And once again, the Three Jaguars return! Our topic this week is so complex we?re going to have to split it up into three parts! Here?s part one. Enjoy!
Introduction
?????Relationships are the building blocks of business. We all know it? how many times have we heard something like ?It?s who you know?? Or maybe ?they got where they are because they?re friends with x?? Or even ?You?ve gotta network?? Usually these things are said with a sneer, as if we all know that it?s more important to be talented than it is to be good with people. But the Three Jaguars are here to tell you that there are hundreds of thousands of talented people who are also unsuccessful. It takes more than talent to make it. If the definition of professional success is ?enough people buy my work that I can make a living off of it,? then obviously, people are part of the equation. No people, no audience. No audience, no money.
?????Suddenly it makes a little more sense why ?it?s who you know? is such a common phrase. It takes more than one person to make a career out of your talent: not just your fans, but people who work to make your art available to them in any number of ways; and not just them, but even other artists, who are your peers and a place to turn to for advice and an understanding ear.
?????And the key to all these relationships? Is communication.
?????Ah, communication. So many ways to strengthen relationships? and so many ways to wreck them. You need to do a lot of communicating as a creative businessperson. Let?s get started.
Communicating with Fans and Customers and Patrons: Marketer
?????Our first target? Your fans, customers, and patrons. Some of you may remember from the first column on roles that Marketer is your customer-facing self?
But wait! Shouldn?t ARTIST be the one talking with fans? They?re fans of the art, after all?
?????Maybe so, but with rare exception, Artist is very sensitive to other people?s interpretations of her work. Too sensitive. Criticism offends or depresses her; lukewarm responses inspire doubt or resentment. Enthusiasm gets her talking? maybe too much, draining her interest in finishing the work, or revealing spoilers fans weren?t quite ready for, or distracting her so much she doesn?t spend any time doing anything productive.
?????No, Artist needs to be in the studio. Marketer is the only one with the aplomb and savvy to actually handle fans? who are, after all, also your customers, and entitled to their negative opinions and complaints as well as their enthusiasms.
?????So here?s the watchword for communicating with fans and customers: service.
?????Why?
?????Because your fans and customers and patrons are all supporting your creative endeavors. Whether it?s through their enthusiasm, their word-of-mouth recommendations or their dollars, they are participating in your career directly, by giving you free advertising (and the best kind according to studies), by funding you, and by cheering you on. They don?t have to do any of those things; you?re only one of many thousands of artists they could be supporting, but they?ve chosen you! So your job is to make them glad they?re spending their time and attention on your work: by comporting yourself with respect for them and ensuring that they are pleased with the quality of the products they are selecting to get your work into their hands.
?????Remember: your art, when it trades hands, is a product. Even if you?re posting it for free, that free download or webpage or sample is still a product, which means Marketer is the one in charge of packaging it, making it available, and dealing with people?s responses to it. Artist is going to be verrrrrrrrry tempted to butt into this relationship, but she doesn?t belong here.
?????So let?s talk specifics.
How Do I Talk to Customers?
Some principles first:
1. Be interested.
?????These are people who are interested in your work; it behooves you to be interested in them. Listen to their response to what you?re creating. Listen to their experience when they buy something from you. Tell yourself ?I will react to all this later, for now, I will pretend like they?re talking about someone else?s work, not mine.?
?????Did something touch them? Why? Make notes. Artist did something right; she?ll want to know.
?????Did they really love the product? Was the print perfectly trimmed? Was the mug exactly what they asked for? Were the extra graphics in the e-book appreciated? This is valuable information for Marketer.
?????Did the buying experience please them? Was it easy for them to pay? Did they get what they wanted in a timely fashion? Were they pleased with the level of interaction they had with you or your distributor? This is information Marketer and Business Manager need to manage relationships with business partners (or to streamline your own processes).
?????Remember: people who like your work have at least one thing in common with you, and probably a lot more. Be interested in them, because they will be interesting people, and they have valid and useful things to say.
2. Be professional.
?????Most of us have heard terrible stories about Artists Behaving Badly on the internet. You don?t want to be one of those people, because those stories spread like wildfire and repairing the damage afterward is painful and will make Marketer weep.
?????You are a businessperson now; you have a license that says so. Be professional. That means be courteous, listen to what people are saying, and above all, don?t get emotional about it. If you absolutely must have an emotional reaction, have one in private, unload it on your friends and confidants, or write it down and then trash the letter. If you are prone to emotional responses, try not to use communication media that reveal it: avoid phones, and never send emails immediately; wait a day before responding.
