I studied what was supposed to be graphic design in community college. It was a lame course with an unqualified teacher, which is partly why I didn’t become a graphic designer. Most of what I know now is self-taught. I wish I’d met today’s guest post author, Pamela Wilson, a lot sooner. Pamela is one of those people who has a knack for explaining complicated concepts in plain English. She makes graphic design principles seem downright sensible. So if you don’t yet have the cash to hire a designer for your marketing materials and need to do it yourself, listen up. Pamela has some good advice for you.

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You may not know it now, but by the end of this post I aim to convince you that you already have the tools you need to create marketing materials that present your work in its best light.

The Studio Source is devoted to helping you implement marketing efforts that will make your business stand out from the rest. If you absorb what Stacey shares here, you’ll know how to position your business to be memorable for the long term.

My blog, the Big Brand System, is devoted to sharing information that helps small businesses make the marketing materials they’ll use to promote themselves. I’m a graphic designer, and some people have said that the Big Brand System is going to put my design studio out of business.

That’s ridiculous, and here’s why:

You’re Not My Customer
My clients are organizations who have large marketing budgets. My fees aren’t cheap, so I can only work with companies who can afford me.

I suppose that sounds like I’m showing off, but after being in the design business for over 20 years, I bring lots of experience to the table, and my fees reflect that.

At the same time, it has been frustrating for me. I’ve met many people over the years who really need the help of someone like me. When you have a very small business, polished, professional marketing materials can give you an advantage when you compete with other businesses for the attention of your target market.

Oftentimes I’ve stopped and helped. I create a basic website, or a set of brochures, or a presentation kit that helps that person go out into the world with a piece that tells their story and sells what they offer.

In the Old Days
When I first worked as a designer back in the late 1980s, our work was done manually. Clients gave us typewritten pages, and we marked them with our instructions and sent them out to a typesetting service. The next day, a courier service would deliver galleys: photo paper that had the typeset text output on long, glossy pages.

We’d take the galleys and slice them with our X-acto knives and use rubber cement to glue them onto mechanical boards. These boards were sent to a printer to be photographed. It was a time-consuming and hands-on process.

The Big Secret
Fast forward to today. If you’re reading this blog, you own a computer that does more than I could do at my drafting table as a professional graphic designer back in the 1980s. The ability to type on a keyboard and see the results on a screen in front of you before you printed them out didn’t exist at that time.

The big secret I’m here to tell you is if you know what to do with the powerful tool you’re sitting in front of, you can create beautiful and effective marketing materials for your business.

Rules and Skills
Like any skill you want to learn, graphic design and marketing have some basic rules you need to master before you can do them successfully. And like any new skill, the more you practice it, the better you’ll get at it.

It is worth the effort to master these skills. Why? Because no one is more passionate about seeing your business succeed than you. No ad agency or design studio you hire can match the enthusiasm and energy you’ll devote to creating crowd-pulling marketing.

Learn, Apply, Grow
I encourage you to pay attention to what Stacey shares here. Apply it to your business and observe the results. Make adjustments if needed, and try again.

Learn what you can about design, too. Once you’re mastered some basic design skills, you can take the powerful tool you’re sitting in front of and make beautiful pieces that will help your business shine.

You’re a creative person, so you have an advantage over the rest of the population. You’ve already been exposed to color theory, composition basics and how to really “see.” Your learning curve for design skills should be much shorter.

I challenge you to try it. Learn about typography, copywriting and white space. Add these skills to your toolbox and use them in your business marketing. Before you know it, you’ll have the most passionate, eager person in the world working on your marketing: you!

About the author: Pamela Wilson helps people grow their business with great design and marketing. Want to know more? Get her free Design 101 e-course at her site, BigBrandSystem.com

Related posts:

1. What happens when you try too hard (Marketing 101 revisited)
2. Seven ways to shape your brand
3. Put four Ps in your creative marketing

A craftsperson once told me a story about a couple who remarked how much fun her work must be. She replied, “Well it would be if someone actually bought something!”

The craftsperson was having a bad day.

The nice people went away.

There’s a school of thought that seems to suggest if you do something you’re passionate about, it must be all kinds of fun, all the time.

You know better.

There are days when you get a little frustrated. And there are those days when you want to throw in the towel, snap your paintbrush in two, pitch your computer out the window, or strike the word “creative” from the collective vocabulary until the end of time.

Okay, maybe that last one is just me. But whatever your frustrations are, they’re best expressed with discretion.

