Art Marketing Boot Camp™

"But What If..."

I spent the day yesterday with a couple of artist friends. One of them spent the whole day talking about the economy, the impact on the art business, and ultimately the impact on his income as an artist. Though his concerns were valid it was clear this had become all consuming and was impacting his state of mind.

"Maybe I should go back and get a job", he said, "Maybe I need to give up on the idea of being a painter." "I need more galleries but why should I bother because their business will be bad anyway." "What if the economy gets worse, no one will buy art."

In the nicest possible way... I got in his face and told him to stop. It was like the Charlie Brown Cartoon with PigPen who was always walking around in a black cloud of dirt and negativity.

Here is the bottom line. We cannot worry about things WE cannot change. We can only worry about things we CAN change. What I said to this artist is this:

1. It is what it is. 

Just because the economy is bad does not mean art is not selling. It is selling somewhere. We see evidence of it every day. (Read previous posts).

2. Stop buying trouble. 

Deal with what comes to you, what is, not what might be. Sure it's good to be prepared but don't assume the worst will happen. It might not. 

3. Make up your mind to succeed no matter what. 

If you try nothing by assuming no one will buy, they won't. If your art is not out there in galleries, art shows, etc. it won't sell. If you actively market your art it might sell. 

This guy was talking about pulling his art out of the galleries and waiting out the bad economy. I told him you have a better chance of it selling if its hanging in a gallery than if its in storage. Keep it out there.

4. Art is selling somewhere.

 Art is still selling in certain segments of the population. Don't project your circumstances on others. Someone has the money to buy art and is buying it. A gallery in Carmel told me yesterday last month was his biggest sales month in his 20_ year history. An artist friend told me last month he sold more paintings than any month in his 25 years as a professional artist. Its up to you to find out where art is selling and tap that market. 

5. Expand your market.

 If you're a locally known artist who only sells locally, what can you do to get into other markets and become known there? Expand in your region, expand to other states, other countries. This is a global economy. Its up to you to find it.

Yesterday in Carmel there were a lot of foreigners walking the streets. I heard German, Italian and British tourists. The Euro is strong so they are visiting US tourism locations and they have the money to buy because of the favorable exchange rates. Find ways to get into markets attracting foreign tourists.

Conclusion:

Attitude is everything. Though there is no doubt these are different times you can decide to succeed or fail. It starts with what's in your brain. Decide to succeed and you will find a way if you're creative.

Showing Up

"80% of Life is Showing Up" -Woody Allen

I've been receiving lots of questions about the economy lately. One artist told me today she was pulling her work out of a gallery because they were not selling anything. DON'T DO IT I shouted! Keep your work out there. Its better to have it out in the gallery in case someone comes in and buys it.

Everyone is a little nervous about the economy but its making people make silly decisions. Don't assume everyone is in your shoes. They are not. Just because you are concerned about what might happen to your business and what might happen to others, do not assume they cannot buy. Showing up is important.

Two weeks ago my friend put his home on the market. When I saw him last night he told me he pulled it off the market because of the recent stock market issues and because "no one can get credit now." DON'T BELIEVE EVERYTHING YOU HEAR! While the media is blabbering about no credit, I happen to know of companies looking to extend credit for home buyers. So why take it off the market? Doing so simply is assuming no one is in the market. Yet our local paper lists recent sales and though home sales are down there were over 100 sales just last week. Someone is getting loans. Someone is buying. Don't assume there are no buyers.

This is also true of art. Don't let the media bring you down. People are still buying art. Want proof?

 

Someone has money. There is always a market and there were lots of people who spent money even in the great depression. The key is to go where the money is and be visible. 

Proof... just yesterday a gallery in NY told me in spite of the market he sold a $400,000 painting. Someone has money. This same gallery told me that they have never seen huge drops after 9-11 or even the crash in 87. Yes things softened some for a couple months but it got back to normal after a couple months.

More Proof... a guy I paint with has had a bit of a dry spell for the last three or four months. Then out of the blue this month he has sold 20 paintings, including 12 after the market crashed.

Show up. Keep your work visible. Be everywhere you can be.... galleries, shows, magazines, online. Just be visible.

My Wedding Theory of Advertising

There is another advertising principal... I call it the wedding principal. Sadly I see it all the time. Clients and companies will spend months developing a new product, building a new gallery or retail location, prepping for a show. Suddenly getting people there is an after thought.

