#artisicallya-rambo

[suzukiblu]

oh and btw, merry chrismukkah to @artisicallya-rambo too. 💛

[suzukiblu]

How did you spread your Ko-fi/ comms? I've had a Ko-fi of my own set up for a little over a month now but I'm struggling to get any commissioners. Do you have any tips?

disclaimer: This is what worked for specifically me and my specific situation/style/etc and I don't know your specific audience or how you typically interact with them, so take or leave what I say in terms of what seems like useful or helpful information to your own situation. I do have some more specific advice for you in the back half, just I'm gonna be starting out with the "this worked for me" stuff.

Anyway actual answer/info behind the cut, hah. God, this is so long and only mostly organized, I apologize, I just get INTO it sometimes when I get asked this kind of thing.

First and foremost, for clarity's purpose and all: I have been on the internet for literally twenty-five years and am WELL established in fandom, as well as someone who has been reasonably popular and/or well-known in multiple fandoms on multiple sites at multiple times. There are literally people following me who were reading my stuff ten or fifteen or even the full twenty-five years ago. Given your profile says you're in your twenties I may have LITERALLY been online longer than you have been alive, haha.

So like, I've been at this a minute and have a LOT of experience in engaging and maintaining an active audience because that's a thing I value having and therefore do my best to encourage; it just works best for my process. So if you're feeling a little vexed with the response you're getting, know that this is all coming from a much-experienced Old(tm) who has had issues getting commissions and attention several times themselves and just currently has a decent chunk of followers and a very communicative "yes and" writing style and is, as a writer, WILDLY prolific. Like. WILDLY prolific. Genuinely, I am not trying to brag or talk myself up here or anything, I just straight-up feel like I haven't written at all if I don't break 2k in a day ( and even 2k feels kinda low to me at this point ), and I write EVERY day.

Literally. Literally every day. Like I missed two days after I got COVID and solo-drove four hours and needed to sleep for a week to recover, and I missed one day at the beginning of this month because I was real burned out from writing 32k more than usual last month and just needed to veg for a day. That's it, that is it all. Those are literally the only days that I have not written in like, the past SEVERAL months. Like, the high end of "several", to be clear. Occasionally I have a lighter day and only write a few hundred words, but typically I do somewhere in the range of 2.5-3.5k, and on my more productive days I can break 5 or 6k easy. That is the kind of person that you have asked for advice here, haha. 😅 So like . . . I'm low-key a freak, productivity-wise. Like I am the living embodiment of that one interview where George R.R. Martin is staring at Stephen King with visible fear in his eyes as the dude describes how many billions of pages he writes a day like it's no big.

tl;dr: I write SO. SO. MUCH. So much, and ALSO I have a backlog of something like two million words on AO3 and definitely hundreds of thousands more words under my tags list on here on top of that. People get a LOT of content when they get into me, I am MADE of content. I have built up a lot of momentum over time, that's just what's worked for me personally.

Also I'm cheap, ngl. I'm just--I'm very affordable, Ko-fi-wise. So I am sure that helps, considering!

ANYWAY. Some of this advice is not going to sound relevant to Ko-fi, but it is relevant to how I personally use Ko-fi, so yeah, here we go:

Always remember: everyone on the internet has social anxiety. Yes, even the people who don't actually have social anxiety. Just go into everything assuming most people you meet on here are gonna be shy or nervous or just feel awkward striking up a conversation with you out of the blue, especially if they've never really spoken to you before. It doesn't matter if they don't actually have social anxiety, thinking that way just puts you in a mindframe to be mindful when you're talking to them and being mindful in your communication makes people more comfortable with things like messaging you with questions and the prospect of going through the commission process with you.

Generally just assume the best of people's intentions whenever possible, and when their intentions are clearly not the best, just move on and don't engage. It is a lose-lose situation; you are not gonna convince them of anything and you're just gonna look like a dick to people who don't have the context and leave a sour taste in their mouths. Which, long story short, people are just way more likely to enjoy your stuff and WAY more likely to commission you if you're putting your best foot forward whenever possible. I definitely try not to get too negative on here myself; like I'm not doing any toxic positivity or anything, just I am here to vent some feelings and make some friends and enjoy the process, and I wanna cultivate a setup where other people can benefit from that too.