Listen carefully to bridge the gap
When you encounter someone who sees creative pursuits as fun, it might be because she considers your work a hobby. That person might be a lost cause. But it’s possible “work” in her world is something decidedly not fun. It doesn’t occur to her that artists, designers, writers and other creatives work as hard as anyone else.

She might think that way because she needs to believe it’s true. She needs to believe there’s something better that what she’s currently stuck with, and on that particular day, her “something better” is you.

So what do you do with that?

Our craftsperson could have said something like, “It’s not fun all the time. I have to do a lot of production, and that’s hard work. But as far as jobs go, this one is pretty great. What kind of work do you do?”

People like it when you show interest in them. Once you create a little rapport, you can steer the conversation back to what you have for sale.

At the very least, you can help one more person understand what you do for a living.

Watch for emotion and enhance the experience
Or you could follow those words to their source. When someone responds to your work, what she says simply reflects how she feels about it. “Doing this must be so much fun!” is pure emotion. It’s a mighty good feeling, too.

You can take that sentiment and turn it into an experience your potential customer wants to take home with her. You can chat with her a little, giving her a glimpse into your creative practice. That could be enough for her to decide she’d like to buy something.

If she doesn’t buy, she still leaves with a good impression of you and an interesting story to tell her friends—you did remember to tell her something interesting, yes? She might come back or one of her friends might come looking for you.

Get out of your own head and pay attention. If you do it right, what starts as a frustrating comment can end with a sale.

Share your opinion
What’s the best comment you ever got from a customer? What’s the worst comment you’ve ever heard? Have you ever turned a strange encounter into a great selling opportunity?

Related posts:

1. What to do when you’re nervous
2. Break your routine
3. The other big problem with marketing

Once upon a time, a long time ago, I had a job interview. It was a technical writing gig. I can’t recall the name of the company.

My throat tightened the minute I saw the sea of cubicles. I got downright jumpy when I met with the interviewers. There were two of them and me, in a small room. I suspected they were recent university graduates, and it quickly became clear they were both big fans of pre-programmed conversations.

They asked a few perfunctory questions, then started on the hypothetical quiz section. How did I feel about office politics? Could I give examples? How did I feel about the situation I encountered?

It was like I’d been sucked into The Matrix. I found myself fighting a nearly irresistible urge to bolt for the door.

“I’m not comfortable gossiping about a past job to get a new one. If I were the type, I’d give you my unvarnished opinion of the self-important jerk who took credit for someone else’s work, and exactly how that poisons a workplace. And if you’re asking me that question, I have to wonder what kind of culture you have here.”

But I didn’t say that out loud.

I gave them a sanitized version of the story, reluctantly jumping through their hoops, the desire for a cleansing hot shower growing stronger with every word.

Then things got interesting
When they finally got to the big question—why I wanted to work for the company—I did the unthinkable. I deliberately blew the interview.

“I don’t want a career. I want to do work I’m passionate about.”

I can’t remember if they asked me about writing.

I do recall two very clear realizations: first, I could never work in Cube Land again. Second, and this was striking: way too many job interviews are stellar examples of how to not get your message out.

Put the textbook down, and back away quickly
Far too often, marketing, like a bad job interview, becomes a meaningless ritual. You go through what you think are the correct motions. You sanitize your words to mimic corporate-speak, because corporations are successful, so you figure that’s the way it should be done. Formal. By the book. Non-threatening.

You tell people what you think they want to hear. You don’t dare talk about what you can’t—or won’t—deliver, because you might not get the business.

You water down who you are and what you really want to do.

You settle, too fast and too easily.

And you end up miserable.

A big opportunity and a big decision
A couple of years later, I had another interview. This one was for a vice president’s position at a small company that did cool creative work. I must have made a good impression, because shortly after the meeting they called and asked if I could come in for a few days, to see if it was a good fit before everything was finalized.

I thought hard, but not long. I didn’t want to admit it and lose out on the opportunity, but I knew even before the offer was made I’d rather be in the shop making stuff than in the office talking about it.

I turned it down.

The salary and the title were very tempting. But I knew I couldn’t give them what they wanted, or what they deserved. They couldn’t give me what I wanted, either.

I remained self-employed, for a lot less money.

On rare occasions, I still wonder if I was out of my mind.

This much I’m sure of: the source of those choices wasn’t madness. What I said was the simple truth, and both times the words just fell out of my mouth. I don’t have to fake excitement when I talk about making things, or telling stories, or pushing past stale, stiff, inflicted limitations to do your best work. Because those things matter.

