Managing your time can be tricky! So much to do when you work for yourself … so much to juggle.
We all work in very different ways. Some people use apps, some swear by paper and pen, some plan their days hour by hour others simply wing it. On the back of this and with the publication of our diary planners, we asked three busy creatives: ‘How do you manage your time?’ and ‘What are your favourite planning tools?
Sue says:“My background is firmly rooted in the crafts, having started my journey into ceramics at a small pottery in Lincolnshire in the mid 1980’s. Learning the skills of production throwing; sometimes digging the clay, then wedging and weighing the clay to throw to all the same size and shape. I found the challenge of this precision absorbing and the repetitive nature satisfying. I’m sure it was this early interest into repetitive forms that sparked an interest in volume production and the need to have everything the same.
I’ve worked both as an in-house designer and as a freelance designer for over 20 years for retailers and manufacturers and I still use the skills I learnt in my first job and prefer to work directly with materials, making the initial prototypes, so that I can naturally adapt the forms as the shapes are being made.
I’m inspired by the everyday and the ordinary.”
I love planning.
I remember our business tutor when I was studying my degree saying that the3 P’s were an important platform for any business:Preparation, preparation, preparation!
And the other admonition, originally from Benjamin Franklin I think “Fail to Prepare and Prepare to Fail!”
They’ve always stuck with me.
I don’t always stick by this – I can be disorganised and forgetful too – but I’m aware that preparation and planning is key to getting things to run smoothly as well as routine.
I make lists, I have a book to jot down EVERYTHING … and the girls who help me in the studio also have a book each, to jot down exactly what they’ve made, fettled, how much the clay weighs that day, how long the casting time is.
This way we can all keep track of what’s going on, and when and if someone else has to pick up the threads of a job, then we don’t have to start from scratch as the basis is already there, and I know also how long it takes in reality to make something.
I have office time everyday, as well as time put aside for social media, and then a kind of whole office day a week. It’s never quite long enough, to follow up emails and invoicing etc.”
Sue Pryke Tableware Collection. Photo Credit: Yeshen
How I manage my time …
“My day starts with an early walk with the dog or a run, I mean 6.30ish. This helps to clear my head and prioritise, and has to be this early to allow up to an hour for office and social media catch up before I get to the workshop at 9am.
I take an hour out on a Monday morning to go to yoga too and I make sure I am out of the workshop on time for at least 3 days a week by sticking to my exercise classes or running club sessions so that I have to finish on time!
I don’t have any time saving app, but I have a good clear calendar to jot important events down in as well as The Design Trust’s yearly planner as I think this is a good combination of the 3Ps, a daily planner and a calendar as well as business advice. Perfect!’
Jessica says: ‘I am an illustrator and surface pattern designer based in Whitby, North Yorkshire.
My business is made up of 3 strands: wholesale, freelance designing and selling direct to customers via Etsy, Not on the High Street and retail events.
My work is illustrative, colourful and unique and I have applied it to a wide range of products including greeting cards, tea towels, coasters and wallpaper. I have collaborated with lots of companies on a freelance basis including Comme des Garcons, The Wall Street Journal, The RNLI and The British Museum.
My favourite planning tools
“To organise myself I use Google Keep for lists – for both personal and professional things.
I found it hard having a long list of things I was trying to remember being mixed up, such as accounts info being in the same list as booking a dentist appointment! With Google Keep everything I need to remember is in one place, in its own list depending on the topic and can be updated on the move. I am logged in on my computer at work and my phone, so I can add to it wherever I am!
For day-to-day tasks at work I write reminders on a weekly planner that sits right in front of me. Things crop up during the day that I want to do, or if I have an order arriving from a printer this is where I pop this info. I tend to write a few jobs down for various points of the week on a Monday and add to it as I go along.
I flag emails I want to remember but then put them in a folder as I don’t want them clogging up my immediate inbox – this has helped me feel more at ease about my full email account. The flagging ensures I won’t forget and I check in on them every few days to reply to some.
My diary is my absolute saviour day-to-day. My life is pretty hectic so this goes everywhere with me.”
Jessica Hogarth Illustrative Work
How I manage my time …
“I do find it difficult to switch off from admin – I am very organised so I find it difficult to design sometimes when I know there is paperwork to be done. At the moment we are incredibly busy so I am doing admin all morning and then usually getting 3 or 4 hours to design in the afternoon.
When it gets really busy (with Christmas when I am doing local events) then my Mum (who works for me) is in most days too! This Christmas I took a long holiday as I needed it.
I always get run down at this time of year so I made a plan in September and gave myself a few key design deadlines to work to. I have just about managed to stick to them so this is definitely the most organised I have been for new product launch in January. I spent much of the summer working only 3 or 4 days a week due to one thing and another so really focusing and making the most of my working week has helped me to achieve this.”
Niki says: “I’m an illustrator for fashion, beauty and travel brands and create hand drawn artwork for packaging and social media. I also illustrate live at events and sell prints of my paintings in my online shop.
I’ve been freelance for 10 years. When I think back to those early years, I remember trying to stick to some sort of structure as that was all that I’d known before in my job as a commercial fashion designer.
How I manage my time …
My biggest piece of advice, rather than downloading a great app or reading an epic time management book, is to work out what kind of worker you are and play to your strengths and weaknesses.
I’m naturally really organised and focused, and I don’t have a family life to juggle, so actually I don’t need an online calendar with unnecessary reminder notifications.
My deadlines are in my head, I know how long things will take and I’m realistic with my time.
However my weakness is that I’ll always prefer to spend time on creative work rather than admin. So to deal with that I now I do my admin in a different place to my creative work.I’m not allowed even one pen there, it’s my desktop computer, my scanner and my files.
There’s so much advice out there, so just make sure you’re trying things that suit you, it’s not one size fits all.”
Accessorize Window Display with Illustrations by Niki GroomIf you found this article helpful, please Pin it and share it!
How do you manage your time? Do you plan your days out or work adhoc? Are you an app user or a stationery addict? We would love to hear from you in the comments below.
Marketing and selling are crucial parts of your business if you want to be successful. But it can be difficult sometimes to know what really works, and to keep inspiring yourself with creatives ways to promote and sell.
To inspire other creatives we asked four successful designer makers to finish the question: “What really works to get more sales in my craft business is ….”
This is a really inspiring post! Enjoy.
Rhian Malin – Ceramicist
Rhian says: “I make thrown porcelain vessels with hand-painted cobalt blue decoration. I have been a ceramicist for just over 5 years, to be honest muddling my way through the world of sales and marketing along the way (Who knew there were so many other jobs you needed to be good at to be a potter eh!?).
What really helped to get more sales in my craft business …
I have a lovely PDF price list which has photographs of all of my products with prices and sizes which makes it nice and easy for people to choose what they would like to order.
My online shop on my website gets restocked 2 – 3 times a year, which is a great opportunity to reach out to customers all over the world (mainly customers who follow me on Instagram).
I hold a open studio event twice each year at my studio in Warwickshire – once in the summer and once before Christmas.
I have between 10-15 galleries up and down the UK that stock my work throughout the year which have been fabulous at getting my work out into the world.
I exhibit at a select number of craft fairs a year, aiming for quality not quantity, and often opt for ceramic-focused shows rather than mixed. I’ve exhibited at Ceramic Art London, Art in Clay Hatfield and Made London Marylebone. My display stand is very simple – just three levels of veneered wood, which then gives me a blank canvas to make arrangements of my vessels to give prospective customers an idea of what works well together, and I always finish off my stand with a few flowers.
My last tip is that everything I’ve mentioned above for helping me with my sales (social media, online shop, a price list, getting selected for quality shows and exhibiting in great galleries) all require brilliant photos!
I use a professional photographer, Yeshen Venema,once a year to photograph my work.I think it’s one of the best investments I make every year as I’m sure quality images help me get noticed.’
Emma Barnes – Wild Fawn Jewellery
‘Emma says: “I hand make and sell sterling silver and gold jewellery online and in over 50 boutiques in Europe. I’ve been working on Wild Fawn Jewellery for four years.
I can answer this question on how to get more sales in your craft business in one word – Ethos!
Our ethos of creating minimal jewellery with recycled sterling silver and 9ct Gold, made by hand in our London studio, with as little impact on the environment as possible, has become so important to consumers in recent years and we have been working this way since the start of Wild Fawn.
Getting our message out there on social media and reinforcing it through our mailing list is a great selling tool for us.
We sell both on our own site and Etsy (we don’t want to put all our eggs in one basket!), being such a small team this means we will not partake in any Christmas markets, but there is always next year!“
Janine Partington – Maker – Enamel and Leather
Janine says: I am a designer-maker based in Bristol combining the traditional craft of enamelling with fresh, clean, contemporary design.
In 2018, I completed a part-time MA in Design with distinction at the University of the West of England. During this course, I made the leap into working with leather, in a new and unique way. Drawing on past experiences with printmaking, bookbinding and embroidery I explore mark-making through the carving and painting of leathers to create distinctive and appealing surfaces.
To get more sales for my craft business I rely on the symbiotic relationship between galleries, shops and craft shows to gain visibility within the marketplace so that when Christmas comes sales increase in those outlets and I gain more orders through my website.
What works for me to get sales is remembering throughout the year that if my work isn’t seen it can’t be purchased.
Good customer service and having email conversations with buyers personalises the service I give and leads to a high percentage of repeat business.
I also have a large range of price points for my products that helps people to buy into my aesthetic at affordable price points.’
Wolf & Moon Jewellery
Simon says: “I am the Sales & Marketing manager for Wolf & Moon, a handcrafted jewellery label by British designer Hannah Davis. The pieces are inspired by nature, architecture, art and design. We make unique, wearable jewellery for the modern woman, from eye-catching statement pieces to everyday essentials.
Here is what works for us to get more sales in our craft business …
Limited edition (Christmas) pieces. We did a few pieces last year and they were really popular so we have done a bigger range this year. Customers love exclusivity, but it also gives a chance to design something a bit different to our usual style.
Black Friday sale. Love them or hate them, the Black Friday sale we do (usually around 20% off) is our biggest sales weekend of the year and a vital part of our sales strategy.
Workshops. We hosted our first workshops in September, and the response was great. Our new workshops sell out pretty quickly as people buy them as Christmas gifts.
Our e-newsletter and social media calendar was mapped out weeks ago, with blog posts/influencers/competitions/sales scheduled to ensure we have constant engaging content. Customers really are keeping an eye out for something unique and special, so making sure your content is there to be seen is key.
Social media advertising. This has always been a big driver of our sales, and the spend on it increases at this time of year. However the past few months has seen costs rise significantly and probably reflects the increasingly competitive nature of this strategy.
Did you find these tips to get more sales for your craft business useful? What works for you to get more sales in your craft business? Do let us know in the comments below.
Design and craft is a competitive business. Politically and economically times are tough, and sometimes it’s difficult to differentiate and build your own identity.
To stand out.
To get noticed.
To look fresh.
To be the one that people flock to.
It’s difficult, but certainly not impossible. We asked 5 amazing industry experts to share their tips on how to stand out from the crowd:
Ruth Wasserman – Design Director and Product Strategy Consultant, ex. Made.com
Ruth Wasserman is a Design Director and Product Strategy Consultant, currently helping a global client base of emerging brands to build solid product strategies and creatively inspiring collections. She was previously Design Director with Made.com, the online design and lifestyle brand bringing original design for the home at affordable prices where she was responsible for driving the vision for Made.com Product. There, her team worked with more than 100 designer collaborators at any one time to create their products. Ruth also launched Talent Lab for Made.com, the crowdfunding site for product designers..
How do you select creatives to work with?
