I truly love graphic design and art. The activity of creating even for commercial reasons is like swimming in a pool of happiness and I couldn’t image my life without it. But something else I found I also enjoy almost as much is marketing. In college I double minored in marketing and anthropology, the study of world cultures. Being a graphic designer you wouldn’t think you would need to understand marketing or cultural aspects that are different from your own but you would be very wrong.
I am in my 6th year of being a graphic designer and have had some great highs and a few lows but I do find it comes down to marketing and getting the word out. I can create the coolest app or eBook but if no one knows about it, well it’s like a silent death. But in this economy and everyone’s budget being tight how do you get that word out? Well some people call on gorilla marketing tactics to bridge the gap between creation and everyone knowing about it. In this post I’ll outline a few marketing ideas that might also help others get the word out without blowing your budget.
First whatever you have created and you want to “get the word out” well…it actually has to be good, or informational. If it’s lame well your are going to get the word out about how lame you are, not such a great thing. So first make sure you are honest about the work. Ask friends to take a look, ask the friends that like to point out the mistakes or feel comfortable telling you the truth. You will find that people like to blow smoke and say yes that’s great, but that isn’t what you are needing. When I have people look over let’s say my art eBook, I actually ask them not to give anything positive, this opens the door to finding out if what you have created is really worth you spending time and money marketing. Plainly put if it sucks keep working on it before you invest time and money on your marketing. And not everything is awesome, not all my painting make it to my website, being honest about the quality of your work is really important before you start talking about it.
Second, set a budget, even if you can’t spend money think about the time you are willing to put forth towards promoting your project, and don’t forget to include the production time for your idea as well. I had my children’s story “Sophie the Circus Cat” written about 15 years before it became an actual ebook. It was a story I created while I was teaching preschool art and every publisher I approached wanted money from me to to produce the book and I just didn’t have it.
So time passed graduated college and technology grew along with my skills as a designer. At the SXSW 2011 I came across Gamesalad, an open source developing tool for designers to create games. And then it just hit the right online pokie machines place and right time, and inside of a month I had it up on Apple market for the iPad. My second eBook of my art work followed shortly after. So one ebook is about reaching your dreams like Sophie and the other is about my art, which is a dream come true to share my art with the world. But my whole point is to make sure you have something of quality to market.
The concept of guerrilla marketing was invented as an unconventional system of promotions that relies on time, energy and imagination rather than a big marketing budget. Typically, guerrilla marketing campaigns are unexpected and unconventional, potentially interactive, and consumers are targeted in unexpected places.
One of the first ways I have approached my marketing of my eBooks is to use Facebook and word of mouth. Ask anyone and everyone to send the message out. This alone can create downloading momentum but you really need to back it up with other marketing as well.
Blogging and making sure you do html tags to help Google find your product. If Google doesn’t know you exists or your product, well you don’t really exists. This takes time and your links have to be relevant to your subject. Also ask friends and family to Google you, this will also help, not much but it does make a difference. If Google sees people are looking for you, then it will help your Google rating go up and that can only be good.
My next approach to marketing my eBooks and this is where a little money can go a long way. I created business card sized promo cards about my eBooks. Now I live in Austin, Tx and by far this place supports creatives like no other. So I spend my Saturday going to coffee shops personally handing out this card to people with iPads. I also hang out in front of the Apple store, seems a bit slow but people like to support artist in these places and I have had other opportunities arise from doing this one on one marketing.
Another tactic is I go to book stores and slip my promo card into every magazine that would relate to my iPad eBooks. From the reference guide to the iPads to tech magazines to art magazines.
Recently I even posted to craigslist about my app, and I got an interview invite for a pod cast to talk about my artwork and technology. People like to support locals and in Austin that is especially true.
Be realistic, things don’t happen overnight they accumulate and then become something. It’s all these efforts together that will get my artwork out there and will help build my art/writer career. And the first month my iPad eBook, Fine Art & Watercolor:Free was out it was downloaded over 1200 times. Not viral but not to bad since I actually only spent $20 to get the business promo cards made.
Well I hope these ideas help others and if you have an iPad please download my eBooks. : )