Where good marketing comes from
When you talk about the work you’re truly passionate about, you don’t have to force your words or ideas. That’s the place the best marketing comes from, because it’s the place the best stories are made. It’s good because you mean it. It’s good because it’s true.

The people who love what you create hear that message, loud and clear. They’re listening for it.

When do you do your best blurting? Have you ever had a great opportunity turn out to be a big disappointment? How do you feel about turning down work when you know it’s not right for you?

Related posts:

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2. Lessons learned in art school
3. Two important lessons learned in a car showroom

Sometime during the Pleistocene era, when the dinosaurs were Claymation (think about it),* I learned the difference between sales and marketing.

The only thing that mattered at the time was knowing marketing takes longer.

If you want to get technical, sales is part of the marketing process—the good part, where nice people decide to give you money. Marketing is about creating something and telling people about it, then selling it and actually getting it into their hands.

(If you’re really smart, you will make the telling into a two-way street, and listen to your audience. Paying attention to people is a good way to learn how they think.)

But let’s get right back to the “marketing takes longer” thing, because that’s what really frustrates people. Since it’s a considerable investment of time and effort, it’s critical to pay attention to your marketing, and it’s why the following four concepts belong in your marketing and in your head. I named them the Four Ps to make them easier to remember.

Perspective
Marketing requires you take the long view. You meet someone, hand her a business card, and get an email from her—eight months later. Those contacts are a nice surprise, because you probably wrote that person off as not being interested. Except she was interested, just not at the time. Or maybe she visited your website and started to get to know you and your work, then remembered you when the need (or desire, or both) arose for her to buy from you.

Don’t automatically assume your efforts have been wasted. Good marketing can pay off at unexpected times and in unexpected ways.

Professionalism
Who would you rather do business with—someone who has their act together, or someone who may or may not deliver on time? How much does credibility suffer when there are missing images all over a website, or when it looks like someone’s 9-year-old nephew designed the thing? “Professional” doesn’t necessarily translate into “expensive.” It means you pay attention to details and present yourself so your customer—the person who is about to give you her hard-earned money—knows she can trust you.

You need to bring that quality to every part of your business, including your marketing.

Personality
Does your website copy or print material read like a tourist brochure, or does it sound like you? If I called you on the phone, would I recognize you as the same person who wrote your bio?

Don’t panic. You don’t have to write exactly as you speak. Most of us are more formal in writing, but that’s a good thing. We tend to be more spontaneous in person—we ramble, gesture, and use vocal quirks and subtleties that just don’t work in print.

That said, it’s important to have a sense of you in your marketing materials. You want to reflect your style in your visuals (typeface, logo if you have one, colour palette), as well as your written words. It helps you seep into the consciousness of your audience, giving them the full flavour of you and your work.

Persistence
Persistence doesn’t mean getting in someone’s face until they unfollow you on Twitter or block your email address. It means you don’t give up. Be smart, gracious, funny, sincere, whoever you are in real life. Keep making your work, and keep telling people about it. Growing a business takes time. Establishing a reputation takes time (unless it’s a bad one, which can get established in a hurry). When you interact with people online or offline, talk about more than your work so you don’t sound like an over-caffeinated car salesman or bore yourself to death.

Marketing takes time, so don’t give up on it. You didn’t give up on learning your chosen medium, which took time and persistence. That process tends to be a career-long adventure, so take a good, deep breath, and keep promoting your work.

So perspective, personality, professionalism, and persistence. Or, to reframe it in human terms: be yourself, keep your wits about you, respect the process, and see it through.

Over to you: what’s your take on sales versus marketing? How do you feel about the big picture of marketing? What resonates more for you–the 4 Ps approach, or do you prefer something more descriptive?

*(Okay, I’m not that old, but I’ve been dying to use that Pleistocene joke for ages. Epochs, even. Thank you for your bandwidth.)

Related posts:

1. If you’re a creative, you can craft great marketing materials
2. The other big problem with marketing
3. Make the most of your down time

Three people I know have said nearly the same thing over the past few days—Why can’t I get this right?

One person was frustrated at not being able to master a new skill quickly. One was trying to wrestle designs into lower price points. One was overthinking her marketing message.

Their intentions were honourable, but they weren’t getting the results they wanted, and for good reason. Trying too hard interrupts your flow. It hangs up your thinking and twists you into a ball of anxiety.

Learning takes time
It’s beyond frustrating when you try to master something that looks like it should be easy. When your initial efforts are met with unabashed defiance, you wonder what could possibly be wrong with you, particularly when other people seem to be doing the very same thing with little or no effort.

