Many artists and crafters are learning that to really succeed at your hobby as a business you need to market your crafts well.

Marketing involves engaging your customers in a relationship that builds trust and friendship.  It is easiest and most cost efficient to maintain this relationship using the resources that the internet provides us.  For instance online stores, web sites, e-mail marketing, and more.

Selling crafts online gives customers who want to buy but don’t have the money right now another place to buy when they are ready.  Include a coupon and link to your online store or website on your business card and give it to every customer who enters your craft show booth.  Let customers know if they visit your online store and enter the coupon code they will receive a discount.

With more crafters than ever looking to sell crafts online more and more places to sell crafts are popping up all over the internet.  I’ve created a page to help you sell your crafts online.  http://www.extravaganzacrafts.com/index.php?pr=SellCraftsOnline

Please comment below and let us know if you’ve used any of these sites and how you felt about your success with them.  Also please include the price range of your arts or crafts, and what you sell, if you sell crafts online feel free to include a link to your online store so we can take a look.

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I received an email the other day from Give to Get Marketing expert, Joe Gracia, that shows how Mullen’s Ice Cream Shop uses their business card to do double duty.

The business card contains the business contact information including name and phone number, but also includes an offer to the business’s customers.

The business card functions as a coupon for $1.00 off purchases of $6.00 or more, $2.00 off purchases of $12.00 or more, $3.00 off purchases of $18.00 or more, or 2 scoops for the price of one.  They easily fit all this information on one side of a business card.

There are several ways this concept could be adapted to any business, but I immediately thought of art and craft festival vendors.

Different craft vendors can use different offers.

For instance lower priced jewelry might use an offer very similar to Mullen’s offer above with just a small increase in savings for a slightly larger purchase.  Instead of two scoops for the price of one you could use get a free pair of earrings valued at $x.xx with every necklace valued at $xx.xx purchased.  For higher priced items like fine art or furniture you might want to increase the size of the discount (or use a % off offer) and purchase to fit more with your items.

The idea is to encourage a customer purchasing one item at craft festivals to purchase an additional item or complimentary item as they will receive a larger discount or savings the more they purchase.

Other offers that could be used on a business card include:

• $x.xx off offers
• x % off offers
• buy x get x -1/2 off and other similar offers
• buy x get x free

The back of the card should have a picture of your best seller and say, “Bring this card and a friend to any show and receive xx offer.  See our website for current show schedule.”  It should then list your website address.  NOTE:  Your website should tell what shows you will be attending, have other places they can purchase your items (such as galleries, specialty shops, etc.), and have pieces for sale.  By including a coupon code beneath each offer on the front they could use the coupon on their online order to encourage larger online sales.

HOW TO ATTRACT CUSTOMERS LIKE A MAGNET
Marketing is all about ‘helping people get what they want.’ Simply do that and you’ll have all the customers and sales you’ll ever need. Learn this simple formula and your business will begin to grow instantly. For more information, visit:  Give to Get Marketing

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Hand Painted Wooden Business Card Holder and Display

Prominently displayed business cards of the artists or crafter are necessary in every show booth. They are collected by customers to share with friends and perhaps purchase in the future, by retailers to get in touch with the artist about a wholesale deal, and by fellow crafters to include in group and team mailing lists and promotional materials. Displaying cards in an attractive, unique, hopefully handmade way can add to the esteem of the artist and character of the booth display.

A handmade wood business card holder by Hare and Drum is a versatile piece. It may very well be the only business card holder one will ever need. When closed, it’s a small case to carry around. When open, it’s a card display for the desk or show. The varnished surface will not get dirty easily and can be wiped with a damp cloth. Bold and chic, it’s sure to attract attention and be a conversation starter, helping its owner promote his or her business. It will also last longer than any fabric card holder.

The wood holder is roomy enough for many cards. It fits about 20 standard size (3.5 by 2 inches) business cards. It stays closed when needed and open when needed without any hardware.

Hare and Drum uses various techniques to decorate her holders. They are hand painted, decoupaged with original collages, stained, stamped, and varnished. They are lightweight, shapely, and great to hold in the hand. Each is a one of a kind or very limited edition, handmade piece.

The entire collection of Hare and Drum’s business card holders can be found on Etsy at http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5670064&section_id=6326281

P.S. I’m not affiliated with Hare and Drum in any way. Just helping the economy recover by helping one artist or crafter at a time.

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by Shasta McLaughlin

The Extravaganza Craft Productions

copyright 2009

I’ve told you the things I did on My 30 Day Plan to Greater Profitability and I promised that I would let you know some things you can do to increase the profits your art or craft show business receives.

1.  Draw a marketing map that shows how the people you meet at craft shows are going to move from cold contacts, to warm prospects, to hot buyers.  Include on your marketing map all of your sales tools including your craft show booth, your fliers, business cards, website, blog, social networking, advertising, and more.

