I had an awesome 9-11 day. Hope you spent it with your loved ones. I did a small 9 hour run/walk for 34 miles reaching out to loved ones all over the city. Didn’t quite reach my 80 mile goal…oh well, maybe next year. (I did go farther than I ever have before, though. Aim for the stars and all that…)

I had been watching on-line for some deals on comic book marketing books from amazon. Not a lot in this market. But I did buy some because I really wanted to know what was currently out there that is feeding this market. Hopefully, I’ll find some great info I can share as I do a complete review of these books and hope you will learn some good things. I’ll be sharing with you which books to buy and which to scrap. So check back all over this month and you will get a lot of value.

I want to hammer into your head how much of vital importance to continue your education as a marketer. No matter what you are trying to do in this world, if you don’t know marketing, no one will care. If you are an artist, you have to market your portfolio. If you are a writer, you have to market your scripts. If you want a job at a design studio, you have to market yourself as one of the team, and show a well-marketed portfolio for exactly what that design studio is looking for. If you want to have a job, you have to market your resumê. Whatever you want to do, you have to know marketing.

I want you to make sure you are continuing your education in every way you can. One of the easiest ways to learn comic book marketing techniques is to go buy comic books. Really? Yep. I want to switch your thinking for a minute though, and flip your mindset.

You normally buy a comic book because you have it on your pull list or you really enjoy the art or the story. The next time you are in the comic book shop, look at the stuff you aren’t interested in just for a moment and ask yourself “why?” Why is this comic on the shelf? Why is the logo the way it is? What kind of audience is the book targeting? Do you think they hit their marketing goals?

If there is not a market for a book, why is it on the shelf anyway?

This post is called the educational loop-hole in the comic book market because a lot of what comic book artists do to educate themselves is read how-to-draw books. These are great books if you want to know how to draw. What they are not good at showing you is why-to-draw. That is the education I want you to pick up. The mechanics will only get you so far. This is something every creator should know. If you know “WHY” to create and you practice the “HOW” to create, there is nothing that can stop you. Once you figure out your reason why to create, you will see the best chances of making that “why” dream into a reality is to FOCUS on marketing. And then implement all of that other stuff you know how to do into the mix. It will get you where you want to go a lot quicker.