It’s something that webcartoonists hear from fans all the time: “What’s the best way for me to show my support?”
native ad exchange

Buy, buy, baby!

Obviously, the best way is to buy merchandise.

Click on ads?

Some readers offer to click on ads every day when they visit my site. I actually discourage that. Although I’m not sure, I have a feeling that some of my advertisers can easily track incoming traffic, and seeing click-through via my site from the same ISP address is not going to reflect on my site in a positive way.

It also skews my view of the performance of a given ad or type of ad — which might encourage me to pursue advertisers that aren’t necessarily the right fir for my site.

So I discourage auto-clicking.

Con men

Dropping a polite line to the promoters of a favorite comic convention (or other trade show / speaking opportunity) is a great way for a fan to show his or her support — especially if they write to encourage the convention to invite you to the show as a guest.

That kind of outreach is noticed by promoters. And if it leads to a free table and/or travel expenses, that fan has helped your bottom line considerably.

Viral marketing

This is the big, cost-free, high-return way that your readers can support you without spending a dime: Spread the word using the social networking media of their choice.

Whether it’s Twitter, Facebook, Google+, StumbleUpon, Digg, Reddit, Delicious, or one of the myriad other ways that people can share their finds on the Web, your fans spreading the word about your comic is exponentially more powerful than any kind of advertising that you could buy. And it doesn’t cost a dime.

Speaking of which… 🙂