Is Anyone Here Self-Employed?

[jayster]

When I ask are you self-employed, I'm particularly interested to know if anyone has a business where they do their own marketing?
I have an idea for an art / craft based business and I've got a lot of the groundwork done but now comes the part where I have to start getting publicity. It goes so against my nature to "big myself up" and I find the whole Social Media thing exhausting. It breaks me in a way that I can't explain.
I've even joined various skills exchanges, hoping to swap artwork for marketing, but got no replies.
You're a massively creative community, have you got any ideas about how I could get some support?

 

[Sass]

Me! I'm run a business editing books and doing content Irrefutable Proof

I market through facebook sporadically, and rely on word of mouth. Word of mouth seems to be the best thing

I write, and I used to be a Marketing Manager, so if you'd like some help I'd be happy to oblige

 

[jayster]

Hi Sass,
That would be brilliant!
I've started a blog Polyfacet's Craft Plans | Developing download & print plans for masks that I hope explains about me and the business I'm trying to start.
I don't expect "something for nothing" and I'm happy to swap artwork / skills until my business is making enough to pay for marketing.

 

[Progster]

I'm a private language tutor. There's a great demand worldwide for language teachers, especially for the more widely spoken languages such German and English, which I teach. I don't do any advertising, but rely on word of mouth and recommendations. I mainly tutor online via Skype, so I can work with people all round the world, and work at home, which is another plus. I also do some proofreading for a consultancy agency and the occasional translation.

 

[AsheSkyler]

I adore Theresa Brown's Ezine series. I don't have her guts to draw in the middle of the mall, but she has a lot of good tips.

My grandparents built their business through word of mouth. They did a good job with their work, people were impressed, and referred customers.

Most of my work comes from eBay. I put out a listing for custom artwork, somebody likes my art and price, and they order something. Bit of a pill working with eBay's time limits, but it's better than nothing. Etsy is a beautifully cheap place to advertise through listings (like ten cents a month, plus the expected cut if you sell something). Etsy is better suited to you crafty people than us artsy people, so I'd like to hope you'd have some success there. Sometimes I experiment with classifieds and Project Wonderful, but it doesn't do me much good. I do have a newsletter that's basically nothing more than sending out coupon codes. I've got about twenty people on my mailing list after having it up for a year. Marketing ain't my thing either.

 

[jayster]

Thanks Ashe, I will have a read of Theresa Brown's series.
I had never thought of Ebay; I think I will have to sell on Etsy to start (because of some new, horrible European VAT laws).
I've got a few followers on Twitter and Facebook, and I am going to put a crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter.
I've tried Project Wonderful in the past, and google ads (back in the days when they were affordable) but never found them worthwhile.
Will like your facebook page

 

[AsheSkyler]

I saw something in passing on Kickstarter once where some refused to ship to Europe because of the VAT laws. I've only shipped once to Europe in the past two years, but I probably need to get familiar with them in case I ever have to ship there again. A bit afraid to read them though.

I'll gladly return the favor if you hage a page.

 

[jayster]

Eu law is not made to be understood. It's there to keep us all in our place and farmed for taxes and fines.
UK vat law used to say that you didn't have to get involved at all unless you had a turnover of more than 79k
That's still the case, unless you sell digital goods, then you have to pay the government of each country where the purchase was made, at their specific rate of VAT. I wouldn't worry, if I were you.
My Facebook is Polyfacet's Craft Plans | Facebook

 

[AsheSkyler]

Ship the digital goods on CD and sneakily email it interim. Problem solved.

At least, that's my plan to get around Paypal's disrespect toward digital goods. Haven't had my theory tested yet though.

 

[jayster]

It's ok if you email the file, it's only automated downloads that count. Complicated.

 

[wanderer03]

I've tried running my own business but I struggle to manage money so it ultimately failed. I'm glad to hear that there are some folks out there meeting with success! For extra money, I've signed up on freelance website but the amount of money I'm earning hardly counts as a business. It's just fun money.

 

[Mia]

When I ask are you self-employed, I'm particularly interested to know if anyone has a business where they do their own marketing?
I have an idea for an art / craft based business and I've got a lot of the groundwork done but now comes the part where I have to start getting publicity. It goes so against my nature to "big myself up" and I find the whole Social Media thing exhausting. It breaks me in a way that I can't explain.

I ran many years ago, my own graphic design studio. We all were artists of one sort or another, graphic designers, industrial designers, illustrators, fine artists.

Finding the 'niche' in the market that you are going to sell in, is one of your most important tasks to get your business off the ground. This is 'grass roots' marketing.

Find people who are doing or selling the exact same thing that you are, and look at their advertising, their customer base, their self-promotion and consider how and where they do what they do.

Ask yourself some questions: Who is my demographic? Who is my target customer?

Are they individuals, businesses? Are they people of a certain age? Groups?

After you ask who, and you can answer that question fully then ask:

Where are the customers who will buy what I have to sell?

Are they local? Are they on the net? Are there specific businesses that I can target?

If you have done these things already, then its promotion of your business that you need to do.
But, it has to be specific and targeted otherwise its a waste of energy to self-promote to everyone.

 

[Beverly]

Go over to this site: Entreprenette.com - Entrepreneur Advice - Entrepreneur Tips Ms. Shaw has a great free service called "Instantly Famous Products" it gets your products placed in TV commercials, TV shows and even movies and, it's free. You can't get better publicity than the camera and, stars being seen with your product, and it can be done for free.

Yes mostly as background props, but even those get noticed, and just maybe one of those will be exactly what is needed for a more prominent showing, then your name and company get in the credits and, well there you go, step one to literally putting your name in lights. (Not to mention royalties for every time a video that contains your product is shown publicly.)

If you make it into that area, get a lawyer before you get too far in with product placement, the fine print in contracts can really hurt your business if you aren't careful to get all you are entitled to spelled out BEFORE agreeing to do the placement (or job)

Also know that royalties are pennies per showing and may not sound like much but, those pennies add up over the lifetime of your trademark or copyright.

 

[jayster]

Thanks Mia and Beverly,
You've both given me some stuff to think about.
Mia - a list like that used to baffle me but now I think I can answer most of the list so I feel like I've made progress.
Beverly, I will take a look at that - one of the beauties of having a digital product is that I can gift them for marketing.