“When working with my network of freelance creatives, I select designers whose handwriting fits well with the briefs that I am trying to fulfill, but that also have a synergy with the house style of the brand I’m working with.
It’s important if you are starting out that you be yourself creatively so that you are able to continue to be consistent in your design now and in the future. That way, you can build a roster of partners for whom you are each the best fit for one another.
I launched TalentLab for Made in 2018, and we met so many new and amazing designers that way. It was a brilliant way for new designers to get their products on Made.com. We launched 150-200 new products on the platform and the ones that were most popular with the customers were put into production. Although TL doesn’t exist anymore, there are still platforms that provide a step-up for emerging designers. These days, designers can check out platforms like Buydesign.co.uk that are there to connect designers with buyers.
What’s your advice for creatives to get noticed by people like yourself?
I always recommend that people knock three times.
“It can be easy when you are starting out to feel that people aren’t interested because they don’t get back to you straight away. Try again, and again. If you still don’t have any luck the third time then you can take it as a ‘not now’.
It can also be interesting to have non-committal meetings; ask to meet for half an hour for advice, rather than specifically if people have a job for you or want to make your designs, which is always a bit harder. It’s good to network in that way and introduce yourself to a wide number of people who may be able to help you in the future.”
Jehane Boden Spiers – Artist Agent
Jehane Boden Spiers is an artist and business manager with over 25 years experience in the creative industries. She runs an Artists’ AgencyJehane Ltd based in Brighton, and creates licenses and attracts commissions from clients worldwide. Jehane Ltd sells original artworks, increases income for its artists and provides creative coaching and portfolio reviews for artists internationally.
What’s your advice to creatives for standing out in a very competitive market?
“I have always been pro-active and worked hard.
It puts you at an advantage.
Effort is a talent in itself.
I want this phrase embroidered on a t-shirt!
Be guided by your personal intent. Take time to get to know yourself. It’s not about your strengths and weaknesses. It’s about identifying the aspects of the world which you respond to. What would you feel lost without? What makes you tick and feel inspired? Be specific. Understand this and you will have an effective decision-making tool in both your visual expression and the direction of your business. I am inspired by colour and conversations.
Apply and refer to your personal intent consistently in everything that you do. The artwork you create. The visuals you use in your marketing. The content that you write. It will give your work depth. It will have personality. It will make you stand out from the crowd.
Be consistent and aim for the highest quality in everything you do. People will notice.
Be active on all social media channels. It’s highly effective and free.”
How do you select the people you work with?
“I look for artwork with a defined personality. I respond to artists who have a strong sense of their personal intent and are comfortable expressing it. I enjoy working with people who are highly committed, stimulating, and communicate positively. I have to love an artist’s work personally. It’s as much about my eye as the work of the artists whose work I represent.
I have recently signed up an artist in New Zealand who I first met in a coaching session. I was impressed with her intelligent artwork, individual personality, and conscientious attitude. She had a mature sense of self and clearly put a lot of thought into her work. Her colour palette was very distinctive. She didn’t try to follow the crowd and described her new floral designs as a bit too “floofy” for her. It really made me warm to her and want to work with her.
Every year I run the “Anna-Maria Desogus Memorial Award” at Brighton University 3D Design & Craft (for a 2nd year and a graduating student). The only student to have won two years in a row is student Luke Fuller who recently graduated. His project “Unearthing Port Talbot” blew me away. In so many ways; effort, execution, and personal intent.
Inspired by a long line of his relatives who worked as miners, his work reflects both his local & personal history as well as our industrial heritage and the close relationship of man and environment. Luke also won two other University awards, a bursary to the RCA and was awarded the “New Designer of the Year 2018” prize at New Designers. It’s remarkable to see Luke standing-out from the crowd in a whole range of different environments. It’s meaningful and powerful stuff!”
Dan Goode – Independent Curator and Craft Ambassador
Dan Goode trained in ceramics and was chief talent scout for online designer maker marketplaces Seek & Adore and Home of Artisans. He’s a regular speaker for many organisations including the Crafts Council, The Design Trust and Arts Thread. He’s been a regular contributor for the Getting Started course run by The Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths and a session leader for the Crafts Council’s Hot House scheme.
In the last three years, Dan has become an independent curator for the four Handmade in Britain shows with ‘Curated by Dan Goode’ and works with makers one-to-one through his own enterprise ‘Making Goode’.
What advice do you have for creatives to stand out from the crowd?
“Tell your story! Customers cannot — and cannot be expected to — guess what you do, how you do it and why you do it. Your story is unique to you and it is active, ever-changing, dynamic.
By telling your story you allow others to have a relationship with your work,
to have a personal connection with it,
and that is the best way to build a customer base.
Share your story everywhere: how you became a maker, why you became a maker, why you chose your specific medium and what inspires you (both from the past and in the present). Your story is your most powerful tool!
Be consistent. In whatever you do, whether it be online, at a show or on social media, you must be consistent at all times. Be certain that wherever someone encounters you, they meet the same professional maker and can ascertain the quality of your work: whether at a show or on your website or on social media. A lack of detail anywhere — in photography, text, the quality of your stand, or your demeanour — will undermine you.
Never give anyone a moment to doubt you and what you do. As soon as you sow the seeds of doubt you will lose the customer (and me as a potential curator and ally). Always put your best foot forward!
Be patient. Building a brand takes time.
Choose good shows to exhibit at but also know that you will need to do fairs more than once to create a customer base. In year one at a show, visitors will often be encountering you for the first time and that may not translate into sales. By year two visitors will feel they know you and that’s where you’ll start to take off. Makers who ditch shows after a single year lose potential customers and must start from scratch at a new show.
Shows only last a few days so get more value out of them! If you’re doing a show in a new city, research suitable galleries and interior designers in the local area and invite them. A show is a perfect opportunity to make contacts. Call people, introduce yourself and send well-considered emails with beautiful photography and an invite to attend the show. For those who respond, offer your complimentary tickets.
Record names and email addresses of those at the show, customers and galleries, who have shown an interest in your work. Whether through a sale or a positive conversation, keep in touch with these people afterwards with regular newsletters and invite them to subsequent shows.
If you use a show wisely before, during and after the event, you can capitalise on a single event for many weeks.
Finally, I like to work with positive people! Standing for days at a show, like the Handmade in Britain fairs for which I curate, takes stamina and deep wells of charm. If you do a show, be open and receptive, talk to people and share your work. Above all do not sit at your stand looking at your phone, it is the quickest way to alienate customers and it gives the impression the maker is bored and disinterested. The makers who do best remain focused at all times, and it is these makers I am seeking.”
Barbara Chandler – Journalist
Barbara Chandler is a journalist who from the very beginning of her career – over 35 years ago – has been writing about “design” – though when she started as furnishing editor of Ideal Home magazine, it was called “furnishing and decoration.”
Barbara’s emphasis has always been on the home – covering a gamut of products from wallpapers to washing machines. She also provides advice for making a beautiful, comfortable, efficient home – so decorating and furnishing tips, colour scheming, where to shop, room planning, services and so on. There are newer issues, too – sustainability, fair trade, energy saving, recycling/reusing/repairing and so on.
For 22 years, Barbara was the design writer at Homes & Property at the Evening Standard, had a monthly column in Homes & Gardens magazine, and she sits on the selection panels for various craft and design organisations. She also recently set up Green Grads an ongoing UK initiative to platform UK graduates engaging with eco-issues, such as sustainability, climate change, circular production, waste and pollution, diminishing resources, biophilia, bio-diversity and much more.
Barbara is also a photographer – check out her designer portraits on Instagram.
What advice would you give creatives to stand out from the crowd?
“Work on your pictures. When you send in pictures LABEL YOUR FILES CLEARLY. Your images are going to a journalist who already has a huge download file – and then on to a picture editor with an even bigger store.
Get to know the various types of media that could be interested in you and your work. Try and make personal contacts and keep a careful record of who you meet, and how to be in touch with them. Remember a mention in one publication/programme or so on can lead to more publicity elsewhere. I recently wrote about some “rock and roll” wallpaper featuring album sleeves. That ended up on a radio show who talked about the designs – and played the music.
If exhibiting, try and be on your stand as much as you can. Keep an “outwards” attitude – stay off your phone if possible. Offer information. Have some printed information/images to give to any interested journalist -yes, you can provide images on USB sticks (but they are very easily lost!) but it really helps a journalist to have something to look through then and there, and then to have handy later.
Keep a journalist chatting if you can; ask them what they are interested in and tell them about yourself and your work. A postcard works better than a business card, I’ve found. Make contact with the press officer for the show in advance – make sure they know you have good pics and info as journalists may be writing previews.
Make sure your website is up-to-date. It could be your route to a journalist looking for info, say, late at night or at the weekend. Make sure your contact info is good and clear – phone numbers really do help.
Believe in yourself. Journalists need you as much as you need them. They have pages to fill. So what is it about you and your business that is different, relevant, newsy, or even fun? Think it through – and then TELL US.“
Kathy Shenoy – Product & Maker Development Manager for The New Craftsmen
The New Craftsmen
The New Craftsmenrepresents and sells the work of British-based craft makers, principally specialising in pieces for interiors and collectible craft. They have a showroom in Mayfair, sell work internationally, and have a thriving services arm working on made-to-order and bespoke commissions. Their clients are tastemakers from the worlds of fashion film, music and design, interior designers, architects, property developers, and craft collectors and enthusiasts.
What’s your advice for creatives to stand out from the crowd?
“Work on developing your own aesthetic signature. It doesn’t have to be loud or brash, but you do need to focus and hone a style that can be identifiably yours to help build awareness of your work.
Pay attention to detail. It’s not just your work that will make people want to work with you and buy from you – but your attention to detail in everything associated with you.
Be responsive to enquiries,
be charming and polite,
make sure every way in which you present your work is considered and top quality
(including your website, Instagram account, and show stands)
Ask for, and listen to, feedback from everyoneyou can whom you respect. People who like you, and like your work, will be candid about ways that you can improve – never stop asking!”
How do you select creatives to show and sell?
“We select people on the basis of the following things:
Quality of work – is it well made, is it distinctive, does it make our hearts sing?
Character & Personality – we want to work with people that we can get on with and build a strong and enduring relationship. Chemistry matters!
Personal ambition – we are ambitious for our business and our makers and want to work with people who are the same.
Does it sit with our existing portfolio and aesthetic – sometimes we can love something but can’t quite see where and how it might fit right now.”
How do you find and select new makers?
“We use a variety of methods to try and find new makers; from trawling the fairs and shows on the hunt for new talent, through to searching Instagram and the internet for inspiration.
Our most fruitful method is often the recommendations of makers that we already work with though – we always ask them for ideas and suggestions as they have a good understanding of what we are looking for.”
What’s the number one tip that resonated with you from these six experts about how to stand out from the crowd? What are you going to do to change the way you present yourself? We would love to hear from you in the comments section below.
Do you want to make the most of selling events? If you are a designer maker or creative business then selling at events (from local craft markets to big trade shows, from quirky popups to Open Studio events) is crucial!
To help get you ready to make the most of face-to-face selling, we asked two experienced makers and three event organisers to share their tips on how to make the most of selling events.
Sarah Tyssen – Textile Designer
Sarah Tyssen designs woven textiles on her handloom for production of limited edition scarves and blankets on a mechanised loom. Sarah worked as a designer for Morgan and Oates in Herefordshire which gave her an invaluable insight into all aspects of working in a design studio and the processes involved in commission weaving.
After three years there, she started her own business. In 2007, her family moved to The Weaving House – built in 1896, during the Arts and Crafts Movement, as a weaving workshop for Haslemere Peasant Industries. Sarah was very excited to bring weaving back to the house.
Sarah exhibits at shows and sells through selected stockists around the country.
What marketing do you do for craft selling events?
