Yes, you can make a profit while maintaining your creative integrity
If you’re creating art that people are buying, you’re in an amazing position. You’re doing what you love and other people love it enough to pay you for it. And you’re creating beauty in the world.
We love creative businesses, but we also see a similar concern among creative business owners.
In the artistic world, money is often equated with selling out. With becoming a fatcat, Wall Street bro–a LamboBro, or Lamborghini-owning big shot.
Profits get viewed as the enemy of creative autonomy, and the focus becomes solely on creating, less on having a sustainable business model. Much thinking revolves around the artistic pursuit being the reward, with the money being secondary.
Add to that, to sell your artwork you have to be a bit of a sales person. It can feel gross to “sell” something that you’ve poured your creative energies into. Meanwhile, making a profit means you have to do other things, like creating spreadsheets, marketing yourself and reconciling books–not the stuff of artistic dreams.
You want to focus on being creative, not on managing cash-flow, marketing, and sales.
If you’re a working artist, you need to earn money from your business. After all, your business has expenses. And, to continue to operate you have to cover your business and personal expenses. Making a profit means you can stay in business doing what you love longer.
“Making a profit means you can stay in business doing what you love longer “
Creativity and profitability aren’t exclusive from each other. You can make money while following your passion and maintaining your integrity. In fact, you have every right to embrace profitability earned from your creativity–and you should.
And, by using Profit First you don’t even have to use spreadsheets! But we’ll get into that later.
Why you need to make a profit?
Businesses need money to stay alive!
Every business, even a creative one, has operating expenses. Unless you have money coming in from somewhere else–grants, a generous benefactor, lottery winnings–you need to earn money to cover those expenses.
Meanwhile, you have to earn enough money to cover your living expenses. And again, unless you have money coming in from elsewhere or are independently wealthy, you’ll need to find a way to earn money from your creative business.
Otherwise, you’re stuck working a 9-5 job and only following your creative dreams outside your regular work hours. Or you’re stuck working a night job so you can fund your dreams.
Though it may seem counterintuitive, profits give you the freedom to create more art. Earning a profit from your artwork gives you the financial freedom to spend the time you need creating your art.
Revenue can empower you rather than holding you back.
You deserve to achieve your financial goals
Being a creative person doesn’t make you any less deserving of reaching your financial goals, living the lifestyle you dream of, and having money set aside for your retirement. Just as with anyone else, it’s important that you prioritize your financial needs.
You do that by embracing profitability and charging for your artwork.
Consider also that just like anyone in any other career, your time, energy, skills, and creativity are deserving of financial compensation.
Just because you’re artistic doesn’t mean you don’t deserve to be compensated for what you do–regardless of how many people out there try to convince you to work for exposure, or work for free to gain experience. Your artwork has value, just as your time, energy, and creativity do.
Grants and endowments aren’t generally sustainable
Relying on other organizations for funding puts them in control of how much you produce. If their funding dries up, if they switch priorities, or if you want to explore other creative pursuits that take you outside their eligibility requirements, you could quickly find yourself without vital financial resources.
Finding a market and developing a business model is much more sustainable in the long-run because it puts you in control of your future.
Ways to encourage profits without feeling salesy
Deserving to earn a living from your artistic pursuits doesn’t make talking about money any easier. If financial discussions feel too sales-focused for you, it will be difficult to talk to people about paying you for your creativity.
There are ways that you can still feel like yourself without losing your identity in sales.
- Reframe sales
Often, sales conversations can feel as like you’re asking people for their money, instead of offering them something amazing that could be a great fit for them and change their lives. Consider reframing how you view selling. You’re not begging for money–you’re giving them something of value in exchange for their money. Your creativity is adding beauty, worth, and meaning to their life.
Instead of focusing on making a sale, focus on understanding them, and recommending the best options that address their needs and wants.
If reframing sales doesn’t work for you, that makes sense. It can be difficult to sell something so personal as creative work. In this case, see if you have the ability to hire a salesperson, who might not be as personally invested in the artwork and is more comfortable talking with clients. You might also focus on shifting your mindset around sales and what success or failure around sales means for your self-worth. It’s possible to completely change how you thinking about money and sales and how you view yourself if you put in the time and effort.
- Use technology
These days, it’s incredibly easy to open an online store and sell your products. You don’t have to trudge around from store to store (or gallery to gallery) trying to convince retailers that your products should be stocked. You can if you want to–just as you can still attend local markets.
But, you can also use technology to sell for you.
Build your following and develop relationships by interacting with people on social media. Encourage those followers to visit your website to look at your work and purchase your wares. Those that know and like you will spread the word about you, and soon you’ll find your community growing.
- Partner and collaborate
Creative business owners don’t have to work alone. In fact, a great way to encourage profits is to collaborate with other businesses.
- Writers can collaborate with graphic designers to help clients with a full range of services.
- Interior designers can hire architects (and vice versa) for projects.
- Design students can partner with contractors to create livable spaces.
- Artists can partner with interior decorators to provide curated art pieces for client spaces.
Find people who work in complementary businesses that would offer additional value for your clients and develop mutually beneficial partnerships.
- Teach or create paid educational content
If you love teaching others what you know you can increase your revenue by either teaching or creating paid content around your expertise. Ebooks, online courses, workshops, and downloads are all great ways to earn more money in a scalable way.
- Make your money go further
Regardless of how much money you make, you need to make sure it’s working for you. That’s why we love Profit First. It’s an easy-to-follow system for managing the money you work so hard to earn. Profit First focuses on your sustainable revenue and gives you a process for ensuring you have enough money set aside to continue running your creative business.
You can be permanently profitable without using spreadsheets. And you can make sure you’re covered through retirement.
Final thoughts
Being creative doesn’t mean you’re a non-profit. You can be creative and earn a living doing what you love, you just may have to shift your mindset a bit. In the end, if embracing profitability means you can spend your days being creative and running a business you truly enjoy and find meaningful, isn’t that worth it?
Contact us for a free, no-obligation consultation call to discuss how we can help you be more profitable.