You can spend months in preparation, planning, renting halls, caterers, buy the dress, etc. The day of the wedding comes and no one is there. Why? You forgot to mail the invitations. Advertising is like mailing the invitations. You have to invite people to show up. 

What if you sent a wedding invitation to someone at random from the phone book. Chances are they would not show up. The reason you can mail one invitation to a wedding is because the people you want to attend already know who you are.  

But unlike a wedding which requires one invitation... we cannot assume people know who we are. In order for them to accept our invitation we need to build trust (which is really just getting to know us) or we have to have a compelling reason for people to show up. For instance if a brand new gallery mailed out invitations to an opening but did not say anything about who the gallery is, what the show is, etc. Chances are the opening would be empty. If there is an image, a prominent artist they might get some takers. But if they are established, known and trusted the place will be packed. 

Bottom line: Build trust first (which is the cumulative impact of continued exposure and trusted quality offerings) and make sure all your efforts don't go into the product alone. You have to let people know or even the best product will fall on its face. Send the invitations! Advertise.

My Bald Tires Theory of Advertising

There is a principal I call the bald tires syndrome.... Here is the scenerio. You read the newspaper every day and every day your eyes see an ad for the tire store. You either skim over it and don't notice it, or maybe their name goes into your subconscious. But after a trip to a gas station someone says, "your tires are getting bald, you need to do something about that before you have a blow out and get killed." This is what I call a trigger.... the trigger in this case is you now need tires, therefore it triggers you to pay attention to all things related to tires. 

Suddenly you notice tires stores when you drive by, suddenly you pay attention to tire ads in the news paper and then at some point you go get tires. Your awareness of tires was heightened. Where did you go to get tires? You either went to the place that had that ad every day because their name went into your subconscious, or you started reading ads and one day picked one of the ads and went into a store that was advertising. What if, on the day you decided to pick a tire store from the ads in the paper the tire store who had been running all those ads was not present. Chances are you would pick another ad.

That's the value of continued presence.

This holds true for any publication but its very important with our publication Artist Advocate which helps connect artists to galleries. Some galleries are looking now, some may not look this month but will look next month, others may not look for a year. But when they do decide to look for someone its important that your ad is there. If not they may pick someone else.

 

The Brick Wall Theory of Advertising

I recently heard these words from an advertiser who said this: " I am currently debating whether to place another ad in this upcoming Fall issue or to wait until the February issue to post another ad."

Those of us who have spent our lives in advertising understand a principal, which most people don't understand. I call it the brick wall theory.... please bare with me as I share this. Its a little long but important to understand.

Imagine that there is a road with cars going buy. Your goal is to stop the cars so you decide to build a brick wall across the road. So when no cars are coming you build one line of bricks across the road. But because bricks are expensive you decide to stop the project for a little while. Meanwhile a car comes along at 35 mph, hits the little row of bricks, which have no impact on the car... its a little inconvenient bump. But when it goes over the little row it tears it down as it goes over it. A couple months later you decide you have enough money to build your wall again so you build that first row of bricks again, but then you stop until you can afford more bricks. Again a car comes along, bumps over the bricks, tears them down. This goes on and on and one and though you try to build the wall many times, each time the foundation is torn down.

Meanwhile you have a friend who is also building a wall. She builds the first row and immediately on top of it builds the second row. Already because of the second row being a little to much for a car to go over the car comes to a stop and then slowly proceeds around it but not over it, which allows her time to build a third row, then a forth, and so on. Each time the cars slow a little more, and in fact the cars start to back up because the wall is not a real wall and it has to be noticed. Eventually the wall is so big that every motorist knows about it and has an impression of it.

Of course advertising is not a wall but advertising is designed to slow people to take notice, and the more you do it the more they notice until at some point everyone has awareness of the advertiser. Once they are aware, as the wall grows, they pay closer attention to it, then as it increases in size they have to take action.

Advertising is like building that brick wall one layer at a time. If you start and then stop you're merely a bump which barely gets noticed. If you get that second ad the cars notice you more, the third even more, and so on. Once you build a wall you keep that brand alive by keeping advertising alive and once the wall is built its hard to not notice it and harder to tear down.

Will You Crash Too?

People are paralyzed by fear because of recent stock market downturns and the government bail out. There is no doubt it is frightening.

So... since you have to make a living as an artist will you crash too?

