Do This!
A weekly motivational newsletter focusing on action steps for visual artists.

What's Going On: Announcements /Classes 

>>>Do This:  Consider the Ramifications

Tip / Find of the Week: Ugoff.com 

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WHAT'S GOING ON

: : NEW SUBSCRIPTION INFO : :
I appreciate your quick confirmation to the new email system set up last week. This is a fully automated system. If you ever want to subscribe, unsubscribe, or change your email address, instructions will be at the end of each issue. Please follow these instructions before you contact me. In addition, I haven't quite figured out if you can respond directly to these newsletters. So, in the meantime, please send all inquiries and ideas to me at mailto:alyson@artbizcoach.com Thank you!

: : ONLINE CLASSES : :
"Museums & Artists: What You Need to Know"
begins Monday, May 31
*Note: This is a change of date -- it will begin one week later than originally planned.
For anyone who wants to learn more about museums and how they work. It's especially for you if you'd like to see your work in a museum one day. Why not start doing everything you can right now to make sure that happens? http://www.artbizcoach.com/classes/museums.shtml

See the menu in the upper left of this page to view popular topics from past issues. 

Most of you know that I've had a crazy couple of weeks. I not only decided to upgrade to a new server, but I thought, "Heck, while I’m doing that, I'll just get a new shopping cart and email system." It gets even better: "And this time I'm going to learn to do it all myself!" You see the first time I set these up on my website, I hired someone to do it for me. I soon found out we weren't on the same wavelength and I told her I no longer needed her. Then guess what? I didn't know how anything worked on my website. This is usually okay if you are willing to spend the money to hire someone else to jump in and take over. But I needed simple, daily tasks handled and the learning curve was great. I didn't want that to happen again, so I decided I'd learn this whole system from the ground up. In fact, I'd be the architect. Good idea? Not necessarily. I've had better.

Cat Rutgers, Playtime. Digital Art. ©The Artist.  http://www.catrutgers.com

It's good that I know how things work on my website. It's bad that they didn't work right the first time. My newsletter, which is the primary form of communication with potential customers and clients, did not get delivered properly on Monday. It was posted on the website on time, but that didn't do much good without a mail program that functioned properly (with which I could broadcast the announcement). A very few people got two copies of the newsletter; most received nothing. I'll never know how much business I lost.

My mailing list is invaluable to me. I should have never trusted a new system and myself to figure out unsupported free shareware. What are you skimping on that may end up costing you more in the long run? A free database for your inventory or mailing list that doesn't do what you want it to do? Inexpensive materials that you can't manipulate exactly the way you want to? Or maybe you opt for a free seminar instead of paying for another led by someone with better credentials--only to find out it was a waste of your time (I did this recently, too; big mistake).

The best business tools are not always the cheapest or free. I've come to realize that, more often than not, you really do get what you pay for.

If you use Internet Explorer, you can forward this page to a friend by going up to your menu and, under "File," select "Send" then "Page by E-mail." Or just copy and paste the URL into a message: http://www.artbizcoach.com/dothis

TIP / FIND OF THE WEEK: Ugoff.com 

It made me look! My TV watching was interrupted last week by a fabulous Burger King commercial for their new salads. A super-mod character named Ugoff (with a German accent) introduced the salads and made me feel like I'm not going to be truly cool until I have one of them. Then they posted "ugoff.com" at the end of the commercial. I had to look and I really had fun on the website: http://www.ugoff.com 

What a marketing coup!

Note: See the menu in the upper left of this page to view popular topics from past issues. 

Copyright © 2004 Alyson B. Stanfield, Stanfield Art Associates. All rights reserved. 

I encourage you to forward all or part of this newsletter as long as you include the above copyright information and this link: http://www.artbizcoach.com

Please forward this to your artist-friends. Internet Explorer users can forward this page by selecting "File," then "Send" then "Page by E-mail." 

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