“For pre-show marketing, I promote my presence at events on my website and via Instagram, with increasing regularity in the lead up.
I always post out ALL of the Private View tickets and discount vouchers to my mailing list with a personalised handwritten card, and hand out the rest of the flyers and vouchers at other events I may be showing at.
I sometimes do a free ticket giveaway on Instagram, and do a MailChimp mail out too.
I can’t stress enough the importance of every exhibitor doing their bit to publicise the event.”
How do you display your work?
“My stand set up is versatile and varies slightly according to the size and shape of the space. I customised Ikea trestle table legs to make my base units, which, with different table top attachments, work really well … and they dismantle easily to fit in the car.
I have developed a simple, consistent style of display that I think shows my work well. If there are walls I hang poles to utilise as much of the space as possible. Storage for extra stock, carrier bags, paperwork etc is incorporated on the stand, and I hide away my personal belongings as tidily as possible.
I move work around regularly as I have noticed that the position of an item at eye level or in a different light can help it be noticed!
I have a high folding stool that doubles as a work surface to wrap and take payments. I position this at the outside edge, to keep the stand as clear as possible whilst sales are going on. I can perch on the stool, but am still almost at eye-level to speak to customers, and I can get up easily for a more involved conversation, without looking like I have to ‘make an effort’ to get up …which could put pressure on the customer.
I always greet customers and invite them to handle the work and try things on, and then I leave them alone to look at my work without interruption.
It is important to watch their body language and judge whether additional help or information is required.
I price everything clearly, and usually have a short bio for people to read so they can understand how I work.
I have plenty of business cards as they are a brilliant visual reminder of my work and I always follow up any leads in the week following the show.”
Emma Lacey – Ceramicist
Emma Lacey is a ceramics designer and maker, best known for her hand-thrown Everyday Tableware range. Her work is concerned primarily with tactility and functionality and she uses her making skills and design knowledge to develop work which is a pleasure to hold and behold!
Emma likes to design through making, working with clay to exploit its tactile and aesthetic qualities. She designs for retail and dining markets and works mainly on the wheel whilst also designing for industrial production. Her work sits comfortably between craft and design contexts and is stocked both in independent craft galleries and large design and interiors stores such as The Conran Shop and Liberty.
How do you decide which shows to do?
“I would firstly encourage a lot of research. Make sure your work will sit comfortably and appropriately at an event whilst standing out in some way too. Do this by visiting trade shows, speaking to other designers and makers about their experience and their favourite shows.
If you want to sell more into the retail environment then you might go for larger trade shows.
If you are more interested in selling direct to your customer or collector and working with independent galleries then your best bet is the more specialist craft shows and fairs where you can sell off the stand to a more focused audience and speak to your end customer.”
How do you promote yourself?
“In terms of marketing pre-show, it’s really nice to tell a story and build a bit of anticipation through social media. This can be informal and inexpensive and can help you to reach a wide audience. You will need good images for this and clarity in your presentation.
I have found that making special pieces for shows is a great way to inject a bit of new interest – both for potential clients but also for me in the studio.
You can send out press releases if you have a press-contact list and make sure you provide great images and a bit of concise text to the show organisers in a timely and organised fashion so that they might promote your work too.”
How do you present your work & yourself?
“Think about how you will arrange your work at the show.
Are the pieces accessible if you want people to be able to pick them up or are they safe if you don’t? Are they well lit and curated?
It is tempting to have examples of everything you make just in case that person who wants the ‘slate grey small sugar bowl’ turns up at the show, however it sometimes makes sense to be selective in order to give your exhibition a cohesiveness, which can help it to stand out. You can always send people catalogues or show them images of pieces they can purchase after the show (make sure you get their contacts and make sure you follow up promptly if you have promised to send information).
Speaking to visitors and potential clients is of course a professional activity which requires politeness and knowledge but above all, we are all human and it’s just nice if people are friendly and not pushy.
Know your prices (or at least have them to hand).
Know your work, know your lead times.
It is good to say yes to exciting opportunitiesbut make sure you know what your bottom line is for pricing and timing.
Most trade shows from September onward are a bit late for Christmas orders and people will understand if your lead times are long. However, direct selling events before Christmas are a great opportunity to access the gift market. I don’t do craft markets myself but have friends who do extraordinarily well at these in the lead up to Christmas.
Make sure you have a good amount of stock for these and if they are less formal events (markets or open studios) then take along your samples and seconds. Most people love a bargain and you can make space in the studio and your mind for new work in the New Year!”
Natasha Goodfellow – Curator ‘Beautiful & Useful’
Heidi Harrington Ceramic Vases
Natasha Goodfellow is a writer, editor and curator of Beautiful & Useful, craft fairs held every year at various locations across the UK. She was previously manager of GROW London, the contemporary garden fair, which became part of the House & Garden Festival.
What marketing advice do you have for creatives?
“Social media is obviously a huge help for pre-show marketing. Posting on Instagram, Facebook, X and TikTok etc helps to get the word out to your customers – existing and potential – of where you’ll be and what you’re up to. Use hashtags to reach new people interested in what you do.
The other advice I’d add is to use the publicity materials provided. If a show you’ll be exhibiting at sends you fliers or invites to the Private View, make sure you give them out. And, although it won’t always be possible to supply more if you run out – it’s worth asking.
A good-looking stand and a range of different priced items are key, as is a big smile.2
People who engage with customersdo better than those who don’t. It doesn’t need to be a hard sell – just a bit of chat abouthow they are, what brought them here, or even a(genuine) compliment about something they’re wearing can all help get the ball rolling.
Always have a pile of business cards on your stand for visitors to take, and encourage them to give you their email addresses too. Have an iPad to hand with your website sign up form and maybe offer a give-away as incentive.
In my experience, people come looking for presents and are ready to buy – for their friends and family and often for themselves.
Having a range of items at different prices is a good idea as smaller items priced as stocking-fillers may well attract interest and lead to sales of higher-priced items too.”
Claire Montgomery – The Fairy Tale Fair
The Fairy Tale Fair host handmade, craft, vintage and wedding Fairs in Brighton and Sussex. All sellers are independent and local, the real people behind the brands. There fairs also offer craft workshops and sometimes even have wonderful live singers.
What’s your display advice for new exhibitors?
“We look for stall holders who have beautiful displays to encourage visitors of the fair over to their stall.
We find that stalls with lots of height work well – it could be peg boards, stacked crates with products in or custom DIY display boards.
At Christmas a few fairy lights can really enhance a stall, especially when the natural light dims in the afternoon, the lights really twinkle and draw the eye – they can be simple battery powered ones that you don’t need to worry about plugging in.
Having a strong brand with your company name on the front of your stall, business cards and your colour scheme throughout can help the stand work together, look professional and help your customers identify you. We suggest that props can help enhance displays but be sure to only use props for a purpose and keep in mind that you don’t want them to overshadow or draw attention away from your products – keep these as the main focus of the stall.”
What’s your top tip for marketing?
“It’s great to get lots of photos of your display so you can share these on social media on the day and your followers who visit will know exactly what to look for to find you.
You might even want to do a short video or live stream of your stall and walk about the venue to encourage local followers along.
Be sure to also share any promos the event sends you before the day so that your followers and fan base know you’ll be there.”
The event can do all it can to get people through the doors,but only YOU can bring your followers there to meet you in person.
Rachael Booth-Clibborn – Founder, Muswell Hill Creatives
Muswell Hill Creativesis a dynamic collective of artists, designers, and makers in North London. It runs four outdoor markets a year in the heart of Muswell Hill. Each market is curated to ensure high standards of design and craftsmanship, a core aspect of the collective’s ethos.
What marketing advice do you have?
“For pre-show marketing, list all the Christmas markets you are doing on your website/online shops and include live web and social media links.
Provide the organiser with eye-catching and good quality photography for their promotional use. Don’t just rely on the organiser to promote your presence at the market.
Dedicate time for your own social media promotion and send an email newsletter to your customers with all of your upcoming holiday events. Include images of what they can buy on the day and always include links, locations and times.
Post images of your stall on social media on the day and use Facebook / Instagram Live to give them a tour of the event. Use the event and local hashtags.”
What are your display tips?
“Use props so that your work is not all displayed flat on the table.
Have a trial run before the event, stand back, look at what would draw people in to your stall.
Have visible branding in a practical format to see you through the market season. You want people to easily spot you and remember you from one market to the next.
Use festive decorations for your stall that reflect your brand/product, as well as the holiday.
Good lighting is essential for outdoor markets. Think fairy lights, but also practical (battery powered) flood lights.
Put your business card in with any purchase. Write down costs of products on a promotional post card.
Ask your customer for their email address for future newsletters and follow-up purchases.
Be sure to have a card reader system in place to take payments. SumUp, iZettle and PayPal all have excellent and inexpensive options. Ask a friend for a referral code if you are just starting with this.
Most importantly of all, YOU are your product.Stand up, SMILE and engage people in conversation about your work.Make them remember you.“
Was this article helpful? Please Pin the image above and share it!
Did you find these tips on how to make the most of craft selling events useful? We’d love to hear from you in the comments. What pre-show marketing do you do? What really works for you? What props do you use on your stand at (Christmas) fairs to make you stand out?
Do you want to start selling your wonderful handmade products or launch your design brand online, but feel overwhelmed with all the options for selling crafts and designs online? Or maybe you have started with an Etsy shop or your own website and find it much more difficult to get your site launched or to actually get any visitors or to make any money?
In this post, we explain the 5 main options for selling crafts and designs online so that you have a clear overview. Some of these you might already know of, but others might give you a shortcut to launching your creative products or services online much sooner than you expected!
Option 1: Sell online via social media
One of the easiest and cheapest ways to get started selling crafts and designs online is through social media.
Instagram is still a very popular social media tool but it doesn’t necessarily convert browsers easily into sellers.
If your audience is mostly your friends and family then Facebook is a good place to start. Let them know that you have started your business with images of your products but also with what’s happening behind the scenes. Be careful with overselling yourself on Facebook, because people don’t like that as it is mostly a private channel, but if you share news, your inspirations or upcoming events with family and friends they will love that. Don’t forget to include good images and a link to your website (if you have one) to start driving traffic to your own site.
Did you know that Pinterest is the best social media tool to get sales? Much better than Instagram!
Pinterest users are often in a buying mood because they are at a time of their lives when they are spending on home accessories and gifts. When people move or improve their house, when they get married, have their first child and want a gorgeous nursery, that’s often the time when they spend a lot of money on beautiful handmade and unique interior products. Pins are also ‘evergreen’ so visible much, much longer than your average Instagram picture, plus the average age and income of ‘Pinners’ is higher too.
Make sure you have a business Pinterest account rather than a personal account, and you will need to sell online through either Shopify or Big Commerce to be able to get so-called Buyable pins that allow direct purchases from your online shop.
I strongly suggest you add a great image of a product and include a clickable link. On Twitter and on Facebook you can directly include a link to your website (for Instagram you will need to use LinkTree).Don’t send your followers to your home page, always send them to the specific product page as people don’t want to waste their time having to look for the item they just fell in love with.
And make sure that you have your website address included in your social media biog!
Option 2: Online marketplaces for products & portfolio sites for creative services
Secondly, you can sell craft and design online at popular marketplaces such as Etsy, Not On The High Street, Folksy, and ASOS MarketPlace. Have a look at what organisations such as Crafts Council, Design Nation, Designers Makers can do for you, as they also promote their members online.
If you provide services, such as product design, illustration or photography and even craft commissions, then you need to look at specialist portfolio sites, such as ArtsThread, Behance or the Association of Illustrators.
A big advantage of using popular online marketplaces and portfolio sites to promote and sell your creative products and designs is that they already have existing traffic – people who are looking for the kind of work you create.
