DARING TO TRUST
Here in the mountains of Virginia where I live, the timber, or canebrake rattlesnake is often found. It is a shy snake, preferring to be left alone, and would rather remain hidden or slither quietly away than fight, unless forced to. But, would you trust that snake not to bite you? That’s sure an open-ended question which depends on individual circumstances for answers, but the principle here is somewhat analogous to what I’m thinking.
We in the creative world depend a lot on trust. Generally speaking, creatives are trusting people. Of course, we trust our families, friends and acquaintances. But we also trust our customers, our online friends, and those strangers across the country who are interested enough in our work to follow our various artistic pages. These are people we most likely will never meet in person, but are extremely important to us nevertheless. We always want more of these, right? Whether we know them personally or not, our followers matter greatly to us. We depend on these people to provide a solid support platform for us whenever we launch a new art piece, music project, book, or whatever. They give us valuable feedback, answer polling questions about titles or book cover preferences, and so many other things that make our products better. We’d be lost without them!
How did these unknown followers find out about us in the first place? Some stumbled upon us like a hiker stumbling upon a snake on a trail, and picked us up off internet searches. Others saw our pages when one of their acquaintances shared our page or something we posted on a blog or Facebook. For most of us who self-publish our work, this sharing of information among friends and friends of friends is the life blood of building our fan base. Networking is key! We don’t have representatives out of major book publishing houses, art printing houses, or recording studios, to whom we’d have to pay thousands, doing it for us. It’s not an ego thing to have a large following, but rather, a make-or-break economic issue. That’s why you see so many people, myself included, asking you to share something about them you have found interesting and like. It helps us get the word out to the public that we have new art, music, or a new book coming. It introduces us to new audiences who would otherwise never hear of us.
Many of you have followed my Facebook art page during my creative process over the last three plus years while I researched, did photo shoots of models, and then painted the twelve women for my forthcoming book. The writing process was more behind the scenes and currently is in the editing stage, so my book will not be out for a few more months. However, I hope to develop a large following pre-launch, so that by the time it is ready to launch, thousands of people will be excited about it. This is where I am going to trust YOU, because you are vitally important to me, and I want to include you in the excitement! I’m asking you to share. Share my Facebook Art page posts, my web site, my blog posts. It doesn’t take but a second. I’m trusting that some of you, hopefully many, will do this for me and help me get the word out that a new book of art, prose, and poetry is on the cusp!
But don’t worry, I won’t come back and bite you if you don’t! You can trust ME on that!
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