Market or Die!

It's obvious, if you have a new creative concept, you need a marketing plan; right?

But in my position at the Funky Shirt Lunch Club I receive many submissions of creative projects, like films, theatrical productions etc. and you would be shocked how many of these arrive without a word about how they are to be marketed.

If you want to make your creative production only for yourself that's cool, use your own money, buy yourself a mirror and masturbate to your own brilliance and don't bother the professionals!

Investors sweat to make the money they are willing to place with you in the right circumstances and you owe them respect.

The first thing you have to do after the "I've got a great idea.." moment is to ponder and come up with, "and this is how I'm going to market and sell it!"

Simple ideas are usually the best answer to these questions. Go ask your buyers what they want, an obvious but nevertheless good place to start. I've always found customers are helpful and open, very responsive to these approaches. After all if you can supply a match with your product to their needs and desires it's going to make the customers happy, and if they're distributors; profitable. Everyone loves to be a part of a winning team.

Remember winning is not always just about profit, although that is a great place to start. People in all sections of the creative industries also want to embrace talent, ideas and sometimes take part just because they want to express a position to effect social change or improvement. It all counts, and you need to be aware of their needs as well as your own.

Currently the majority of the people pitching to us at The Funky Shirt Lunch Club fall into two distinct groups. Those that are too focused on the bottom line and those that don't know that there is a bottom line. We aim to encourage and help our creators to do both, simultaneously, there is no reason we can't create quality and generate a profit!