What About Passive Income?
As you can probably tell from my Webshop update, I’ve been thinking a lot about creating a passive income as an artist and designer…
For those of you may not know what “passive income” is, it’s just as it sounds: a source of money coming in that requires little to no effort to maintain daily. Some classic examples are rental properties and royalties, bloggers tend to use advertisements, product promotions and partnerships as passive income streams. As an artist, though, these aren’t necessarily feasible options both practically and financially (I don’t have the money laying around to buy a rental property!) so I thought it might be a good idea to talk about some passive income ideas that are more geared towards the visual arts.
Passive income is income that requires little to no effort to earn and maintain. It is called progressive passive income when the earner expends little effort to grow the income.
What to know about passive income before you start
Like with gaining a following for your work, you can’t just sit on your passive income idea and not do anything to promote it. It can take a lot of time and energy to create the product that you’re looking to make income on and you'll need to put just as much effort in to promote it for people to find, buy and use. That doesn’t sound super “passive”, right? But here’s what makes it worth it: you only need to do this once! Once you’ve done all of the ground work promoting yourself and your products, your work is out there being seen and purchased, it should take on a life of its own with very little additional effort on your end. This is what makes it passive.
By making your asset digital you’re also allowing for people to buy this same product over and over again. So wonderful!
Ideas for visual artists to make a Passive Income
Now here comes the part that, I believe, will make this post more important to you than the other myriad blogs on this topic:
What can you, as a visual artist, do to create a passive income relatable to your work?
So many blog posts, articles and idea lists out there are for everyone other than visual artists. We work so hard, put so much time and effort into a single piece of work that passive income is really important for us to have as a revenue stream! As a result I’ve been wracking my brain for ideas that are more relatable to working as an artist so that your passive income becomes more a part of your portfolio and experience, not just this other thing unrelated to you (and let’s be honest, would you even be motivated to make a passive income around something you’re not passionate about?) SO, here it goes:
CREATE AN INSTRUCTIONAL VIDEO SERIES
Identify what it is that makes your art, your technique or your way of thinking unique and capitalize upon it! By creating a series of instructional videos and selling the access to them, you’re creating a priceless revenue stream. You’ll not only be getting your work out there but your voice, your face and your unique perspective. You can touch countless people and keep them coming back for more. A great example of this lies with Spector Studios.Adam and Sarah Spector have created an entire lesson book of video tutorials, taking their massive experience with clay and spreading their collective knowledge to hundreds of people. They’ve created an affordable monthly-membership program for their library of videos, even stepping it up further by allowing different tiers of access to more amazing tools. Now the Spectors are super serious about teaching so they upload new videos every month. If you’re looking for a slightly smaller commitment you could work in series, selling access to the videos in each series for a one-time payment or some such.
CREATE DIGITAL CONTENT
TEMPLATES
Are you savvy with digital? Are you a designer? Consider creating digital content for purchase and download! Create a template of something that you do every day, maybe it’s a layout for resumes, business cards, post cards, etc. Editable templates are always great for consumers because it means they can have the look of a beautifully designed piece without paying for a custom graphic designer. Make sure to use free fonts (and link to them!) and to flatten your artwork so it can’t be manipulated. Resumes and business cards are great ideas because literally everyone uses them and people WANT TO STAND OUT! So that means sometimes the templates on Moo and Vistaprint are simply not enough.STOCK IMAGERY
Whether you’re a photographer, a designer or an illustrator you’re creating imagery that has the potential to be used over and over again. The rejected options from a client? Repurpose them into stock images for purchase (and make sure your client contracts keep your sketches your property!). Those photographs from a recent excursion? Stock! Unused illustrations and elements from a recent project? Compile and stock! So many options for things we’ve already made and haven’t used could be repurposed for stock-use, you may even have some now! Check out various stock websites to see how you can get your work hosted. A few that might be helpful for you are: Shutterstock (subscription and credit based), Creative Market (credit based), Pixel Surplus (per image), Creative Fabrica (subscription based), Vsual (subscription or per image)TYPEFACES
If typography is your jam consider creating a font for download. Everyone hunts for shiny new fonts to use, maybe turn your handwriting into one? There are a lot of different software out there for turning your typography into real fonts. The amazing Roselyn Carr over at Birdesign has a superb and endlessly helpful post on creating your own font, check it out here!
TURN TIME CONSUMING WORK INTO EASY CONSUMABLES
If you create illustrative or very graphic work, consider turning some of that imagery into a different kind of product! I have very illustrative work so I’ve been thinking about designing some small-run pins and stickers for the webshop. There are so many independent companies out there that can make these products for you so you’re sure to find a quote that works with what you can afford. Yes, you’ll need to front some money on this one, but you will be selling for a profit! Molly-Anne Bishop is another ceramic artist who has turned her time consuming and beautiful illustrations into all manner of non-clay products. Pins, stickers, t-shirts, napkins, you name it! This means that her illustrations are doing double-duty, not her hands (which is great because ours could really use a rest sometimes!). If you’re really handy you could learn screen printing and open your world of possibilities further – beeswax wraps (such trend!), handkerchiefs, pennant banners! I really want to get an EZ-Screen kit and learn for myself…
I hope these ideas have started your own wheels a-churning! If you’re interested in learning more about passive income and how you can put in the effort to get those returns, here is a list of resources i’ve found super helpful for myself:
Roselyn Carr’s blog over at birdesignshop.com
The good folks over at vandelaydesign.com
Lisa Glanz’ super in-depth (and real talk!) post on lisaglanz.com
I really suggest giving these additional articles a look, they cover a lot of technical stuff that I haven’t here (such as legally protecting your assets, cease and desists, etc.) So if you’re really interested in turning your work into a passive income these are some great places to start.