3. Be kind.
?????Everyone remembers kindness, and everyone needs it. If you?re following the guidelines above, you?re already interested, and you?re already professional. Being courteous and thoughtful is icing on the cake.
?????And everyone loves cake.
So, having set out some basic rules, let?s look at some details.
Staying In Contact: Managing Your Inbox
?????Most of us are going to need to instate some rules to deal with fan communications. If you don?t have too many emails now to handle, don?t worry: you will. It?s best to set up some rules for yourself initially so you can manage your customer?s expectations as well as keep yourself from pulling out your hair. Try these:
1. Establish an email specifically for contact from customers.
?????Make this email different from the one you use for personal communication (no mixing up Mom?s birthday party invitation with someone?s request that you mail them a print). If you?re super-fancy-good with email, you can set up a rule that routes your business partner emails into a separate folder, or flags and labels them. If you?re not super-fancy-good with email, use a separate email address for your business partners, so you can manage those relationships without being distracted by dozens of fan comments on your latest offering.
1a. If you work primarily by phone, by all means, get a separate phone number for your business.
2. Batch your responses.
?????As tempting as it is to loom over your inbox like a hungry vulture, checking email can become a spasmodic reflex that interferes with you doing anything else. Decide right now when you?re going to answer your customer responses, whether it?s email or voice mail or social media, and do it all at once. Most of you will want to do it once or twice a day (maybe at lunch/day?s end). You can also do it biweekly or weekly, whichever suits your work-mode better. Whatever you do, though, choose a block of time and stick to it. This leads you to?
3. Office Hours.
?????It?s important to maintain communication with your customers. Nothing is more irritating than ordering a product and not receiving it, and not getting any explanation about why it hasn?t arrived. You want to remain available to help your customers and answer their questions, and also to answer as many fan responses as you can manage? but you don?t want to lose your work-time to it either. Once you?ve decided on a reasonable amount of time, and time period, for answering customer responses, post your ?office hours? somewhere people will see them. Explain that you will be checking email once a day at this time, and that you will be in the studio otherwise and appreciate people?s patience?if you?re not working, you?re not producing wonderful new things to share!
?????Do this even if your work is on a computer. It?s especially tempting for writers, digital artists, and other computer-using creatives to sneak a peek at their email or do a quick refresh on the blog to see if anyone?s said anything lately. Don?t! Close everything but the program you need to do your work and keep your eyes on the prize. If you?re bad at this, there are several programs that will lock down your computer?s shiny things for you so you can?t check until a certain time. Use them.
Templates (or Getting the Most Out of Your Response Time)
?????Most of us will get very similar kinds of questions from fans and customers. ?Do you sell a print of x?? or ?Do you offer electronic versions of that book? or ?Where can I find your jewelry in person,? etc, etc. The questions will be specific to your art form, but if you?ve already been working for a while you?ll already know exactly what I?m talking about, and have a list of those questions in your head. Write them down now!
?????Did you do it?
?????All right. Now, write a FAQ answering those questions and post it somewhere people can see it.
?????Hooray! You have reached about 10% of the people who will want to know something. The rest of them will still be sending you email or asking you in some other way directly. For those people, create a template answering the question. For instance, in response to ?can I buy a paper version of your e-book?:
?????Thanks for your interest in [Book Name]! At this time, [Book Name] is scheduled to hit print on [Date]. You can preorder it now from [Name of Store 1] or [Name of Store 2], or you can pick it up when it arrives in stores on [Date again].
?????If you?d like to follow my publication news more closely, you can also follow me on twitter at [name], check my Facebook profile [name], or follow my blog [here].
?????Thank you again!
?????You can have a separate template for books that aren?t due to hit print for whatever reason. Make a folder of these and keep them handy so you can cut and paste them into your messages. If you work primarily by phone, use scripts for the same purpose.
?????Keep an eye on your tone in these responses. You are aiming for friendly, courteous and professional; not personal, emotional or obsequious. As social creatures we are highly attuned to the suggestion of desperation, and a desperate-sounding business person makes people nervous: no one wants to be the target of hard-selling, or have their arms twisted by pity.
Doing Good When You Do Bad
?????The most important time to be good at communication is when something?s gone wrong? particularly when it?s your fault. As we mentioned previously in the Inner Customer chapter, the only way to transform a negative situation into a positive one is through superlative customer service. Here are the most common issues, and how to deal with them:
You Delivered Late (or Not at All)
?????You took on a commission, or promised to deliver something on schedule? and life interfered, or you hated the project. Your instinct is to curl into a ball in a dark corner and hope the fan doesn?t notice, or the customer will wait to complain until you can fix it.
