058: Freedom in Diversity

Starving Artist No More

When you look at the list of your clients, the list of people who purchase your creative work, what do they look like? Do all of those people or businesses look the same, or do they differ in some way? And when you look at the type of creative work you do, does it all fit into a tiny little box, or do you work in lots of different spaces and in lots of different ways? When you think of how you make income in your creative business, does it all come in the form of immediate payment, or work-for-hire agreements? Or do you also have money coming into your business that’s based on past work? In today’s episode, we’re going to have a conversation with multi-disciplinary artist Steven Jay Cohen and learn why, when it comes to the kind of artistic work you do and the way you do it, there is freedom in diversity.

In this episode, you will learn:

• What it means to diversify your client base and your creative work.
• Why pursuing that kind of diversity is important to the ongoing health of your artistic business.
• What asynchronous income is, and why it can help bring you freedom.
• What it means to think of your creative business as having a “Roster of One.”
• How to focus in on the “why” behind your business.
• Why creative businesses are more like startups than like traditional small businesses.
• How a startup mentality can help your artistic work thrive.

In this episode, I mention the upcoming Thriving Narrators Retreat, which will take place August 22-25, 2024 in Cincinnati, OH. (Steven Jay Cohen, owner of Spoken Realms and the guest for today's episode, will be a faculty member at this retreat.) You can learn more about this opportunity for audiobook narrators on my website, www.StarvingArtistNoMore.com/ThrivingNarratorsRetreat.

During our conversation, I refer to several past episodes of this podcast:

• 008: Developing Asynchronous Income
• 013: Find Your Why
• 054: The Six Components

This episode includes an interview with Steven Jay Cohen, who is an actor, audiobook narrator, audiobook engineer, and writer, in addition to being the owner of the audiobook production company Spoken Realms. Steven will be a faculty member at the Thriving Narrators Retreat, August 22-25, 2024 in Cincinnati, OH. You can learn more about Steven and the retreat here. In this episode, Steven mentions a title that I worked on with him, The Indestructibles by Matthew Phillion , and I mention Steven's podcast, Yet Another Dating App.

In this episode, I reference the book How to Make Money While You Are Sleeping by photographer and author Rick Sammon, and Steven mentions Neil Gaimen's commencement speech, which you can watch here. Steven also refers to the teaching of author and coach Simon Sinek.

A full transcript of this episode can be found here. Full transcripts of every episode will always be available at the Starving Artist No More Blog.

Thank you for listening. Please feel free to reach out to me at www.StarvingArtistNoMore.com, with any questions, comments, or feedback. I'd love to hear from you.