But they had to learn it, too. If you want to get good at something, you have to work at it. You have to practice. And you are required to make mistakes.

(You could say mistakes are a natural part of the process, but if mistakes are a prerequisite, your pride will take less of a beating and you’ll be less likely to quit.)

Give quality work the respect it deserves
Trying to dumb down good design is as bad as trying to copy it. You end up with a pale imitation of the original. The balance is off, the shapes are wrong, and there’s an unmistakable sense that something’s missing. It’s like the cheap knock-off gowns that appear every year after the Academy Awards. Yes, you can have the fabulous dress that Penelope Cruz wore! Except the cheap version usually ends up looking like an okay-ish prom gown.

You’d be better off going to the local vintage clothing store. At least you get a dress that still has its original character.

You could drop the price on an original piece, but that sends its own unfortunate message. Quality buyers get suspicious when they see a price that’s too low. What’s wrong with it? Substandard materials? Poor production?

The price has to be in proper alignment with the quality of the piece and the person who makes it.

That advice is hard to take. You need to earn a living. But pricing creative work is like dating—the scent of desperation is only attractive to vampires.

Selling creative work is also like dating—if you don’t see good prospects, you’re in the wrong place. Move on.

Use your head, but trust your instincts
When you know who your ideal customer is, you have a strong sense of how they think—what delights them, what bugs them, and what they really, really want. All the marketing books in the world can’t replace that kind of understanding.

What they really, really want is a function of emotion. They feel good when they buy directly from you. It’s cool—you’re cool. Your work makes them feel sophisticated. It makes them feel special. There are theories to explain the emotion and techniques to help you enhance that feeling, but sometimes the complicated logistics get in the way. Sometimes it’s best to just be human—to exercise empathy and meet your customer where they are, instead of trying to pull them to you.

So let’s take those three experiences and combine them to craft a basic marketing plan.

Marketing 101 revisited—the creative version

• Make excellent work. (Practice. Learn new things. Practice some more.)
• Don’t sell yourself short—price your work properly.
• Sell in the right places.
• Sell to the right people.
• Don’t overthink it. People are emotional creatures. Let your creativity and empathy help guide you.

Wanting to get it right drives you to do better, but it doesn’t matter whether you’re trying to learn something or get your message out—pushing too hard drives you crazy.

You might think marketing is just another skill, like learning to roller skate, but that’s not true. Marketing is a multi-faceted activity. So much of you is wrapped up in your work, you can’t separate yourself from your marketing. And you shouldn’t, because you is what helps sell your work. Marketing isn’t just a matter of following a recipe. It’s an organic process. If you approach it that way, it feels more natural, and more like a part of your creative process.

Just remember: don’t try too hard.

Over to you: What happens when you try too hard? More importantly, what happens when you step back, relax, and let things unfold?

Related posts:

1. The wisdom of failure
2. The power of commitment
3. Forget the textbook stuff – marketing is cool.

I have perfectionist tendencies. When I embark on a new writing project, a little monster appears on my shoulder and tells me it’s going to be a dismal failure. Life coach and author Martha Beck claims this is why writers drink. In my world, that little monster can become a major creative block.

There’s a cognitive therapy technique that allegedly helps banish these thoughts. You ask yourself what’s the worst thing that could happen, then deconstruct your faulty thinking by then asking yourself what’s so bad about that worst thing. Repeat as needed.

Here’s how that usually works for me:

Me: This is horrible. Nobody is going to like this. People are going to think I’m an idiot.

My Inner Shrink: Okay, what’s so bad about that?

Me: Shut up.

My Inner Shrink: That’s just you expressing discomfort. What’s so bad about feeling like an idiot?

Me: No, I mean it. Shut up.

Apparently I’m not big on sensible exercises I read in self-help books.

There’s been a new idea rattling around in my head during the past couple of weeks about how to better deal with my little monster. Since he’s mine (my monsters are always male for some reason), I can make him into anything I want.

So now the monster on my shoulder is Jack Spar Captain Jack Sparrow. When I find myself getting stuck or freaked out, I ask, “What would Jack do?”

I know what you’re thinking: the rum in my house will always be gone.

Never fear, I will not turn into a slobbering drunk. I don’t drink. I may, however, need a hat. A really big one.

My new strategy for breaking down creative blocks isn’t perfect, but it takes the edge off nicely. And textbooks be damned—it works for me.

