How should I reframe the cost of giving away art or merchandise in these campaigns?

Stop thinking of it as giving away your art or merchandise. You’re simply running an ad. The cost of the print you ship or the commission you create is just your ad spend, exactly like paying for advertising. When you run ads, you have duds all the time—you spend energy and money and nobody clicks or buys. That’s completely normal. You might create twenty ads hoping one hits that you can run for months. The same applies here: you’ll run multiple giveaway campaigns, some will be duds, and that’s the game. This mental reframing is critical to staying motivated and not getting discouraged.

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Asked by teaching content · Answered by Patrick Shanahan · art-marketing-podcast · 2023-08-23