Successful Art Business, Planning and Marketing Tools and Techniques You Can Use

The other day I received a phone call from a number I did not recognize – where did all these extra digits come from? The woman on the phone asked if I used Photoshop for my photography business.

Her company was offering a service where I could upload my digital images, have them processed or manipulated and they would be ready for me the next day to download. She offered to let me try their service for free. I explained to her that when I need to use Photoshop I send my images to my local graphic designer.

The caller ID number was starting to bug me. What was it with all of those extra digits – maybe some kind of new internet phone service? The woman spoke great English but I could tell it was not your basic midwestern accent. I had to ask, “Where are you calling me from?” She responded, “I am calling from Switzerland and my company is based in Germany, may I send you some information?”

Read the complete article here on cobizmag.com :  How To Grow Our Creative Economy

___ Cool Study - To turn the pages move cursor to upper corners.

As was mentioned in the first part of this article Business Plan Basics SWOT (Part I) – Strengths & Weaknesses, a basic part creating your business and marketing plan is conducting what is called a SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) analysis.  The second part of conducting a SWOT analysis is doing an inventory of the opportunities and threats facing your creative business.

As we did with analyzing Strengths and Weaknesses the first place to start by taking a piece of paper and draw a vertical line so you have two columns – one labeled Opportunities and the other labeled Threats, you can take it even further by adding a third column labeled Neither or Neutral.

When we looked at our strengths and weaknesses we were analyzing factors that were internal to our creative business – opportunities and threats are factors that are external to our business.  Typically these are called “environmental” factors – not necessarily the green kind but this type is becoming increasingly important.

Why do I need to look at Opportunities and Threats?

Read more

There is a lot of buzz right now about how the US is in a creative crisis.  According to the recent  Newsweek article The Creativity Crisis  – “Kim(Kyung-Hee Kim) found creativity scores had been steadily rising, just like IQ scores, until 1990. Since then, creativity scores have consistently inched downward. “It’s very clear, and the decrease is very significant,” Kim says.”"

Charlie Rose also had a segment on Creativity which featured Ashley Merryman who co-authored the Newsweek article as well as a couple of other creative guests.  I suggest you check out both the Newsweek article and Charlie Rose video – very interesting!

Even businesses are getting into the act as a result of the poor economy and the uncertain future.  In the recent study conducted by IBM –  ”2010 Global CEO Study: Creativity Selected as Most Crucial Factor for Future Success” executives cited creativity as the key to success – “More than 60 percent of CEOs believe industry transformation is the top factor contributing to uncertainty, and the finding indicates a need to discover innovative ways of managing an organization’s structure, finances, people and strategy.”

Clearly this is a broad application of “creativity”.  The world has changed and what worked in the past may not work now.  It will be interesting to see how businesses try to nurture and implement creativity into their organizations.

Some ideas on developing and harnessing creativity:

Read more

You can help them — and they can help you

In the first article I discussed how the creative sector is the fifth-largest sector of the Colorado economy, directly employing over 122,000 people-plus another 75,000 supporting these creative enterprises. This puts it slightly behind biotechnology/biomedical, IT and telecommunications and larger than defense/security, agribusiness, food processing and technology in terms of employment according to a recent study by the Colorado Council on the Arts.

So what is the creative sector? The study described Colorado’s creative enterprises as: “The creative enterprises include nonprofit cultural institutions, commercial businesses that are producing and distributing products in which the creative content defines their market position, and, finally, the thousands of individuals who are self-employed.” Broadly speaking the creative sector includes businesses and occupations in the design, film & media, heritage, literary and publishing, performing arts and visual arts & crafts fields. Read more

The creative sector of Colorado’s economy is the 900-pound gorilla that few have really noticed until now. According to a new study by the Colorado Council on the Arts, this sector is the fifth-largest of the Colorado economy, directly employing more than 122,000 people – plus another 75,000 supporting these creative enterprises.

The true story of the impact of the creative economy is not just shown in the direct employment figures, however. There is a multiplier effect, where each creative enterprise job contributes to additional jobs and revenues for other firms-like yours. If you own a restaurant or other business near an arts district, you are directly benefiting from the traffic generated by the creative sector. For some Colorado towns, like Creede, the arts community is vital for the area’s survival. Read more