by Bridgette Hernandez, Guest Blogger -  Every independent artist needs to be entrepreneurial. If you want to sell your art and become a professional artist, you have to learn how to think like a business person. That means you need to be an artist when creating and be an entrepreneur when selling.

If you're not sure how to advertise and sell your art, just keep reading. Here are 5 helpful business tips that every independent artist needs to follow.

1. Create a Brand

You are your own advertiser and you need to become a brand.  Creating a brand out of your art and yourself is a must if you want to start making money and selling your art. To become a brand, you need to:

• • • design a logo
    • create a website
    • create profiles on a couple of major social media platforms
    • have a stunning portfolio

You need to make sure you look like a professional, and potential clients can find you easily. This way, you'll be advertising your brand the right way.

2. Charge Like a Professional

The prices of your artwork should not be randomly chosen by the way you feel at a certain moment. You need to be very precise and responsible when it comes to charging your clients.

This means that you need to:

• • • research to see how much your competitors are charging
    • explain why one piece of art costs more than the other
    • charge consistently for similar works of art
    • if prices go up in art supplies or similar resources, you need to charge more

Stay informed and ask around a lot. This will help you charge exactly what you’ve earned and still keep your clients happy.

3. Understand Your Audience

Although it's hard for some artists to create with specific goals in mind, you need to understand you can't create without a plan or a goal. If you create only when you’re inspired, or only the things you personally prefer, you might lose your audience.

This means that you need to understand the following:

• • • what your audience likes the most
    • what they expect from you
    • what type of artwork is currently selling best

By knowing the answers to these questions, you’re being entrepreneurial and smart. Now you can create the type of art that is currently in demand and sell it without any problems.

4. Get Legal Advice

Apart from knowing how to properly advertise and sell your art, you need to learn how to protect it as well. You have to ensure you know your rights. Also, you must find a way to have your clients respect those rights.

So, you could ask for legal advice about things such as:

• • • signing sales contracts
    • protecting your copyrights
    • respecting your legal obligations such as paying taxes
    • commissions

If you want to succeed as an independent artist, you need to keep things legally in order.

5. Work Hard

Finally, there’s one more thing you need to keep in mind, on your way to becoming a successful independent artist. You have to put in the hard work and never stop creating.

But, forget the idea of the inspired artist sitting on a hill and looking at the horizon. Hard work as an independent artist includes:

• • • creating a schedule and sticking to it
    • creating art daily
    • checking and responding to emails
    • running social media pages and profiles
    • sending out messages, invitations, and sample work

It’s a job like any other, so it’s best that you start acting like that as soon as possible.

Final Thoughts

Being an independent artist means you have to be your own manager, advertiser, and salesperson. It may sound hard or impossible at first, but with the right mindset, you can do it.

Follow the business tips above to ensure you know what you’re doing and start working on your career as an independent artist today.

Bridgette Hernandez is an independent freelance writer and blogger building her career. She has a Master’s in Anthropology and enjoys combining her knowledge of human behaviors and traditions, with her experience in marketing to provide readers with insights into their customers. She works as a writer for Trust My Paper and Supreme Dissertations, and is currently working on her first book.