Hey guys!
I'm so excited for today's video.
This is something that I think I've been wanting to do for probably half a year now.
It is not really talked about in the art world.
But I kind of want to bring this knowledge to the surface in case there are people out
there who might need this.
My dream is to kind of help other artists get started.
Mira, what are we talking about?
I am talking about side hustles as artists.
The tea is about to get real.
Except this is actually coffee.
Jokes aside.
this is going to be a talking kind of video, so if you want art... come back in the next
video or go binge one of my playlists!
I want to tell you guys different side hustles you can do to get started by making an income
as an artist.
I'm gonna start with some of the more common things first, and then I'm gonna work my way
to the more uncommon ones that I don't really hear discussed as much.
I'm not going to go super, super in-depth on these.
My goal here is to give you a place to start... and you can take what you learned from this
video and do your research elsewhere and get started.
Alright, so I have some advice I want to share before I share these points.
Sorry I keep talking.
If you want to make art a side hustle, a side job, or even a full time job... don't put
it off and say, "oh, I should start tomorrow.
I should start next month."
Because you're gonna get in the habit of putting it off.
Putting it off.
It's just going to take forever to get started.
So find something, and just jump in.
It can be scary, but it is so worth it.
I also do most of these little side things.
There are a few that I don't do, or I stopped doing.
But they're still worth sharing, and they're still great!
Let's get started.
The first one is the most obvious.
It is what we're doing right now!
That is YouTube!
How does YouTube make money if you're an artist?
You don't have to do YouTube as an artist.
This is completely optional.
But I'm saying this one first because this has opened so many doors for me.
It is the thing that has made so many other things possible for me.
I just want to share that with you because it's so worth it.
I don't do YouTube for the money, but it has helped me make a living as an artist.
YouTube doesn't provide a livable income for most people, but there is Goodle AdSense.
If you don't know what that is... basically, when you watch a video, you see the ad at
the beginning, midroll, or at the end.
Wherever it is.
That actually pays the person who is making the videos.
But more importantly, it opens the door for other networking opportunities... which we'll
talk about!
Alright... the next side hustle you can do as an artist is if you have a social media
following, you can get brand deals.
So that means if you have Instagram, a blog, YouTube, whatever it is... if you build up
a following you can use that for brand deals.
That means you can either approach the brand, or the brand will approach you.
You have to be very careful with this, and make sure you are genuine.
Because if you become a sellout and do every brand deal opportunity... that's gonna drive
people away.
I only do a couple brand deals a year.
I make sure it is with brands that I already actually use and trust and like.
Because I don't want to recommend something that I wouldn't use to somebody else.
That just feels wrong to me.
The third thing you can do as an artist: open a shop.
Now, this is going to take you into two different points, but the first shop option is where
you ship you own stuff.
You can do this with Etsy, Shopify, Tictail, Storenvy, Wix... the list goes on.
There are so many options to set up stores online.
The nice thing with shipping stuff yourself is you can make original paintings, original
drawings or even if you knit or do sculptures... you can sell these!
The good things about this is you can feel like you have more of a relationship with
your customers, because you can include thank you notes or extra little goodies like stickers
and coupons.
And you get to control your profit margins and choose exactly how much you want to make
off of that product.
The cons with that is, yes, shipping can be a hassle if you have a lot of orders.
So sometimes it's hard to keep up with that.
There are some downfalls with this.
For instance, setup costs.
If you want to buy a printer to make your own prints, if you want to buy a Cricut to
make your own stickers.
If you have to buy packaging supplies.
All of that stuff costs a lot of money up front.
But you can pay it off, because you can control your profits.
So it's okay.
And you can promote it on your social media, so yeah!
If the whole shipping thing intimidates you, the next thing you can do is outsource your
products.
I really like doing this for my prints nowadays, because prints were very hard to keep up with.
And ink and all of that stuff was really expensive and a hassle.
There are different sites you can do this on, such as RedBubble, Society6, Casetify
(they make cell phone cases).
There are a lot more, you just have to do your research and find what one works for
you.