2.  Make sure each sales tool mentioned above (and any others you use) moves your customer through a process that leads to them buying your art or craft.

3.  Get a website.  Click here for easy instructions on how to build a website.

4.  Get your website search engine optimized.

5.  Arrange to take credit cards.

6.  Offer a payment plan.

7.  Get email marketing (auto-responders).  See my post on following up with your customers by clicking here.

8.  Create emails for your current customers.  Remember to follow the Can-Am Act for email.  Send your customers useful relevant information.  You want this to help your business reputation not hurt it.

9. Create emails for your warm prospects.

10. Create emails for your cold contacts.

11.  Sign up your customers to the proper groups above.   Ask permission before signing up people for your emails.

12.  Check if your business cards, fliers, etc. look professional and are updated.  Be certain they have current contact information.  Make sure they mention your website if you have one.

13.  Collect names, addresses, phone numbers, and email addresses of the people who are interested in your product.  Ask if they would like to be signed up for your emails.

14.  Sign up for Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, Fast Pitch Networking or many others.  Let your customers and prospects know they can follow you there.  Post regularly.

15. Create a blog.  Post regularly.  Mention your social networking sites and your website often.

16.  Make sure your posts to your blog automatically post to your social networking sites.

17.  Pick up the phone and call a customer that you haven’t heard from in a while.  Renew your relationship with them.  Tell them the news from your business.  Offer to send them free information or ask if they would like to sign up for your newsletters.

18.  Send an email to customers that haven’t bought in a while.  Renew your relationship with them.

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by Shasta McLaughlin

The Extravaganza Craft Productions

copyright 2009

Recently I’ve been working to make my business more profitable each and every day. Today it occurred to me that I should share with you how I plan to do that.

Week one I worked on catching up on left over unfinished projects from previous weeks to prepare for my 30 days of greater profitability. As usual I accomplished some of the things I intended to do, did some things I planned to do later early, and didn’t accomplish some of the plan.

Week two I learned new things about my email marketing to keep my messages from being flagged as spam.  I joined a networking site I’ve been meaning to join for months when they ran a special I couldn’t pass up.  I did a client consultation which was a new service for me.  I blogged about what I was doing and I did all this while keeping up with requests for information about my business.

Week three I mailed coupons to show promoters, had  a second client consultation, worked on facebook profile and group pages.  I created a profile on Fast Pitch Networking and added a few contacts there.  I worked on cleaning out my email box, and signed up for a MySpace account, and I blogged about what I had done to make my business more profitable this week.

Week 4 what I had a new member join my Linked in account and contacted her right away with other places she could get more informaiton.bbI found my friend that was already on MySpace and reconnected with her. I created an email I can send to all my customers and prospects reminding them that they can follow me on my blog, facebook, twitter, MySpace,  and Linked in.  I still need to finish formatting it and send it to everyone.   I remembered to tell a client over the phone that they could follow me all these places. I also worked on creating my profile on Fast Pitch Networking and added a few contacts there. I blogged about my experience working toward greater profitability this week.

This last week while checking my email and cleaning out my inbox I made a horrible mistake and downloaded a malicious file. I spent the whole last week trying to back up my files so I can reformat my computer. I didn’t accomplish many of my goals except blogging about this weeks experience.

What I learned over this 30 days is that although I didn’t always accomplish everything I set out to do by having a goal every day and working toward it I did improve my business. I am confident that my business will be more profitable in the future because of the efforts that I made this month.

Next time I will blog about the many things you can include on your 30 day Plan to Greater Profitablility.
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by Shasta McLaughlin

The Extravaganza Craft Productions

copyright 2009

Recently I’ve been working to make my business more profitable each and every day. Today it occurred to me that I should share with you how I plan to do that.

Week one I worked on catching up on left over unfinished projects from previous weeks to prepare for my 30 days of greater profitability. As usual I accomplished some of the things I intended to do, did some things I planned to do later early, and didn’t accomplish some of the plan.

Week two I learned new things about my email marketing to keep my messages from being flagged as spam.  I joined a networking site I’ve been meaning to join for months when they ran a special I couldn’t pass up.  I did a client consultation which was a new service for me.  I blogged about what I was doing and I did all this while keeping up with requests for information about my business.

Week three I mailed coupons to show promoters, had  a second client consultation, worked on facebook profile and group pages.  I created a profile on Fast Pitch Networking and added a few contacts there.  I worked on cleaning out my email box, and signed up for a MySpace account, and I blogged about what I had done to make my business more profitable this week.

Week 4 what I accomplished.