Which brings me to the real reason for today’s post: I just finished putting together a free eclass. It’s called The Creative Marketing Foundation Course. It’s primarily for artists and craftspeople, since it deals largely with selling physical objects, but creatives of all flavours are welcome to join in. Hey, everybody’s welcome. All you need to do is go to the page and subscribe to the class.

The Creative Marketing Foundation Course short and sweet: six-lessons (and quite possibly a bonus lesson, but you’re going to have to sign up to find out). Since it’s free, you can try it with no risk, and if it’s not what you’re looking for, no worries, you can unsubscribe easily. I won’t be too upset—I have Jack to comfort me.

Related posts:

1. A little Christmas shopping insight
2. Seven ways to shape your brand
3. How to turn frustration into an opportunity

When was the last time you got a handwritten letter in the mail? We don’t see many handwritten letters anymore, or printed letters carefully laid out on beautiful stationery. It’s a treat when it happens. You get a little thrill when a package arrives in the mail, even if it’s something you bought and paid for yourself.

In my imagination, a new bank starts up. They send me a yo-yo, with the word “Steady…” engraved on the face. The introductory letter says something like, “We know how it feels, watching the ups and downs of the economy. We’re here to help you plan sensibly for a more secure future, so you can enjoy today.”

I know. A bank run by real people instead of profit-crazed bureaucrats. Fat chance. But a yo-yo, that would be cool. There is something truly magical about being in a state of Yo.

Imagine you receive a formal invitation to a tea party at an artist’s studio, printed on pristine white card stock, in flowing script, as if you were being invited to visit the Queen. Or a coupon for a new Asian restaurant, printed on the wrapper of a pair of chopsticks. Bring them in and get an appetizer for half price.

I may have an overdeveloped sense of fun, or maybe I like high-end gimmicks.

Or perhaps it’s a finely tuned sense of the tactile.

Kids interact with the world by touching things. It’s one of the ways they learn. Parents tell them not to touch, to keep them safe and to teach them about social norms. But we never outgrow our need for it. That’s why pet therapy is so effective. It’s one of the reasons wrapping your hands around your favourite coffee mug is so satisfying.

So what if you went old school and literally put something in the hands of a customer? Create a carefully crafted message that’s short, sweet, to the point and perfectly aligned with your personal style. Something sent to a chosen few.

Make a series of cartoons; number each one in the series. Each is part of a story that will be revealed when recipients bring their cartoon to a party. Or, if you and your customers are tech-savvy, arrange a private online event for everyone to upload the cartoon you sent them by email.

Engaging someone’s imagination, their sense of touch, their sense of fun, is a powerful way to connect. Treat their attention like a gift—because it is.

What kind of message would delight you?

Related posts:

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3. Don’t tell me – show me

Here’s some insight from my other life, the one where I design and create work I sell directly to customers.

Last year, people weren’t much into gift boxes. Excess packaging wasn’t cool. This year? Just about everybody is saying yes. They’re spending less, for the most part, but they want the things they’re buying to be special. This year, a little detail like a gift box is important.

I suspect that customer mindset will stick around for a while.

That doesn’t mean dressing up a low-priced item with fancy packaging. There’s an old saying about silk purses and sow’s ears, and a good reason it’s an old saying.

That doesn’t necessarily mean you panic and drop your prices, either. You might be able to break a psychological barrier ($39.75 instead of $40.00, maybe, or breaking up services into smaller, more affordable pieces), but if a price is too low, the thing attached to it becomes cheap. You’re not selling to people who want cheap. You’re selling to people who want value.

People are thinking carefully about how much money they have to spend. They’re thinking about how they can find the best value for that money and still give a gift that will delight the recipient.

They’re getting it right without overthinking it: something thoughtful, that doesn’t break the budget, wrapped with care, because the recipient is important.

That approach should form the foundation of your marketing efforts.

Related posts:

1. Send your audience a message
2. Look back, move forward – legacies and resolutions
3. What happens when you try too hard (Marketing 101 revisited)

The Prince George Hotel in Halifax, Nova Scotia has started a series of billboard ads. The first one featured a beaming bride-to-be getting ready for her wedding. Two hotel staff members in classic black and white chambermaid uniforms are helping her with her gown.

The second billboard I saw on Saturday. This one features a family seated at a dining room table. Mum and Dad are only visible from the neck down. Their little guy, seated between them, has an expression of utter bliss on his face as he contemplates the only object on the table—an elaborate confection in an enormous glass goblet.

The message on both billboards is simple—anything for you.

