When is the right time to take the leap of faith into the world of a full-time creator? Join us as we discuss how to take your creative outlet from a part-time gig to a full-time career. In this workshop, Cynthia Lin will share her insights on just that - how to move closer to having a sustainable, growing, full-time career as a creator and what she has learned on the journey to becoming a full-time artist. Sheāll share some hard-earned how-toās for successfully growing your creative career over time.
Cynthia Lin is a popular YouTuber (46+ million views) and a Billboard-charting ukulele artist. With an approachable teaching style and a mission to empower everyone to create, Cynthia shares joyful ukulele videos and a welcome dose of the aloha spirit. Creator of the #100DaysofUkuleleSongs project and a headliner at ukulele festivals around the globe, Cynthia has fostered a dedicated ukulele community worldwide, both online and in-person. She is supported by nearly 5000 patrons on Patreon.
@Th_Mole@Laura_Hepworth sorry for the mishap! Links are updated and should be good to go. Let me know if youāre still having a tough time registering.
Hereās my question, open to feedback from all! How do you create community around your work when itās less interactive and doesnāt as clearly demonstrate āvalueā? For example, if you make podcasts or live theater shows or paintings vs. coach, teach lessons, make how-to videos.
Quick question though, there were a lot of peopleās Patreon links in the chat, but, with listening to Cynthia, I didnāt get the chance to go visit them. Is there any way to get a copy of the chat messages from a workshop?
@Dave_Maher Iām still struggling on this as well (Iām a jeweller, indieathor, and digital illustrator), but Iāve been trying to show more ābehind the sceneā posts and asking questions to try and get people more involved and interested in what I do. Not much result yet, but Iām hopeful it will yield a result eventually. Iāve also read some saying that people like to be able to connect with the person behind the art/content and get to know them, not just as a creator, but as a person so Iāve been trying to treat my Patreon as kind of a combination of a personal and business/art blog. Whether thatās a good idea or not, Iāve no clue, but itās the best idea I have right now to try and get people to engage with it.
thank you all so much for tuning in! happy to follow up here and try to cover questions that we didnāt get to in the webinar. letās keep the conversation going!
How important do you think it is to have both public and patron-only content on oneās Patreon page? Iāve been trying to keep a balance of the two, but sometimes struggle with this and knowing when to make some public or not. Right now, Iāve been making a lot of posts as early-access posts as I donāt have many patrons yet and want to try and get potential patrons interested in what I do (especially if they donāt already follow me on some other social media platform so arenāt familiar with my work).
This also makes me wonder about something else, how important is it to have a strong/active following outside of Patreon, or is it feasible to just concentrate on building your audience primarily on Patreon itself? With the constant changing of algorithms or decline in popularity of a platform, Iām finding myself highly frustrated and, at times, rather burned out trying to grow my following there in the hopes that some of them will transition to supporting me on Patreon. Itās exhausting and sometimes I think it would be really nice to get rid of at least some (if not all) of those platforms and just focus on Patreon.
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Hi Laura! I think the answer to both of your questions is that you need to create and build a public body of work and public following. To me, Patrons are the small subsection of your following that you can consider True Fans. Typically, Iād say thatās 1% of your audience. SO - most of your focus should be on building your public body of work and public following so that you can bring more people into the 1% club. I believe in focusing on more and better content - grow and improve your body of work, and that will grow your overall following, which will grow your Patronage. but focusing on just Patrons will be very limiting.
Hereās my big advice - stop getting frustrated about things you cannot control (like your following). Instead, focus that energy on making more and better content. Create. If you love to create, focus on creating. Followers will come when you become really good at creating.
First, anybody in the music biz that is doing well we should listen and see what we can take away from it. I heard someone ask this question, I know you donāt care for FB and I get that but Iām in the same boat as the person that asked, I have a really good following on FB but Iām having a problem getting them from FB over to Patreon. FB is freeā¦ Any help would be appreciated.