• Power Pay contacted me but then never got back to me.  I guess I still need to call them next week.
• I remembered that I had a Linked in account and had a new member join there.
• I found my friend that was already on MySpace and reconnected with her.
• I created an email I can send to all my customers and prospects reminding them that they can follow me on my blog, facebook, twitter, MySpace,  and Linked in.  I need to finish formatting it and send it to everyone.   I remembered to tell a client over the phone that they could follow me all these places.
• Worked on creating my profile on Fast Pitch Networking.  Added a few contacts there.
• Worked on cleaning out my overly full email box which got even fuller despite my efforts.
• I  blogged about my experience working toward greater profitability this week.

Here is what I didn’t accomplish.

• I still didn’t get my accounting done.
• I didn’t call the people I just mailed free newsletters to in the last few weeks to ask them what they thought of the newsletter.  It is probably too late but I will try to fit this into next week anyway.  Call your prospects right away they are only interested about 7 days!
• I didn’t create any articles to send to show promoters that will encourage them to list their shows with me.
• Since I didn’t write the articles I also didn’t start calling my huge list of show promoters.  Obviously I didn’t sign them up in my email marketing system.
• I didn’t get the article written for my newsletter although I have some very good ideas to write about.

I hope that this series is inspiring you to work along with me to improve your businesses profitability by doing something each day that will make your business stronger. I know that I’m a bad example but I would really suggest that you write your goals down on a calendar.  This way you can truly see what you did accomplish and will remember what you didn’t get done so you can work on it in your spare time or in your next 30 day plan.

The plan for the next 8 days:

Day 24 -Write and send a quick email to all my customers from the past asking them how their businesses are doing?  Tell them how my business is doing and showing them where they can get more information from my business.  Sort of bring them back to take another look at my business.

Day 25-Write the article for my newsletter.

Day 26-Finish writing my book.

Day 27-Clean out my email box.

Day 28-Do my accounting

Day 29-Create articles to send to show promoters who haven’t listed with me yet.

Day 30-Call show promoters and ask them if I can send them free articles.

Day 31-Blog about my 30 days to Greater Profitability for my art and craft show business.

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by Shasta McLaughlin

The Extravaganza Craft Productions

copyright 2009

Recently I’ve been working to make my business more profitable each and every day. Today it occurred to me that I should share with you how I plan to do that.

Week one I worked on catching up on left over unfinished projects from previous weeks to prepare for my 30 days of greater profitability. As usual I accomplished some of the things I intended to do, did some things I planned to do later early, and didn’t accomplish some of the plan.

Week two I learned new things about my email marketing to keep my messages from being flagged as spam.  I joined a networking site I’ve been meaning to join for months when they ran a special I couldn’t pass up.  I did a client consultation which was a new service for me.  I blogged about what I was doing and I did all this while keeping up with requests for information about my business.

This week I got less accomplished than I had intended but what I did do I feel good about.

Week 3 what I accomplished.

• I did mail  my coupons to show promoters.
• I had a  second client consultation.
• I learned something new about my facebook profile and group page.  Added links to my group from my profile page.
• Worked on creating my profile on Fast Pitch Networking.  Added a few contacts there.
• Worked on cleaning out my overly full email box.
• Signed up for a MySpace account.  You can follow our posts at http://www.myspace.com/extravaganzacrafts.
• I  blogged about my experience working toward greater profitability this week.

Here is what I didn’t accomplish.

• I still didn’t get my accounting done.
• I didn’t call the people I just mailed free newsletters to in the last few weeks to ask them what they thought of the newsletter.  It is probably too late but I will try to fit this into next week anyway.  Call your prospects right away they are only interested about 7 days!
• I didn’t create any articles to send to show promoters that will encourage them to list their shows with me.
• Since I didn’t write the articles I also didn’t start calling my huge list of show promoters.  Obviously I didn’t sign them up in my email marketing system.
• I didn’t contact Power Pay and get signed up to accept credit cards.

I hope that this series is inspiring you to work along with me to improve your businesses profitability by doing something each day that will make your business stronger. I know that I’m a bad example but I would really suggest that you write your goals down on a calendar.  This way you can truly see what you did accomplish and will remember what you didn’t get done so you can work on it in your spare time or in your next 30 day plan.

The plan for the next 7 days:

Day 16 -Call the people I sent newsletters to.  Ask them if they would like to receive free articles.  Sign them up as prospects.

Day 17 -Create articles for show promoters.

Day 18 -Call show promoters and ask them if they would like to receive free articles to make their businesses more profitable.

Day 19 -Call Power Pay and get set up to accept credit cards.

Day 20 -Find my friends who are already on MySpace and try to connect with them.

Day 21 -Do my accounting!

Day 22 -Write article for my newsletter.

Day 23 -Blog about my accomplishments this week.

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by Shasta McLaughlin

The Extravaganza Craft Productions

copyright 2009

Recently I’ve been working to make my business more profitable each and every day. Today it occurred to me that I should share with you how I plan to do that.