But these sites can be extremely competitive, so make sure that you stand out with professional photography and targeted key words that focus on your talents and niche. You will still need to do the bulk of the marketing and drive traffic to your own pages, as these marketplaces and online portfolio sites won’t do that for you.
Option 3: Online shops & boutiques
The third option for selling crafts and designs online is to use online boutiques and retailers, such as Made.com, Gifts.co.uk, Boohoo.com, Inthestyle.com, Brownsfashion.com
The difference between an online marketplace and an online retailer is that with an online marketplace you are responsible for adding the products to your own web pages, promoting them and selling them. You deal directly with your clients and get paid directly. Online retailers, on the other hand, do most of the promotion for you and deal with the clients. You often get paid a commission fee or the retail price minus a fee. Some buy stock and warehouse it for you, but it is most common that you get the orders and dispatch them to the clients yourself and get paid by the online retailer, rather than the client.
Online shops are especially good for creative businesses to work with if they are niche, have a decent marketing team and a big marketing budget, and have a good reputation and traffic, for example around weddings, ethical fashion or children’s products.
Don’t forget to check out what your existing bricks and mortar stockists do online either! Talk to your shops, boutiques and galleries to promote and sell your products online with them too. Send them high quality images to include on their website and for social media use.
Established galleries and retailers often get good traffic and it’s good for your profile to be seen in the right places online.
Option 4: Print-on-demand websites
This is an online option to sell creative designs online, in particular for pattern designers, illustrators, and photographers. You upload your designs and create products such as t-shirts or mobile phone covers, that then get produced on demand and sent directly to the consumer.
On demand printing can be a great way to get a variety of prototypes produced of your work and to create relatively cheaply a broader range of products that you can share. Also, as these businesses are mostly based in the USA and Canada it might be an easier way to sell in those countries.
However, the royalty that gets paid by print-on-demand companies is low, and we have heard of many instances of copyright infringement so be careful when uploading your designs.
And yes, of course, you can also have your own website to sell your creative products or services online!
This is often the starting point for many new creatives, although it might feel daunting.
The biggest advantage of having your own website (with e-commerce possibilities) is that you will be in total control. You can create the exact branding you want, and you can easily create your own online shop window and collect contact details.
We recommend Shopify, Big Cartel, and the London-based Supadupa to start selling your creative products online. For portfolio sites with beautiful images and simply designed layouts (perfect if you want to showcase what you can do rather than necessarily sell) we recommend Square Space.
It’s important to have one online place to show your work and tell your story. The big disadvantage of having your own site is that you will need to spend time driving enough traffic to your site, which can be a big job.
Did you find this blog post helpful? If so, please Pin the image above and share it.
Did you find this simple overview of ‘the 5 main options for selling crafts and designs online’ useful? Please post any questions or additional suggestions in our comments box below.
Deciding that you want to create and launch a collection of creative products properly, is one of the most crucial decisions to make for your creative business. It will move you from a ‘hobby mindset’ into the ‘creative business mindset’ and it will save you a lot of money, time and energy too!
In this article we will focus on how to create a collection that sells. But first …
What makes a good collection that sells?
A good collection has around 5 – 15 items and are recognised as being similar, often through a visual theme (e.g. the colour, material, techniques, or function of the items are related). Think about it as ‘belonging to the same family’. For example ceramic mugs, cups & saucers, cake stand and small plates. Products work individually, but also together, and they are often purchased together.
Your collection has a story to tell; there are similarities but differences. Share with your potential clients why you created this collection, the concept and ideas behind it. Who or what inspired you to create this collection? Sharing that with your clients online, on social media but also with your trade buyers will really make the collection stronger.
The individual pieces in the collection are aimed at a similar client group, who like your particular style and products. For example, colourful, hard-wearing metal gardening products for children; beautiful handmade ceramic coffee cups and mugs for ethical coffee geeks; functional but beautifully designed notebooks and stationery for old-fashioned paper and graphic pattern lovers in their thirties.
A good collection often mixes different product types e.g. a hat with scarf and gloves, or a short and a long necklace with three different pairs of earrings.
Think about the price levels of your collection and individual pieces in advance to make sure that you position them correctly. Pieces in a collection often have similar price levels, although creating a collection can be a great way to include both more affordable, medium-priced and higher-end products in one collection. I often recommend to have different price levels within a collection, ideally 3 price points: from lower to middle and possibly a higher price range. Think for example the same ring in silver, gold and platinum; or offering a notebook as well as a framed screen print and an original piece of artwork. This ‘trick’ will help you to sell more as your prices are affordable for a broader group. And if clients love your work they will often come back for more of the same!
Before you start creating a new collection it’s a good idea to find out what has worked well in the past for you:
What are currently your best-selling products or services? Don’t guess, check your accounts and receipts! Are you aware of the so-called Pareto principle or the 20/80 rule? It turns out that very often 80% of your turnover will come from 20% of your products or sales, so which products and services are working hard for you now?
What are your most profitable products or services? Again, do check your finances and go into some detail here. Do you know the cost price of your products? Have you checked what the income and expenditure are for your key items? Your bestsellers might not be profitable after all …
Which products do you need to drop? It’s good housekeeping to delete around 25% of your products each year! Many makers are hoarders and keep on creating more and more stock … Is it time for a good clearance sale? Do you want to increase your price points? The easiest way might be to stop producing some items and introduce new ones.
Are there gaps in your current collections? Are there products or services missing? Have you got good ideas to add to your existing range? Have your (trade) clients asked for something or given you suggestions? Could you add new colours or new products that would make your current collection more complete?
What would you really love to design and create? What are your new product ideas? Have you learnt a new creative skill or would you like to use a new production method or material?
If you want to create a collection that sells well in the future than evaluating in detail what’s currently working for you is a great first step.
Step 2: Who do you want to create your next collection for?
To create a collection that sells you will need to become more aware of who your ideal client is. Not just in terms of age and gender, you will need to go deeper than that. Think about creating various collages about your ideal clients, and answer questions such as:
What’s their job and what hobbies are relevant to your creative products? For example, a yoga-loving mum wants her day-to-day jewellery to be easy-to-wear, but she might be curious about a quote on a pendant or is interested in jewellery inspired by nature and the sea. A female lawyer who wants to show her feminine side at work and in meetings might go for a bigger statement ring in pure gold or a large necklace made from natural stone.
How would you sum up the style of their house (if you create home and gift accessories) or their wardrobe (if you create jewellery and fashion accessories)? Are they living in a seaside cottage in Cornwall that has a mix of found objects, own artworks and second-hand finds (with a special love for retro pieces from the early 1960’s), or are they a single gay man living in a Hoxton apartment who loves dark and moody colours and fabrics?
Where would they buy your kind of products or services? Get specific. Which design shops and craft galleries in particular? Which online marketplaces or which craft fairs or trade shows would they visit?
When and why would they buy? What’s the motivation for them to purchase e.g. because they are looking for a special handmade Valentine’s card or Mothers’ Day gift, or because they are designing a gorgeous nursery for their first born? Is there a specific trigger or time of year when it is more likely that your clients will buy? That’s the time for you to launch!
CREATIVE EXERCISE: It might be really useful to create 4-5 different client collages as a result of these questions. Really bring them alive! Give your clients a name, a job, hobbies and show their wardrobe and home. What would they say about your kind of products or services? What are their questions or worries about your products?
Step 3: What market research do you need to do?
Doing practical market research isn’t easy! Avoid the common mistake to only listen to what you want to hear, and not what you need to hear … Also, most ‘big’ marketing research reports might not be that useful to you as a small business in a niche market.
But doing a little practical market research can really help you to increase the chances that you create a collection that sells, rather than one that flops.
Firstly think about what you need to know about your ideal clients. What questions do you want from them? And how would you get the answers?
Do some online research about what competitor products are out there already. If possible visit a shop or tradeshow where similar products are being sold and ask the sellers about the product. Who buys it? What’s the price range? Evaluate what’s already out there and try to identify what would make your product better than what’s already out there.
Instead of doing a survey or questionnaire try to see if you can observe your clients. Start with actually checking the need for your product or service, and how are they currently using your kind of product? Observing rather than asking questions can get you to the truth quicker as people mostly want to please you – what they say and do is often different!
Step 4: Positioning: standing out from the crowd
Where do your new creative products fit in your market? You might decide on your position from a price point of view (e.g. low end, middle, exclusive), based on style (e.g. contemporary, luxury, detailed) or on other client benefits or values (e.g. ethical, environmental, local).
If you have identified 5 – 10 of your closest competitors who create and launch similar products then it becomes much easier and more specific to identify what makes you and your next collection different. Why should people buy your work? What makes it different and better than what’s out there? The better you can answer this question the easier it will be to get interest and sales later on.
Identifying your positioning clearly will help you with setting the right price point for your new products (and making your business more profitable potentially!), and will also help you to create a memorable and confident brand.
Let’s be honest: You don’t want to create a collection that only sells … you want a collection that shows what you are about and that makes you money too!
Step 5: Sketch your product ideas
I often push people to spend at least a whole day creating sketches with product ideas for their next collection. This is the time to really stretch yourself and get loads of your product ideas quickly on the table! This is the time to come up with at least 50 product ideas and variations for your collection. Really push yourself and get out of your comfort zone. This is the time to be really creative.
Creatives are known for always having lots of ideas. This is the time to really get going and dig deep – use your own knowledge and experience, and the practical research you have done already to come up with innovative ideas, relevant product ideas, and a story that connects your products into a collection. Allow yourself to get into the ‘flow’ to come up with loads of ideas – some will be rubbish, some might be brilliant! The point is to get the ideas flowing.
Keep your ideal client in mind at all times during this stage. If you have created some ideal client collages then you can visualise the various clients much more, how they might use or wear your product, or how they would buy it and when.
In fact, I often suggest that creatives don’t just focus on developing one product collection but sketch out three completely different ranges. Again, this is to push yourself and to avoid the trap of focusing too much on just one idea.
At this stage don’t criticise yourself or worry about costs, production or whatever (we come to these considerations in a minute!). Allow yourself to be creative and get loads of related product ideas, colours, and materials on paper. I would suggest that each product idea would go on one page so you end up with loads and loads of sketches at the end. Don’t be too precious or detailed, just get the ideas out of your head at this stage.
Start to select some of your favourite products in the various collections you have drawn. You might already start discarding some of your product ideas – just put those pages aside for now. Then for say around 20 products per collection, you start to research:
What would be the total cost to create this product? Think about the cost to produce a prototype, how long it will take you, the materials needed, and if you need new equipment. You might even be able to identify the cost price of your new product ideas. What would the cost price be if you created and sold 5, 50 or 500? Creating an Excel sheet will make your calculations and the comparisons between individual products easier to digest.
What price would you be able to get for your individual products? Don’t just base your price on the cost, but think about what the perceived value is for your potential clients. How much profit would you expect on each of these products? Would you be able to sell them wholesale or direct only? What would the wholesale or trade price be for your new product ideas?
Think about the production of each of these new products. Would you need to get new skills or equipment? A larger studio space? Would you need to outsource? What would this do to the cost and the price of your products? Again don’t just make a judgement based on the cost and the price, it might be that some of your new product ideas get you really excited or they might attract the attention of a different client group or enable you to position yourself differently than before. All these different aspects need to be taken into account.
At the end of this stage, you should end up with only two collections with around 20 products per collection. Maybe you got some new product ideas or did you tweak your ideas based on this quick financial and production evaluation? Don’t spend too long on this evaluation as you are wasting your time if you go into too much detail, but do make sure that you have some realistic ballpark figures!
