Still working on that review of the CMS iStrip! Those things take me forever, so here’s something shorter, more a warm-up, in the meantime.

Webcomickers like myself are always looking for new, lazy ways to increase visits to their site. Well, here’s a couple you ought to check out if you haven’t already!

COMICRANK: Comicrank not only works as webcomic promotion, but also as a very unique tracking tool. Imagine a toplist where you never have to worry about voting or updating incentives. For some people who have too much to do already, Comicrank is your cup of tea! Its “toplist” is ordered by number of readers only, so yes, I GUESS you could call it a popularity meter, but I would argue it’s subtly different. That point however, is moot.  To sign up for Comicrank, make an account, fill out the information, and put a small button on your site which functions as a tracker (and does not interfere with other tracking codes like Google Analytics, to the best of my knowledge).  If you are a popular or middle-range comic, you’ll stand to attract some new readers because you will be on the front page of the site. If your comic is new or not too popular, it’s ALSO a good tool for un-inflated reader numbers (Kind of mid-way between Project Wonderful stats and Google Analytic stats).

KAPPUKOOHI BANNER EXCHANGE: Ignoring the very strange, tough-to-pronounce name of this banner exchange, it’s a perfect size for just about everyone  (88×31 button).  This is a great way to reach a very diverse audience. Not everyone who signs up for the exchange will be your comic’s same genre, so your banner could be displayed for free on sites whose readers most likely would not normally stumble upon your comic. Since it’s free advertising in exchange for such a small space on your site, I’d recommend trying it out. I’ve gotten modest results, which bodes well for when more people join, since the exchange circle is still very small. For small banner spaces like this, it is IMPERATIVE that your banner have clearly-readable text, if you include text at all. You have a small space to make an impact, so do it right. I recommend checking out the “members” link on the site to see other banners currently up. (Hopefully this may one day take the place of the ill-fated rubifruit exchange.)

SIGN UP ON UPDATE TRACKING SITES: Bunches of these sites exist, and for minimal work, you can start “advertising” your comic update to all visitors on that site by either merely creating an account, or in some cases, inserting a small code on your webpage. For sites that update many days a week, it’s almost a synergistic effect for gaining readers–your link is always prominent on that site. If you update not so often, it still works, just not as well for those who can update more. Then again, that is a rule of thumb with webcomics: the more you can update, the more readers you will have (dependent also on quality, but that’s not what this article is about.)

Anyways, that’s it from me! Today’s article was more for people pretty new to these kinds of self-advertising. I hope it was useful.