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ARTIST SUSTAINBILITY ROADMAP
A step by step checklist to help you become an emotionally and
financially sustainable artist
ABOUT
The Void Academy teaches artists how to build community and make a living.
To thrive as an artist or arts organization, you need to reach an audience and generate sustainable income. We believe online tools and community funding are the future of arts sustainability and we are here to equip artists for this future.
With a combined 30 years of experience in art-making, communications, web strategy, online fundraising, education, and media production for the arts, we will help you use online tools to grow your community and make a living doing what you love.
Over the last four years, we’ve helped artists raise over of 1.6 million dollars (and counting) towards their crowdfunding projects. We’ve distilled this knowledge into a series of fun and helpful online courses and created this organization in order to share them with you!
We sincerely hope you find our materials helpful,
Karina, Siena, and Noah
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THE VOID ACADEMY
HOW TO USE THIS GUIDE
□ Get ready: Print these pages out or keep them digital. The check boxes work with most PDF viewers.
□ Keep the roadmap handy: Keep this roadmap tacked on the wall of your studio or somewhere handy so that you can always be aware of where you are in your process!
□ Check things off as you go: You can check the boxes off digitally using almost any PDF viewer, or check them off on your printed version.
□ Pace yourself: Don’t stress yourself out! Little by little you, will get everything done. Building a sustainable business takes time and some trial and error, so be gracious with yourself.
□ Join The Void Academy community: You are not alone in this — tons of other artists who are on their own journeys are here to talk with you. Become a Void Academy member here and share your story on our forums.
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STEP 1 GET INTO THE MINDSET
Repeat the following phrases to yourself:
□ I am an artist who has spent time honing my craft.
□ The work I do as a human being in this world holds real and important value.
□ I deserve to be compensated for my labor.
□ My work makes the world more beautiful and oftentimes tells untold or under-told stories.
□ In order to be an artist, I have to take care of my body and my mind.
□ If I want to make art full-time and take care of myself, I have to earn money.
□ Money is rightfully earned when people want to pay me for the work I have made.
□ Keeping all of this in mind, I embark on a path to sustainability.
□ I will depend on the community of people who are glad that my work is in this world to help me take care myself. They depend on me to make the world a more authentic, challenging, and / or beautiful place.
□ Good morning, life! Here I go!
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SET YOUR FINANCIAL GOALSSTEP 2
□ Describe your artist sustainability dream: What is your fantasy scenario with respect to how you would like to be able to support yourself from your art? Meditate on this fantasy and/or free write about the dream scenario.
□ Track your finances: Get in the habit of tracking your income and expenses for both your personal life and for your art. This can be done manually by following your own bank account, or by having it done automatically for you via an application such as Mint. (See our list of helpful tools and apps for artists on the last page of this guide.)
□ Take stock of your previous artist accomplishments: Has there been a moment when you felt financially successful as an artist? Maybe you sold a piece? Or got paid well for a show? Take note of these instances. Brainstorm the most important factors that enabled these accomplishments to occur.
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□ Document your work: Create visual, audio, and written documentation of your work that can be shared online. This is an ongoing process.
□ Create a website: Your website is a home for your work. Your website allows people to learn more about your work as well as to support it in various ways. (Check out our list of great artist websites here.)
□ Create a mailer: Set up your mailing list and connect it with your website. (Check out this article on our journal which explains why a mailing list is so important.)
□ Create your mailer call to action: Come up with an engaging call to action for your mailing list sign up button. What will people get if they sign up? What can they expect from you and how often? Make it “worth it” and interesting with something free and fun. Make sure your mailing list call to action is one of the first things a person sees when they visit your site. (Check out this list of great artist mailers here.)
□ Create a blog: Set up a blog if you are interested in making that kind of content to share with your community.
□ Create and link your social media sites: To do so, look at the intersection of what platforms you’d like to use the most and where your community is most active. Make sure there are links to your profiles on your website.
□ Share your website: Share your website and mailing list sign up link with your community on social media.
□ Take our online course: Web Presence for Artists is a step by step system that walks you through creating an artist website in a way that’s quick, easy, and fun. Sign up here.
SET UP YOUR ONLINE PRESENCE STEP 3
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□ Create your content and events calendar: Set up a personal (digital and/or physical, public and/or private) calendar for your mailing list updates, social media updates, and events.
□ Coordinate your communications: How often are you using your online platforms in tandem with your live events (i.e. public showcasing of your work)? Try to coordinate your online communication with events.
□ Find what you love: Make sure your calendar does not exhaust you. Do not utilize social media platforms that you do not want to use. Only use those that you enjoy and as often as feels good to you. Make sure that your calendar has reminders to inform your community about live events before they happen.
SET UP YOUR CONTENT AND EVENTS CALENDARSTEP 4
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□ Create content: Spend time creating content for your website and mailing list and doing this on a schedule so your community can grow and build trust with you.
□ Share content: Cross-share your content between your media platforms as much as possible.
□ Get involved: Attend, host, and participate in events in your local artist community.
□ Collaborate: When you find like-minded artists to collaborate with, both of your communities grow.
□ Give people a way to stay in touch: When presenting your work in arts spaces, make sure to get people’s emails and add them to your mailing list. Let people know that you want to keep in touch.
□ Build a consistent rhythm of communication: Communicate clearly and in a timely and sincere manner. (Check out The Heart of Artist Sustainability animated video on our journal.)
