Balancing My Start-Up Business and My Family Life |
Posted: May 4, 2017 |
I never pictured myself as an entrepreneur; until my daughter was born, painting was just a passion. When I first held her in my arms, everything changed for me. I knew that I had to hustle in order to give her a better life. Of course, just like pretty much everything else in life, nothing went as planned. Working Two JobsI knew that, in order to be successful, I had to take my business seriously, but I had no idea where to start. Lucky for me, my sister-in-law was a web designer and set up a website for me as a Christmas gift. She also was a lipsense distributor on the side and knew a little about starting a business on the side while working full-time. Meanwhile, I started making time for painting every day, because I could no longer afford to only do it whenever I felt like it. My new routine looked something like this: work at my full-time job as a chef from 6 a.m. to 2 p.m., come home and spend time with my daughter for a few hours, then stay up until 2 a.m. improving my technique on canvas. Getting my little start-up off the ground was easy because my daughter was so small, but as she got older and her needs changed, I began to feel the crunch of time. I was booking shows in galleries as well as tables at various festivals and art shows and starting to gain momentum, but unfortunately my daughter's mother was becoming less and less of a stable role model for her -- and definitely not a reliable partner for me. We parted ways when my daughter was a toddler, and I took on the role of full-time parent. Working full-time, raising my daughter alone, and running a business was harder than anything I'd ever done. I had the support of family, but even then I was always pressed for time. My sister-in-law often urged me to set up an email list and collect email addresses at all the events I was doing, but I had no idea how to even do that -- never mind when I'd maintain it. Still, I knew she was right. I had to do something to keep in touch with my fans, because even though social media like Instagram was working well for me, all that could change in the blink of an eye in the fast-paced landscape of the digital age. I needed a reliable way to connect with my fans -- one that I'd hold the keys to. Self-EmployedEven knowing that, I continued to put it off. The more art shows I did and the older my daughter got, the less time I had to spend on email marketing. By the time my daughter was seven, I'd quit my day job and was officially self-employed full-time. I was working with several other artists on multiple other projects: a bi-monthly magazine, collaboration paintings, galleries, and more. It seemed every week I was traveling somewhere for something. Between my daughter being in school and my work load, I felt like I barely saw her. Creating More Time For My DaughterI finally gave in and hired a email marketing agency to help me out. I needed a way to tell my fans and previous buyers about upcoming shows, and I knew I needed to get organized if I wanted to convert my following into repeat customers. It was a game changer for me. The agency organized everything for me, down to the sheet I'd use at shows to encourage people to sign up for my newsletter. Within a couple of meetings, they determined an incentive to get people to sign up at my shows, as well as an autoresponder schedule to keep my fans interested and to lead them through my sales funnel.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|