On a recent Q&A call for my online mentorship program, Artists & Profit Makers, we were having a conversation about the best ways to connect with customers. One member shared that she almost never emailed her list, despite having over 1000 subscribers. (The result of connecting with customers at craft shows over the years.)
After convincing her that the best use of her time was committing to emailing her list once a week, she conceded, but then followed that up with this statement:
“I need to refine my message.”
And that simple comment sent me off on a rant.
Here was this jewelry artist, with gorgeous work, stunning model photography of her work being worn, and a list of fans just waiting to hear from her, and she felt she couldn’t reach out to them because she hadn’t refined her message.
What a waste!
Not only was this mindset keeping her from sharing her work, it was literally losing her money.
And I’m sure she’s not the only artist or maker who feels this way.
One of my core missions with Designing an MBA (and Artists & Profit Makers) is to help artists and makers understand how certain “rules” of marketing that seem so cut and dry are actually holding them and their businesses back.
It’s why I wrote not one, but two posts on why your art or craft doesn’t need to solve a problem. And why I spelled out how email marketing and blogging both look very different for artists and product-based businesses than they do for info-marketers. And why I think that selling your art or craft IS selling an experience.
And it’s why today, I want to talk about messaging.
When it comes to business, your message is essentially what you say about your company or your brand. It’s what your business stands for and how you want to position the value your products or services provide.
It’s one of those core business ideas that everyone talks about as essential for all forms of written and verbal communication (like copywriting, content marketing, and podcasting) but that few people actually understand how to do well. Which is why the people who do understand messaging, like my friend Brigitte, are in very high demand.
But I’m going to let you in on a little secret.
If you’re an artist, maker, or product designer, your message doesn’t matter.
At least not in the traditional definition of messaging.
And you certainly don’t need to spend time refining your message before you email your list or start sharing your work.
Yes, if you’re selling an idea or starting a movement, messaging is important. If you’re a speaker or author or service provider, then yes, you do need to hone your message.
But if you’re an artist or maker, then you need to hone your work.
That’s because, as an artist or maker, your art (or product) is your message.
Your art or your product is the thing you put out into the world.
And despite what any copywriter or most marketing gurus will tell you, your art or product CAN stand on its own.
That’s because words aren’t the only way to communicate an idea or make an impact. Words have just been privileged over other ways of communication and understanding for so long because we exist in a world that split the mind and body and then decided the mind was more valuable.
But as artists and makers, we have the ability to communicate, to inspire, to move, and to impact people without words. Our art and products can touch and change people through the visual and visceral in a way that transcends the verbal.
Thats why, when artists and makers tell me they need to “refine their message” or “get better at copywriting” or “figure out how to write better captions on social media,” I tell them that their time would be much better spent on honing their product photography or connecting their work to customers in person or yes, even focusing on refining the art or product itself.
Thankfully, we live in an age of marketing that is finally doing justice for us visual and visceral people.
The visual web means we no longer have to figure out how to translate what we do into words. We can lead with images of our art and products, whether that’s images of the art itself or the art or products in the world, interacting with people or other art or objects.
That’s why, rather than getting hung up on what to say about your art or products, your time and energy is better spent learning to create images featuring your work that create immediate emotional and visceral reactions.
And if, like the jewelry artist I mentioned at the start of this post, you already have those stunning images, then your time is better spent sharing those images in places where you own the content or the audience. Or both. (That means on your website, your blog, and in your email marketing.)
As artists and makers, it’s time to stop letting word-focused marketers tell us how we should share our work and instead focus on what we do best – creating emotion and impact through our art and products, and letting our art and products “speak” for themselves.
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Letting our art and products speak for themselves is why I’m so passionate about helping artists and makers harness the power of visual content creation. And while I’m questioning the wisdom of sharing great images to platforms where we own neither the content or the audience (such as Facebook and Instagram), I’m a huge fan of platforms that help us get more eyeballs on the visual content we do own. (Images on your website, product pages, and blog.) That’s why I’ve created a completely revamped version of Practical Pinning! Pinterest has changed a lot over the years (and a lot since I taught my Pinterest class on Creative Live) but it’s still one of the best ways to get more traffic to your own website! Registration for Practical Pinning is open now. Click here for all the details and to claim your spot!
