Web Toons or Tap for Skeeters?

[joevallen3]

In case you missed the line near it, what I meant was, my family, friends and supporters of my other projects can't tip me right now so yes, Tap is keeping from making whatever money (even if it's a small sum) that I would have already made from that. My urgency is that I want to have my accounts fully set up with every feature I'll be relying on so I can make the best decisions for my projects and artists. Ya dig?

[joevallen3]

awesome information and perspective though! thanks for taking the time.

[joevallen3]

If nothing else, the Forums here are a major selling point for Tap. This is the best Creator Support I've gotten yet. Thanks guys.

[Marvin]

I absolutely would be getting tips right now if the feature was activated from friends family

If you already have people ready to support you, why don't you direct them to your patreon or create a ko-fi ? Those are great ways to get them to support you financially without them mailing you money. If they do so through the tipping program, you'll either have to ask them to watch a ton of video ads or to buy tapas coins which isn't gonna be very profitable for you since Apple takes a 30% fee (+ Tapastic takes 15%).

I agree with what everyone said, I personally publish my comic on both Tapastic and Webtoon and it enables me to reach 2 different set of readers. As for Webtoon, I also have two things to add :
- their special patreon pledge is only for a year
- if your serie is successful there and you end up getting an e-mail offering you a contract, just know that you'll have to produce one 20 000px long episode per week, which can be a lot of work depending on your comic's style.

Tapastic staff definitely has issues with communication, in my experience.

While I agree with that, I really think they're a small team and already do a lot... They often answer in the forum if you use their name, do some Q&A livestreams and now run a podcast with some up to date news...

I'm sure it wasn't your intention but your message sounded a bit aggressive ("which made me feel like I didn't matter to them"... "Tap is literally keeping us from earning on our own merits"... "someone deciding if I'm worthy to accept my own tips or having to wait"... "I don't need anything from tap but to get out of my way"...) and disrespectful to the Tapas staff who are really doing as much as they can.

Michael has to activate the tipping feature on each account one by one, he receives hundreds of emails each week from people who want to get the feature so please be patient, he probably hasn't even seen your "multiple emails" and doesn't even know you exist yet.

Even though I've gotten pretty attached to this website and community and don't really like people bowling in expecting customer service as if they were in a high class hotel, what really got me pissed in your message is this :

it's wasted building an audience for free

No it's not. If you only want your reader's money, then you'll never get the hang of Tapastic, I'm sorry. You'll miss on a fantastic community where people who can't support you financially still do everything to give you feedback and love. Even if they never leave a comment, they're still individuals interest in what you create and that's already pretty valuable I think. And if you only want to think about how they could lead to your success, then at least consider the weight of their views, likes, comments and shares. Self publishing is entirely about your readers, don't forget it.

If I have ONE advice for you (though I second everything @UzukiCheverie said) it's this : your work and your readers come first. If you take really good care of them both, you'll find ways for money to follow. Please don't try to do it backwards, it rarely ends up the way you want...

ps : what's wrong with reaching non-American readers ? As long as they understand english, what's the point of publishing on Internet if not to rally readers from all over the world ?

[joevallen3]

Thanks Marvin! Great advice and yeah I will certainly set up a Patreon for Skeeters too. JUst trying different avenues with different projects. Skeeters got Tap to try out. I dont want people to be watching videos either and all that. I also heard about toons demanding work load too. I think a weekly post is safe now considering we have a couple months of episodes saved already. Appreciate your reply.

[Marvin]

I dont want people to be watching videos either and all that.

Then what do you expect from the tipping feature ? (colour me puzzled)

I don't think you should limit your series to only one platform. I remember the staff wildly encouraging creators here to spread their work as much as they could and it won't prevent you to see where your serie is getting the best results, believe me ! People don't really like to migrate from a platform to another so if your Tapastic subscribers want to see your other series, they'd probably rather have them handy here on Tapastic than head to webtoon for example.

[joevallen3]

I expect what I keep repeating. For my readers to be able to tip me? Like right now, if my aunt want to throw 20 bucks to the project, she could? So dont be confused anymore. And yes, I'm very aware of Patreon having my graphic novel, "The Adventures of Jesus and Frankenstein" on there now. I will certainly create one which webtoons supports so another pro for them.
I think posting on multiple sites is a great idea though and I appreciate your time but what I'm expecting to be clear again is for people who want to tip me to be able to? I know that sounds insane but that's all I wanted to know so I have clear answers to report back to my artist with because we're both confused.

