Healing Arts Business Owner is Out of Ideas to Turn Profit
Dear Godscribe:
I have been trying to turn my healing arts business from hobby to an ongoing money making business.
I’ve tried posting on social media, participating in holistic arts fairs, and even going to local businesses to sell my healing tools.
I get positive feedback and promises of further purchases and/or follow up, but not enough transpires.
What am I missing? Any insight on next steps I haven’t mentioned?
Signed, Confused
Dear Confused:
Your problem is a common one in the holistic world, people making things no one needs.
Even poor people spend the little money they have on things they need.
The population of poor and lower-middle classes are growing faster than any other demographic.
Even if a business competes to satisfy the wants of people with money, that market still has to satisfy the buyer’s necessities.
No amount of marketing is going to sell goods that serve no one’s needs.
Find Your Customers
Understand the market your work sets within. Ask potential buyers what they need, and do so in a way that turns your products into creative, but useful ornamentation.
If you don’t make your products useful, you’ll wind-up creating cool stuff that collects dust on the shelf.
When you supply people who have money something they require, in a way that satisfies a want over a need, they can at least justify the extra expense your creations are over cookie-cutter manufactured versions.
Poor people will only buy when it’s cheap. And nothing about your work is inexpensive to make, neither in time or materials.
So begin by looking around the house for all the things you use that can be replaced with an ornamental version.
- Toilet paper roll holder
- Paper towel holder
- Small bathroom shelf
- Kitchen utensil holder
- Towel rack
- Drawer pulls
- Etcetera etcetera
This is a time in human history when downsizing is the right way to go because there is a glut in the market of unusable doodads.
Find a way to satisfy the needs of the current market.
One way is by establishing customer compassion for Spiritual relics.
So the next tier of your healing arts products, in other words, should be “sacred ritual.”
Rituals and rights can be served by secondary income streams like teaching and healing. You’ll need to make videos on the healing practices or at least demonstrate the practice of ritual.
But First Get a Good Money-Maker Under Your Belt
Our real bit of advice for you is to learn a trade.
Woodworking
Welding
Blogging
Website building
Stone masonry
etc.
Make that trade become your skill to earn a living, and help you master your art as well.
Mastering an art or craft requires years of practice. Long before you can earn a living at it, your living and your art must be separate ventures.
Train yourself to master something you can earn a living with first.
Many sculptors are house builders, oil painters are teachers, and illustrators are graphic designers and website creators.
Don’t force your art to make your living, until you are better at it and in demand for it.
Otherwise, dear friend, it will remain forever, just a hobby.