Be a realist at this stage and consider if your numbers are right and if your ideal clients would be prepared to spend this amount. Some items might be too expensive to launch (for now), or can you adapt them to make them cheaper? Or what can you do in terms of branding and positioning or building your profile to make them worth more? This can be a very creative process.
It’s tough to make these decisions, I know, and you might want to skip this ‘boring’ stage.
But checking your numbers NOW will avoid you wasting your time, money and energy in trying to create products that nobody will buy.
We don’t want you to end up with more unsold stock, we want you to create and launch a collection that sells!
Step 7: Get real-life client feedback
Potential clients love it when you get them involved with the creative process and ask for their opinions. Be careful who you ask… your mum or best friend is not your ideal client! And again be careful that you don’t just listen for what you want to hear, rather than useful genuine feedback. And lastly, it’s only an opinion of one person if there is something critical they say, don’t take it too personally! Most of us have the problem that if we get one negative comment we focus on that much more than the 20 nice compliments we also got!
I wouldn’t share your product ideas on social media or online at this stage. Instead be very focused who you share your ideas with – very similar to what you did in step 3. In fact, you might want to return to the people you asked then for some feedback.
If you have a good relationship with your stockists then it might be useful to ask them for some feedback too. Ask them confidently and be specific with your request. Ask fewer questions but observe more … what’s their response when they see your work or hold it in their hands?
Step 8: Select your favourite products
Now it’s finally your turn to select the products that you will launch. Give your collection(s) a name and put all the pieces of paper with the sketches on the floor or on the wall to do a really good review. Look at the sketches and ask yourself these questions:
Are YOU excited about this collection? (Probably the most important question!)
Are these indeed the best products that work together as a collection? Are they similar but different enough?
Are there any gaps in terms of functionality, price point, to make the story complete?
Do you need to tweak or change colours, materials, size? Do your price points need to increase or decrease?
Do your products display individually and as a group? Does the collection encourage collecting and repeat orders?
If you found this article helpful, please Pin the image above and share it.
And … that’s it! Our ultimate 8 steps to create a collection that sells! If you found this epic blog post useful then do let others know who might be interested too. If you have got any questions or feedback then let us know in the comments box below.
Are you a new creative ready to start your own business or freelance career? Maybe you are a design or craft graduate, or maybe you are self-taught or are changing careers? Do you want to improve your business and marketing skills but don’t know where to start? There are loads of business books for new creatives like you out there!
We love recommending books as they are such a great, easy, and often very affordable way to boost your business and marketing skills. Books have really changed my life! I try to read nearly every day and it really has helped me to get a lot more knowledge and skills quicker.
I regularly teach professional development at art schools and creative business support organisations across the UK. Some art universities really prepare their students for the real life transition, but others lack basic business or entrepreneurial skills. I hope this list of my must-read business books for new creatives will help anybody who wants to polish their business knowledge – recent graduate or established creative alike!
Designing Your Life – Bill Burnett and Dave Evans
This is my absolute favourite business and creative career book for any new design or craft graduate. I think this book should be on every recommended list for business books for new creatives and graduates. And their teaching method and exercises to be part of the curriculum of any art college or school!
So, what’s Designing Your Life about then? Bill Burnett is the Executive Director of D-School at Stanford, the Design Program that started the design thinking movement, and Dave is the Adjunct Lecturer at the Product Design Program at Stanford. This book is the result of what they have been developing over the last decade for their students to help them ‘get a job’. What makes this book and approach stand out is that it’s based on their unique and innovative design thinking techniques so you will be brainstorming and prototyping your own career all along.
This book is completely focused on creative planning and visualising. It’s full of thought-provoking and visual/creative exercises, practical insights and real-life stories. It talks about career goals and what you want to do next, your happiness and purpose, success and failure in equal measures. Their methodology works so well because it connects so closely with the design process – with added messiness, ways to find more than one solution and how to get unstuck too!
Bill and Dave have real empathy for their students, and share some fabulous ‘dysfunctional beliefs’ around developing your career that they visualise and help you to ‘reframe’ and see in a different way:
So, they turn “I should already know where I’m going” into “You can’t know where you are going until you know where you are.”
Instead of “I should know where I’m going”, gets turned into “I won’t always know where I’m going – but I can always know whether I’m going in the right direction.”
And “We judge our life by the outcome” becomes “Life is a process, not an outcome”.
One of the key passages for me in this book is:
“We trust that you now understand that prototyping to design your life is a great way to succeed sooner (in the big, important things) by failing more often (at the small, low-exposure learning experiences). Once you’ve done this prototype-iteration cycle a number of times, you will really begin to enjoy the process of learning via the prototype encounters that other people might call failure.”
Enjoy! And fail often.
The Essential Guide to Business for Artists & Designers – Alison Branagan
This is one of the classic introductory business books for new creatives as it includes all the main start-up business topics that new creatives need to know about – from money and finance to planning, from self-promotion and intellectual property to tax and legal requirements. The first edition was published in 2011 with a newer version published in 2017 with has more up to date resources and social media advice then the older version.
The Essential Guide to Business for Artists & Designers is a really good introduction to improving your overall business skills, and also a good book to dip in and dip out of later if you need to figure out something specifically. Alison is one of the best known creative business advisers and trainers in the UK and is written specifically for a British audience. It’s full of resources, images, quotes and case stories of other creatives, and images by Tim Bradford.
Will it fly? – Pat Flynn
When I was starting out in the world of online business and learning a few years ago it was Pat Flynn who gave me the best ideas and inspiration. He is still a big star in the world of passive income and developing multi-million-dollar businesses. He is also a very nice family man who shares a lot of his own ups and downs.
This short book is perfect for creatives who have a business idea and who want to test those ideas to turn their idea into something better. It’s written especially for more digital-orientated businesses but could work well for other creatives too. He has also included a free online ‘companion’ course with this book to help you turn your idea into a business that flies.
There are some great creative and real-life exercises in Will it Fly? to help you experiment and identify the ‘mistakes’ in your assumptions. Indeed, he is a big fan of failing early and often! Because you can learn so much from the feedback you get when you go out there and see what works with real potential clients.
Although Pat now runs a multi-million-dollar business himself this isn’t a ‘get rich quick’ book. He emphasises the importance of doing your market research, testing your assumptions, focusing on a niche, and building relationships and a community. It’s full of really practical business planning advice too if you are looking for funding.
Growing Gills – Jessica Abel
I have recommended this book by graphic novelist and professor of illustration Jessica Abel before as she shares a true creative and human approach to developing your career. Growing Gills is the foundation for her popular online course Creative Focus and is aimed especially at people who want to turn a hobby into a job.
This isn’t really a book to read, but a book that gets you into action through reflective questions and practical exercises. There is also a workbook that you can download that gets you even deeper into the exercises. She covers topics such as ‘what’s stopping you?’, how to get started and make decisions that move you forward, and how to deal with the ups and downs of being a creative professional.
Screw Work let’s play – John Williams
Are you not sure what you want to do? Have you got loads of different ideas? John Williams calls you to join the Play Revolution and start a ’30-day-play-project’ to stop you thinking and start you doing and trying out your idea.
This is a great book if you aren’t sure yet what creative business you want to start or focus on, or if you have got a full-time or part-time job and you want to dip your toe into the startup-business-waters.
Screw Work Let’s Play was hugely popular in 2010 when it first came out, and John created an online community of ‘Scanners’ who can’t settle on only one creative business idea. Do join John’s online community here – with loads of free additional resources. Last year he published an updated version of this book.
Setting Up a Successful Jewellery Business – Angie Boothroyd
This is the number one business book for any wannabe jeweller – without a doubt. Angie Boothroyd covers all the business topics you need to know about as a new jeweller – from finding your niche to pricing your jewellery, to selling and branding and essential time management and money management skills.
Setting Up A Successful Jewellery Business is just over 100 pages long and I would recommend you read through it in one go, but then have it handy to dip in and out again when you need to get an answer for your fledgling jewellery business.
Becoming a Successful Graphic Designer – Neil Leonard
Neil Leonard is a senior graphic design tutor and graphic designer himself who also ran the Design Your Career events. This is a beautifully produced book with loads of great images of projects and many interviews with successful graphic designers and their careers – from the UK and abroad.
Becoming a Successful Graphic Designerreally explains the many different careers a graphic design student can get into – from getting a job at an agency, to freelancing and starting your own business. It explains the different career opportunities, different areas and how to transition from education to work. With some practical tips on how to promote yourself, writing your profile and CV, structuring your portfolio and the outlines of a contract and invoice.
Joining the dots – Alex Mathers
Alex is a professional illustrator and coach, and the founder of the popular Red Lemon Club for illustrators. He is an illustrator himself, who travels the world while earning a good living, writing books and supports other illustrators with practical marketing and business advice, as well as coaching.
Joining the Dots is a short eBook (you can read it in just over an hour) and a lovely compilation of practical advice for new illustrators but also useful for other creatives.
From A for audience,
to B for Brand,
via J for Jazz and K for Karaoke,
to R for Remarkable and Z for Zealous.
(and he got a great one for the X too!)
Some of my favourite quotes from this little gem:
“I know that people’s definition of success vary. For me success is about doing what makes you come alive.”
“Challenges which you overcome, even if you are ‘unsuccessful’ the first or even the tenth time, means you are improving and growing. When you push for your business to grow, you are actively rejecting a comfortable and ultimately vulnerable business.”
“I find it funny how much harder people make their lives by creating things that are too similar to everyone else’s. Differentiation makes everything so much easier.”
“Seeing success with the best clients requires finding and engaging with many, and getting rejected by many too.”
“Weaknesses are often strengths in disguise, waiting to be explored.”
“Making money is a creative act. There is no shame in it because it will allow you to thrive. Think of money as a note of thanks for providing someone with value that helped them.”
“If your finished work does not make at least a few people smile, cry, do a double-take or say: “wow”, you have to work at it until they do.”
“Seek always to provide value, rather than to impress. Trying to impress usually leads to overcomplicating things.”
And my personal favourite one: “The best creative work is done for yourself, within the context of what others need.”
This is a perfect read and ‘pick-me-up-book’ with lovely illustrations by Claire Powell. Also check out some of the other e-books that Alex has written for illustrators, such as How To Get Illustration Clients.
Did you find this article helpful? Please Pin it and share it!
Did you find our must-read business books for new creatives useful? Did you purchase one and learnt something? Have you got additional recommendations? Then we would love to hear from you. Just share in the comments box below.
PLEASE NOTE that we included some affiliate links in this post to Amazon, as many of our readers like the convenience of this big online retailer. But of course we recommend that you purchase your business books from local bookshops instead … as we are a big fan of local and independent shops!
Many creatives are concerned about intellectual property – How do you protect your work online and on social media? How to stop people copying your best ideas (especially if you teach craft workshops!)? How do you avoid big brands copying your latest products or ideas.
We anticipated that intellectual property was going to be a big topic. But we have been overwhelmed by the response! Sometimes very emotional responses. We received many many emails about intellectual property problems from creatives who wished to stay anonymous. Thank you for sharing with us. And for trusting us.
This blog post is my personal take (Patricia van den Akker, Director of The Design Trust) on intellectual property for creatives, and what I have learnt in the last month but also in the previous 20+ years as a creative business adviser about intellectual property for creatives:
Lesson 1: Intellectual property is (surprisingly) emotional
Although many creatives prefer to put their head in the sand when it comes to anything to do with law, the reality is that many creatives have quite strong opinions and emotions around intellectual property, and especially when it comes to protecting their creations.
Over the last few weeks and years we have heard from many creatives whose work was copied or at least very strongly influenced by.
But we have also heard from creatives who have been wrongly accused of copying others.
And that’s very painful too.
