Submit For Review

Submitting your comic for review is a really great marketing strategy. It's free, it's simple, and it gets your comics in front of a crowd.

The cool thing from your perspective is that unlike other marketing techniques this technique is usually free. While there are some exception, in general, if you're submitting to somebody for review and the reviewer actually charges you a fee for your comic reviews then you probably want to avoid that person; reviews are usually part of how they draw in readers and listeners so few reviewers charge. Also, if they are charging for reviews then there is something wrong with their policies in general. Better yet, it should only cost you a PDF copy (if you're nice enough to send a printed copy, then you're just being nice).

In short, if they are charging and/or demand printed copies then you may want to avoid them.  

he other cool thing about reviews is the bad reviews. While it's crushing to get a negative review, they can actually be better for you as a creator because they tell you a lot of where areas where you need to work on. Also, a bad review doesn't necessarily spell bad publicity; you do get your comic in the public eye. So even if it's a really bad review, people that really like that particular genre and looking for something interesting in that genre may still be interested in your comic. There's been a lot of comics that have been really poorly reviewed and have still gone on to become major successes. So if you get a bad review, listen to it, figure out where you screwed up, and correct that stuff later on. 

Of course, if you also get a really good review, don't make the mistake of letting that go to your head. A good review is great for your publicity and it's also great for if when you sell the comic. A really great glowing review says, "Hey, we know what we're doing, buy this book!" Butt don't let it go to your head. You've got these people that are really good artists and as soon as they get to start getting good reviews, they tend to have a serious talent problem because they start believing the press and all of a sudden they develop a major blockage of their talent. 

So definitely submit for reviews as part of your marketing strategy and learn from the reviews as much as you can, but don't let them get you down or take them to heart; reviews, bad and especially good can affect your well being even as they are effective marketing tools.