What mistake do most artists make when they're trying to start selling?

The biggest mistake is investing time and money in everything except actually trying to sell. Artists spend months or hundreds of dollars on websites, logos, business cards, business licenses, and worrying about logistics that come after a sale - before they’ve ever validated that anyone will buy their work. They also seek validation by showing images to people instead of trying to sell the actual product. This is completely backwards. The website industry, camera companies, and other businesses are very good at getting artists to buy their products before the artist even has a business. You need to work in the opposite order: get your product and try to sell it first, then invest in business infrastructure after you’ve proven there’s demand.

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Asked by an artist starting out · Answered by Patrick Shanahan and Nick · art-marketing-podcast · 2020-10-01