The Second Immutable Law: create true believers

by Bill

After you have your flag flying and folks are seeing it they have to know whether the flag is worth hunting down....people won’t buy your stuff if they can’t tell whether it works for them. That’s the job of our find ability thing. Here we are worried about making sure we are bringing the right people through the door, by right I mean people who have an interest in checking you out, people who likely have the problem you solve better than anyone else.

This law is all about three things:

Trust

Relationships

Narrowing the field

Trust

People generally won’t buy unless they have some way of knowing that your stuff lives up to its promise of solving the problem they have today. Establishing a relationship with them, and no we’re not talking about BFFs, we’re talking about taking enough interest to find out just what it is they need and whether your stuff, will help them.

Other than being friendly and welcoming, what else can you do to build trust and help potential buyers? Before I go on, let’s be clear... the goal here is to help those folks who might like your stuff learn more so they can decide if indeed it is worth their time to follow your trail of breadcrumbs. One of the best ways to help this process along is to provide sign posts and resting spots along the trail to your store, site, booth or gallery.

Let’s assume you want to guide folks to galleries that a displaying your work, think of the trail as the time line needed to alert folks leading up to your show. So, just as trails like the Appalachian have Trail Blazes (signs marking the way) you can do the same with tweets or Facebook status updates that mention your coming gallery opening and drive folks to teaser posts on your blog or on your Facebook Fan page. Once you get closer to the show, you can start driving people to specific posts that describe your work and more about the gallery and maybe linking to the gallery’s web site.

Your blog or Facebook posts are the resting spots along the trail, they're short posts that let potential buyers know about your work and see whether it fits them. This level of transparency helps to build not only your credibility, but also trust from prospective buyers that you aren’t going to try to sell them anything they don’t want or need.

Relationships

Once again, to reiterate...we aren’t talking about becoming BFFs although that is possible, in this context, relationships are the next step after trust has been established. A relationship with a potential buyer is also a pre-requisite for becoming a true believer in the goodness of your stuff, and provides buyers with the necessary beliefs and knowledge to credibly evangelize your goodness.

This relationship thing happens over time and is based on your willingness to guide new buyers through their buying process by letting them proceed at their own pace. As they continue down the trail your regular contact can takes as many forms as you can imagine, especially if the strategy synchs with the values and problems of your potential buyers. In simple terms, it can just be letting them know where you’ll be, when you'll be there, and what you are working on. In this way you empower them to choose when they are ready to buy more of your stuff and while letting them know you value them.

This stage is particularly effective for Etsy folks or anyone selling their stuff on-line, just watch some of our Featured Artists on Twitter and Facebook and you’ll see how the masters do it. If you are on Twitter follow our Featured Artist list @bwphoto/featured-artists or join the Facebook page and friend some of the folks there.

Narrowing the field to focus

This part of the Second Law is all about knowing that you can’t be all things to all people. To be effective, you need to weed out some people and by that I mean have a way to separate not only the lookers from the buyers, but also, the one time buyers from those likely to become true believers. This process of elimination helps you focus on your regular buyers and helps them know more about your work and when something you make might be something they’d like.

If you have a way that folks can easily learn whether there is a potential match made in heaven you’ll both save a lot of time and worry. The criteria and method depends on how wide or narrow your focus is and who your stuff is designed for.

Ways to focus

Make it painfully obvious who your stuff is meant for. So if you are selling stuff to left handed bowlers with elbow and thumb pain, you’ll not want to spend time on bowlers with bunions on their right foot. The way you communicate this is up to you but the best way is to be as specific and narrow as possible, like saying your stuff is ideal for left handed bowlers with elbow and thumb pain.
Describe who your stuff is for and what those who own it experienced...what it did for them. So using the left handed bowler example above you might say that left handed bowlers with elbow and thumb pain experienced significantly less pain when using your gizmo. To add credibility you’ll also need to add photos or quotes from those folks you helped.

Now that you have the idea you may ask how does this apply my stuff as an artist? Well...the process is no different. If you’re a jeweler your work helps the person wearing it feel better about themselves, by increasing their sense of attractiveness. Your beaded bracelets help that young hippy woman better identify with her values. Your abstract paintings that are full of color not only brighten up the walls and rooms they become a part of, but also, reinforce the buyer's love of color.

So...as that colorful abstract painter, you might describe your work as full of richness that turns any drab room into haven of sensuality and brightness. People who bought your work experienced more joy by having it in their home offices during dark winter days. Support your claims further by having photos of your work in the homes and offices of those who now proudly own it.

If you make funky jewelry that is best worn by women who tend to be vegans and grow their own food, your work is going to reinforce their values especially if you use hemp. When you describe your work describe it in terms that attract those young and old hippies. Reinforce your description by interviewing a few of those folks and let them tell how much your funky bead work adds to their lives.

The Second Immutable Law helps you see how building trust, relationships and narrowing focus is important to getting more of your work out into the world and increasing your ability to support yourself from it.

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