Clattertron

[dc]W[/dc]riting last week’s post about decentralizing my comics gave me an idea for another blog post. It is related to posting my comics everywhere: the time I spend making comics (and blog posts) vs. the time I spend on distribution. (Note: this post first appeared on my Patreon blog)

Photo by Tristan Colangelo, via pexels.com.

One might think, “how long can it take to post stuff on Facebook?” Longer than you think, because I’m not just posting my comics and blog posts on Facebook. Facebook is one of eight social media channels I manually update (and I do double duty on Facebook: the Clattertron page and my personal account), the rest being Instagram, Patreon, Pinterest, Tapastic, Tumblr, and Twitter.

It adds up.

A few minutes here and there, not to mention preparing specific files for different social media channels (ex: Tapastic lets me make custom thumbnails for each comic).

Usually, I plan on an hour, each Monday morning (while I eat breakfast) to manually distribute my comics on social media or to schedule updates for later (like the Clattertron Twitter). The same goes, more or less, for when I distribute a blog post too.

And if the link preview doesn’t work on Facebook? Fixing it is another 20 minutes or so right there.

Is it time I would rather spend drawing or working on comics? Of course. However, all of this distribution is something I have to do.

I wonder though: should I spend less time worrying about making sure people can read my work or not? I don’t know. It is something very much on my mind, because the efforts of posting my comics everywhere can be draining at times. “OK, I’m finished with this social media site. On to the next…six.”

It’s a necessary evil, I think.

Even though the time would be better spent making my next comic, getting my work out there is important. As I said last week, there are some comics I only read on Twitter or Instagram, because that is where I see them. I’m working on building my own audiences on those social media channels, which means I have to spend the time posting.

I can say the same about making my coloring books. I love coming up with the ideas for pages, the drawing, and the inking, but I could live without handling the formatting, printing, and production side. The nuts and bolts side sucks, but I wouldn’t have a coloring book to sell otherwise (unless of course, I go through a real publisher. Hey, I would love such a thing).

Until I’m in a place where I don’t have to worry about spending time distributing my stuff, I’ll keep doing what I do. You don’t find time for such a thing: you make time.