[Kayke]

Your aunt would have to sign up Tapastic/download the app and either watch videos to earn coins or purchase coins using her phone.

[joevallen3]

purchasing coins is fine and watching videos is cool to give people another option. That's all fine. Except she can't....because I'm not activated. Thanks for your input though.

[joevallen3]

and it's only through the app? I didn't realize that.

[PotooGryphon]

For my readers to be able to tip me? Like right now, if my aunt want to throw 20 bucks to the project, she could?

You'd actually make more if your Aunt gives you the $20 through patreon or paypal or mail you the cash in a sweet holiday card. Honestly, the tipping feature works best for those that don't pay to get the Tapas coins and are willing to earn the coins through watching ads.

Ex. for $100.00 in the Tapas coin store a user can get 120,000 coins. However, 100 Tapas coins equals roughly $0.08. So with that rate, 120,000 Tapas coins equals roughly $96.00. However, since they're bought coins -30% goes toward app fees and -15% goes to Tapas for hosting/maintaining the feature, so you'd roughly get about $52.80 from that 120,000 Tapas coin tip that a user spent $100 to tip you with.

In conclusion you could of gotten $100 if they gave that to you through patreon or paypal or mailed in a sweet holiday card OR get about 55% of that $100 through the Tapas tipping feature...

There's no -30% app fee if a user earns their coins through watching ads so you'd instead get 85% of that if the user instead earned 120,000 tapas coins from watching ads.

For fun your $20 from your Aunt would equate back to you $11, if your Aunt buys $20 worth of Tapas coins from the app.

[joevallen3]

Good info and the aunt 20 bucks example has helped clear up a lot! Thanks!

[69Michi]

Just want to quickly add my two cents on Webtoon's support program since people have already talked about most things you need to know.

It might sound like Webtoon's pledging program is easy money, but unfortunately it depends on the series and how good they do on the website too. And most of all, the program doesn't last for forever. In fact the Webtoon x Patreon program that Webtoon is offering right now for artists on Discover section (Not featured) will end in August this year. So you have approximately 7 months left to take advantage of this program. (Not counting the time you need in order to build up the requirement subscriber and views) So I would say for long term run, Tapastic and Patreon are your best bet. Unless you are lucky enough that Webtoon would pick you as one of their featured artist, which is a very slim chance but worth the try.

[joevallen3]

ooooh good info. and no, I'm never, "lucky" and I don't think anything is ever easy money. I'm a total work horse in anything I do so hard work doesn't scare me. But lucky, yeah, no, so I wouldn't count on that. Good info and thank you

[SpavVy]

Well, to be fair they are probably loaded with emails and not just from those requesting the tipping feature, plus they have a website to run >_> it took them at least a week to activate mine and I think a little bit longer for my friend.
I know you want to make money off of your project but the tipping feature isn't really going to help you make a whole lot. You can just upload on both Tapastic and Webtoons for more exposer, and as for the Webtoons 'trolls' to be honest I haven't seen a whole lot of them around, the worst I usually see is ungrateful readers that want creators to upload faster. I was once hesitant to start uploading on webtoons because of 'trolls' but when I did I gained a crap ton of new readers in less than a week including my first patron.

[scythe]

You should also know that there are tens of thousands of webcomics out there, if not more, and only a minuscule percentage of them will ever make the creators anything more than a couple of bucks, let alone a profit. Putting a comic on sites like Tapastic or Webtoons should not be understood as a money making venture, especially if you're just starting out.

[joevallen3]

I'm on both now and I got an email from Michael activating me. Thanks!

[joevallen3]

There are???? lol Not my first project. I already make money from my writing and various other projects but thank you for your input. Got my tap activated and just launched webtoons for Skeeters.

[bakasama25]

Let put my thoughts on Naver/LINE Webtoons. Naver is the most largest webtoon portal in South Korea. That's all well in good for getting work in the public eye but the competition for getting into the paid tier is fierce. It's quite possible to have a webcomic that has fairly substantial following but not get into paid tier. The time to get that tier might be longer than the time your comic reaches it's end. That doesn't seem to have happened to LINE Webtoon, yet. I do think that it will get to that point eventually.
.

[joevallen3]

I was reading where it said if you are posting at least twice per month and you get 5k monthly US views then they would start pledging to your patreon. Seemed reasonable as far as requirements to get involved in the program. We literally just posted our first episode there a couple hours ago but I see what you meen, There;s definitely more traffic there. Either way more exposure can't hurt, right?
Thanks for your post!