Getting Corn Dog Published: Part 1

George Corneliussen

If life is a gamble, then publishing is one heck of a gamble. I have recently decided what the next step in my journey to take my cartoon series "Corn Dog" to the "big time" will be. The ultimate goal is to hook up with a major publisher and take the old dog as far as it can go.

While submitting the series to an established list of publishers is in the works, I have decided to do a few things before I do that. The following is a list of what I have done and will do along with an explanation of why.

1. I have purchased a domain name based on the "Corn Dog " title. ( In this day and age, your chances of gathering interest from a major publisher go way up if you have a completed product with verifiable public interest to submit to them.)

2. I have secured the services of a professional website design company to design my "Corn Dog" website. ( I want my site to look like Corn Dog is a legitimate product when I submit it to publishers. And, I want to be able to verify Corn Dog's commercial appeal to potential publishers .)

3. I have secured the names/websites of several respected companies that will produce Corn Dog products that I can offer for sale on the Corn Dog website. These products can be produced at little or no start-up cost to me and can be shipped on an "as needed" basis directly to customers. ( These services allow me to provide high-quality Corn Dog merchandise to customers without my having to tie up cash that I could use to promote the Corn Dog site ).

4. After the Corn Dog site is up and operational, my plan is to submit finished Corn Dog products to potential publishers. ( The reason for this is to make sure potential publishers are exposed to a broader depth of Corn Dog material than a simple example of the cartoon would provide. A typical submission will include things like a finished Corn Dog book, calender, etc. This will also show potential publishers that I have an active hand in the marketing of my product, and that I am not the proverbial "babe in the woods" when it comes to publishing.)

With the world of publishing in the state of flux it currently is while it decides if printed media or virtual media is the "way to go", I believe it is more important than ever for anyone hoping to publish their work to participate in both the creative and business end of their work. Do not let yourself believe that it "takes too much time" to do both. If you try your best and fail, well, that's the way the cookie crumbles; but if you don't succeed because you put your future totally in the hands of others, you will never know if you were given a legitimate shot or not. I will publish more articles as my ship sails (sales ? ) forward.

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© 2007 George Corneliussen