Commissions advice?

[Thunderhawker]

Right so I am now taking commissions through my site, and I was wondering what those of you who have been doing commissions for awhile would give as advice to someone just starting out.
I have dropped business cards at the LGS, and have gotten a very favorable local response. But Virtually nothing through the website. I am including business cards in all my ebay sales in the hopes that folks will think of me, or at least refer their friends to me.
Any thoughts or suggestions on this front would be greatly appreciated.

Oh the site is: commissions.thunderhawkerminis.com
Thanks in advance!

 

[mattsterbenz]

I have gotten virtually no business off my website as well, it\'s all been local business and the occasional person browsing CMON.

Local business is the way to go. Customers tend to like it more because of the face-to-face interaction, they get to see your work in person beforehand, and are much more trusting than when dealing over the net.

Become friends with your customers. They will be much more inclined to come back, as well as tell their friends. Repeat business from a few customers is much more valuable than one-time small orders from many customers.

I have to say that I like local business much more than over the net, anyway. I don\'t have to deal with shipping, as I can meet the customer at the game store. I get a lot of satisfaction watching the customer pick up each figure and smile.

-Matt

 

[Naukhel]

I only do local business, myself.
Never bothered with a web-site. Maintaining one would just increase the price.

 

[Celthulhu]

Commissions

As solely mini painting artists, we get more commissions, the more minis we put up on ebay.
People interested in what we have on ebay, or because they see the featured auctions on CMON, search us out and find our website, where they contact us, or they ask a question through ebay.

When you put a mini up for auction on ebay, create a forum thread in Discuss Submissions and post the mini to CMON. Many people do that, and then put a link to the auction, and to the CMON image so people can look at pictures.
I\'ve seen lots of people do this. I\'ve also seen people post pics and links to ebay on other forums they belong to, in appropriate areas.

Just my 2 cents. :bouncy:

 

[DaN]

The only commissions I\'ve had...

An almighty TWO - count them, TWO so far
Have been off eBay

I placed photos of the figure unpainted, and links to work I HAD done.

 

[EArkham]

I\'ve actually had a fair number of commissions and commission requests as a result of my site. It\'s completely dependent on the traffic you get. You can\'t really put up a brand new site and expect commissions to start flowing in as a result. Advertise your site and build the traffic with good content (galleries, tutorials, reviews, forums, etc). This takes a while to build up, so be patient.

The best source for commissions as a new painter is eBay. Don\'t list figures on eBay thinking you\'ll make a ton of money; you might, but do it mainly for the advertising. Include a link to your website in every eBay auction you put up. Make sure you\'re not selling anything from your website while the auction is active or eBay could close your auction. Assuming the quality level is high enough, figures you finish on the side, or ones from your personal collection that you no longer use for gaming are great for putting up on eBay for business.

When you have eBay auctions up, go to some of the assorted forums and post about them, with an image IN the post (NOT as a link) if the forum allows it. For example, if you\'re selling a 40K character, mention it on the 40K forums like Dakkadakka. Also, DON\'T do this for every single auction. Two reasons: too many posts might make you come across as annoying, and also too many posts may result in \"ad blindness\" where people get so used to seeing your posts that they don\'t really think to check out the work.

Putting cards in what you ship out is very good, but it\'s better to put the link in the eBay auction. It\'s a lot easier for a person to click a link than to type in a full URL. The cards will mostly get you repeat business from people who already have your work.

Offer discounts for recurring customers. Don\'t advertise it; just do it once someone has tossed a couple of decent-sized commissions your way and ONLY do it for the customers that you want to keep dealing with. Having five really good repeat clients that are easy to work for is a lot better than having twenty where every job is a chore.

Also, don\'t undersell yourself. If someone says you\'re too expensive, don\'t haggle. Just politely thank them for considering you and then move on. However, if you NEVER get work because everyone says you\'re too expensive, well... then you really are too expensive. If nobody ever says that you\'re too expensive or you end up with more work than you can handle, then you\'re too cheap.

Hope that helps.

Kep

 

[demonherald]

I\'d echo everything Kep just said.. The more you do it the more response you will get.. I still get most of my commission work through my ebay sales ... but it\'s all a matter of building up your rep.. when posting in your gallery mention wether or not the pieces are commission work.You\'d be amazed how much that helps as people see what level you are painting to commission and wether it suits what they want or not..

there are a hell of a lot of people out there doing commission services and a hell of a lot of cowboys .. so don\'t worry if you aren\'t bombarded with commission requests just paint up the stuff you want in the style you want and put em on ebay . The more yu do and the more people see the better your chances..

good luck..

and just to repeat ... never ever haggle..... it simply ain\'t worth it.

 

[Thunderhawker]

Thanks everyone! I appreciate all teh good advice and will try and implement it.

 

[lizcam]

PM\'d you