Three Top Tips

I was asked to give "three top tips" to creative entrepreneurs in an interview about how to successfully blend creativity and business.

Ellie Stevenson interviewed me, along with Nick Williams of 'Inspired Entrepreneur'.
Read the full interview on the ArtsHub website.

Here's an extract:

Can you give us three top tips for running your own successful creative business, David?

1. Firstly, define what you mean by success – it could be a mixture of financial success, creative challenges, recognition, job satisfaction, quality of life, etc, and that formula will be different for everyone. Define what you mean by success, don’t let others define it for you, and know where you want to go.

2. Be clear about your market and don’t try to sell to everyone. Choose your customers. Choose customers that fit your objectives and your ethos and that deliver the financial results you want. Don’t have a scattergun approach, looking for any old customer. Choose the customers that work best for your business strategy.

3. Understand intellectual property (IP), because IP is at the core of the creative industries. It’s important to make sure you don’t get ripped off by other people, so it’s about defending and protecting intellectual property; but just as importantly, it’s also about how to commercialise that IP so you can make money from it, through sales and licensing, for example. Given that IP is so central, I think most creative businesses could do with knowing a bit more, and learning how to use it.

---

Note: This is an extract from an article by Ellie Stevenson, first published on ArtsHub UK.

---

Share your own Top Tips with other creative people in business on the Creative Enterprise Network

---

Creative Business Guide

A useful and readable 'Creative, Cultural and Digital Industries Guide' has been published by Business Link West Midlands

It is available in hardcopy from Business Link West Midlands and downloadable as a free eBook in PDF format below.

This creative business guide was written by David Parrish, author of the book 'T-Shirts and Suits: A Guide to the Business of Creativity'.

The 48 page publication covers a range of issues relevant to enterprises in the creative, cultural and digital sectors.

Sections include:
 - Strategic Planning
 - Understanding your Customers
 - Profiting from your Ideas
 - Organisational Structures
 - People and Skills
 - Promoting your Products / Services
 - Financial Management
 - Legal and other issues
 - Links to useful organisations and resources for creative enterprises

There are also four case studies featuring creative enterprises from the West Midlands region: 383 Project, Stan's Cafe, Gas Street Works, and Capsule.

Download PDF:
Creative, Cultural and Digital Industries Guide (PDF) [3.2 MB]

Businesses in the West Midlands region of England can obtain a hard copy of the Guide.
Contact Business Link West Midlands on 0845 113 1234.

The creative industries guide was designed by iDM Design, Wolverhampton

This creative business guide was written by David Parish of TShirts and Suits.
David Parish retains copyright in this material and other writing about the business of creativity, as published in the book 'T-Shirts and Suits: A Guide to the Business of Creativity', the publication 'Designing Your Creative Business' and a series of other articles, blogs and 'Ideas in Action' features.

Similar creative business guides can be written for other organisations in the creative, cultural and digital sectors.
Contact David Parrish to discuss options and possibilities for your own version of this creative industries guide.

 

---

 

Viral marketing - MUTO video

Thanks to Danielly Netto from Newcastle University Business School, who's researching business models in the creative industries, for including this viral video in her presentation.

This is a video from artist BLU showing the awesome MUTO 'animated graffiti' work in Buenos Aires.

Published on the internet using a Creative Commons licence, it's already had about 3,000,000 views on YouTube so far and received nearly10,000  comments.

The business model used has been categorised as 'Findability/Creative Investment'. In other words, the creator gives something away for free in order to reap financial benefits by other means. It's one of the 3 (or 14) Kinds of Free.

It's a brilliant example of viral marketing !!

See also Viral Marketing Video from Berlitz.

See also Buzz Marketing

---

Don't be a 'Poor Pioneer'

I often advise creative entrepreneurs who have innovative products or services. Sometimes it's a completely new idea and they are planning to open up a new market for it.

Someone asked me whether I'm ever tempted to 'steal' the ideas people tell me about when I'm advising them. My answer was firmly No, for two reasons - more later.

