A few years ago I attended an event hosted by a successful and growing entertainment company.
The presentation was given by a number of talented directors, and showed the company’s slate of current and upcoming projects. In the audience was a gathering of highly evolved creative super-people: animators, concept artists, story developers, producers, sound designers, and creative directors.
It was both interesting and inspiring. I could barely work the rest of the day, as I reflected, thought, and dreamed about what I had seen and heard. I found myself wondering if I could communicate as well as these highly influential people could.
That’s when I realized that something had been missing from my career and my own fledgling online business. A specialized skill I realized that, during my years toiling away as a “technician in the trenches”, had been left underdeveloped.
So I set about fixing it.
It’s a skill that I have come to realize separates creative people with ordinary, garden-variety results from the creatives with GREAT results, regardless of their core talent or ability to do their craft. It’s an essential ingredient for maximizing your potential.
You might have missed it, too. You probably didn’t see much of a need to develop it because it wasn’t stressed in your academics.
That skill is creative communication: the ability to talk, write, and demonstrate why what you are making is worthwhile to your intended client. (And… to do it in a way that demonstrates clear value, instead of trying to use a bunch of lingo and be overly opaque.)
Have no clue how to do that? Well, then… keep reading! (The great news is, it’s not all that difficult to do.)
Is Creative Communication The “Secret Sauce” You’ve Been Missing?
If you make the most amazing stuff ever as a creative freelancer, but you don’t know how to talk about it, then you’re missing out on a huge potential boost to your business.
Your ability to speak, talk, write, tweet or otherwise communicate about what you offer is the catalyst that kicks your freelancing into high gear. It builds your personal brand, gets your name on the lips of your best potential clients, and makes it so that you don’t have to work as hard to find them… because they come looking for YOU.
The individual creative freelancer can no longer afford to shut themselves out and quietly toil away at their craft, avoiding all human contact. Creatives who spend years in a never-ending cycle of ideating and making are only playing with half the tools in their toolbox. In the always-on, ever-connected world we live in, to go silent is to declare ourselves out of the game.
In short, (to quote one of my favorite movies, “Field Of Dreams”): just because you built it doesn’t necessarily mean they will come.
Why Just “Making Great Stuff” Isn’t Quite Enough
You may be asking yourself at this point, “What? Isn’t making great stuff enough? If I just do a good enough job of making something, or offering a great service, won’t people tell each other about it and then I won’t have to?”
It’s time for a reality check. I’m sorry to say that even the best product is not going to get noticed on its own merits. There’s just too much noise, too many voices, too many messages that your customers are bombarded with each day.
You won’t be able to just create something, and wait for the requests to come rolling in. You will have to do something to get people’s attention.
There’s Making… And Then There’s Marketing
You should put just as much importance on marketing as you do making. (Note, that doesn’t necessarily you should spend as much TIME marketing… but you should definitely understand its importance.) While marketing involves a lot of other things than just verbal communication, it is a big part of it.
For many creative entrepreneurs and small business owners like us, this is an unwelcome wake-up call. Because sometimes we like nothing better than to shut out the world, go into our happy place, and do our thing we know how to do to our heart’s content. We don’t want the outside world invading the sanctity of our personal space.
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that… if you’re a hobbyist.
But if you actually want to further your business goals, create sustainable value, and take the next step in your growth journey as a creative freelance superstar, you will have to learn how to be a good communicator.
Are You At A Loss For Words?
On a personal level, how many times have you tried to speak with people about what you do and found yourself at a loss for words?
Have you ever been at an event, business-centric or otherwise, and that dreaded question came up: “So what do you do for a living?”
I sure have. It was always easy to carry on a dialogue in my had about what my business was about. But a dialogue with another person is different matter.
Here’s the good news: good communication is like any other skill: it can be learned and practiced. All it takes is a resolution to get better at it, and a persistent and constant effort to incorporate better communication into your regular daily routine.
Don’t Underestimate The Value Of Good Communication
Don’t underestimate how much improving your verbal communication skills, even a little bit, can go a long way to improving your creativity.
It also boosts your own morale and alleviates much of the frustration you may be feeling about your message not getting across to people whose opinions matter. It adds another weapon to your arsenal of influence.
Don’t forget that verbal skills depend on a couple of other skills to be most effective: listening and nonverbal communication. (In fact, many will tell you that nonverbal is even more important than verbal.)
How Can You Begin Improving Your Communication Skills Today?
I hope this convinces you to begin a regular regimen of improving your “gift of gab”. Fortunately, there are a lot of great resources our there to help you with this. Here are some ideas:
- Put it on your “to do” list to speak to at least one new person a day about your business.
- Choose an element of communication and work on just that thing for a week until it becomes second nature.
- Join a group like your local chapter of Toastmasters that can really provide a safe place for learning to speak fluently.
I’d also like to invite you to read elsewhere on my blog about communication:
6 Ways To Improve Your Communication Skills As A Creative Freelance Business Owner
A Quick Creative Communication Challenge For You…
Now, I want to leave you with a challenge. In the next 24 hours, find one person that you can speak with for a few minutes about your business. Start the conversation with something like this:
“I have a (your creative service here) and I’d really like to get your opinion. Do you have a few minutes to talk?”
Assuming they had a few minutes, of course, who wouldn’t want to stop and listen to an idea? Very few. Now go out there and do it!
I wish you the best in your journey to not just create value more effectively, but communicate about it more effectively as well.
~ Mike