Protect Your Most Valuable Asset; Your Database

Protecting your most valuable asset; your database is something you should be aware of. After spending a long time networking, recording names and emails of people attending your exhibition openings, paying customers, and recipients of your newsletter etc., you do not want to breach privacy legislation or their trust, this way you can build a long term relationship with your database.

A common mistake often made when sending an email to a client database is putting the recipients email address in the To field instead of the BCC field.

A BCC (blind carbon copy; also Bcc) is a copy of an email message sent to a recipient whose email address does not appear in the message.

This is in contrast to To and CC recipients, whose addresses do appear in the respective header lines. Every recipient of the message can see all the To and CC recipients, but does not know about BCC recipients.

I do not recommend you sell, trade or give your mailing list to anybody or organisation.

You must provide recipients with information on how to be removed from your email list.

To your printmaking success,
Warmly,
Jo Lankester
Creative Income Coach

P.S Get a FREE report of the 7 Secrets to Building a Sustainable Printmaking Business.
www.howtogetstartedinprintmaking.com

P.P.S Review your weekly goals at the beginning of each week. Plan the upcoming week with your goals in mind.

P.P.S Your life is in your hands, to make of it what you choose
John Kehoe

Jo Lankester
Stone Wall l, 2010
Sugarlift Aquatint
12 x12.5 cm
Edition 20
$70.00 AUD


© Jo Lankester 2010

Pure and Simple ways to Update Your Database

Updating your database on a regular basis will increase your printmaking audiences, your profile and positioning, your credibility as a printmaking artist and importantly your sales.

You may be thinking that you don't know enough people to keep adding to your database on a regular basis. The aim is to build your database to include prospective buyers, people positioned in the community who buy art and support the arts.

I recommend adding 5 people to your database weekly, schedule this in your diary for the same time each week to get in the habit of doing it.

Your database will need to include a range of categories such as:

• Family
• Friends
• Friends of friends
• Friends of family
• Neighbours
• Members of organizations you belong to
• Past, current and potential customers and collectors
• Funding bodies
• Artist peers
• Directors and curators of public art galleries
• Directors of alternative art venues and non-profit spaces
• Commercial galleries
• Dealers and agents
• Architects, interior designers and property developers
• Businesses and art collectors
• Media-local, metropolitan, specialist art/craft magazines
• Editors of and writers for publications in which your work might fit
• Head of local and state arts agencies
• Art organizations you belong to

The most important people to start with are your past, current and prospective clients given the 80/20 rule for sales, (That is 80% of your sales will come from 20% of your buyers), I can't stress enough how important these people are to you making 100% of your income from your printmaking products and services.

To your printmaking success,

Warmly,

Jo Lankester

Creative Income Coach

P.S Get a FREE report of the 7 Secrets to building a sustainable printmaking business that will catapult your sales and rocket ride your bottom line.

www.howtogetstartedinprintmaking.com

P.P.S  Learn to enjoy every minute of your life. Be happy now. Don’t wait for something outside of yourself to make you happy in the future. Think how really precious is the time you have to spend, whether it’s at work or with your family. Every minute should be enjoyed and savoured.

Earl Nightingale

Jo Lankester

Stone Wall ll, 2010

Sugarlift Aquatint

12 x12.5cm

Edition 20

$70.00 AUD

© Jo Lankester 2010

How to Create Your Free & Easy Database Guaranteed to Increase Sales

Hello, thanks for reading my blog on printmaking and creating your own database.

There are many ways to create a database including purchasing software specifically designed to record data on your clients. Alternatively there is a free and easy way to create a database using a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet. This can easily be exported to many other platforms including your email account.

The following fields are recommended to include when creating your database,

• Name
• Position
• Organisation
• Address
• Suburb
• State/Territory
• Postcode
• Phone Number/s
• Email Address
• Category
• Title of Artwork
• Edition Number
• Date Purchased
• Price Paid
• Dispatch Date
• Notes

Microsoft Excel is an easy and simple spreadsheet to use. Fill in each field in order as listed from A-Z in the top bar of the spreadsheet. Your clients, prospective clients, galleries etc are then listed down the page in numerical order.
You can add any field that is relevant to your research in segmenting your target audiences.

To your printmaking success,
Warmly,
Jo Lankester
Creative Income Coach

P.S Get a FREE report of the 7 Secrets to building a sustainable printmaking business that will catapult your sales and rocket ride your bottom line.
www.howtogetstartedinprintmaking.com

P.P.S The secret of getting ahead is getting started.
Mark Twain

Jo Lankester
Castle Hill; West End Dusk, 2010
Sugarlift & Open Bite
60 x 80 cm
Edition 20
$270.00 AUD
© Jo Lankester, 2010

3 Hot Reasons to Build Your Database

Hello, thank you for taking the time to read my blog on printmaking and building your client database.

Creating a database of people who have previously bought your printmaking products or services enables you to build an ongoing relationship with them and those who have expressed interested in what you do. These people may have attended your previous exhibitions or exhibition openings, artist talks or workshops.

Your database is priceless and could potentially be a recurring income stream for you.

3 hot reasons to build a database are,

1. Investing the time to keep in touch with your client database with news of new work, and workshops will increase their knowledge and interest in what you are doing. You are contributing in creating confident art buyers, gallery patrons and supporters of the arts.
2. You can email your client database regularly with a newsletter, exhibition opening dates, artist statements about new works, how many prints sold each month, new galleries or outlets that sell your work. By keeping them informed you are adding value to their investment.
3. Viral marketing is something that happens naturally when you start building a relationship with your client database. Once they become confident and educated in your printmaking products and services they will naturally want to share their knowledge with others, spreading your information to people in their circle of friends or work colleagues expanding your printmaking audiences.

If you haven't already created a client database I encourage you to do so straight away. This is a marketing tool which will be the most beneficial to you long term.

To your printmaking success,

Warmly,

Jo Lankester

Creative Income Coach

P.S Insider secrets to building a sustainable printmaking business www.howtogetstartedinprintmaking.com

P.P.S Our greatest glory is not in never failing but in rising up every time we fail

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Jo Lankester

Fissure, 2010

12 x 12 cm
2 copper plate colour Sugarlift Aquatint Etching
Edition 20
$80.00 AUD

© Jo Lankester 2010