Is it just impossible to make a living off of tapastic?

[isaacfriedman]

I feel like if everyone in the world saw every page of comics I put out, I'd still only make around $300 a month. Not that that's even remotely likely since my viewership has fallen 50% in the last two months for reasons that are painfully obvious. But that's beside the point. Are there people who make a living off of tapastic or is it just a way to make a little extra cash from what is essentially just a hobby?

[shazzbaa]

No, it's absolutely not a living if you're only depending on Tapastic's ad revenue.

Ads were once a really good way to make a living off comics, but most creators I know who used to make their living primarily off of ad revenue -- even from their own sites, w/o Tapastic taking a cut -- have had to find new sources of income to supplement it in the last few years.

just a way to make a little extra cash from what is essentially just a hobby?

The "hobby" thing isn't a necessary conclusion to me! A lot of webcomics and freelance creators work this way, where you want multiple sources of income, because you're unlikely to be sustained by just one.
This comic comes to mind, particularly this part:

If you use the free hosting Tapastic provides to post your webcomic online and then also run a patreon, or offer commissions, or run yearly kickstarters, or do conventions, or whatever....... it's still tough to make a living, but it's a lot more potentially achievable!

[Shanny8]

Being a comic artist you will never be able to make a living off just one project/one income. Even professional comic book artists work a number of different projects so that they can survive and keep doing what they love.

A lot of artists do commissions for extra $- during their spare time and at convention shows. Some take on art projects that arent comic related(like storyboarding, illustrations for books, & graphics/design jobs). Some turn their webcomics into printed books and sell those at conventions.

[AnnaLandin]

I agree with @shazzbaa - using only the ad-rev to make a living is unfeasable. You need to spread your revenue streams a bit to make it all add up; ad revenue, Patreon-income, Kickstarters, commissions, work for professional publishers, etc., etc. I've done a little bit of everything, and will continue to do so!

Grassblades is my personal project, but I wouldn't define it as a "hobby". I'm not making a living off of it, but it's not something I'm going to shrug and give up on a whim either.

[UzukiCheverie]

To add to what people are saying about ad revenue being the only source of income, you wouldn't really want that, to be perfectly honest. Ad revenue is a constantly fluctuating income source - there are many factors that determine how much money you make, which include, but are not limited to:

• Your average viewcount
• The average CPM
• The value of the ads that are being put up on your website
• In terms of places like Project Wonderful, the average bidding on ad space
• Users who are using desktop version vs. app (in the case of Tapastic specifically)
• Users who are using desktop version + ad block (obviously not gonna get ad impressions from these guys)

All of these factors are subject to change at any time, for better or worse, so if you depend solely on ad revenue, you're taking a pretty big risk and basically gambling your entire livelihood on how the numbers decide to stack up. When you do commissions, sell books, etc. these you can tend to control a little more in your favor. Though you will have times you don't sell as many books as you had hoped, or you don't make your quota in commissions for the month, there are still things you can do to combat these things (such as going out and looking for more work, conventions to attend, etc. or do special commission events to get some more eyes on your work) but with Ad Rev, there's really no way to control your outcome, aside from just updating as often as you can (and even then, that's very, very little control).

So yeah, while some people are able to make a lot of money off ad rev, it's definitely not a dependable source of income, and it would be in most people's best interest to not be making their only income off of Tapastic ad revenue alone.

[joannekwan]

Yeah, don't put all your eggs in one basket!

All the successful artists that I know of who do make a decent living off their art do a plethora of things, commissions mostly. And those range from individuals to corporate clients.

[isaacfriedman]

To clarify: I never intended to make a living on tapastic ad revenue. I'm a college student studying additive manufacturing and mechanical engineering and hope to go into a related field and continue to do comics on the side. I was more just asking out of curiosity because I was under the false impression that maybe some people on here were legitimately making a living off of tapastic alone.

[indagold]

I think most of these sites just work for extra money on the side. Unless somehow you got super famous I doubt it.

[vongcw]

I thought about your question for a fair bit. I seem to rather think it is not just about ad revenue but rather, how can I make a living off this work that I love (comic drawing)? Aren't we all asking that question?

I know I am.

I don't think there are any THE ANSWERS out there. But this is where I've figured out up to. I think the only way for us to make a living as comic artists is having a solid community. By that I mean fans, peers, and mentors. From that base, I think anything could work. You could open a Patreon account (my weapon of choice), you could make ad revenue, you could sell physical copies, you could offer it to a big comic distributor, you could do a whole lot of things. As lots of people have mentioned. By the time someone is getting large ad revenue, they could also do a whole bunch of other things.

Thing with community ( and I mean real community) is that it is not something that we can control. Peers, fans, mentors, appear to be chance meetings from my observations. If anyone has ideas on how to increase that I'd love to hear em... lol but maybe I'll open a different forum topic for that.