Photographer Makes One-Third Of His Living Expenses Off Only 94 Fans
from the cwf+rtb-works-here-too dept
Jim Hein writes "a very well known Fine Art photographer is using the CwF+RtB model. He breaks things down into actual dollars and cents. He has figured out how many "True Fans" he needs to make a living."Photographer Ctein's "Contributor Program" gives his fans the opportunity to collect his prints and allow him to focus on creating. He shared the latest results:
Make no mistake, I didn't get anywhere close to 1000 True Fans (didn't expect to), I got 94. But those Contributors provided me with approximately $15,500 gross revenues, $12,500 net. That's about one third of what I need to live on, not a life-altering level of support but certainly a life-enhancing one that provides me with considerably more time to work on my art -- the point of this.Even though the tiers start at only $9.50 a month, his average sale was around $165 -- demonstrating that he has given his customers a real reason to buy. Additionally, Ctein recognizes that his subscribers are his most passionate fans, so he takes this as an opportunity to further solidify his connection to them:
Last winter I offered them about a dozen extra dye transfer prints from the first TOP print sale at an extraordinarily low price, and super-cheap copies of my photo restoration book before the new edition came out. They also got advance notice of this year's print sale.Offering exclusives is one of the ten scarcities that we've discussed before, so it's great to see it in practice. The other lesson that Ctein learned from his experiment is that, yes, it does take work. He now has to devote about 3 days a month dealing with the administration of his subscriber program. That said, spending 3 days a month on something that provides 1/3 of your living expenses seems like a worthwhile investment. And this is only in the first few months of launching his program -- if he's able to improve the performance, he could do much better. So yes, it's exciting to see photographers embracing the CwF+RtB concepts and making them work.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: cwf+rtb, photographer, true fans
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: how does this compare to other photographers?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Before Christmas, he sent us a pack of christmas cards made from his images. I was suprised, and enjoyed sending them to friends.
I am glad he has had some success with the program. Also, I learned about it from this site!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
A Living?
So this guy is doing great with respect to earning a bit of money on the side but he will probably still want to do the weekend wedding shoots and studio portraits to earn a living.
It's tough being an artist and living of the patronage of others. This appears to be more in the way of a start to someone's photography career that will later include gallery exhibitions and substantial print sales. I'm not sure that it's a departure from the normal way of things
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: A Living?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: A Living?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: A Living?
The sky is falling, you had better run along now before it is too late.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: A Living?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: A Living?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: A Living?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: A Living?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: A Living?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: A Living?
The whole point of having a market is to allocate scarce resources (via money): inevitably there will be winners and losers. D'oh.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: A Living?
If the amount of money spent on art is decreasing, then the only logical thing to do to get more of that pot is to increase your efficiency so that you get more of it. There is absolutely NO reason to be less efficient if the problem is a market reduction. The only time when less efficiency is market sustainable is when the market is rapidly expanding.
This is where your reasoning falls. Now, as to whether the poster's conclusion that more artists can make a living is accurate. That, I couldn't tell you, but...the potential is there. Certainly, by being more efficient, he has created more breathing room for himself.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: A Living?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: A Living?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: A Living?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
However, I guess there's also the problem of production. I imagine an artist couldn't sustain the output to provide the material to a large audience, so perhaps the paywall makes sense in this case. However, if he as a warehouse of unsold copies of his art book waiting to be sold, it would be a good indication that he could support more fans.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Paywall
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]