Tips for Selling Character Skins

Have you ever wondered how some cartoon characters became so famous, with hundreds or thousands of articles bearing their names and images? Take those who have animated series out of the equation, as they have a marketing medium, and you still have a handful of characters who became famous on the merit of their designs. Examples are Julius the Monkey and Emily the Stange.

This article looks at some tips for creating and selling cartoon characters.

Cute VS Cool

Are your characters cute or cool? Cute characters easily appeal to the women’s and toddler markets, two of the largest consumer markets. Character merchandise is usually cheaper and more affordable. Therefore, the profits through high sales volumes can be quite staggering.

Cool characters are better suited as collectibles and are often more suited to the male market. Because they are often more exclusive and expensive, sales volumes are rarely as impressive as cute character merchandise.

In the spirit of game development, decision makers may simply want to choose a design that is more suitable for the game concept. But as far as possible, if the concept of the game allows it, try to choose cute characters because they have a better chance of being licensed for marketing.

character bible

A character bible is the basis of every product that would be derived from an intellectual property, be it a game, an animated series, a comic, a storybook, etc. Regardless of the resulting product, everything must refer to the bible of the character. This is what the Bible is all about: a kind of blueprint for an intellectual property as well as being a showcase for intellectual property.

Style guide

A style guide to showcase your characters in all their glory is absolutely necessary if you plan on licensing your characters. The average licensee is often quite unimaginative and seldom sees beyond what is shown. So if you show them screenshots of your gameplay, hoping they’ll see the full potential of your character designs, chances are they won’t. A style guide with multiple poses and designs for each character would help them better understand and appreciate your character designs.

Product Concept Boards

In your style guide, it would be good to include product concept boards. These are representations of simulated products with their character designs embedded. Product concept boards are great for letting potential licensees see how they can use your character designs in their products.

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