Well my original work involved surreal stuff/dreams/psychology and a lot of weird strange stuff which probably was for a niche audience but recently I finished that and grew tired of it and wanted to move onto fantasy, specifically urban fantasy.
I kinda wanted my comic to appeal to a broader audience and I knew the story would be a mixture of action/horror and some campy elements which is pretty popular. Not that it's purposely made to appeal to a specific demographic, I felt it would be easiest to make compared to other stories that would take probably 10 years or more to create.
Most of my work is inspired by anime and manga, so part of my target audience is anime fans. I also wanted write black female protagonists in fantasy stories, that's part of my target audience. I'd say it's the following:
- New Adults (aged 21 - 35)
- Anime, manga, fantasy, paranormal, and romance fans.
- Black women
That's about it =)
My target audience is pretty broad too. I don't expect everyone to like my comic, but I want it to be the kind of story that anyone could like. And I'm mostly trying to write the kind of story that I'd want to read! And my favorite stories are the ones that are for any age group, but aren't so kid-oriented that adults can't enjoy them too. Like Pixar movies!
And even though my comic is about superheroes, I'm not terribly well-versed in superhero comics myself, so my readers don't have to be either. But I want my comic to potentially appeal to superhero fans too. So again, anyone haha.
Primarily teens to young adults, and people who like weird mystery stories that build up over time, as opposed to fast-paced action-filled stuff (there's some of that, but it's not the focus).
My comic also leans towards females, because I want to present a story with an MC girls can relate to. Though I'm happy to say, I have a good amount of male readers too. :> I'm actually really happy that guys aren't deterred from a comic starring a female character and can find her relatable too.
Hmm, I think I try to appeal to people who like sci-fi and/or fantasy genres mostly, as in ages maybe teens and adults since it would be easier for them to relate to my characters (and also because the comic is very likely to become gruesome at some points). I also try to appeal to the LGBTQ+ community as well since most (if not all) of my characters are part of that community as well.
At the start I didn't put too much thought into my target audience, especially since it was a first attempt at comic making and extremely rough. But if I had to say at that time it would've been a teen audience. Now that I'm trying to flesh out my existing comic more I would say it's between a teen and young adult audience though it's only a slice of life kind of comic.
For the other comics that I'm currently planning out however I would say their audiences would be teens and young adults interested in the fantasy, adventure or drama genres. I don't think there would be an specific demographics although I suppose one of the two stories I'm working on would be aimed at those who are interested in or familiar with urban culture.
It's definitely worth putting thought into your target audience and I think this thread has made me think more about the importance of it in developing a story/comic or otherwise.
Absolutely, I think knowing who it's for can give you an idea if it's going to resonate with them or not
@WinterRobinhood @Catspacesailor
I totally applaud the LGBT community here for knowing exactly who their target audience are, I think that really helps to know how to connect with your specific audience
LOL
is wattpad audience mostly teenage girls? or just happen to be the one reading your work?
I'm just wondering cos I feel like with the statistic is always higher with girls reading than guys, then all these online platform for readings are dominated by female audiences,
so free platform would be dominated by teenage girls, because teenagers in generals don't have too much money to pay for things,
and maybe the paid content is better geared toward more mature female audience who has money to pay for specific content they want to read, cos adult usually does not have that much free time compared to teenagers.
Yes cryptocurrency is a good example.
Another would be something like the Luna Network, or Thumb Drive frisbees. Or perhaps something like Drones that carry Dead Drops for world wide offline file sharing networks.
The Luna Network aims to give sneaker net browsing it's own artificial intellegence to make finding things like Dead Drops and other drones an easier process.
interesting, few weeks ago I've been marathoning youtube videos about AI, that's where I got my education lol,
I don't think I came across Luna Network yet... although I felt like I have heard about it, or Thumb drive frisbees, but I can look that up in youtube and maybe someone can explain it to me via video audio without me reading texts about it lol
It's not up there yet as I use more Goblinrefuge than anything else. That and:
Diaspora
GNU Social
Mastodon
Stuff like that.
It's more something I'm beta testing before wide release. But often such early technology features in my works of fiction. I guess you could say I'm a bit of a method actor.
Now there are Dead Drops on youtube. But I'm taking the concept of the Dead Drop, and moving it into a more secure format. Like DroneNet.
Or even IPvRV. Although I've had enough of internet debunkers lately.