Talking comic sales and how to increase them has been a discussion that has been prevalent for years now, and while there are many theories on how to increase sales, no one really looks at the tricks that publishers use in order to increase sales. It’s my hope that by presenting the common tactics that publishers use to get sales, we can open a conversation on how to not only generate sales, but sustain them.
Bart Allen as the Flash lastest 13 issues and returned to the original numbering
First issues – Nothing boosts sales like the first issue of a series. A number one issue is a gateway for people unfamiliar to the character or the series. Its a jumping on point for new readers, and it allows for older readers to feel refreshed at a new start. The proliferation of this tactic has led to another tactic where publishers take all of the issues of a particular title and return them to their original numbering to give the comic a greater sense of history. This is best evidenced in Adventure Comics which was recently relaunched with Superboy as the lead and then shifted to the Legion of Superheroes with the original numbering.
The problem with this shift is that it has the potential to lead to confusion for new readers. After all, going into the new #1 of Adventure Comics, it was assumed that Superboy would be the star for quite some time, but after less than ten issues, he was skirted off to his own first issue of his self-titled series. Its understandable that Superboy in his own title would work better for branding and marketing purposes, but bringing back Adventure Comics and then return it to its original numbering creates a barrier between the comic and new readers.
Marvel has furthered the ridiculous nature of inflated numbers with Deadpool #900 and Spectacular Spider-man #1000 – neither of which actually earning this numbering.
If you need a CHECKLIST, your crossover might be too much.
Crossovers - Mega summer event crossovers are sure-fire moneymakers. They hold the promise of new and exciting directions for a line of comics that seems stale. Good crossovers allow for many comics to logically participate in the event, and while some crossovers may spin a bit out of control when it comes to tie-ins (see: Civil War, and Blackest Night) they are still great at generating money due to the completionist aspect of some readers. While first issues act as gateways to the world of comics, crossovers touch the collectability aspect of comics that appeals to readers.
Tie-ins – Somewhat in the same vein as crossovers, tie-ins connect two titles with one another in order to introduce one audience to another. In Paul Cornell’s Action Comics, Lex Luthor is the star and as he travels the DCU, he has been encountering various villains. Eventually, Luthor meets up with the Secret Six which led into a crossover with the Secret Six comic. Readers of Action Comics (the sales of which numbered over 30,000 as of November 2010) had to pick up a Secret Six comic (the sales of which numbered at 19,000) in order to continue with the story. While this is a great way to get new readers onto a struggling book, it can feel a bit cheap and contrived if the two titles have nothing to do with one another. With a crossover, it is often unnecessary to read every tie-in to understand the whole story, but with line to line tie-ins, the story is built to force readers to pick up the other title in order to get the full story.
Huh?
The Action Comics and Secret Six connection is logical, as is the recent Justice League of America and Justice Society of America tie-in, but others haven’t been built on this same logic. During the Sinestro Corps War storyline that went through Green Lantern and Green Lantern Corps, the only other title to connect to these stories was, strangely, Blue Beetle.
Movies – After the millenium, superhero movies began to boom, but comic book sales didn’t follow suit. It seems natural to assume that a hit movie like Spider-man would result in a huge boost in sales, but this simply isn’t the case. The first Spider-man movie was released on May 3, 2002 and made over $100 million in its opening weekend. That same month, the Amazing Spider-man comic book sold 105,094 copies. The next month, there were four Spider-man titles in the top 10 highest comic sales with Kevin Smith’s Spider-man/Black Cat: Evil that Mean Do being the highest selling of the four with 126,766 copies. Still, Spider-man wasn’t the highest selling comic of June 2002, with Transformers: Generation One issue 3 (a comic without a movie or a number 1 issue) selling 141,118 copies.
This signifies something that publishers were not expecting; movie sales do not directly translate to comic sales. While Spider-man the movie will generate ridiculous amounts of money, it will not generate readers and while this might seem strange at first, upon closer inspection, the problem can be defined as one of oversaturation (in addition to the problem with the direct market).
Take Thor for instance. The movie premieres this summer and in preparation for the film, Marvel has produced no fewer than EIGHT Thor titles in addition to his appearances in the Avengers. Multiversity Comics breaks them all down. Imagine someone who has seen the Thor trailer and is interested in doing some research into the character before the film comes out. Once our reader goes to his or her local comic book shop, there are eight titles all vying for attention. The reader looks through each one and is frustrated at the inability to decipher which one is the REAL Thor. In an attempt to capitalize off of the coming Thor craze, Marvel has oversaturated the market with too many Thor books that are made inaccessible to new readers looking for the “true” Thor.
Meanwhile, upon Scott Pilgrim vs. the World‘s big screen debut, the graphic novels topped the New York Times bestseller list. It absolutely dominated the charts because there is only one Scott Pilgrim vs. the many different Thors.
Conclusion - Publishers have other tricks up their sleeves in order to generate sales, but these are the four most prevalent in the industry outside of plot developments (because deaths and rebirths are always sales generators). Speaking of death and rebirth, I have neglected to include these on the list of tricks because they have more to do with content rather than form and they often fall under the four tricks I have listed already. I would like to comment on death and rebirth for a few brief moments, however.
Comic book characters die and are resurrected and there is nothing wrong with this. Sure, some deaths are handled better than others, but a character’s resurrection does not cheapen or dilute the fact that a character died. That original death story still exists regardless of the resurrection, so its not worth getting angry about. If a character has story potential, why should that be squandered? The Flash can run so fast that he can travel through time, but somehow he can’t come back to life? Batman is unbelievably wealthy, in peak physical condition, and has done battle with gods, yet he can’t travel travel through time? Its puzzling that some comic fans can accept the fantastic elements of superheroes, yet death and resurrection is where they draw the line. Anyway, back to talking about form.
While some may lament that publishers have nothing new to boost sales, readers must understand that this is just the nature of the business. There is nothing inherently wrong, evil, or sinister with any of these tactics because they generate sales and the only way for the industry to survive is to use the tactics that are necessary in order to survive.
Let’s not forget promotional items, such as rings, to promote the sales of books. We also shouldn’t forget variant covers and character changes, such as deaths or costume changes that generate media attention.