My job as an adviser is to ask questions, including tough ones, to help entrepreneurs make their creative businesses even more successful.
One question that goes straight to the heart of business strategy is this:
"If you are successful in developing your new product or service, and open up a lucrative market for it, what is to stop other businesses (perhaps bigger businesses with more resources and power than you) following you into the marketplace and taking most of the profits?"
It's a killer question that sometimes people cannot answer.

Sometimes the truth is that there is nothing at all to stop others joining the party once all the hard work has been done. In this case I fear for the business concerned. I tell them that they may end up penniless after opening up new frontiers - they may become a 'Poor Pioneer'.

Creative people take pride in being 'groundbreaking'. But breaking the ground for others to make all the profit is not so smart!

In other cases the entrepreneur's answer is that other businesses cannot enter the market and take the profits, because they have created some sort of 'barrier to entry' to prevent others joining the party. In creative enterprises the barrier to entry is often some kind of intellectual property such as a patent or copyright-protected work. In this case copycats cannot easily follow them into the marketplace with 'me-too' products or services.

Intellectual Property Rights are the creative entrepreneur's defence against commercial predators.

Which takes me back to the question of why I don't copy my clients' ideas and set up a rival business.
The first answer is that it would be unethical to do so and I have a reputation to protect.
However the second answer is more pertinent and more powerful; it is in two parts:
1. I don't want to steal something that in turn can be stolen from me. In other words, if there isn't a barrier to entry for me, then there isn't a barrier to entry for further competitors. I too could end up being a Poor Pioneer.
2. The business initiatives I really do envy are those that do have barriers to entry, that have some kind of monopoly rights for the owner to exploit alone. But of course these are the very ones that I cannot steal!

So I either (1) don't want to, or (2) cannot set up as a competitor to my client after hearing about their new business initiative.
I'm still ethical, of course, but that's not really relevant here.

The most successful creative enterprises are capable of both (a) developing new products or services and (b) using intellectual property rights to protect their position against competitors so they can enjoy the fruits of their creativity without 'new entrants' stealing market share. 

So don't be a Poor Pioneer, looking back bitterly on all the creative work you did, only to find that other people made all the money from it. Use intellectual property rights in partnership with your creativity, to devise a successful business model.

It's much more fun to be a Rich Pioneer !

---

See also: Creative Labourer - or Creative Entrepreneur? and Let's follow George Lucas

Artist's 'Second Life'

Artist Ken Walters sells his work in the virtual world Second Life, as well as in real life to galleries, individuals and companies.

I met Ken when he attended one of my training workshops for creative people in business and I was fascinated by his personal story as well as his artwork. A feature in The Guardian tells how a stroke made him into an artist, giving him another kind of 'second life' after previously working as an engineer, without any kind of artistic training. He now runs a successful creative business from his home in the North of England.

He has combined his new talents as an artist with a marketing strategy which includes a variety of online and virtual media including Second Life. Ken also publicises his work through social networking sites and has published images in the "T-Shirts and Suits (Creativity and Business)" international group for creative people in business within Facebook.

His income is derived from direct sales and through the licensing of his intellectual property.
Global corporation EA Games were impressed with his work and commissioned him to design 100 digital dinosaurs for a new educational game called Spore. Ken retains ownership of the copyright in the designs and gets a cut of merchandise sales as part of the licensing agreement.
In this way he is developing additional income streams as a Creative Entrepreneur.

Ken Walters can be contacted by email (mail@kwdag.biz) and his website address is http://www.kwdag.biz/.
His character name in Second Life is Blunt Fhang.

---

3 (or 14) Kinds of 'Free'

Thanks to Hannah Rudman for sending me a link to an article on Chris Anderson's 'Long Tail' website about '14 Free Business Models', which is based on a paper entitled 'Copying and Copyright' by Google's economist, Hal Varian.

The 14 business models which involve giving things away free include: 'Sell Physical Complements', 'Advertise Yourself', 'Sell Information Complements', 'Site Licences', 'Sell Other Things', 'Sell Personalised Versions' and 'Ransom'.

Another blog post by Chris Anderson is about The Three Kinds of Free, ie (1) 'Cross Subsidy', where giving away one thing leads to sales of another, (2) 'Third-Party Subsidy', where advertisers, for example, pay for free content and (3) the 'Freemium' business model, where the vast majority of consumers get the product for free and a small percentage pay a premium for some kind of enhancement which subsidises free distribution to the majority. "In this model, charging a small percentage of a large user base beats charging a large percentage of a small user base", Chris Anderson says.