Last Autumn I spotted on Kickstarter a campaign for a planner called Dream Plan Do. For anybody who knows what I do – I have been self-publishing the Dream Plan Do planner journals for the last 3 years. I was so furious when I found out! Although … it very quickly turned out that the design, audience and quality was rather different than ‘my’ planner. But I still was out on revenge!
However, when I digged a little deeper it turned out that this lady in the USA had been self-publishing her Dream Plan Do planner … since 2015! Two years before I launched our Dream Plan Do planner. Oops. I had to calm myself down very quickly. Sometimes it’s true: people come up with the same names or ideas (more about that later!).
On the other hand, there was also a planner designed in Italy with a very similar name, feel and audience as ours, which we got removed from Kickstarter. And there are at least two very similar business planners for creatives around that look remarkably similar to our concept, but we can’t really do anything about. We just hope that clever and professional creatives spot the one that’s the best! 😊
Being copied really hurts. It’s not flattery at all.
Many creatives have told us how it really hurt them deeply when they found out that they have been copied. They often put their soul into their work, and have developed very personal techniques and quirks over many years and sometimes decades. If they are known for a specific technique then their identify is often closely aligned with it.
When somebody then just copies that they feel really lost.
As if somebody has stolen their identity.
Something that was deeply ‘theirs’ got taken away.
Unfortunately, the reality is that unless your work is copied in detail and you have proof that you were the first to develop this, then it’s unlikely that you have a legal case. The difference between imitation and inspiration is very small indeed. Although you might feel like it’s a copy, most specialist IP lawyers would need to see clear evidence and would probably disagree.
You might feel that you have the moral right. But unfortunately, you have often limited legal rights. And many creatives know that and feel very powerless. Especially if it involves big brands or other small creatives.
However when we spoke to various intellectual property experts they all were very cautious about using social media. It might help as a last resort tool but it is strongly adviceable that you get specific legal advice of what to do and write exactly. If your case comes to court then your social media actions might work against you. If you accuse somebody of copying your work while this isn’t (entirely) true then they might sue you for defamation. Use specific words and avoid others. Be careful.
Lesson 3: Unfortunately many amateurs start with copying
When you are learning something new then you need to start somewhere. And as crafts and handmade are super popular right now, many new creatives look for ‘inspiration’ on popular social media platforms like Instagram and Pinterest. Often copying the work of professionals who have developed their styles and techniques over many years.
It’s one thing to copy a design for yourself, your own use or as a gift. It’s something very different if those copied pieces than appear online or on social media for sale.
If you want to be a professional creative then please be original. We all need inspiration, but make sure that you add your own unique take on what you create. Especially if you are promoting and selling your work.
Many new creatives are not aware of intellectual property or copyright. If your work is copied (but make sure that you have got a case – see Margaret Briffa’s tips here!) by a fellow (new) creative then a good first action point is to get in touch with them by email or letter, and explain that you believe they have copied you, you clarify your rights, and very often they will take it down immediately.
For example: a couple of years ago our software alerted me that nearly 40 of The Design Trust’s blog posts had been copied on to another creative business support’s website. They had removed all our links to our site and referred them back to their own pages. I got in touch with them in writing immediately, explained that it was my copyright (and very hard work to write these original blog posts based on over 20 years experience … “thank you very much …!”) and requested that they were removed immediately. I suggested that it was fine to refer to short quotes and refer back to specific pages, but that copying 40 blog posts in their entirety was an infringement of my copyright. They apologised and removed them immediately.
This is very often the case. A simple letter explaining and confirming your copyright is all that it takes. Many people do not know what copyright is and how it works, and might infringe your copyright without realising it. If a stronger letter needs to be send then a formal cease and desist letter from a lawyer can work well too.
This takes us neatly to my next intellectual property for creatives lesson:
Lesson 4: Educate yourself. And other creatives.
Many creatives are very scared about intellectual property and prefer to put their head in the sand. Although IP law should be really straightforward, it’s actually one of the most complex! (Hence, we as The Design Trust do NOT provide any legal advice. We are not legal specialist and we suggest you get in touch with any of our recommended intellectual property organisations here.)
There are many myths around intellectual property for creatives, and it’s rare that art colleges teach the basics around intellectual property (more about that later).
Many creatives are very worried about being copied, but then often do the ‘wrong’ things such as leaving samples or send high res files to potential large clients or manufacturers, or ‘free’ competitions (in any of these cases your work can be very easily copied!).
Not knowing the basics of intellectual property might stop you from pursuing potential opportunities with bigger retailers or clients, or for undervaluing your worth in licensing agreements.
But this is also about you NOT infringing somebody else’s intellectual property! Do you know that your photographer is very likely to have the copyright on your images (unless stated clearly in your contract!)? Did you know that you can’t use quotes on products and books, unless you have explicit written approval?
Indeed, a couple of years ago we fell unknowingly foul of the latter. We had commissioned 3 designers to illustrate quotes from creatives and business owners for our first Dream Plan Do planner journal to be included at the start of each month. I wasn’t aware that I needed explicit written confirmation and we had to change and delete these illustrated quotes the week before we went to print. Very stressful indeed, but at least we didn’t run into problems later on, when we potentially would have had to stop selling our planners. You can read here a useful article on the Etsy website about intellectual property infringement and how they deal with it.
Another example is my own sister who started her fashion-for-disabled-children business 12 years ago and received within 3 days of her opening her online and bricks-and-mortar shop a very threatening letter from an IP lawyer. It turned out, that although she had done some basic trademark research, she hadn’t checked out the trademark register in the Netherlands in detail when launching her new business.
It turned out that a trademark had been registered in the fashion category and hence this business had a claim on ‘her’ business name. She had to change her new business name immediately, and completely rebrand her website and all promotional material including business cards and brochures – immediately. The cost of replacing everything was huge, and of course this wasn’t the business launch she had had in mind! To avoid a similar issue for your business you might like to check out this blog post by the IPO on trademarking your business name.
Indeed, it’s very easy to become more ‘IP savvy’ and educate yourself about intellectual property and how to protect yourself. Use the copyright icon. Be careful what you share with whom.
We have had many creatives contacting us about copyright infringement as a direct result of teaching craft workshops. Our advice to anybody who teaches:
Do make it clear in writing before and during the course that this work or design is your copyright and explain that that means that your students can’t copy and then sell it as their own. When sharing any templates or patterns then it’s recommended that you include the copyright icon with your name and the year. Make it clear in writing that it is for their own personal use only, and not for commercial use. It might be good to have a conversation about it during the class, and even have this included as part of your terms and conditions.
You might also consider to teach certain projects that are easier to make, but not offer similar projects for sale. This will avoid any painful situations in the future.
Lesson 6: The role of the bigger players, journalists, art colleges and (trade) fairs
It’s extremely frustrating when any of the ‘big boys’ steals from a small creative business. There seems to be a certain group of big brands that tend to copy from smaller businesses, sometimes by buying their products, sometimes by inviting them in for a meeting or through ‘free’ competitions. Be aware of the companies that have a bad reputation in this case. Do ask more experienced creatives about their experiences. And be careful to jump happily into meetings without being IP savvy! ESPECIALLY with some of the big names.
Many small creatives feel very upset when they get copied by big brands. It does often feel like David and Goliath.
Not just does it feel extra unfair, but also are they missing out on a potential lucrative deal.
Plus small businesses often don’t have the capacity, energy, money and knowledge to fight cases against much more powerful big companies.
I am also very pleased to hear about the lobbying work that membership organisation ACID (Anti Copying in Design) is doing with the big UK companies around intellectual property and how they are working with big companies to make it part of a broader ethical stance on doing business. As individual companies it’s very hard to fight big companies, but together we can achieve much more. I would love to see organisations like the Design Council and the Crafts Council do much more in this regard. Although the Design Council has some basic information about intellectual property for creatives on their website, it’s not at all mentioned on the Crafts Council’s website.
However, I also would call out to journalists, awards organisations and (trade) fair organisers to be more vigilant around work being copied. I regularly visit events or are part of a judging panel and notice then regularly work that’s very strongly influenced, in particular at graduate events. Recently I was a judge in a graduate show where I spotted a series of woven pieces that were very reminiscent of a well-known British weaver. I was very surprised to see that this young weaver then was selected for a large article in a major design magazine by a journalist who should frankly have known better. Stop supporting copycats please. And dare to call people out on it. Especially if you are in a place of influence.
I also strongly believe that art colleges and universities in particular have a much stronger role to play in combating intellectual property infringements.
I strongly believe that universities can provide much-needed advice early on, by:
teaching their students the basics of intellectual property for creatives,
but also to teach them more about the history of their craft (so they know their roots!),
and a far stronger focus on being original and where you can find your own inspiration (away from the internet and social media!).
The University of the Arts London used to have a specialist intellectual property department called Own-It, which was very useful and pro-active in providing intellectual property advice. They have a useful two-page resource on intellectual property on their site here now.
Lesson 7: Sometimes similar ideas happen at the same time
Yes, sometimes similar ideas happen.
A couple of years ago my husband, who works in advertising, was part of a team that was about to launch a mega-big advertising campaign. Then a week before their multi-million pound launch a close competitor launched their own campaign with a very similar idea. They checked, but nobody was to blame. They pulled the entire campaign (at great cost) and came up with a new idea.
The thing is with intellectual property: You can’t protect ideas.
You can only protect the finished thing.
It’s the execution that counts.
But if it feels too close to what others have been doing, and potential clients could confuse you, then do walk away. It’s the professional thing to do.
Did you find this article about my lessons about intellectual property for creatives useful? Then please share it so that more creatives are educated and know what to do. We would love to hear your comments, and especially if you learnt something in this post or from the resources we shared above. Or if you know of any additional intellectual property resources then let us know too.
Are you scared of money and finance, costing and pricing your work? Many creatives are! But the reality is that if you want to start and run a successful creative business then you need to face the money facts and somehow learn those financial skills.
I am often surprised how few creatives have ever read a book about finance or money.
While it’s one of the easiest and cheapest ways to boost your financial skills!
In 2019, The Design Trust organised a special month-long #FebFinance challenge around finance and money, which started with daring creatives to read at least one of our recommended finance and money books for creatives that month – and it was a huge success with 100’s of creatives joining in, commenting and getting excited about money and finance! Yes, reading a book can be very inspiring and life-changing even. We continue to have finance as our February topic every year in our Business Club.
So, if you thought that there are very few finance and money books for creatives available, then check out our favourite ones here.
We would love to hear from you in the comments if we have inspired you to read one of them!
‘Women on Money’ by Julia Rothman (c) – for Good Company Money Issue 3
Book 1: Overcoming Underearning – Barbara Stanny
This is one of my most recommended books for creatives, and many creatives have told me how life changing this book has been for them too.
Barbara is an American journalist who was born into a rich family and then married. Unfortunately, her husband gambled all the inheritance away so she had to get herself a job (and a divorce!). She decided to interview professional American women who earn more than $100,000 to see what they do and how they think differently. This book is the result.
Overcoming Underearningis a great book if you are a chronic ‘under-earner’… somebody who finds it hard to stand up for themselves, who is very likely a people-pleaser, and finds it difficult to talk about money, let alone negotiate a better deal or ask for more.
By the way being an under-earner has got nothing to do with the amount you earn, but that you are earning less than you want or need to earn.
It’s a fairly quick read (less than 2 hours so no excuses there!) but it’s a very powerful book … asking poignant questions about your thoughts and behaviour around valuing yourself and your work. It will make you conscious of what’s going on, so be warned that this book can have a strong emotional impact.
But it could really resolve some of the major underlying issues you might have about undercharging for what you are worth.
It’s aimed at women in particular, but I think many creative male practitioners might find this challenging book useful too.
Book 2: Profit First – Mike Michalowicz
You probably know that sales – expenditure = profit.
