Comic Books and Behavioral Advertising: Using Information to Gain New Readers

We already discussed how comic companies should create and advertise tie ins to their films and how Internet users are willing to share information, so it's only natural to have these two concepts come together.

As stated before, customers like to share their opinions and interests online, often liking company pages on Facebook or tweeting to companies on Twitter. We already said that comic companies should take advantage of this information in a previous blog post, but that plan catered more to existing fans. Since the ultimate goal of comics is to increase readership, comic companies should target new readers by using the behavioral data of users on sites such as Facebook and Twitter.

Comic companies should place ads on the pages of users who have liked one of their films or one of the characters of these films. They could place these ads even when users just talk about aspects of the film in their status updates and comments with friends. Ads could also be placed on search result pages when users search for anything having to do with the films, such as movie times.

A much more organic way to get comics into the hands of new readers would be to take advantage of the interest people have in the films and create a website that would appear at the top of the search results, rather than just use ads on the side. People new to the comic universes of the films would have questions about who some characters were, what some items were, or where story lines were going. To answer these questions, these people would obviously turn to searching on the Internet for answers. Comic companies could create a website that contained all the answers to these questions and then linked to a copy of the comic that these answers were found in. It's a much less obvious way to sell books than just ads, and interested visitors would purchase the books to find out more.

Using this data shouldn't be a problem, since Internet users, especially the younger generation, like to give their information out and might actually enjoy seeing ads targeting their interests. Of course, these efforts only get new readers to read one issue of a book. To get them to continue reading, comics have to improve their overall quality of the books they published.

Improving Sales by Improving Quality

As we've discussed before, comics companies have had huge successes with their film franchises, but the sales of actual books have remained relatively the same. While it could be said that the blame is on poor promotion, preconceived notions, or stigmas against comics and comic readers, I firmly believe that the blame rests squarely on the poor storytelling that's been a part of the comic industry in recent years.

It seems like lately, comics have been plagued by one bad decision after another. DC and Marvel both initiated new readership programs and we know how that turned out. Marvel then launched the ghastly AVX crossover that squandered the potential of the culmination of the Messiah Complex storyline.The list just goes on and on.

It's clear that the big two need to improve the overall quality of their books, and the first step to doing this is by increasing the amount of editorial support. There have been numerous instances of writers having to ask fans about certain aspects of a comic or download previous issues simply because the editors could not get the writers back issues. A "continuity bible" needs to be created, especially for the X-books, in order to ensure fluidity among writers and between story lines. Television shows do this and it's inexcusable that comic companies do not.

It's not just the editors though. The writers themselves seem to be pitching terrible storyline after terrible storyline. Comic companies need to start taking risks and hiring writers who are willing to try new things. There's a reason the X-Men soared in popularity after Chris Claremont took the helm. He was not afraid to introduce new characters, utilize lesser known characters, and to create story lines that no one expected. Instead, writers today focus on the popular characters and rehash the same stories over and over. I've picked on the X-books a lot in this blog post, but that's simply because they're such a mess right now and are a prime example of what has been wrong with comic writing in the last few years. When House of M happened, almost all the mainstays got to keep their powers and the ones that were depowered got them back a few issues later. Had the creative teams been a more daring, we could have gotten interesting stories about Cyclops, Storm, Psylocke, and others learning how to deal with the fact that they were now human, and could have had lesser known characters rise up and take their place and responsibilities.

 House of M was a mini reboot of sorts, in addition to being a crossover, and it shows, among other examples, that reboots and crossovers need to stop happening. They only serve to frustrate current readers, perhaps even driving them off, and they don't particularly help in gaining new ones. As a friend of mine recently said:

"Unless a character is in dire straights, all anyone really needs is to be reset to a clean slate. Mark Waid's Daredevil is a perfect example. He didn't ignore past story lines, but he found a way to acknowledge them and still give the character a clean slate. You can jump onto his run if you've been reading Daredevil for years, or if you've never read a Daredevil comic in your life."

 If a writer is truly talented and capable of producing excellent work, then he or she should be able to write around tough plot points; a complete reboot should never be necessary. If these writers were being hired, the quality of the comics would go up, news would spread, either by word of mouth or by reviews, and sales would increase. It's really that simple. It seems, though, that comic companies don't seem to grasp this idea yet and we may have to trudge through the muck for a while longer.

Comics and Online Privacy: How Comics Could Take Advantage of the Willingness to Provide Information

While we're well past the Golden Age of comics, we're square in the Golden Age of the Internet. Speeds are becoming faster and faster, content is being published like never before, and connecting with friends and new people is easier than ever thanks to social networks. It's also easier than ever for others to discover information about us online, which may lead some to label this the Gilded Age of the Internet.

It's this ease of discovery that causes people to get nervous about doing anything online; after all, who hasn't heard a story of someone getting their identity stolen and having huge amounts charged onto their credit cards. However, it seems as if the younger generation doesn't seem to care about people finding out stuff about them, or rather, have different priorities in what they allow to be found out about them. They post every important life event on Facebook, tweet every second of their day on Twitter, and share every meal they have on Instagram. This plethora of information is a marketer's dream; more information means tailored advertisements which equals higher sales.

