I don't want to do marketing—I just want to create. How can I build a successful art business?

Everyone feels this way—it’s completely normal to want someone else to handle marketing. But here’s the reality: if you’re willing to do the marketing work that others won’t do, you instantly put yourself in the top 0.001% of artists. The competition is almost non-existent because so few artists actually do the work. Everyone wants shortcuts—uploading to marketplaces, hoping for passive income, wishing for an art rep. Those easy activities that take five minutes don’t work, by definition. The things nobody wants to do are where the gold is. That’s where you find your advantage. Everything valuable requires work. Once you accept that and commit to doing what others won’t, you’ll be in a completely different league with virtually no real competition.

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Asked by artist resistant to marketing work · Answered by Patrick Shanahan and Nick Friend · art-marketing-podcast · 2020-06-27