Wearing Many Hats: The Business Side of Being a Creative

Have you ever felt uncomfortable promoting your creative work? That internal resistance to "shouting from the rooftops" is something nearly every artist faces. Today, I'm diving into why self-promotion isn't selfish—it's necessary.

As creatives running small businesses, we wear countless hats. The marketing hat often feels most awkward, but it's essential for connecting your work with the people who need it. I share my own journey of promoting my studio through everything from $5 social media boosts to local billboards, while emphasizing that authenticity trumps perfection every time. Your unique creative voice—the way you draw a line, mix colors, or approach your craft—deserves to be seen and celebrated.

The community you build around your work becomes your most powerful marketing engine. When someone experiences what you offer and tells a friend, that connection sparks a chain reaction that no paid advertisement can match. I've witnessed this firsthand as my studio has grown, with visitors often mentioning they followed me online or heard about my space from someone else. These connections fuel my transition from healthcare professional to full-time studio owner, allowing me to fully invest in my creative community.

Remember that sharing your work isn't about ego—it's about inspiration. Your creative journey might be exactly what someone else needs to see to begin their own. Whether you're creating to sell or simply for personal fulfillment, your authentic voice matters. What creative passion are you ready to share with the world?

Chapters

• 0:00 Permission to Self-Promote as Artists
• 3:03 Finding Your Unique Creative Style
• 5:12 Authentic Marketing and Community Building
• 9:06 Embracing Creative Passion Full-Time
• 11:51 Helping Others Discover Their Creativity

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:06

Hello, hello, happy Friday, happy Good Friday. It is a beautiful day out today, at least here in my little neck of the woods of Ohio, and just wanted to come on and talk about a little bit of what I've been doing to raise awareness of the studio and the space and a little bit about self-promotion. I feel like we, as artists, wear many hats when we are a small business and sometimes it's really hard to shout it from the rooftops about everything that we do without it feeling like we're like look at me, look at me. That's not really one way you should look at it. It's a way of promoting what you're doing, inspiring others, and it's absolutely necessary. So I just think that it's important to give yourself a little bit of freedom to do that, permission to do that, and if that's something you need from someone, I am here to give you that permission. I want to know what you're doing and no one is going to tell me I do, let alone the business itself and the location and really everybody that is being represented in the studio. So when I have an exhibit and the artist is showcasing their work, I want it to make it worth, their worthwhile. I want it to sell for them. I'm hoping that at a show something is sold from everybody that's exhibiting the new exhibit coming up next month. That will be our first photographer. I'm really excited to introduce you to him next month. Hopefully, he'll make an episode of the podcast. I hope that it is something that the people in the community love to come by and take a look at and check that out. I don't believe he wants to teach, which is absolutely an option. It's just something I offer because I think that it's kind of exciting to see how many people want to learn what you do, and we've had great success with a lot of the exhibitors teaching and I think almost 100% taught for the first time in my studio if they exhibited. We've had a couple that didn't teach and that's totally fine too. Again, that's an option, but I'm really excited to have a photographer coming up.

Speaker 1: 2:40

So I want to find layers and ways to promote them, as well as the space itself and the things that I do. I think that it's just really important. So when you think about like, how do I self promote, how do you present what you do in interesting ways, it's really important really to start from the beginning. You know, how did you get into your art? What inspired you? What made you want to start? When did you start? Was there something that sparked the interest? Or do you have this series of drawings and sketches from when you were a child to showcase? This is where I started and this is where I am, is where I started and this is where I am.

Speaker 1: 3:28

There's always, always, a reason that someone creates is either through necessity or inspiration. For me, it's like breathing. I have to create something every day. It's just part of me. That's what makes me who I am. I've always been a creative and I love it. I absolutely love the challenge of it. I love learning creativity and I will never, ever stop exploring.

Speaker 1: 3:53

And so another part I think that's important to be willing to explore and showcase and talk about when you're self-promoting is your style and you know what sets you apart from everybody else. Everybody may know how to draw, but they're not drawing like you. Their line, their straight line, will not be the same straight line as the next person. You think that a straight line is a straight line? It really is not. There is a style and a voice to what you do, and it's so intriguing and interesting for you to share that and maybe show where you started and where you're at now and did something influence that. How did it evolve to where you are now? And then do you stay authentic to one style or do you like to evolve, maybe every year? Or you throw in a color, maybe you have a certain color palette that you use all the time and then you toss in a new color once in a while. Talk about that. That's so interesting and I just find it fascinating to hear people share that.

Speaker 1: 4:57

Show up, show up with yourself, be consistent, share something on some sort of cadence that you select, then keep it going. If you can't keep up with it, it's okay, you don't have to like, come on and apologize for it. I tend to do that quite a bit, especially with the podcast and some other things too, especially with the new studio. But you know, don't feel like you're at an airport and you have to announce every little thing. It's totally okay. But just share, be authentic and share the good, the bad, the imperfections. It makes you human and everybody can relate to that and that's so, so important. And I would rather be authentic than try to have everything edited over and, over and over again and then it's not relatable. So keep that in mind.

Speaker 1: 5:53

And then if you want to put some money or monetize some of the things that you're doing behind your self-promotion, you know you can do it in ways that feel approachable and real and authentic. I do run ads for my classes, especially when I have a teacher outside of my studio going to teach a class, and I'm not talking hundreds of dollars, I don't have any kind of budget like that at all, but I'm telling you like five bucks, 10 bucks behind a class promotion. But I'm telling you like five bucks, 10 bucks behind a class promotion, especially on social media, goes a very long way and there's no way that someone can find me right now other than on social media. Or if they do Google search, because one of the first things that I did was secure my profile on Google and then, you know, update that all the time. If I am closing, I update my hours. If I have a Q&A that someone has asked me over and over in the studio, I make that a Q&A on Google. I want to own as much information that I can control on that platform because it is a search engine and so sharing that helps market yourself.

