August 28th, 4:00 – 6:30 pm, Old
Feed Store, Cobden.
Maximizing
Creative Time by Optimizing Marketing & other Business Efforts
The aim of this gathering is to provide
participants with updates and tips about how various business actions and media
strategies can be used efficiently and effectively to advance professional and
economic involvement in the arts.
4:00 - 4:15 Introductions.
Sharon Wittke and Peter Lemish
4:15 - 5:15 Maximizing Creative Time by Optimizing
Marketing and Business Efforts.
Panel of artists and media specialists, with open discussion.
Break
5:30 - 6:30 Discussion of next steps, including October 12th
event.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
OPENING
PANELISTS
Aimee M. Wigfall – Photographer.
Amy
McMurrow-Hunter: - Arts Promoter
Shawnee
Wine Trail - Shopping in the Hills
Southern
Illinois region - Bleeding Hearts Photo Contest, Heartlandarts.net
Emily Kircher - EKRA: Emily Kircher Recycling Artist
Facebook page: Search “Emily Kircher Recycling Artist”
Sharon Wittke – Hobby Artist
PANELIST NOTES:
1.
What are some of the highpoints and challenges in your
pathway as a working artist?
AIMEE:
Highpoints:
Working with clients throughout the
creative process.
Providing actual experience of
having photos taken.
Enjoying editing process and
developing an image to its fullest potential.
Challenges: Time: working full-time + 2 kids + husband +
home = little time for photo business.
Marketing
blocks-working through creative barriers to define target market, clients
Work flow: Develop efficient
workflow for image processing, bookkeeping, database.
…… Did I mention, time?
AMY:
Highpoints:
Appreciation by artists for work I was doing (promotion, marketing,
etc.) which was helping them get sales, and watching people (including myself)
enjoy the artists' work.
Challenges: As
an intermediary, cash flow (a more collaborative/sharing model would be
helpful) and
obtaining content/stories for marketing
materials. Previously no use broad
distribution pipeline [below] - focused on traditional (website, PR),
time-consuming marketing tactics.
EMILY:
Highpoints:
Being my own boss ~ Getting to be creative everyday.
Challenges: A working artist has to wear all the hats of
a business owner (ie. Creative
director, bookkeeper, marketer, etc).
Working in isolation can
sometimes be lonely.
Working
on art can be repetitive and might lead to repetitive stress injuries.
SHARON:
Highpoints: As hobby
artist, rather than full-time artist, I do not rely on income generated from
art sales. So, I do not have pressure to
produce & market products of a working artist.
Luxury of
being able to create what I want most of the time
Challenges: Time management.
2. What are the challenges involved
in balancing creative and marketing work?
SHARON I resent the
time needed to market my work, as it interferes with my art production. I’d rather paint than sit at a computer, so I
have a semi-permanent “Please pardon the mess – Website Under Construction”
message on my website.
I sell all my work at local galleries and on Etsy. Clients are
unable to purchase directly from my website, because I don’t have time to check
it constantly. Thus, my website serves
as a place to view samples, and then purchase an item on Etsy.
Learning to price work so that it’s marketable but also rewards
the artist is a critical skill.
AIMEE Time is
small factor b/c my photography business is not so busy to limit time to create
marketing pieces;
Creative blocks in
developing marketing pieces that keep me from marketing at all.
EMILY Desire to make, be creative while the marketing side of
things might seem tedious and boring.
The trick is to make your marketing work part of your
creative work:
·
Develop your own style of
marketing
·
Share your creative process and
‘in progress’ photos as part of your marketing.
AMY I believe it's mainly a
matter of discipline, or making it part of the routine. In my experience,
you have to have a clear goal with marketing activities (e.g. increase Twitter
followers, get event attendees, sell products), and spend time on activities
that drive traffic to that goal. Note the activities/number needed to
reach the goal, and work/check progress regularly.
3. What tips can you recommend for successful marketing
of your creative work?
SHARON: If you are hesitant to use online techniques for marketing your
art because you lack computer skills, either take a class, engage a tutor, or
figure out a way to pay or barter with someone to market your work online.
Don’t look at marketing as
necessary evil - apply your creativity to marketing;
ETSY is a godsend for many
artists…but explore other options, too.
EMILY: Develop an online presence, for
example:
§ Online store (ie. Etsy, Goodsmiths,
Artfire)
§ Social Networking (ie. Facebook business
page, Twitter, Pintrest)
§ Write a blog
Be your own biggest cheerleader.
Always
carry business cards that have pictures of your work.
If
you make something you can wear, always wear it.
Develop your own marketing style
and voice.
AIMEE: Know target market & where to find them;
how many? what do they read? hangout?
Use social media to your
advantage, but:
·
Don’t get
bogged down with it;
·
Devise a
plan for posting and management of it;
·
Don’t depend
on it solely.
Make sure you use good
images, not poorly lit, grainy, or color-casted images.
Have functional website.
Getting too bogged down with it can eat away at your creative time,
business mgmt time, and effective marketing time.
If you hate it, outsource it.
AMY:
Automate as much
marketing as possible to keep people interested, then you can spend more time
actually interacting with people (leading to more sales). Here's an example of a way to set it up (and
it's using free tools). People online want regular updates/content/photos,
etc.; each update doesn't have to be a novel or a new universal insight.
To build/maintain audience, set up a
distribution pipe for your blog posts:
1.
Blog (briefly) on a
regular basis/as often as possible (Blogger.com - Google) about your art/products/shows/events,
etc. --> [From here everything's automated once set up using the blog's
automatically generated RSS feed. Setting up a broad distribution network
allows people to find out about you according to their preferences.] -->
- RSSinclude.com (blog posts embedded
into any webpage) -->
- Twitterfeed.com (blog posts sent
automatically to Facebook, Twitter, etc.) -->
- Facebook/Twitter accounts-->
- Newsletter (Mailchimp.com provides
pages and links for you to develop a mailing list, and automatically
sends out newsletters to your mailing list based on blog RSS or Twitter
feed as per the schedule you set up).
2.
Check regularly (daily,
weekly) to respond to your audience if necessary. While your online audience
grows, spend your time making more of your art, and participating in more
events (or distribute in more shops/galleries) to sell your products while
providing your online contact points.
3.
This is the very top
level, and can develop into a much more audience/individual focused strategy
over time (e.g. learn people's interests, develop groups, reward customers or
visitors, etc.).
4.
If this type of strategy
doesn't work for you, find a successful artist and copy what they do, or visit
the links provided and read about what other artists are doing.
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