Link. Link link link. How easy is it to find your Ko-fi link? Make it easier than that. Keep it in your pinned post and on the front page of your actual blog and in your back pocket and stapled to your sleeve. When you post a commission, link your commission info in the description. When you talk about your art in general, link your commission info in the body of the text--like for example, "I'm trying to use my Ko-fi more" or "I finished up my last commission, I have some slots open again". ( used my own Ko-fi links for reference here, obviously, hah, but specifically linking to your main page OR just straight to your actual commissions page are both useful options. linking your main page introduces you as a person more effectively, while linking straight to your commissions page removes a step for people and makes it easier for them to find the info they're looking for. )

Communicate! Remind people that your Ko-fi/your commissions exist every now and then. Like, definitely not daily or weekly, but depending on how often you update your blog in general, maybe once every month or couple of months give people a heads up if you've got commission slots open/available. That way they're not awkwardly peering at the pinned post you put up months ago wondering if you're still actively open or just forgot it was in your pinned, and also it gives a heads up to people who might've been thinking about or meaning to commission you that you're available for work.

Post consistently in general; not just about commissions or Ko-fi, obviously, just like making yourself available and open to people and hanging out WITH people. Answer as many asks as you have the spoons to. Talk about stuff you like and stuff you're excited by and into. Like obviously not everyone can do this but I personally post a lot on here and I definitely UPDATE a lot on here; generally speaking if someone swings by my blog once or twice a week, there's gonna be at least a few hundred to a few thousand words of new stuff for them to read ( or SEVERAL thousand, even ). Or to look at, when I'm feeling arty.

Answers asks and make personal posts. Like I'm not saying trauma-dump on your followers or use Tumblr like a diary, definitely, but it's a good idea to give people a bit of an idea about yourself in terms of things like talking about your dog being cute or if you're going to be out of town on vacation or how your process works or just new or different things that you're trying out/experimenting with/interested in. Bluntly put, you want people to remember you are a person who wants to hang out with them and not just a Content Generator to be "liked" and then scrolled on past, and you want to engage with them and try to talk to them when they talk to you and generally be, like, approachable. In my case I just do my best to assume the best of every interaction and try to notice who's regularly popping up in my notifs and remember what I can about them. This does not always work for me because my memory is swiss cheese, but I do what I can there because I very much appreciate people engaging with my stuff ( and also my me, haha ) and I think communicating that kind of thing to people usually makes them feel good, and in turn you feel better about what you're doing and how people are responding to your work, and then you're more motivated TO work and maybe they catch some mistakes for you or have good ideas that vastly, VASTLY improve what you had in mind. The circle of fandom! The life cycle of a WIP!!

Which leads us into: you need to be doing things that are very recognizably You(tm) and cannot just be picked up for free just any random anywhere. Which like, that can be an issue with fanart, obviously, because the internet is FULL of free fanart, so what you probably want is to be looking to court people who are looking for art of their fics/AUs or their own original characters. Like your style is very distinctive for sure, that's definitely a good thing, so leaning into your personal interpretations of characters is a good idea, and it does look like you're doing that with the stuff of yours I've seen. I would just say lean into your own designs and own little quirks of styling and stuff you really love to draw and go hard on all of it. Once you really feel it out, the stuff you are REALLY vibing with is the stuff that is gonna resonate with people the most significantly in the long run, in my experience. Even if it doesn't always get the same level of response as less niche stuff does, it'll very likely get a more DEVOTED response, and people who'll come back for more of it. I did not write so dang much of Darcy Lewis in my MCU days because her fans were uninvested in seeing new content for her, put it that way.

Also, I AM in fact cheap; I have a few different price options on my Ko-fi and two-thirds of them are five bucks or under. The nature of how I personally do Ko-fi means I'm adding words to already-established stories, though, so people are coming in invested and more willing to donate so they can find out what happens next. Which, like, is obviously not something that works with art commissions, unless you're doing something like "when I hit this donation goal I will draw the next page of this comic script I have written in thanks for hitting the goal". But honestly, sometimes doing a limited amount of projects and getting people interested/invested in said projects is more cost-effective in terms of your time and energy and less overwhelming than doing a million different things all at once. Plus it gets your audience more story to chew on in the long run and I have NEVER met anyone who complained about a fuller narrative happening to them.

