Cyanide and Happiness Archives - Marketing Your Art the Right Way

Shawn Coss grew up loving cartoons, but never dreamed it could become his full-time job. He grew up in a time and place where art wasn’t considered a viable career.

His dad told him he should get a “real job” instead of pursuing his dreams. The thought was, you could only be a professional artist if you went to an art institute, or learned at Disney. Like most people who grow up in difficult financial situations, Shawn’s dad didn’t want Shawn to grow up with the same hardships he had to go through.

Shawn hit his first break when he met Kris Wilson of Cyanhide and Happiness through MySpace. Kris liked Shawn’s work so much, that he invited him to work on the C&H team.

Cyanide and Happiness provided Shawn enough financial stability to start his own clothing company, Any Means Necessary. One of the clothing company’s campaigns, Inktober, brought an influx of fans and attention.

This brings Shawn to a an exciting but difficult crossroads. Should he go all-in on his company or keep it as a side hustle.

In this episode, Shawn talks about why there’s no formula for becoming a popular artist, defining success on your own terms, and why running an art business is such hard work, among many other things.

Derek Miller has always had a creative side to his life. As a kid he wanted to be a cartoonist, and little did he know, he would become deeply entrenched in that world as an adult through the web comic Cyanide and Happiness.

While he was in college, and a few years afterward, Derek was part of a small metal band and also ran a small music blog. He was also a part of a non-profit to help artists turn their passion into full-time jobs.

All that experience in the art world helped Derek run three successful Kickstarter campaigns at Cyanide and Happiness. Instead of treating Kickstarter like another crowdfunding tool, he treated each campaign like its own event.

After three successful Kicstarter campaigns and constantly being approached by creatives about crowdfunding, Derek decided to write a book on the topic. This led to the creation of his book Six Figure Crowdfunding.

In this episode, Derek talks about why you need to keep your creative momentum, the power of a positive mindset, and not getting down on yourself, among many other things.