But what happens if you turn that equation around? Sales – Profit = Expenditure.
In Profit FirstMike Michalowicz explains that most people have this contradictory habit called Parkinson’s Law: “The demand for something expands to match its supply.” Or basically we spend what we get.
Do you spend in line with what you earn?
And when your sales go up … what happens then?
Do you spend more to invest or ‘because you are worth it’? And therefore never make a profit?
Indeed, that’s what many business owners do! When we get more sales then we also increase our spending!
And as we often pay ourselves from our profits, we often end up earning very little because we first spend on the business before rewarding ourselves ….
Sound familiar?
Michael argues in this book that we should first set a limit to what we spend on ourselves (e.g. our ‘drawings’) as part of our business expenses, by allocating a specific % of money to pay ourselves first! So, pay yourself first and then limit your other expenses. Sounds good, doesn’t it?
Profit Firstis a very insightful book that will help you to minimise your expenditure and ‘tame your cash-eating monster’.
Mike shares some really great ideas of how to manage your money better, assessing the financial health of your business, minimising your expenses and debt and starting to pay yourself a higher salary.
You can read the book in about 4 hours, but the ideas and systems Mike shares can have a major impact if you decide to implement his suggested systems of different buckets. Even if you don’t follow all his rules to the letter, but simply allocate your income immediately into pots for salary, savings and expenses, this book will help you to mange your money better.
BOOK 3: What they Don’t TEach you about money – Claer Barrett
This is a brilliant personal finance book written by the FT’s personal finance expert Claer Barrett. It is clearly written and easy to understand because it avoids confusing money jargon. What They Don’t Teach You About Money covers everything from our emotions around money to investing, pensions, mortgages, credit cards and student loans. It helps you understand how borrowing money works (and how expensive it really is), how to get into good money practices and how to think ahead – even just a little bit – to plan for the future.
A fantastic book to help get your own finances in order so that you are set up well for your business finances too!
Book 4: How to Become a Money Magnet – Marie-Claire Carlyle
Are you sabotaging your chances to attract more money?
This is a very thought-provoking and practical book, full of questions, quizzes and exercises to challenge your attitudes and thoughts around money, being worth it, and how to break the pattern to become ‘richer’ in your life and business.
How to Become a Money Magnet is a joyful and insightful read that you can dip in and out of regularly, with lots of checklists and case studies. You will get much more out of this book if you decide not just to read the book, but actually DO it.
Book 5: No B.S. Marketing to the Affluent: No Holds Barred, Take No Prisoners, Guide to Getting Really Rich – Dan S. Kennedy
I read this book a few years ago and I really had a love-hate relationship with it! (It doesn’t help that the author is close friends with and a big fan of Mr. Trump, and I don’t really believe books with titles that tell you that you will get really rich!). I have to say that I sometimes screamed at this book and squirmed too.
But, it’s actually really insightful, and if you want to sell to rich people then I do recommend this book to you.
Plus, I personally think it’s a good idea to sometimes read a book that you might not agree with. This book will definitely expand your mind and your approach to selling to ‘rich’ people.
The start of the No B.S. Marketing to the Affluent is really useful as he shares marketing data and insights of who rich people are (pointing out the huge differences between a self-made New Money man or someone who inherited money. Between somebody earning say $250K a year and someone earning $10million. Between an older business family man – often with two families (haha) – and a gay couple in Manhattan!), and how they spend their money, and how they want to be treated. Yes, most rich people are optimists, but don’t believe the myths that they are confident!
The second part of the book is about what they spend their money on, which goes into great detail on what kind of products and services they are interested in, the importance of niches and being the best, and the motivations behind their purchases. And the last part of the book goes into how to market and sell to them, the customer service required, the networking and schmoozing.
This is a long, detailed, and very well researched book, with very specific marketing advice if you want to sell to rich people. It’s not a quick fix book to get rich. (Which is a good thing in my opinion.)
Book 6: Think & Grow Rich – Napoleon Hill
This is a finance success classic. It’s unbelievable but this book was first published in 1937.
And what is truly amazing is how relevant it still is today!
Napoleon Hill researched the habits and mindsets of hundreds of tycoons in the USA for over twenty yearsat the start of the previous century to write this classic on how to become financially successful.
You’ll realise that there have been recessions before and that people dealt with it.
That the struggles we have today around money and success are much more universal, and have very little to do with our current financial, political, economic or internet/technology age.
Think and Grow Richis a classic self-help book on how to get rich and successful, beyond today’s financial struggles and the interference of social media and the internet (the telephone even barely existed when he wrote this book!).
Timeless lessons from the white men in charge from a century ago are still surprisingly relevant today.
Book 7: Motivations for Creative People – Mark McGuinness
But what’s really good about this book is that it covers all of our motivations as creatives, and how they often conflict with each other. Especially the ‘creative’ versus ‘money’ motivation!
If you struggle in your head to make a living from what you love doing, and find it hard to charge properly for your work, then this is a great book to help you. Mark is a poet himself too, and he explains the external and internal motivations (‘the rewards and the joys of work’), how they work together but also conflict, and how you can create a business model that works for your creative business or career in line with your values and goals.
This personal finance book is written by a fun loving, British, twenty-something economist, with a good social media profile, and it was recently recommended to me by a millennial (Thanks. You know who you are!).
This book covers the basics of how to manage your money better while dealing with the challenges, insecurities and opportunities of the 21st century. Stuff that we probably should have learnt at school, but we were never taught budgeting skills, mortgage rates or basic investment. Plus let’s be frank: nobody really likes to talk about money, and most of us don’t really know what to do. This book fills that gap.
It’s a really practical and honest book to help you get out of debt, spend smarter and more in line with your own values, get an emergency fund together, get your pension sorted, and even invest. Plus it has got a special chapter about money in business – although it’s a little basic, it gives an introduction to financial terminology, how to start doing your accounts and deal with tax.
But what I love about Go Fund Yourself is that it’s also about the bigger and more inspirational picture around money, and what your financial dreams, values and aspirations are. How to change your money mindset. How to make choices from all the different options. It has a healthy dose of scepticism when it comes to ‘wealth’ and will help you to make a more conscious effort to your financial realities (whatever your age!).
‘Finance for the People’ by Paco de Leon
Book 9: FINANCE FOR THE PEOPLE – Paco de Leon
This is a wonderful, plain speaking, easy to understand personal finance book that delves into our emotions and habits around money and how we can change them.
Finance for the People asks the reader to look at their beliefs and experiences around money and then offers practical exercises to help shift the mindset with realistic mindfulness activities too.
The book has more than 50 fun illustrations and diagrams to make the concepts accessible. It’s the kind of book we should all read in our twenties to help us not be frightened of money, to help us learn about saving, investing and pensions and to bring in good finance ‘habits’ early.
A fantastic book for people who are not sure where to start when it comes to reading about money!
Book 10: Worth It – Amanda Steinberg
This book is written by the American independent investment adviser Amanda Steinberg who ran the very successful DailyWorth website, and who was on a mission to get more women interested in money and investment. The first part of the book is all around what you are worth, what stories you have been telling yourself around money, and how to hit the reset button.
Worth It is an inspirational read about money and how you can create the life you want to live. Some of the advice is very much aimed at the American market, and might not be so useful for a British or European audience, but overall her approach travels well. From a British perspective it’s interesting to read her questions around investing in a property, as she personally has been bitten badly and lost her own house in the past and is therefore a strong advocate for renting.
Book 11: Stop Thinking Like A Freelancer – Liam Veitch
Freelancing is tough financially.
Liam used to be a struggling creative freelancer but created a very successful £1 million+ web business and in this fairly quick book (3 hour read) he explains how he did it. How he managed to attract enough of his dream clients, build exposure, and created more predictable income streams. Of course in the process he stopped being a solopreneur and became a ‘proper’ web agency with a team. And that’s of course not what every freelancer is looking for.
But Liam has got some good points around the small-minded-thinking that many freelancers often have and that can stop them from being more successful.
That they don’t think of themselves as businesses.
That they need to start thinking bigger.
That they need to have clearer financial and business goals.
That they need to throw out the non-and-low-paying clients and aim for better and more reliable clients.
They they have to start differentiating themselves from the competition.
Stop Thinking Like a Freelancer is a great read for any creative freelancer who wants to up their game and become more professional.
This isn’t a pure finance and money book for creatives, but one that will expand your thinking, make you more strategic and give you loads of marketing and development tips.
If you found this selection of finance books helpful, please Pin the above image and share!
Did you find our recommended finance and money books for creatives inspiring? Did you purchase and read one of these books? We would love to hear from you in the comments. Share with us which finance and money book for creatives you selected and why. And let us know what you learnt, so that you can inspire other creatives to read these books too!
Please note that we have included some affiliate links to Amazon in the blog post above, as many of our readers like the convenience of this online retailer. However, we would love you to order any of these books from your own local book shop!
Are you struggling with time management? Would you like to be more productive, stop wasting your time so much on social media, and make more time for making and creating? Many creative professionals struggle with time management, so here is my personal selection of the best time management books for creatives who want to stop talking and start doing.
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People – Stephen Covey
This is a time management classic for both individuals and organisations. I read The 7 Habitsnearly twenty years ago for the very first time and it had a profound effect on me. And it still has!
Although the title is very business-like and corporate it actually goes really deep emotionally. It’s not a ‘quick fix’ book (I wouldn’t recommend you read it all in one go!) but it deals with our human struggle on how to spend our limited time in this world. I have re-read this book now several times, and each time I discover new ways to work on myself and refocus on what I really want from my life and business. It asks some really big questions but also offers practical solutions and activities.
The book centers around the 7 habits:
Be proactive: Stop moaning and start taking charge of your life basically! It’s up to you how you choose to respond to challenges, where you are heading and how you’ll spend your time. What are your values? What do you want to focus on?
Begin with the end in mind: Rather than focus on the here-and-now and immediate tasks (e.g. do you start your day with emails and social media?) start to create a value-driven principle-centered mission of what you want to get out of life. What life do you want to create? What do you want your legacy to be (literally)? Setting long term goals will give you clarity and purpose to help you make better decisions. Then work backwards to set smaller goals and deadlines of what you need to work towards.
Put first things first: Are you making the time for these important aspects in your life? Is the balance in your life right between life and work, you and your family, your health and your money?
Think win/win: You’ll need to negotiate and create relationships build on trust, values and long-term goals if you want to achieve your goals.
Seek first to understand, then to be understood: When it comes to interpersonal relationships will you truly try to understand the other person’s perspective? Really useful chapter also about learning to negotiate – both in business terms and within your family and personal relationships.
Synergise: Put it all together and you’ll get more than the sum of its parts. Through mutual trust and understanding conflicts are resolved and better solutions can be found than when working alone.
Sharpen the saw: Are you looking after yourself (physically, mentally, socially, emotionally and spiritually) so that you can be more productive?
I recommend the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People especially if you need to look at the bigger picture and you want to find clarity and focus: What do you want from your life? What’s your purpose and values?
Give Me Time – The Mind Gym
This is both a strategic and practical book that goes straight to your own time management issue. At the start of Give Me Timeyou do a quiz and based on your answers you’ll get a personal recommendation of which chapters/exercises to read and focus on. Perfect if you haven’t got a lot of time and want a quick fix!
Although this time management book isn’t specifically focused on creatives, it’s very helpful if you don’t like planning, if you feel that you never have the time to do what you really want to do, if you are super busy but it doesn’t fulfill you and if there are too many distractions in your life.
Finish – Jon Acuff
Let’s be honest … do you find it hard to finish projects? To turn your ideas into real products and services that you can sell and launch? You start, work on lots of different projects and ideas …. But you rarely finish them?