Though everything in the financial markets is out of our control there are things you can control:

1. Your Attitude and Determination:

You have three choices. You can decide to succeed no matter what. You can choose to fail. You can choose to see if you'll fail or succeed. Managing your attitude is critical. You must tell yourself no matter what the market conditions you will survive. Yes you will have to work harder, be more creative and maybe reinvent yourself. It won't be easy, but this success attitude actually will make a difference. In the 1980s I decided to succeed no matter what. I became creative, aggressive, increased my promotional efforts. Meanwhile my competitor was overwhelmed by his fear, he began shrinking and because he was so afraid to spend any money he went out of business. When that recession started had ruled and had more market share than I did but by the end he was out of business. Meanwhile I used the recession as a lever to change the game and ended up owning the market share. It took guts and determination because I didn't have much money to work with and I risked what I had. But because so many others were lying low I stood out and ended up stronger when the recession was over.

2. Your Output:

If your sales decrease don't decrease your output. Keep painting, sculpting, etc. Build inventory for better days. Plus because you probably will need MORE galleries to succeed you'll need to have more inventory. Keep yourself under pressure. Invent new concepts for new shows.

3. Your Tenacity: 

If your attitude convinces you that you can succeed you'll need to become more tenacious, a more aggressive marketer. You need to pull out all the stops. INCREASE your visibility because chances are your competitors will decrease. This is where market share is won, which is not possible (inexpensively anyway) at any other time. This is the blessing of recessions for marketers. You need to do more, try more things, do more mailings, more emailings, build customers lists, get more galleries and enter more shows (for visibility.

Crashing is not an option. Success is the only option. There are always people with money... in the US markets, in foreign markets. You have to find them, reach them, brand yourself, and sell them. No excuses. Don't let fear slow you down or paralyze you. This is a huge opportunity to grow.

Art In Down Times

Since everyone is whining about the economy and a bit paralyzed by fear I decided to call around and find someone who went through it. I promised I would not use his name BUT this is a real person (name available upon verbal request) at an established art gallery.

I wanted perspective. "Have you lived thru stock market crashes in the art business?", I asked and what was the outcome. Here is what he said:

"In 1987 everyone thought the art world would come to an end. Our business slowed down a bit for about two months, but it did not end. We had ample business all along just not as much of it. But at the end of two months everything was pretty much back to normal and our business was thriving. People with money who buy paintings continue to buy them. In fact I sold a $400,000 painting today (this was written two days after a massive stock market crash in October 08)."

"Right after 911 the same thing happened. Everyone thought our business would die yet within a few days we were selling paintings again. It took about two months for things to fully come back but we never experienced a huge down turn."

What Business Are You In?

If you're like many I know you strive to quit your job and become a full time artist. Perhaps you've already done it.

Many artists have shared their frustrations with me. "Eric, I wanted to be a full time artist yet the business aspects are taking me away from what I love, which is creating art. What should I do?"

Most people I know never anticipated that they were opening a business enterprise. They just wanted to paint or sculpt or create. 

Suddenly the responsibility of bringing home the bacon is dependent on your ability to create art that others want to buy, establishing your name, selling your product, and managing the business aspects like taxes, paperwork, framing, shipping, etc. So can you get away from it?

Unless you have a solid helper... a spouse, friend, partner you're probably on your own. Its always helpful to have someone to help if you can find someone to volunteer (even a couple hours a week) or someone to work for you. The clutter of doing business can impact your artwork and your rhythm.

I've watched too many people give up and return to life working for someone else. We don't want that to happen to you.

My belief is that your best bet is to find a great art gallery. They can boost your career, manage your promotion, and hopefully bring you consistent revenue. Take the marketing off your lap unless you absolutely love it and are good at it. Then you can focus on better quality artwork, which should result in higher prices eventually.

Secondly ask yourself what you can farm out to others. They don't have to be employees (you don't want to do payroll taxes, benefits, etc.) Break your roles into different pieces. Can someone do the framing for you and then box and ship for you? It might be worth a higher price for your frames if you can drop off the works to a framer to handle this aspect. A good small business accountant can keep your books, manage your accounts, watch your revenues, and do your taxes for not a lot of money. Probably a couple hours a month for not much invested. Often art students will work for little or nothing to be able to observe you. Can you put them to work doing prepping of canvas, varnishing and so on?

Anything you can do to stay focused on artwork will make you a better artist, happier, and less encumbered.