Creativity as a Business | Samantha Shepard

This year, April and I made a commitment to get out of the industry typical events and attend a few out of the box type of conferences. We hoped to meet new creative faces and get inspired to bring new things to this industry. We accomplished both of those things and much more when we attended Altitude Summit in Salt Lake City.

If you’re not aware, Altitude Summit is a blogging conference tailored more towards the creative aspect of blogging. The conference has been thriving for several years now and is well known for attracting many highly respected names within the blogosphere. The conference is run by Gabrielle Blair & Sara Urquhart both well known for their expertise and personal success within blogging.

The conference opened with a keynote by Joy Cho of OhJoy.com. She has experienced tremendous success through design collaborations with brands such as Target, Land of Nod and Feed. She is incredibly sweet and genuine. I found her talk to be full of great points which I feel apply to our industry of paper crafting. I want to share a few points for those of you who may be interested in turning your hobby of crafting into an income stream.

• Give people a taste - One of the great things which blogging affords is your ability to put on the internet a taste of your work. Blogging can be your personal diary but more often these days you’ll find that readers will find you for specific reasons and one of those reasons could be to see your work. Put forth a taste of your style to show people what you can do. This can be done through a blog or through other social media channels like Instagram or Pinterest.
• Don’t wait for an ad - if you want a job or to work with a certain company. Don’t wait for them to post an ad or help wanted sign. Most companies respond favorably to those who approach them and say “Hey, I like you. This is what I can do for you and I would love to work for you for these reasons.” It is not always the right timing, but you will find that the company will remember you and may reach out when the timing is right.
• Do the work you want to get- I think this really applies to our industry. If you really enjoy painting and want to attract companies who need painting, then that should be a major focus of what you put up on your blog or social media. Many customers will email me and ask me “How do I apply for your creative team?” and my answer is always the same: Be a customer. Be enthusiastic. Post in our gallery. Get noticed for your work. Do something remarkable with our products. Show me you already know how to do the talent part. I promise you we are watching. It’s far more likely we will pick from our most avid customers than a person who doesn’t have a username on our site.
• Just keep going - Many companies you want to work with will say no. You have to get through all the no’s to get to the yes’s. This is particularly true in the creative world. Your aesthetic will not appeal to everyone and that is actually very ok. Keep going and doing what you love. It shouldn’t be easy. In fact, it is almost never easy. However, if you really love and really want it, you will just keep going because not doing it isn’t an option. That is how I feel about my work and in the cases of my life where I didn’t feel that way, I ended up mentally quitting.

If you’re interested in reading more from Joy Cho she has two excellent books available. Blog, Inc. and Creative, Inc. You can also read her blog at Oh Joy.

Another big highlight was hearing Martha Stewart speak. Everyone has their own opinion of Martha Stewart but I have always appreciated her keen business sense and impeccable taste. She spoke about running her business and answered questions from Gabrielle Blair about how she got to today. Her practical advice for those of us with children was to “Beg, Borrow Help!” which I found to be endearing. Many of us struggle to feel like we are good mothers without sacrificing our efforts in our work. She had no single answer, instead she acknowledged how hard it is and advised us to not always do it alone.

The rest of the conference was full of seeing familiar faces and meeting new friends. I’m happy to say that I learned a ton about creating more effective videos and how other brands work with bloggers. Be on the lookout for some really awesome collaborations we have coming up which were a direct result of the folks we meet at this conference.

(Photo Credit : http://justinhackworth.com/)

Have a creative business and want more?

If you want to hear more about my take on growing a creative business, I will be speaking about that topic at the upcoming conference Inspired. This conference is an intimate gathering and retreat in the beautiful Evin’s Mill retreat outside Nashville, TN. I’m honored to be amongst other great and highly respected creatives. They are offering early-bird pricing through the end of July which is (eek!) next week. Register Here. They do sell out so if you are interested I would book it asap.

If you plan to attend please drop me a note because I would absolutely LOVE to have members of my Studio Calico family there.

Also, if you’d like to see more posts from us about the business side of things please leave a comment. I would love to give you whatever insight you’d like into what it takes to run a creative and growing business. I will tell you, it is absolutely as much fun as you think it is, and more!