How Can I Gain Exposure As An Artist? Don't Bother.

(Transcript)

A lot of artists want to know how they can gain more exposure.

I got to tell you. This is the wrong question to be asking.

The question to be asking is “How can you define your niche or niche, or also known as the target market or tribe?”

Knowing your niche means that you know who wants to buy your art.

You know why they want to buy it, and you know where to go find more people just like them.

When an artist asks this general question – “How can I gain more exposure?”

That typically is a tip that they don’t know their niche.

Because if you know your niche, you know that you don’t need to impress or engage with a bunch of people.

It’s just a small segment of the market that you need to focus your energy and attention on.

So gaining exposure is actually not the name of the game when it comes to success as an artist.

What’s important is for you to understand your niche or niche, target market, or tribe.

So the good news is when you know your niche, and you know that it’s not about gaining general exposure, but it’s about targeting that small group of people, then you don’t have to live with this brutal kind of burden thinking that you’re going to have to impress millions of people in order to be a successful artist – that couldn’t be further from the truth.

You can be incredibly successful if you’ve got a hundred raving fans and some people will point to this formula of a thousand raving fans I don’t actually think that many people are necessary.

What are raving fans? Those are people who want to buy what you have as soon as you make it or they’re just so excited about what you do, they tell other people who buy your art, right?

Because obviously we all only need so much art.

But if you can cultivate referrals from your raving fans, then they will sell for you.

What happens when artists don’t know their niche or their niche?

Well, they become prey right? Because what they think they need to do is someone else needs to discover them.

Someone else needs to give them exposure.

American Idol is a really good example of this.

What a lot of people don’t know is that when someone just auditions for American Idol, they don’t even get on the stage.

They just audition. They have to sign a very onerous contract.

Basically, it looks like a contract for indentured servitude.

Nobody in their right mind would sign this contract.

It’s because they don’t know their niche, their niche.

And I can only tell you this, that even revealing the details of the contract, there is a threat inside of the contract that says if you reveal the details of this contract, we will sue you.

What are they hiding, right? So I’m just concerned that you understand that gaining exposure through juried shows or through art contests, or from whatever BS is presented to you, that is not the way to succeed.

The way to succeed as an artist is to just serve your tiny little tribe of people.