But how can comics take advantage of all of this information? The most obvious option would be to show advertisements to people who said they liked a comic movie adaption. It can, and does, go deeper than that though. Comic companies could take advantage of people's willingness to provide information and desire to express themselves and their opinions by asking readers to give their thoughts on recent storylines, characters, artwork, and any other comic related aspect. Then, comic companies could take this information into account in crafting future stories, ensuring that readers would like the choices being made and thereby increasing, or at least maintaining, readership and sales.

This campaign could be easily implemented across social networks like Facebook, Twitter, or specific message boards that could be created on official company websites so readers could post their opinions. By doing this, readers could feel like they were a part of the comic making process which would result in relationships being formed between the company and the reader.

Of course, great care would have to be taken by the comic companies to ensure that they weren't alienating any customers. They should state specifically that data was being collected and what it was being used for, and then give users the option to opt out of the data collection program in case they were uncomfortable with this. Giving people this choice would reduce the potential problems of data collection and would retain all the people that actually wanted to share their information, bettering the product for everyone involved.

Assuming it's all done correctly, online privacy might actually be beneficial to comic companies. By embracing what people like to post and share online, these companies will be able to incorporate their products into people's identities, thus creating a long and lasting relationship between everyone involved. 

Selling Comics Over Social Media

Social media has permeated society, particularly Facebook; even the US Army has an account. Any business hoping to increase its presence, and therefore sales, has to consider social media as a requirement, and comics are no exception.

Many people in the industry have realized this and have flocked to social media, Twitter specifically. Gail Simone, in particular, has been very active, frequently interacting with fans and retweeting their comments. She is active on Tumblr as well, reblogging fan art and comments. The benefit of such interactions is that by interacting with fans on such a personal level, the artist/writer/etc can then form bonds and relationships with their fans, which are then likely to help increase sales since fans are likely to support the people they're "friends" with.

These relationships can then be taken advantage of to help increase sales. For example, an artist could talk about a new series they're working on by showing panel or page teasers, which the fans would then go and purchase. A writer could talk about a convention they were attending, which would drive ticket sales by fans attempting to see the writer and buy their merchandise. An indirect sales benefit is that since people are more likely to positively view others they've had positive experiences with, reviewers would be more likely to positively review projects by writers/artists/etc that had used social media well. This is especially important for people who work on indie comic books, as they have to be able to boost the awareness of their projects (more so than Marvel and DC) in order to get sales.

What happens, though, when a site loses popularity, as was the case for MySpace several years ago, and everyone is forced to move to a new platform? Of course it would take some effort to regain the same amount of followers as on previous sites, but by cultivating positive relationships, a devoted fan base should be more likely to follow to the new site.This shows that, if done effectively, there's no real downside to using social media and it's actually vital to do so, for both staying relevant and for increasing sales.

Marketing Comics for the Mainstream: Modifying Stories and Channels for the Digital Age

Comics have long languished squarely in the realm of the "nerds." Any interest in caped crusaders, empowered amazons, or ostracized mutants was quickly met with derision and disdain. Within the last few years, however, comics (or at least the heroes of the comics) have received a huge surge in popularity, mostly thanks to the incredible success of the Batman films, the X-Men film series, and the entire Marvel cinematic universe (which includes Iron Man, Thor, and the Avengers).

Despite this new found popularity, the sales of the comics themselves have remained relatively the same.  The audience of the movies represents a virtually untapped market and it's clear that the comic companies are not applying marketing strategies correctly to attract people in this market.

When it comes to e-marketing, the current trend is to cater to existing fans. Ads are mostly placed on websites current fans visit or on the company's own website. To get to the potential market of the movie goers, the companies (particularly Marvel and DC since those are the properties being most adapted) could create a tie-in comic series to the movie adaptions. These could become special universes within the comic company's mythos (which is done quite frequently) and then the plot of the movies could be advanced through the comic medium, bridging the gap between sequels. The DVD releases of the films could contain coupons that would allow the customer to download an issue for free.

The problem with this is that digital comic reading is still in its relative infancy. Each comic company maintains its own proprietary reader, making it difficult (and expensive) for fans to enjoy stories from all companies. As a result, piracy is a serious issue and won't be solved until there's an aggregate comic reader (Comixology sort of solves this issue, but it has yet to catch on).

Should all of these issues be fixed and the solutions be implemented, the next problem is getting the word out. Because the new comic tie-ins are relevant to the movie industry, ads could be placed on film websites. Social media campaigns (such as twitter accounts created to give incremental updates on a film's status and production) could be utilized, as well as leaking details to mainstream media and having news outlets pick up the story.

Of course, all of this doesn't matter if the actual content of the comics themselves is poor. The comic industry has tried multiple times to attract new readers, most recently with DC's The New 52 and Marvel NOW!, but these efforts have been riddled with the same problems that have plagued comics for years: terrible concepts and writing, managerial meddling and favoritism, and sexualization and objectification of women.

The comic industry is largely considered to be a boy's club by people both in the industry and outside of it, which is a view that needs to die out. In order to increase readership, comics need to be written exactly like the best TV shows, movies, and novels are, having rich worlds with nuanced, realistic characters of both genders reacting to situations in a believable manner. It's only then that people will stop viewing comics as being only for the nerds who sit at the back of the classroom, giggling as they ogle the needlessly revealing and impractical costumes of the female heroes.