I know what you’re thinking. Fancy hotels have a big staff and a big budget; you can’t possibly do something like that.

Yes, you can.

Let’s pretend these two events are real. When someone books a wedding at the Prince George, there will be staff assigned to make sure everything goes as planned. Payroll is already in the budget. The youngster with the scrumptious after-dinner treat? The kitchen already has the ingredients. All the dessert chef has to do is get creative.

Is there significant cost for this special treatment? Would either of these things cause staff burnout?

Not if you do it right.

If you’re running a 4-diamond hotel, you make extraordinary service your mission. You hire the right people and train them well. You keep your promise.

But first you ask yourself a simple question: what defines 4-diamond service?

Okay, you’re not running a hotel. You may not even have anyone working for you. But you can still ask the same question: what makes a buying experience extraordinary? Is it someone remembering your name? A handwritten note with your mail order purchase? A phone call or letter afterwards to make sure all is well? An over-the-top quality guarantee?

Let’s keep this in context: we’re not talking about Big Dave’s Motor Inn and Grill. The Prince George isn’t a cheap place to stay, and it shouldn’t be. Quality service is priced accordingly, and people expect to pay for quality. If you offer something extra that costs extra, you plan for it and build it into your pricing (you also make sure it’s something that will enhance your customer’s experience, otherwise it’ll backfire and you’ll look like a money-grubbing jerk).

Being thoughtful isn’t expensive. It’s amazing to see how many businesses don’t bother. And that, dear friends, is your golden opportunity.

P.S. Check out the Prince George’s pet-friendly policy and Specials & Packages page. This is fantastic marketing.

I’ve finally succumbed to the pressure. You can follow me on Twitter @thestudiosource

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This just in—the economy is a construct.

I know. That’s not news. We usually think of the economy in terms of paycheques and employment rates and the price of electricity and groceries. But the “economy” is like a strange fantasy world where we exchange pieces of paper for the work we do. Somebody somewhere put a value on that work, and we more or less agree with that value. The things we buy are also assigned a value. Sometimes that value changes.

It’s pretty weird when you think about it that way.

It gets even weirder when you don’t actually receive little pieces of paper for your work. A lot of the time, there are only numbers on a larger piece of paper that comes from the bank. Sometimes you just look at the numbers on your computer screen.

We can get a little more real. Say I fix your front gate, and you give me a loaf of bread and basket of apples in return. There is a direct exchange between you and me, but the transaction still requires an agreement of value.

It’s the agreement part that can drive you nuts.

I see people underprice their work out of fear that no one will buy it otherwise. These are often artists and craftspeople. There’s a wild variation in style and skill among people who sell the things they make, and therefore an equally huge range of prices. Instead of looking for an established price range in their medium and skill level, and instead of finding the right place to sell it, they panic and undersell—often to the wrong audience.

I see people present their work in a way that undermines their customers’ perceptions of it. A poorly designed website or amateurish business card or retail display doesn’t convey a sense of quality. So by ignoring these important details, they risk losing a portion of their audience, because they break the value agreement.

This may sound stupidly obvious, but people who share agreements on value tend to gravitate towards the same places. They respond to similar visual cues—things like packaging, design, colour, the tone of advertising copy. A television commercial for Kia isn’t going to have the same look and feel as, say, a commercial for Volkswagen. The audience is different. The agreement of value is different. To use the jargon, the demographic is different.

Embarrassing true story: when I started my jewellery business, I signed on to do a show sight-unseen, based on a recommendation from someone who had participated in a show with the same promotions company, but in a different location. My first show, and just to add to the hilarity, it was out of town.

I found myself across from someone who was selling quilted water cooler bottle covers, in the midst of a crowd of customers who balked at a $40 necklace.

The bed and breakfast was lovely.

(Note: never walk into a venue without doing proper recon, even if someone tells you it’s good. They may not have the same perception of value as you do, or they may have had a good experience, but discover some unfortunate inconsistencies down the road.)

You see the problem. If I had found myself at the high end of the price and quality range of the show, I could have been a big fish in a small pond. But I turned out to be a (ahem) donkey. If I’d somehow landed in the midst of the best of the best, I could have beaten everyone on price, but would likely have ended up with the same dilemma: not fitting in with the audience’s perception of value.

The good thing about a construct is it provides a framework. You can find comparable work and see if your pricing fits within the accepted range. You can see how people in your field are presenting that work. You can find untapped audiences by using the framework as a starting point, maybe even push the boundaries of the framework—if you give the audience something they agree is truly valuable.

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