?????The worst thing you can do is stop talking. If you see in advance you?re going to be late, contact the customer now and explain that there?s been a hold-up and you won?t be able to deliver on time. If you?re just barely going to miss the deadline, apologize; if you?re going to miss it by a huge margin, offer recompense. Imagine yourself as that customer and think about what it would take to make you feel like you?ve been treated fairly, and do that, whether it?s a partial or full refund, a coupon toward other services, or some other brainstorm.
?????If you?re on schedule and something happens the day of the deadline, then again, talk to the customer and explain the delay.
In either case, make a new deadline with milestones and tell your customer as you reach them so they feel comfortable that you are actually working on their product or project. Whatever you do, don?t stop communicating with your customer. You should be more communicative with them as you make errors, not less. Many people will forgive you for being late if you explain what?s going on and deliver on your new schedule. What they won?t forgive is being left in the dark with a broken promise.
?????Can you blame them?
The Product Was Messed Up
?????Closely related to missing a deadline is dealing with product problems. Someone?s print is on flimsy paper, that person?s e-book formatting is full of errors, yet another fan?s hand-painted glass ornament arrived in pieces. When dealing with product problems, first identify who was responsible. Are you the one making the product? If so, you?re the one who gets to troubleshoot and fix it.
?????Was it someone else?s issue, because you licensed the product to them? Then you have to figure out where the responsibility lies. Did you give your distributor a flawed file, or bad directions? Or was it solely their issue? Once you figure it out, you can either handle it yourself, or you can tell the customer to contact the distributor.
?????Take notes on this process so you don?t repeat your mistakes. If someone loses their $2000 brooch in the mail, require your clients to purchase insurance, or to go through a different mail provider.
Fan Didn?t Like the Art
?????And here is the one time you have permission to? SAY NOTHING.
?????And really, you shouldn?t. There will be people who dislike what you do for any number of reasons. Some might go so far as to hate it with fire. Your job, when faced with these people, is not to say a word. Don?t comment on the negative review. Don?t answer the snarky blog post. Don?t make your own oblique but easily-guessed comments on twitter about fans not getting it.
?????If you are cornered in public by someone saying something about how bad your work is, and are forced to answer, just say politely, ?I?m sorry to hear that,? and move on. Art is subjective. Not everyone is going to like it, and that?s okay. What?s not okay is an artist getting on someone?s case because their tastes are different from yours.
?????Please note ?fan not liking the art? is different from ?fan complaining about the product.? If someone says they hate your jewelry because it falls apart easily, make sure your jewelry doesn?t fall apart. Make sure theirs in particular hasn?t, by offering to examine and fix/replace it. (See above, Product Was Messed Up.) But if they say your jewelry ?sucks because it?s trite and kitschy,? then you are go to ignore them.
Sample Responses
Marketer Jaguar says: ?Let?s review!?
Positive Situation: Fan is Happy!
??I?m glad you enjoyed it! I?m working on the next book in that series now, focusing on Character Y from the first novel.?
??Thank you! That particular piece took x hours, and I learned a great deal from it. I?m hoping I can apply it to my next piece.?
??That?s great to hear! Was there anything in particular you liked? Could I offer any options to make it more special??
Neutral Situation: Fan is Indifferent.
??If you liked the romantic elements of that story but it didn?t really satisfy, I write romances under a pen name? here?s a coupon for 10% off, give it a try.?
??Yeah, I know it?s been a while since I?ve put out a new design, but I?m working on something really special? I expect it to be ready in a month. Would you like to be on a mailing list to see sneak peeks??
??I see that particular product didn?t wow you? can you tell me what about it was subpar??
Negative Situation: Fan is Angry!
??I?m sorry to hear you didn?t enjoy it.?
??How did I fail to meet your expectations? Is there something I can do to make it right??
?[crickets chirping]
Don?t Do or Say This:
??You don?t like my art, you suck!?
??I?m having problems, please give me money!?
??That reviewer is wrong, I?m going to explain why!?
??That person said something cruel, I think I will tell my fans and let them go after her.?
?????This concludes Part 1 of our chapter on communication. Next time we?ll meet up with Business Manager to discuss the next area of communication: Business Partners. Stay tuned! And as always, if you?re enjoying the Three Jaguars, leave us a tip, or share the link!
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Mirrored from MCAH Online.
Source: http://haikujaguar.livejournal.com/1119216.html
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