I personally choose RedBubble, because I really like it!
So the good thing about this is you don't have to do the shipping.
They do it for you.
They print everything on products for you.
There's no overhead up-front costs.
The downfall with outsourcing is if you want to sell original pieces, you're gonna have
to do that in a separate shop.
Like Etsy.
That's what I do.
Also, there's a lot less profit margin if you do this, because they take most of the
money.
Which makes sense, because they are the ones who print it, they ship it.. they do most
of the work.
The fifth thing you can do is very similar to the last thing with outsourcing... except
instead of outsourcing your artwork on prints or pencil pouches, or whatever through like
RedBubble... you can do more of a home decor and textiles route.
So what this means is you can design fabric and wallpaper patterns.
I like to use Spoonflower for this, but there are plenty of other websites where you can
sell wallpaper and fabric patterns.
Okay.
The sixth side hustle..
I feel like every artist needs to do this if they have an online following because it
is so so helpful.
It kind of like... pays for your hobby.
Do affiliate links if you can.
So what are affiliate links?
Well, you may have heard word about the Amazon Affiliate program.
Basically, what that is is there's a product that you either mentioned, used, or really
like.
And you link it somewhere.
That can be below a YouTube video, on a blog, wherever.
The possibilities are literally endless with affiliate links.
You usually have to put a disclaimer that you're using affiliate links so people know.
But.
If people click on that link, cookies will track it, because they clicked your link.
So if they buy anything on Amazon, you get a commission from it.
They don't even have to buy the exact item that you linked.
Which is like... really cool!
So that extra ten percent or whatever that you earned commission from that item is really
helpful.
And you can use it to buy your own art supplies, which is like... so cool!
You can do affiliate links through any brand that you like.
You don't have to go through Amazon.
If you contact the company, or apply through their website sometimes you can even get a
higher commission than Amazon offers.
So just do your research.
Reach out to brands that you like and figure it out.
The nice thing about affiliate links though, is it does not cost the consumer any more
to buy the product.
But instead, it benefits both of you.
You get a commission, and they still get the same thing at the same price.
Sooo... if you aren't an artist and you see people using affiliate links, know that it
helps small people like us.
It's really helpful.
And it also benefits you because you get something out of it.
The seventh side hustle you can do is commissions.
So, say you know people in your town, or you have family and friends... and they know you're
an artist... chances are, they're probably like lurking on the sidelines waiting to ask
you to do a project for them one day.
If you let it be known that you're doing commissions, chances are.. somebody's gonna hit you up
eventually.
If they like it.. word of mouth spreads.
And people are gonna keep coming to you for commissioned projects.
This is a really good thing to do if you want to build your reputation in your town, and
you want to do local work.
You can hit up small businesses and offer to make business cards, or artwork for a small
shop or something like that.
But you can also make traditional paintings and stuff for your family and friends.
You can make wedding programs, wedding invitations, and outsource that through VistaPrint.
There's so many possibilities that you can do with commissions.
So talk to people that you know, and see if they're looking for any projects.
I find that small businesses are usually pretty eager to hire small artists for commissioned
work, because small businesses usually like to support other small businesses.
It feeds the local economy, and it's just really nice.
The eighth side hustle you can do are online commissions.
So if you don't really like doing the whole local commission thing... take it online!
That's okay too.
If you have experience with digital artwork, and just graphic design in general, this will
be very beneficial for you.
You can make logos for people.
As I said, wedding invitations, programs.
All sorts of things.
T-shirts.
People are always looking for stuff.
There are lots of websites you can go to for online commissions, such as Fiverr, PeoplePerHour,
Freelancer, Guru.. there's so many of them.
By the way, I'm gonna try to link a lot of this stuff below, because I know this is a
lot of information.
Alright, the ninth side hustle is probably one of my favorites.
I am a huge, huge fan of passive income.
You can do this with Redbubble, which I mentioned earlier.
You upload your artwork, people order it, and RedBubble does the rest.
So you're constantly making income after that.
There are a lot of other sites you can do this with as well.