Speaker 1: 7:03

And then I also have been exploring, doing commercials and maybe some billboards, and I mean like really inexpensive, like the electronic ones that you may be up for like five seconds just to see. Will someone see it? Is it going to be effective? What can I do to promote this? So just exploring with maybe $50, $100. I just I don't have a huge budget but I'm trying to see what will stick. So do it in ways that really represent you and make it fun and catchy and connect with the people in your community. That's huge. Their word of mouth is going to be your best marketing.

Speaker 1: 7:49

Having somebody tell a friend have you gone here? Have you seen this? Do you collect this? Have you experienced that? And then that person visits and tells the next person I'm telling you it's amazing. And even if it's an online community person, I'm telling you it's amazing. And even if it's an online community, that I mean look at Reddit, look at how people share a cute little five 10 second video and it's inspiring or funny and like I, like this, I connected with this. That's huge. And then you're building a community really around yourself and I am finding that out the longer that I own my studio. When people come in, I follow you on Facebook, or I follow you in doing this, or I've seen you do that, or I was at this event and I still, to this day. I'm blown away, like I can't believe that that connection is there, this little community that is evolving from people that want to have a moment to be creative or mindful, or create a memory with friends or try a new thing that maybe I have the supplies for. I absolutely love it and it inspires me. Okay, I want to try this, I want to get materials to do that, and that is what I'm building my life surrounding that kind of energy. So, turning my passion into what my livelihood will be, that's my goal. That's why I am retiring from my full-time healthcare job. That is why I'm staying at my studio full-time.

Speaker 1: 9:20

At my studio, full time, I really am investing myself into my work, my art, my community, and I have like 110% involved and invested in this. I can't even explain it and I'm trying to be as diversified as possible. You know, sharing by teaching, selling things that I make, helping people create, and I try to give back. I try to donate time, donate art, really just the whole gamut, and so finding that nice balance is important, but it is also a way to promote what you do and promote yourself, and that's okay. And I don't get every job that I have applied for. When it comes to submitting commissions or requests to do art, I don't get selected for everything and that's okay. I'll learn. Okay, maybe I need to be more creative or do something in a different way, or maybe my price wasn't in the right you know vein that they needed and that's a lesson learned. And it's okay if someone tells you, no, it's not the end of the world, you just need to learn from it. Make it a lesson and that's what is most important.

Speaker 1: 10:38

And then, really, as an artist, you know what do you want your work to represent? What do you want it to do for others? Maybe you just want it to be seen and maybe you don't want to sell it. There's a lot of artists out there who don't want to monetize their art. They just want to create it. Maybe they don't even want to show it, they just want to enjoy it for themselves, and that is absolutely fine. You're not forced to show your work. You're not forced to share your work. Just create, just find the space to just make something.

Speaker 1: 11:09

Do something writing, drawing, it could be, you know, uh, creating poetry. It could be creating songs. It could be practicing a musical instrument. It doesn't have to be, you know, traditional paint or pastels or pencil or charcoal there's, so you know. It could be cooking. You could be a creative business person.

Speaker 1: 11:31

Try something. Try something that's going to light you up and make you happy, and I think that promoting that love, just sharing that you're doing something, that's what counts, that's what's most important, keeping in mind that people really are here to inspire one another. You don't know what that energy is going to do for someone else. It could be a catalyst for someone to try something on their own when they see that's how you have done it, if you're willing to share it, and it can be in a group setting where it's one-on-one, you know people around you doesn't have to be online. If you've shared it online, just talk about what you love to do and be authentic about it and don't be afraid. Don't be afraid to share what makes you unique and what you love to do. I'm telling you there's somebody else out there that is going to connect with that, and it's going to be wonderful to finally find someone else that has this passion that you do about the things that you love, I absolutely guarantee it will just give you such energy to find that connection with others. It does for me, and so if you're kind of lost in wanting to explore what there is out there to do creatively and it's something that maybe I have a tool or materials for and you want to try it, you know you can contact me or stop by my studio and I will set you up in a way to explore that, try it out.

Speaker 1: 13:11

Anything I really, you know, have found out this week we had our first sewing classes and I got to help a lot of people. So either for the first time or try their machines for the first time, or someone had you know there, there's a lot of machines out there right now that are really inexpensive and they're almost like a toy level, and so it was really frustrating for them because needles were bending or the thread was breaking or they were so lightweight like you couldn't even put two pieces of cotton through it without it getting jammed up, and so once I put them on a different machine that was a little heavier duty and that it was more like a real sewing machine, you could see how excited they were that this was actually working and I really maybe could sew and I could do this. And you know you have to have the exploration of some of the right tools in front of you to feel a little bit of satisfaction and less frustration. So it's okay if you can't, you know, invest in something. Find a place that has the offers to borrow or try out something. So you know that, oh, I may like this.

Speaker 1: 14:26

Try your local libraries too. I know you can reserve a sewing machine or materials to try new things. That's a great resource and they're free. Just sign up for your library card. So I just wanted to hop on and talk about that and self-promotion. And if you happen to see any of my ads or any of my billboards or any of my commercials locally here in the Stark County area, I would love for you to let me know, because they are out there in the world for a little bit to see if they are measurable and are doing what they're supposed to do. But have a wonderful Easter and a beautiful weekend and thanks for following along. I appreciate the support and I can't wait to come back here next time and talk to you about more art inspiration. So have a wonderful weekend, be safe, take care, and I will talk to you about more art inspiration. So have a wonderful weekend. No-transcript.