Mind, I don't actually know if you're the comic-making type, comics are just the first example I thought of, but also you do have to make sure you're giving people enough content to be invested in to begin with. Sticking with the comic example, people aren't gonna donate to see more of a comic if they don't know they LIKE your comics, so doing some shorter ones and posting a nice selection of those first and THEN doing a donation goal is more respectful of your audience because you're clearly actively interested in them and want to make things you can share with them, not just, like, collect their Ko-fi donos, and at the same time it's also just better advertisement for you. Ethical marketing, basically; there's plenty of content you shared freely, and you're also posting the things that get crowdfunded for everyone to see and not paywalling anything, and ideally building some community and making some friends along the way. Which, like, obviously substitute whatever works for you for "comic" here; I personally just find having overarching narratives/stories/settings helps people get invested and enjoy themselves more with your stuff, and also be likelier to REMEMBER your stuff. Come up with an AU, do some little comics or illustrations in it or some design work for it. Just make a thing that is very specifically YOU and what you like.

On that note: get niche. Get weird. You REALLY don't wanna be making stuff that is not as You(tm) as possible and can just be picked up anywhere. You wanna make the kind of stuff where people go "I wanna see more like this, fuck, who else is even MAKING this, alright OP please do me a solid and have more of this on your blog--fuck YEAH you do, look at all this, okay I live here now". In fandom terms: yes, everyone loves Timkon, Timkon'll get likes, it'll probably even get comments, but if you really want to find the diehards who are gonna lock in and ENGAGE, you wanna make sure you also do the niche shit that you're telling yourself everyone else is gonna think is too weird or just not be interested in. Shut up, imposter syndrome, people LOVE weird! People WANT weird, this is fandom, we're a largely queer subculture that's reclaiming our modern mythologies from capitalism, we're not here for the normie shit! We'd be rereading canon again if we just wanted the normie shit!

Seriously, being openly weird and leaning into said weird is a VERY definite reason that people recognize and remember my writing as opposed to, like, just consuming it and moving on without even noticing there was an author involved. If people vibe real hard with the themes you get really into working with or really like the unique parts of your style/voice or appreciate the way you handle certain subjects/characters/weird niche shit, they're a lot likelier to remember you and either come back or just stick around from the start. Like attracts like and your "like" will be delighted to have found you, and you will get to enjoy the benefits of BEING found by your fellow niche weirdos and all be thriving together! Everyone wins!

Also, I have some more specifically tailored practical advice/critique that is based off my immediate reactions to what I saw when I clicked over to your blog/Ko-fi, which definitely take with a grain of salt because I am giving it without being familiar with your process/situation/audience and from a different position. I'm just trying to be less general and offer some stuff that might be more specifically useful to you. So like, please feel free to hit me up in DMs or asks if you wanna talk about any of this in more detail or get some clarification on anything I'm saying here, this is just what I've got from my initial impressions and off the dome.

Also-also, again, this is all based on what's worked for me personally, so I'm sure there's some stuff that might not be applicable to or just not vibe with you because of that. So like please don't take this as me trying to smack down what you've been doing so far or anything, I'm just trying to be thorough in building on it and also, like, my graphic design experience definitely slipped into some of this, hah.

So to start I took a quick look at your blog to see how easy it was to find your Ko-fi and then a quick peek at your Ko-fi itself to see how it was set up. I found your Ko-fi immediately, which was good! Having it in both your bio and your pinned is definitely the right idea. I did have to expand your bio to find the link that was listed in there, which not everyone will do while scrolling past, but that's just like, nitpicking on my part since you do have the pinned post directly beneath it. I just am very much "make literally everything as easy as possible for everyone ever in every possible way".

It'd probably be helpful to mention that you're open for commissions in the "about" on your Ko-fi's front page so people don't have to scroll too far or click any links to find that out/have that confirmed. You may also wanna either slim down the descriptions in your commissions listings or break them up into paragraphs; you wanna do your best to avoid big solid blocks of text because people are likelier to only skim those and therefore less likely to absorb the information.

Skimming is also bad because it means people are less likely to notice that something you're describing appeals to them, and are way MORE likely to end up confused. "Confused" ups the chances that they just decide they don't wanna bother you by asking for clarification, given they might feel stressed by asking or pressured to buy or just like they're bothering you.

Avoiding text blocks is also just gonna make your descriptions wayyyyy easier to read for people who are dyslexic or have vision problems or possibly didn't learn English as their first language ( depending on their fluency for that last one, obviously, but you never know so yeah ). Basically you wanna make the commission process as quick and effortless and A-to-B as possible for people; your goal is "how can I make this process as close to one-click shopping for people?" Your goal is to become the Occam's Razor of commissions.