Well last week I worked on catching up on left over unfinished projects from previous weeks to prepare for my 30 days of greater profitability. As usual I accomplished some of the things I intended to do, did some things I planned to do later early, and didn’t accomplish some of the plan.

Here is what I did accomplish.

• I kept up with incoming orders and new requests for information while getting my kids ready to go back to school.
• I published my monthly newsletter that I try to accomplish the last week of the month (although it won’t be due out until the next week).
• I learned something new about my email marketing that will keep my messages from being flagged as SPAM as often.
• I worked with a new client doing a phone consultation on building their website (this is a new service I offer).
• I  blogged about my experience working toward greater profitability this week.
• I joined Fast Pitch Networking (www.fastpitchnetworking.com) which was planned to come later in the 30 day plan.  Hey they had a good “sale” going where it is only $4/month for a year, I couldn’t pass it up.  If you join Fast Pitch Networking look me up.

Here is what I didn’t accomplish.

• I really didn’t get my goals written down on a calendar although I do have them planned out in my head.
• I didn’t get my accounting done and it has been falling behind a few months now.
• I didn’t get my office really clean (instead I worked on my daughters room and it is greatly improved).

I hope that this series is inspiring you to work along with me to improve your businesses profitability by doing something each day that will make your business stronger. I know that I’m a bad example but I would really suggest that you write your goals down on a calendar.  This way you can truly see what you did accomplish and will remember what you didn’t get done so you can work on it in your spare time or in your next 30 day plan.

The plan for the next 7 days:

Day 8 -Get my coupons sent out that I mail to show promoters each month.

Day 9 -Call the people I just mailed free newsletters to in the last few weeks.  Ask them what they thought of the newsletter and if I can sign them up for a free report and to receive further information from my company.  Sign them up as prospects in my email marketing system if they say yes.

Day 10 -Do my accounting.

Day 11 -Create a few articles to send to show promoters that will encourage them to list their shows with me.

Day 12 -Start calling my huge list of show promoters and ask them if I can send them free articles that will help make their businesses more profitable as well as articles that will make their vendors businesses more profitable.  Sign them up in my email marketing system.

Day 13 -Continue calling my list of show promoters and sign them up for the articles in my email marketing system.

Day 14 -Contact PowerPay about getting a system in place to be able to accept credit cards.

Day 15 -Continue getting PowerPay set up and blog about my experiences this week.

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by Shasta McLaughlin
The Extravaganza Craft Productions
copyright 2009

Recently I’ve been working to make my business more profitable each and every day. Today it occurred to me that I should share with you how I plan to do that.

Day 1-Set a goal to do something to make my business more profitable each day for 1 month.
Day 2-Make a plan. Get out a calendar and write down the goal for each day until calendar contains one goal for each day. Make each goal one that can be accomplished in a time frame of 1 day to 1 week.
Day 3-Finish writing down goals on calendar. Breaking larger goals down into step by step goals if necessary.
Day 4-Clean office so I can find everything I need to accomplish goals.
Day 5-Do projects I’ve been putting off for the past month or so especially accounting.
Day 6-Finish projects I’ve been putting off for last month.
day 7-Blog about my experiences this week.

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Set a goal for your art or craft business, then set a reasonable amount of time to accomplish that goal in.  Working on it a little bit every day makes it nearly impossible not to accomplish it eventually.

Goals that you might need to work on to improve your handcrafted business:

1. Learn to know my customers and market better.
2. Improve the customer service my customer receives.
3. Sell more at shows-become a better salesman.
4. Follow up more with customers-collect contact information and follow up respectfully.
5. Improve marketing plan or pieces.
6. Build a website.
7. Promote my “handcrafted” website.
8. Automate more of the sales process.
9. Make my business paperwork including business cards, fliers, brochures, catalogs, invoices, etc. more consistent to build brand awareness.
10. Make sure all my business paperwork has correct information on it including business name, contact name, complete mailing address, phone, website, and email.
11. Improve my displays.
12. Find new places to sell my arts and crafts including gift shops, galleries, specialty shops, and handcrafters boutiques, etc.
13. Improve my online sales.
14. Improve my offline sales.
15. Improve my accounting techniques.
16. Improve profits-set correct prices or cut costs.
17. Organize my workshop, studio or store for a better customer experience and better efficiency.

Setting a goal for your art or craft business  is like climbing a pyramid you can’t do it in one giant step.  Instead break it down into smaller steps.  Promise yourself to at least try and do one  smaller step a day.  Don’t beat yourself up if you don’t, instead try to go on the next day and celebrate the days you accomplish more than one step.

Work on one of your business goals at a time until you get really good at doing it consistently.  When you are really good at reaching your current goal add another goal without dropping the first one.

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