This book (you can read it in less than 2 hours) is full of really great insights about why we don’t finish what we start. I really cringed a couple of times …
About the importance of the first day after you start when you are full of hope, when you often supersize the scope of your project, and then don’t follow through. And instead of getting yourself back on track gently, you quit.
About not being good enough. By having only the exceptional standard of ‘perfectionism’. And oh yes, the ugly head of perfectionism raises up regularly in disguise!
About how adding fun and joy to your goals and activities make it more likely you will do them. But how this bizarrely contradicts with out inherent belief that if we want to make something happen it needs to be hard, and can only be achieved by a lot of sweat and tears.
About the hiding places to avoid messing up. (Also called procrastination)
About the importance of tracking your progress.
And the final chapter really hits it home: About why we so often self-sabotage when we are very very close to reaching our goal. (This is so good!)
“What are you getting out of not finishing?
Because you’re getting something.
That’s the true reason why you don’t finish.”
Finish is a must-read for any chronic, super busy and super-excited starters who frankly rarely finish anything and want to really figure out why that is the case. Deep stuff. A book that will make you sit up straight.
Manage your Day to Day – a 99U book edited by Jocelyn K. Glei
This is a compilation of articles by creatives and entrepreneurs around time management including marketing guru Seth Godin, Behance Founder Scott Belsky, graphic designer and typographer Stefan Sagmeister, author and creative process expert Steven Pressfield, and creative coach and poet Mark McGuinness (see below).
Short, snappy articles and Q&A’s covering building a rock-solid routine, how to focus in a distracted world, tame your email and social media, and sharpen your creativity.
A beautifully designed books with great quotes such as:
“I don’t wait for moods.
You accomplish nothing if you do that.
Your mind must know it has got to get down to work.”
– Pearl S. Buck
Manage Your Day To Day is a beautiful little book – perfect if you want to get a little boost and make the most of your time and creativity.
Productivity for Creative People – Mark McGuinness
If you are looking for a quick introductory read into time management, especially for creatives, then this is it. You can read this practical book in an hour or so, covering both the big challenges and practical solutions for creatives who struggle with having too much on, who don’t have time to create, who feel anxious and overwhelmed most of the time, and who get distracted easily.
Mark has brought together in this book many of the time management gurus, such as David Allen and Steven Pressfield, and translated them for creatives, with many practical stories and insights from his own practice as a writer and poet, and creative coach.
Especially the chapter on how to get creative work done is very useful, with tips including email management, how to stop last-minute panicking, how to design your ideal work week, create rituals and habits to get into your creative zone, how to stop procrastinating by incubating instead (this is truly a marvellous insight!) and even how to make the most of boredom!
Time Management for Creatives ebook (free!) – Mark McGuinness
I’ve recommended this 32-page Time Management for Creatives ebook for many years to creatives as Mark really covers all the aspects of improving your productivity and getting better organised. Although published in 2007 (and downloaded more than 100,000!) it is still very relevant. Highly recommended! And yes, this is a free download.
Organizing for Creative People – Sheila Chandra
Do you believe that creativity thrives in chaos? Then this book is not for you.
This is one of the very few books about organisations systems for creatives, written by a creative – the singer Sheila Chandra. It’s full of really practical advice on how to sort out your systems, paperwork, work and living space, routines, how to make better decisions, planning your work load, delegation and much more. She asks the really big questions for most creatives, but also gives really practical advice to help you get sorted. Organizing for Creative People is for creatives who need a helping hand to get sorted.
Create Space – Derek Draper
We are the first generation that don’t have enough time.
‘Rather than having the need to fill space, we have the need to create it.’
In Create Spacepsychiatrist Derek Draper argues that we, and especially leaders, deliberately need to make more time and space to think, more time and space to connect, more time and space to do, more time and space to be. And each of these 4 parts is broken up in 3 chapters to create space to reflect, learn, decide, check in, share, relate, plan, deliver, lead, dream, balance and grow.
Each chapter starts with a story explaining a specific case study from Derek’s executive coaching practice, and his psychological theories behind the behaviour and dominant thought processes and behaviours. At the end of each chapter he includes some ‘ask yourself’ questions, often very deep and thought-provoking, or suggest practical exercises to work on.
Derek makes the case for us to deliberately step back and regain some control. Unless we make space deliberately we won’t be performing and developing at our optimum. This is much more than just a question of how we fill our time and diaries, or even how we manage our energy, but it’s mostly a state of mind to create your own life and priorities.
This is an excellent read for anybody who is feeling overwhelmed, who makes rushed decisions, who wants to encourage their deep and creative thinking, who wants to make more time to reflect.
(In 2020 Derek caught Covid and spend nearly 12 months in hospital, he is one of the longest surviving Covid patients in the UK. He is still recovering.)
Personal Kanban – Jim Benson and Tonianne DeMaria Barry
Kanban (Japanese 看板, signboard or billboard) = a Lean manufacturing method to manage and improve work by balancing demands with available capacity, and by improving the handling of system-level bottlenecks.
Based on Japanese manufacturing methods to minimise bottlenecks in the system this book shows how you can use these agile working principles in your own life. However machines need to be productive, but people need to be effective. It’s not about doing more and more and more, but about choosing the right work at the right time. Being aware of the impact on ourselves of the work we do, as well as on our colleagues, families, and the wider world.
In Personal Kabanthere are only two simple rules: visualise your work and flow, and limit your work-in-progress.
Visualise your work flow through Post-It notes into specific columns, moving them from one step to the next will make your work priorities more actionable, and providing a context-sensitive flow.
Limiting your work-in-progress will help you to complete what you start and understand the value of our choices.
Combined, these two simple acts encourage us to improve the way we work and the way we make choices to balance our personal, professional, and social lives.
It’s a very simple system that will appeal to creatives who love PostIt note planning!
Growing Gills – Jessica Abel
The subtitle of this book is ‘How to find creative focus hen you’re drowning in your daily life’ and is one of my most recommended books for creatives.
This isn’t a ‘pure’ time management book, but rather a very practical book about the creative process and how to get your best work done.
Jessica is an award-winning graphic illustrator and Professor of Illustration and she created this book to accompany her popular online course The Creative Focus workshop. Although you can read this book in two hours you would totally miss the point. This is a book that you need to DO. Indeed, you’ll get a workbook and short online course for free with the purchase of this book.
As Jessica suggests herself: Read one chapter a week and then do the accompanying exercises in that week and see how it works for you. Indeed this book is more like a course to get focused, rather than a book about time management.
Each chapter deals with a specific challenge that many creatives will recognise:
What is really stopping you?
Why do we as creatives hold on to too many ideas and how that stops us from finishing any of them?
How to identify and gain control over the many commitments you’ve made to yourself and others?
How to prioritise
Dealing with the ‘Dark Forest’ or why and how we go through creative crisis in the midst of big projects. And how to escape.
How to get back on track when you’ve derailed.
Jessica has got a great knack to describe a situation in such a way that it really resonates, but more importantly she identifies what’s really going on and what you can do about it. The description of The Dark Forest especially really resonated with me. At the time I felt seriously lost in the middle of rewriting my own Dream Plan Do book.
Firstly, I was surprised that I wasn’t the only writer/creative dealing with this challenge (Oh yes! So obvious in hindsight, not at the time!) but also how she managed to describe my feelings, and then reframe it as an essential part of the creative process, rather than me beating myself up for being pretty lost and thinking I would never get to the finish line of writing Dream Plan Do. While of course continuing to procrastinate! Haha!
Her explanation of why it is crucial to go into these undiscovered territories, without a map, really helped helped and calmed me down. Yes, I realised – it’s the only way to create your best work!
Another wonderful creative exercise in the work book is the ‘should monster’ AKA the evil gremlin of self-doubt! What are all the ‘shoulds’ in your life that are driving you crazy? Instead of keeping it all to yourself .. get it all out! Draw your own ‘should’ monster with all your ‘shoulds’ and then share it on social media! Do check out #shouldmonster on social media. As soon as you start to see the funny side and that you aren’t the only one struggling with this you will feel so much better!
Growing Gills was written in particular for new creatives, and especially creatives who are not yet working full-time or are considering the move from hobby to professional. But I think most creatives can do with a boost of insights into how the creative process sometimes can be challenging and tricky, so that you are better prepared. Highly recommended. Especially if you DO the exercises, rather than just read it as a book.
When – Daniel Pink
The big but basic idea in this book is that our energy is at it’s best in the morning and earlier in the week (if you have weekends!). Throughout the day our energy levels go up and down, and if you work with these natural energy flows then you become a lot more productive. The subtitle of this book is: The scientific secrets of perfect timing.
So instead of wasting your time in the morning with more and more emails and social media, use this time for ‘deep work’ that needs your brain space. For example this is the perfect time for some serious thinking or creating that needs you to get into flow.
I was aware of this phenomenon (who isn’t?) but it really shows that by planning better WHEN you do certain activities will increase your productivity.
So now I often really plan blocks of time to work on writing up projects or creating online content, while I leave more repetitive jobs such as emails, social media or indeed folding up the washing and doing the supermarket shop for later in the day when my brain isn’t as sharp. And I am a lot kinder to myself (and more realistic!) of what I can achieve in a day too! Just by shifting jobs around during the day has helped me to get more done quicker.
When – The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timingis full of practical examples of what can go wrong if activities aren’t done at the ‘right’ time (when people are tired or have lost most of their willpower) and also how to plan your days and hours better in line with your own energy. It also shows how important regular breaks throughout the day are – including a detailed description of the ‘perfect nap’!
THE DESIGN TRUST DIARY PLANNER – Patricia van den Akker
Although this isn’t strictly a time management book for creatives many clients have told us how useful they have found our diaries and planners to help them turn their big goals and dreams into do-able actions by breaking them down into smaller chunks. Our specialist annual diary is giving many creatives the strategic and practical framework to reflect and plan ahead through setting long-term goals and turn them into goals for the next 12 months, making time for quarterly reviews and monthly planning, and tracking their goals and numbers for finance, marketing and social media.
When you work by yourself it’s often hard to get accountability and to stay on track. If you decide to do things tomorrow then nobody really notices. Unlike a regular team meeting on Monday morning with fellow colleagues, the solopreneur struggles. Many of our diary planner readers have told me how they use the planner to write down their goals and activities, but also to have regular meetings by themselves to help them actually do what they want and need to do.
The Design Trust diary planner also helps creatives to do the right things at the right time. Most creative businesses are seasonal with a most sales in the run up to Christmas. So it’s really important that you start ‘planning with the end in mind’ – if you know when your clients are most likely to purchase then work backwards to plan when you need to have your website ready, your images, when to design your collections. But also on a weekly or even daily scale can you get much more done by being aware of what to do when, and to stack your time with similar activities and doing ‘brain-intensive’ activities (like planning, creating) in the morning, and more repeat jobs (like emails) in the afternoon or evening.
The Design Trust diary planner has been self-published for the last 5 years. For more details about The Design Trust diary planner see here. It’s normally only available for pre-order in mid September, and then from early November – February. More than 7,000 creatives in many countries across the world have been using The Design Trust diary planners in the last 5 years to achieve more in their business and life and turn their goals into action.
If you found this book list helpful, please Pin the image above and share it!
DISCLAIMER Please note that we have included affiliate links in this post, which means that The Design Trust will get a small commission if you order the recommended time management books for creatives above via Amazon. Of course it’s entirely up to you where you order your books from (we prefer small indie local book shops too to be honest!) but as many of our readers find Amazon very convenient and we offer lots of advice for free we do sometimes include links that earn us some additional pennies and pounds.
Have you got any recommendations for time management books for creatives? Or did you decide to purchase one of the books above and got lots out of it? We would love to hear your comments and time management suggestions below in the comments box.
