A Year in Review

In reflecting upon my journey of over a year in managing my small business and honing my craft as an artist, I wanted to take some time to step back and capture some of my experiences and learnings. There are so many resources out there for small business owners and I hope I can provide some insights into the fine arts industry and give back to the community that has supported me through this deep dive into my own business.

I linked this piece in my article about making the switch to a career as a full-time artist and it is still the foundation of my business today. With these principles in mind, I have established a business that I am both grateful for and proud of. The steady growth I have seen over the past year and a half has shown me that it is possible to find a market for sacred art as well as traditional oil and watercolor paintings. Since launching my site and other sales channels, I have found the following metrics invaluable: visitors/channel or referral source, total sales/channel, page visits/duration, top selling products/time, and bounce rate/time.

These all give me a better understanding of where my customers are coming from, which products have the most interest vs. purchases, and what might be causing friction in the purchase flow. Comparing this with in-person sales has in turn given me a better picture of my buyer persona.

Lessons Learned

1. Establish personas and identify key factors influencing purchase decisions

After creating my first cohesive Pacific Northwest landscape series, I decided to start dropshipping prints of each piece. My hypothesis was that hikers or tourists would want to commemorate their time on the trails with artwork featuring some of the iconic views. I advertised in Reddit hiking communities and Facebook interest groups and assumed SEO would drive customers to the site more organically simply through tags/keywords of these well known spots. What I learned, however, was that landscape prints were best sold in person or on-location. Just a single day neighborhood garage sale resulted in more sales of prints than I had seen online in the course of a month. Plein air painting brought more interest into my artwork from tourists than online sales as well. It became evident that buyers favored the tangible experience of in-person interactions, fostering a personal connection with the artist. Recognizing the diverse preferences among demographics, I prioritized introducing varied merchandise offerings, including prints, puzzles, and postcards, tailored to cater to distinct age groups, thereby enhancing market appeal and consumer engagement.

2. Embrace critiques and find fellowship online

As all great business ventures begin, I turned to Reddit (r/artbusiness) to get started. There I found advice on all things pricing, marketing, and sales strategy. I did a deep dive into ecommerce platforms and chose Shopify to host my portfolio and storefront because it took care of most of the admin work. This site helped me establish my presence as a professional artist and iconographer. Sharing my story and blogging about my art journey through my website and more informally on Instagram helped me connect with my collectors. And then finding a community online and joining Facebook groups like the Women's Small Business Support group and posting my artwork on r/painting gave me access to helpful critiques and more sales tips and tricks.

3. Establish a fair and objective pricing model

After working on a donation-based model while I was still painting part-time, I found it difficult to make the switch to establish an hourly wage for commissions and fair margins on my prints. It took time to research the current landscape and an average customer's willingness to pay for my work in order to develop a model that would ensure a sustainable income. My recommendation for any artist is to consider the cost of materials, shipping, and then pick an hourly wage or charge anywhere from $1-10/square inch of each piece for commissions. Pricing really does go hand in hand with establishing the value of each piece as well as the profession and industry as a whole.

4. Require deposits for commissions

This one was a tough lesson to learn after very nearly falling for a scam. I had completed a painting for a customer who refused to use my Shopify site or PayPal to process a payment and insisted on checks. I didn't feel comfortable proceeding at that point and scrapped the painting and later learned that this is a common scam. Insisting on using established payment processing methods and also requiring a deposit upfront would have prevented a few days of churn.

5. Keep experimenting and creating

One of the joys of working in a creative space is leaning into that creativity to experiment not only in your craft but also your business. From testing new suppliers, shipping methods, and products (I somehow found myself working on hyperrealistic cakes, packaging design, food illustrations for local restaurants, watercolor cards, and ancestral saree art this year)-it really helped to prevent creative burnout while testing new markets.

Next Steps

I'm excited to take everything I've learned this past year and continue to see steady growth in my business next year while also growing as an artist and iconographer. I will be focusing primarily on religious icons for commissions this year and sharing my love for this deeply spiritual discipline by mentoring local high schoolers. Since moving to Texas, I will also be looking for long-term gallery representation to showcase more of my landscape artwork locally.

This year I have also begun working on a small side project that combines my love for tech, faith, and art! Sancta Familia was founded out of the desire to build a bespoke prayer book to meet the needs of my own family prayer. In most South Indian Christian households, there exists a list of rote prayers which are recited every?night. Pulled from a variety of different books and prayer cards, the family prayer was at times difficult to lead let alone invite guests to join in and follow along. This need to consolidate prayers and build a personalized book with the ordered prayers and responses led to the release of the Powathil family prayer book. The book was treated as both a functional prayer guide for anyone to use to follow along and also as a beautiful heirloom and reminder of spiritual traditions. Seeing the benefits of illustrating and publishing a book for my own family, I realized that it could be helpful for others as well.

This is just a preview launch and the beginning of an experimentation cycle to learn more about the needs of each family. If you're interested in learning more or customizing a prayer book for your family, please feel free to DM me on LinkedIn or shoot me an email at [email protected] to get started :)