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Does artistic activity not have to seek profit?

To survive as an artist, financial support is essential. No matter how lofty your goals or dreams are, economic reality will always await you.
Relying solely on parents, friends, acquaintances, and students for artistic activities will soon reach its limits. In this suffocating environment, many people are motivated to create, but are also worried about the food they will need.

That requires a clear goal.

How many hundreds of people can attend a concert?
How many CDs will you sell?
How many books will you sell?

How many paintings will you sell?
How many pieces will you sell?
How many original goods will you sell?

A common mistake is to say number of units sold or monthly sales.
I understand that it would be reassuring to sell a lot, but that's not actually the case.

What really matters is profit.

Perhaps because there is still a continuing tendency in the arts industry to consider talking about money taboo, the industry as a whole faces a challenge in that it is not possible to create an environment in which people can generate profits and focus on creative activities.
How many artists are there who rely on their parents, their spouses, or meager income from events to barely scrape by to make ends meet?
Even if they know that it will cost them money, most of them create a venue to make their presentation in order to raise their profile and gradually build up a fan base.
Of course, such activities are very important, but there is more that we who work in the arts need to consider.

This means that artistic activities that cannot generate profits will only continue to decline.
Momentary sales at events and the like are just superficial numbers and should not be overly excited or upset about.

How to find your fans?

Some people may dislike the idea of linking artistic activity with business, but I believe that the artists who visit here are reading this because they want to make a living, so I will not hesitate to share my knowledge from a business perspective.

First of all, if you keep in mind that you want to make a profit, what is the first thing you should do? The answer is to attract customers.
In order to elevate artistic activity, which tends to be self-indulgent, into the business realm, backward thinking is required.
What is it?

Ultimately, "make a profit"

How do we achieve this?

"Make sales"

How do we achieve this?

"Having contact with customers"

How do we achieve this?

"Attract customers"

It's a simple concept, but it is the foundation for turning artistic activities into a business.
Without customers, your business won't survive.

So where can you find the strong fans who will support and encourage your artistic endeavors?

Are you training your sales skills to attract customers?
No no...do you think it's shameful for an artist to do that?
Most companies have a sales department. Human resources, general affairs, accounting, and legal affairs are all necessary, but the one department that is indispensable is the sales department.
So, as artists, we have to continue working on our own, or by working with people with sales skills, in order to attract audiences.
The reality is that without customers, there is no business.

Sales is an essential business activity for finding your fans.

② Sales

Why do customers come without attracting them?

To begin with, artists often come from wealthy families. In that case, parents have a lot of influence, a wide range of friends, and work hard to gather people for their daughter or son. People who grow up in such an environment tend not to do their own marketing.

Because I grew up believing that someone else would do the sales activities for me without me having to say anything, I never had the chance to hone the most important skill of sales and attracting customers.

It's a blessing that customers come to their shows even when they don't do anything, but some artists never had the opportunity to hone their sales skills, and so they never even think about the need to sell themselves even as adults.

This leads to becoming a risky artist with no salesmanship and a life dependent on others.
The world is changing rapidly with the advent of AI and other things, so we are quickly approaching an era in which it will be very difficult to survive no matter how talented an artist you are, unless you at least acquire sales skills.

Realize that the reason customers have been coming to your business naturally up until now is not only due to your own efforts, but also due to the enormous influence of your close relatives.
Once you realize this, you'll want to be grateful for all the support your parents have given you and your friends and students have given you, and work to further improve your sales skills.

summary

I explained that in order to naturally gather fans, it is important to think backwards and attract customers.
Developing your own unique methods of attracting customers is an important economic skill that will support your artistic endeavors.

Think carefully about how to attract customers and put it into practice repeatedly. Attracting customers is the foundation for building a fanbase, so be sure to incorporate this way of thinking into your business to hone your sales skills and increase your ability to attract customers.

Next article ➡ The most important issue for an artist is 〇〇.

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