The Studio Source helps you build an extraordinary business by focusing on approach—how you show your work, how you connect with your customers, and how you can make great marketing without selling your creative soul.
Stacey Cornelius
I'm a writer, jargon translator, idea junkie & creative entrepreneur with a Fine Art degree. I have years of professional experience in retail, theatre, fine craft and information technology. Read More
The perception of “cheap”
I posted the above tweet on March 1st. I followed it up with, “There’s a reason I don’t buy “bargain” art or craft. Cheap = poor quality. Pricing is part of your marketing and part of your brand.”
A thoughtful question followed: at what point does my perception of handmade being cheap change?
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.
Posted in: Creative marketing
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.