There are plenty of good reasons to give things away for free - including making more money.
The decision to publish my book 'T-Shirts and Suits: A Guide to the Business of Creativity' as a free eBook was based on the same kind of thinking as the business models described above.

Read also 'Give it away free' which includes example of how creative enterprises in Brazil and China have given things away free for smart business reasons.

---

Cate Blanchett 'Sparkles'

Congratulations to one of my client creative businesses, Sparkle Media on their successful projects in Australia !

The visual effects and animation company has recently worked in Australia with Oscar-winning actress Cate Blanchett and Joseph Fiennes, producing video footage for the multimedia theatrical performance Minutes of a Separation.

Sparkle Media also worked for Reebok whilst in Australia on an 'advanced fitness' website project.

It's a pleasure to work with creative entrepreneurs like Glenn Maguire and Andy Cooper, who are the company's directors.
Over the several months I have been involved in their business growth, I have been able to advise them on matters such marketing, intellectual property and enterprise development.

Sparke Director Glenn Maguire said:
"Since attending David's workshop and then engaging him as an adviser, Sparkle Media has gone from strength to strength. The company now operates on a global level, going head to head with world wide agencies - and beating them. We've never looked back and have a lot to thank David for."

Working internationally from their base in Liverpool, Sparkle has worked closely with creative industries support agency Merseyside ACME.

Carnaby Street W1

Westminster Council bought the copyright in the design of its iconic street signs (pictured).
This means that it can now generate income fom licensing this intellectual property to businesses.

The designs were created by Misha Black in 1967 and the copyright remained with the designer until his death, when it passed to his estate. Black's son then sold the copyright to Westminster Council in London for £50,000 GBP (100,000 USD).

The Council plans to charge licence fees to more than 100 companies that use the design on popular tourist souvenirs and other products.

Designers should follow Misha Black's example by retaining copyright when creating designs for clients, to make a profitable sale later - or to generate licensing income themselves.

---
Photo credit: DearCatastropheWaitress.

---
See related blogposts:
Protecting - and profiting from - your IP 
Whose photos are on your website? 
Let's follow George Lucas 

---

Beware 'Copyright Grabs'

Photographer Chiz Dakin (Peak Images) asked me to warn other photographers about the problem of 'copyright grabs'.

Chiz is concerned about the trend for businesses, particularly large corporations, to "grab copyright in any image they can get their hands on", as she puts it.

This practice is a hazard for photographers who don't carefully read the small print in contracts with clients.
It can also apply to competitions.

So the advice from Chiz is: make sure you read the small print to ensure you don't lose your intellectual property rights in your images!

See also:
Protecting - and profiting from - your IP 
Whose photos are on your website? 

Give it away free!

Creative entrepreneurs often ask me how they can make money from their music or computer games when MP3 files and software is so easy to copy.

One answer is to use the fact that people copy your stuff to change a threat into an opportunity.

Banda Calypso's music is copied onto CDs and sold on street corners in Brazil. They don't get a cut of this income but they don't mind. In fact they supply theses street-sellers with master CDs to copy! And they organise things so that there is a plentiful supply of their music for sale in each town on the route of their tour, before they arrive to perform. They see this copying and selling as an advertising function and they don't have to pay these street-corner entrepreneurs. Their gigs are always full and they've made enough money to buy a private jet to take the band on tour.

Timothy Chan, one of the richest men in China used to get ripped off by copyright pirates. His computer game CDs were copied illegally and sold cheaply. He could have tried in vain to stop this. Or he could have let his business go bankrupt. Instead he changed his business to take advantage of the copying. He decided to make his money from online connection fees instead of CD sales. He changed the game so people had to play online and pay a very small fee per minute. The copied CDs spread like wildfire and so did his customer base. Every CD copied now helped his business.

Smart entrepreneurs see opportunities when others see only threats.
They change their business models to take advantage of changing technology, economics and social trends.

See also: 3 (or 14) Kinds of Free

---