regular schedule...

...and do one or two things a day to promote your strip. Focus on the things that work and dump the stuff that doesn't.

Two strong promotional outlets (like twitter) are more valuable than wasting time on a plethora of marketing that doesn't perform.

Q15:	"Great advice. Lastly, If you had to be a superhero for a day, who would it be and why?"

Not sure. Although I've always wanted to have the power to make fish blink.

And thanks for the questions!

Q16:	"Thanks so much for the chance to Tweeterview you, Brian. If you are following out there on twitter, be sure to "