My favorite website to use is Creative Market.
You can use DesignBundles, Fontbundles, GraphicStock, Adobe Stock, Graphic River.. there are so
many of them.
The beauty of this is a lot of these sites don't care if you upload your artwork to another
site.
Just make sure you read the terms and conditions (to make sure you actually can).
But yeah, you can definitely upload a design to one website, and another website, and make
income from both of them.
So that's really beautiful.
Most of my creative income is actually from passive income.
I love it.
It actually frees up my time so that I can make more artwork, more YouTube videos, and
spend time with my family!
You guys have probably heard of the tenth thing, but Patreon is really good side hustle
as well.
Patreon is really cool because people will pledge a certain amount per month for your
content.
So whatever skill you have, or whatever products that you have to offer people... people pledge
and pay like a dollar, five dollars, ten dollars a month, and then you deliver whatever you
say you're gonna deliver to them.
This one is kind of hard for me to keep up with, because I feel stretched with a lot
of things, so it's kind of sporadic for me.
Usually for the one dollar tier, people just like tip you.
I see a lot of artists, for like five dollars, they deliver so many digital prints and whatnot.
Now the smart way to do this is to deliver digital products so you're not overwhelmed
with shipping stuff every month.
But do whatever suits you fancy.
Feel it out for yourself.
The eleventh thing.
If you feel like you have a certain skillset or talent that you want other people to know,
you can use Skillshare and design a course, and people will learn from you... and you
get paid!
Skillshare is so cool because there's tons of videos with so much useful content.
And you can learn like.. calligraphy, how to turn a watercolor painting into a vector.
Like... all this really neat stuff.
It's not even just for artists.
It's just a really cool site.
I definitely recommend checking it out, even if you don't want to make a course.
Just a side note.
Yeah, you can teach a course.
Share you knowledge.
Earn a little bit of cash on the side.
I feel like the last one is pretty obvious, but for me, this is a little intimidating.
So I have actually never done this.
Maybe one day.
I have so many friends who do this, and they rave about how amazing it is, and how I should
do it.
Once I work up the courage, I will probably do this too.
But I'll tell you about it, because you already know about it.
You can do craft fairs and conventions if you have a lot of artwork.
Even if you do crafts, not painting or something.
You could do these.
So basically you set up a booth, you have your prints, your artwork, stickers, pins...
whatever merch you wanna sell... and you sell it!
It's easy.
So this is really cool because you can connect with people locally.
They can see your stuff.
You can get your name out there.
People might approach you for business opportunities.
I have had a friend get other opportunities through doing this.
This is really nice if you have a full time job, because usually craft fairs and conventions
are on the weekends.
Friday, Saturday, Sunday.
Yeah.
The possibilities of stuff that you can sell at these are endless.
As I said, you can sell paintings, prints, stickers, pins, whatever.
But, if you don't do that kind of thing, you can sell other stuff too.
I have a friend who goes to these craft fairs and exclusively sells soap, and he makes a
killing doing this.
It's crazy.
Alrighty, those are the twelve side hustles that I wanted to tell you about.
They are not super in-depth.
I just kind of wanted to present the ideas to you, and encourage you to do your own research.
Because what works for me, or what works for one of my friends may not work for you.
You kind of have to learn it, get the feel for it, and just kind of do some trial and
error.
Like some people make a full-time living from this, which is what I do.
But there are other people who just do a couple of these things and they pay for their art
supplies.
Even just doing one or two of these things can help buy your supplies, and that's really
nice because it feeds your hobby... and you can keep doing what you love!
I feel like this stuff isn't talked about super much for artists, so I really just wanted
to get this information out there.
I really just hope it helps somebody, because I think art is really cool and fun and dreamy...
and why not earn a little bit of side cash from it?
Okay.
Sorry this video was so long.
If you want me to go more in-depth on any of these, let me know in the comments.
Maybe I'll make another vide on this in the future.
Anyway guys, keep being creative and do what you love.
Enjoy your art.
Be happy.
Have a good day.
And thank you for watching!
Bye guys!