BUILD YOUR COMMUNITYSTEP 5
CHECK IN WITH YOURSELFSTEP 6
□ Assess your events participation: When being invited to present your work, give an artist talk, or contribute in any capacity as an artist, how often are you compensated financially by the institution which asked for your participation? Assess when these endeavors felt worth your time and labor and when they did not. Keep your needs in mind when accepting future invitations. Remember it’s okay to say no if something does not feel worth your time and labor.
□ Assess your artistic collaborations: How many were positive overall experiences? How many helped to grow your community? How many of them yielded income and how many did not? What elements did you like most in the process of collaboration and how can you recreate these in future collaborations?
□ Assess your online communications: What kinds of content do you enjoy creating the most? What kinds of content is your community responding to the most? What channels are you enjoying the most? On what channels is your community most active?
□ Reconsider your strategies: Based on your above answers, focus your energy on the channels and types of content that you truly enjoy and that works for your community.
□ Be your own advocate: Advocate for yourself financially when you are asked by an institution to do work for free. Ask them to reevaluate their budgets and find money to compensate you for your labor.
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THE VOID ACADEMY
RUN A TIME-BASED CROWDFUNDING CAMPAIGNSTEP 7
□ Learn about crowdfunding: Check out the following articles on our journal for a crowdfunding primer. If Mozart Could Crowdfund, So Can You, Myth Busting: Arts Crowdfunding Edition, Why We Teach Community Funding for Artists
□ Assess your community: Make lists of people who support your work at various levels. This will help you to determine how much money you can feasibly raise.
□ Create, plan, and execute a campaign: Make sure you do the legwork before your campaign so that you are well set up to make this experience as stress free as possible. (Check out this list of great artist crowdfunding campaigns we’ve compiled here.)
□ Let us guide you: Take our Step by Step Crowdfunding for Artists, a course which guides you through every single step of running an arts crowdfunding campaign. This course comes with templates you may use to prepare your budget, rewards, community assesment, and more.
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CREATE A PATREONSTEP 8
□ Come up with a creator’s statement: Analyze the kind of work you produce and come up with a creator’s statement., e.g., Roscoe Luna is creating essays, sound art, and feminist performance. Begin building your Patreon profile based on this statement.
□ Set up your membership tiers: Make sure to include $1 and $10 levels. Refer to this blogpost written by Patreon team members to learn about other data-backed best practices.
□ Choose your payment plan: Choose a monthly or a “per-thing” payment plan for your patrons. This choice depends on your workflow and the kind of work you make. What makes the most sense for the kind of income you need to make the work? We recommend a monthly patronage model to start and you can always change this later down the line.
□ Create a video: Create a short, simple video for the Patreon page in which you describe your work and incentivize folks to become your patrons.
□ Let folks know: Notify your community with a call to action on your website, a link to become a patron in your mailing list update, and through social media.
□ Grow your Patreon: Create a content calendar to help yourself know how often you will post things to your Patreon community and what you will post each time. Remind folks to become your patrons by posting cool snippets of the kind of content you release only to backers. Continue to share your Patreon on your website, on social media and at in-person events.
□ Take our course: If you feel you need a bit more guidance with creating a Patreon, take our Ongoing Income for Artists course!
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□ Set up a shop on your website: Alongside your Patreon, set up a shop on your website if this kind of structure suits your work.
□ Create a visible link: Have an unobscured link to the shop on your website so that those looking to buy your work can easily do so.
□ Display your prices: Have prices displayed for what you are selling and details about delivery timeline.
□ Include beautiful images of the work: Make sure these images clearly represent your pieces.
□ Check out other sales platforms: In addition to your website, there are many places to sell your work online. (Check out this article that lists some to consider.)
□ Share the work: Share the work you are selling on social media and through your other channels of communication with your community, whether it’s in-person or through the internet.
□ Take our course: If you feel you need a bit more guidance with selling your work through a storefront, take our Ongoing Income for Artists course!
SELL WORK THROUGH YOUR WEBSITESTEP 9
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EVALUATE YOURSELF AND CONTINUE THE CYCLESTEP 10
□ Evaluate your progress: What is working for you in terms of how you’re making money from your work? Which parts of your process do not feel enjoyable to you? Why?
□ Readjust your flow: Keep what works in your process and re-work the rest. Being an artist entrepreneur is hard work and you want that work to feel as fun as possible so that you do not get burned out. How can you refine your process? How can you focus more of your energy on the parts of the process that you do enjoy?
□ Continue the cycle: Continue community building using online platforms, in-person events, and mailing list. Hang on to the connections you make with folks who are interested in your work.
□ Read our guide: If you feel that after reading this document you need more support in understanding exactly how it is that artists ask for and get what they need from their communities, check out the guide we wrote for The Creative Independent titled How to Ask for What You Need.
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MAILING LISTMailchimp Mailer LiteTinyletter
FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT MintClarity MoneyQuickbooksExeq Ca$h
CROWDFUNDING Patreon KickstarterBackerkitKicktraq
ART SALES PLATFORMSShopifySociety6Etsy PrintfulBandcampRedbubble
GREAT TOOLS
SOCIAL MEDIA MANAGEMENTBufferCrowdfireRiplBit.ly
WEBSITE MAKERSSquarespaceWordpress
DESIGN CoolorsWhat The FontPixelmator
ORGANIZATIONSCreative Pep TalkThe Creative Independent
© THE VOID ACADEMY 2018
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