Your promo sheet on Tumblr I'd say could be an issue in the sense that it's a little difficult to read; you want people to not have to think about it to clock it as what it is. I only immediately knew it was a commissions sheet because I went in looking for one, and you want people to INSTANTLY know it is a commissions sheet. Like, before they even process anything about it, they should have the instinctive recognition of "this is a commissions sheet" and be primed to read a commissions sheet.

The main issue I see is that the sheet's layout is pretty dense and lacks visual flow in its composition; the prices are scattered and the font on the header is hard to read at a glance; my reflexive assumption from the moment it took to recognize it as text and the overall layout of the graphic was that it was a border, not a header. And like, I figured it out like half a second later, yeah, but that first couple of seconds can disorient or confuse people or just make them just scroll by without stopping to read, because it's not a tall image and the image is ALWAYS your best chance to catch somebody's eye, especially when deliberately going for art commissions.

The first thing I actually read off the sheet was "X no NSFW GORE", which I was initially unclear on the meaning of and had to reread to realize what you meant, but either way is not the first thing you want me to read; it should definitely be on the sheet and very visible, but not positioned to be the first thing someone's eye goes to. It belongs off to the side in a lower corner or just over on the right-hand side. Right now it's too high and too emphasized in comparison to the actual header, which is very much what you WANT people reading first.

There's almost no negative space on the sheet and some of the example art you've included is shrunk down so small that it's REALLY hard to read unless you've seen the larger pieces before, so I think considering doing two or three complementing slides so you can spread out your offerings/pricing and make your examples bigger would really be helpful there. I think it's a really good idea to include multiple pieces as examples, it shows your range and makes it clear what people are gonna be getting for their money; that's definitely the way to go imo. You just also wanna be sure that people can see the details and get the full vibe of your art and the work you put into it. Like, I REALLY love that pic of Match you have down at the bottom, full disclosure I realize we have like never spoken but it is literally my phone background and has been since the day I first saw it ( my lock screen being the complementing Kon pic, natch ), but you can't see any of the cool little details I know are in it with it shrunk down that small. I wanna see his eyes and the detail in his hair and the phone cord wrapped around his throat and the heart freckles, I LOVE those dang heart freckles! And like, those are also interesting little quirks and creative things that will make people think, "oh, I like how that looks, if I commission this person I'll get a cool pose or creative styling or fun details out of it!", so they are definitely the kind of thing you should make sure to show off when you are showing off your work.

I personally tend to go for vertical posts over horizontal ones, given Tumblr is meant to be scrolled and it's more important that people's eyes get caught by something in the scrolling process than that your graphic expands across the screen in the best fit; a lot of people won't even click on the image to expand it anyway. You do want to make sure it'll stay readable if they DO click, of course, so I'd personally recommend stacking two or three horizontally-composed sheets on top of each other to make the POST'S composition vertical. Scrolling down is how people traverse this site; you want to lean into presentations that read well when they're being scrolled down.

The accompanying text below the actual sheet is also not as neatly balanced/formatted as it could be, so it looks less . . . hm, less INTENTIONAL, maybe? Less thought-out than it could be, at least. It makes it harder to read at first glance and doesn't give off a professional vibe. Using bullet points or indents or headers can help with that kind of thing and just make it easier for the eye to follow along and for people to read/focus on what you're saying. ESPECIALLY when you're doing promos/price lists you want to have the most stripped-down and functional version of the text you can manage. You wanna get your point across as clear and succinct as you can and make sure there's negative space around your text so the words can be read quickly and the text itself can breathe, visually-speaking. Negative space is your friend.

Yes I realize talking about the VISUALS of text is a little weird but listen man, you're an artist, you get what I'm saying here. You wanna make the actual first-glance look of your text aesthetically appealing and easy to follow through at the pace and in the order you want it followed. Which like, takes some practice, obviously, but again, I have been here for twenty-five years, haha. Just this is a very visual site and very scroll-oriented, so you wanna do your best to be eye-catching! That's why I frequently post my finished fics with a little accompanying image, just to make sure they stick out to people in the tags.

uhhhhh okay this was a lot, lol, sorry for dumping a ton of info all at once there, but hopefully some of it will be helpful to you! Even if some of it probably sounds weird and way too concerned with curb appeal, haha. Sometimes you just gotta put in some grind and build your momentum, sometimes it's really just that; in the meantime, just try to be approachable and enjoy yourself! If you build it, they will come.