When people say only romance and BL are the most popular comic genres on comic-hosting sites and the guaranteed ways to get popular, they're not thinking outside the box.
Yeah, in terms of comic-hosting sites, they're one of the top hits. But if people took time to actually scan through some of the comics past the front page and did some research, they'd see it's "Romance and X" or "BL and Y". There is always another genre attached to them. Which is why I've worked with romance and paranormal or romance and cosmic horror. It gives room to get creative. It's why we have romantic thrillers and horror comedy, for example. We combine genres.
I dunno -- it just feels lazy to lump all of those comics together and have this singular view of them. You don't have to draw romance and BL; but you can at least try to look at the elements and themes they use to be eye-catching.