The more I work with small creative business owners (especially women), the more important it seems to have a positive support group around you.
We creatives need support. We need nurturing and thoughtful conversation. We need to trust ourselves, and we often look to others to see if they trust us to do the right thing, to build the business, to be as good as we hope.
Now, I know, in my heart and soul, that it’s important that we give ourselves as much of that trust as we can. I don’t want to dismiss the importance of doing the work ourselves. It’s vital.
However, it’s also important to gather, talk to, and develop relationships with people who support your creative and business endeavours. People who get it. People who can see at least part of your vision. People who can empathise, even if they have no experience of what you’re doing themselves.
Sometimes, the people closest to us (husbands, friends, mums) don’t get it.
They can’t see it. Not in a malicious way. They just don’t have the vision or the experience. Sometimes they haven’t even heard of Etsy or craft markets, so they don’t even realise there’s a market for your unique designs. They simply can’t see the commercial potential or the creative aims.
And sometimes friends and family get caught up in their own fears about their own careers and worth. Their fear of doing what they really want to do is transferred to you – they tell you they’re not sure you can do it, because they can’t do it, or worry about their own success rates.
Aren’t we funny, us humans?
A story I love is Gina of rosiebull designs, whose husband, supportive as he was, told her she’d never make any money at sewing personalised glasses cases. Several successful years later, she’s proven him wrong! And she now has this reminder (by Kyleigh’s Papercuts) up in her studio to remind everyone how successful she was, despite the doubt:
(I want to mention here that Gina’s husband wasn’t mean – he just didn’t know that Gina’s designs, plus notonthehighstreet.com, plus a consumer desire for tactile, personalised, gorgeous gifts, would result in a financially successful business. This isn’t uncommon when people look at craft-based businesses.)
Here’s the thing:
Find your community.
I speak to clients who feel isolated as they start to nurture the first tender stems of their dream. The people closest to them can’t support them.
The most important thing is to notice that they’re not you’re people. They’re not your target audience, and potentially they don’t have the knowledge of the industry that you do.
It’s okay to love people who aren’t your customers! It’s okay to be friends with people who don’t get your business, or understand that it could support you financially.
But I recommend that you don’t talk to them about your business. Or, if you do, have some pretty serious boundaries about asking them for advice or taking on their feedback.
Also, you don’t have to prove them wrong immediately. You don’t have to make it an overnight profitable endeavour. You get to take your time to build up your business, your scalability, your customer base. And while you do that, you need people who will hold the potential with you, not naysayers who’ll damage your confidence and enthusiasm.
And then you might think about finding a supportive group of like-minded creatives. Join an Etsy group, or reach out to a local business for a coffee, or connect with people on Facebook or Instagram (though I thoroughly recommend in-person meetings!).
It can make the biggest difference to talk to people who truly get it.
Jx
PS Gather with me and like-minded business owners at the Small Creative Business Retreat in March. Guaranteed to make new friends!
