How to build a fanbase

I've done it 2 1/2 times, and so can you

Today I was checking my messages on Deviantart, and I was happy to see that someone had read through my whole Bloodbound comic and left lots of comments. I was mentally checking my progress in building a fanbase for it, and it dawned on me that most people don't know how to do this. I see authors and other creators all the time vainly seeking "engagement" or whatever the buzzword is now.

I've built fanbases for my work three separate times. These exact techniques may not work for you, but I think the principles stay the same, so hopefully this is useful.

The first one I built was when I became a fan of Sonic the Hedgehog. I started writing fanfiction and drawing art of my characters. Back then, in the early 2000s, to get in touch with fans, you built a fan site and joined web rings of like-minded fans. So that's what I did. I wrote and wrote fanfics, and drew and drew art. On my 10th fanfic, I started getting friendly emails and AOL Instant Messenger texts from people who had enjoyed my work.

Number 10 is an important number. Don't forget it.

My site grew into a fairly large fansite, but I burned out and closed it all down. As it turns out, I wasn't cut out for administrating what amounted to a whole social network by myself. But I still liked Sonic, so I posted my work on sites like fanfiction dot net and deviantart. People congregated there, and it was fun to read other stories and talk to other artists or writers. To this day, I still have fans of that body of work. I hear from them periodically or see them leave favorites on my artwork or stories.

Being able to draw scenes from your stories is a big selling point.

Well, time rolled on, and Sonic's shine wore off a bit. My husband got me into the videogame Destiny and Destiny 2. I didn't know where to find the fandom, so I poked around on pinterest and finally landed on Tumblr. Destiny 2 was big on Tumblr. So I joined there and started posting stories and art.

Again, I gained zero traction in the Destiny fanfiction fandom until I had posted 10 fanfics. On number 10, I started getting comments and likes. I don't know why 10 is a magic number, but it is. All I did was the same things I did with Sonic, which amounted to:

I have cool art. Look at it!

I have cool stories. Here are excerpts! Read them for free! It's easy!

Here is art of stuff from my stories! Look at them! Click over and read the story!

I love my characters. Here's what they look like! Here's a few emotional drabbles with them! Now you can love them, too!

Eventually I started creating my own original work, and again I started over with 0 fans. I tried following the "experts" and their advice to join all social media. Join the screaming mob until you feel like butter scraped across too much bread! Trust us, we're the experts!

Spoilers, social media is the hardest place to build a fanbase. The systems are designed to bury everything you post. Feeding the algorithm has become a meme, and it's just as soul-sucking as it sounds.

So I quit most social media and went back to places I knew how to use, like deviantart and my blog. My work has exactly 1 fan, and that's me. So I'm going to do the same thing with my own stories that I did with fanfics years ago. I'm going to write the stories and draw the characters. I'm going to publish the books everywhere, and make sure that everything is on the library systems like Hoopla, so people can read them for free. The art is free. I'm going to adapt books into comics and give out the comics for free. (Eventually they'll go into a paperback, once the books are finished!)

After Atlantis is finished at 10 books. (Notice that number 10 has cropped up again.) I wanted to promote it, but again, book promotion is kind of like screaming into the void. There's a lot of books out there, lots of screaming authors hawking their stories. Plenty of advertisers willing to take your money and give very little in return. So that's why I started turning one into a graphic novel. You want eyeballs on the internet? Use pictures. I know not everybody can draw their own graphic novel, but by golly, you can commission artwork of your characters. There's a lot you can do to capture eyeballs.

And after almost 3 years, it's working. On deviantart I'm attracting followers and readers. On Comicfury my level of daily hits is flirting with triple digits. I'm trying out Substack and gradually gaining some traction there. I've had people tell me that the comic intrigued them so much that they ran out and bought the book to find out what happens next. Sometimes I do some promotion on Xtwitter but the void-screaming effect kicks in over there and I don't get much response. It's nice to try every so often, but it's not a good place for creators. I recommend Tumblr and Pinterest before any other social media network. Build a blog and write fan-things about your work on there. Link back to it from other online places.

I see a lot of people who write a book or draw art, and then bury it. "Oh, I wrote a few books," they'll tell you, then change the subject. When pressed, they only talk about all the reasons why you shouldn't read it. "Well, it has triggering content," they'll say. "My hero is a bad person at first and assassinates his evil uncle, then has to go on the run from the fairies. Oh and the fairies suck out people's life force really graphically. You wouldn't like it."

And I'm over here like, "Why don't you tell me what you DO like about it and not what you DON'T?" It's like the opposite of how you SHOULD talk about your book. You are the first fan of your work! Act like it! Don't be ashamed!