Customers Remember the day of their purchase

As I'm trying to figure out ways to market my work and increase my sales, I came across a set of books written by Jack White. He has a number of books about the "Magic of Selling Art", etc. In reality, there's is no magic, but he has a lot of good common sense suggestions about various ways to market your artwork, present it, close sales, etc.

So, reading one of the books, he started talking about the "Day of Remembrance" for people purchasing your artwork. I was thinking in my head... "yeah... right... it's just a product". However, more I read and the more I thought about it. He's right. I may be selling a painting, but whomever purchases it, will remember the day that they purchase it. I remember the days that I purchased each one of the paintings in my house. Couldn't tell you about the day that I bought groceries or my tv, etc. But, I do remember the day for each one of my painting purchases.

I remember one special instance around Christmas time. This was when I first started mixing landscapes with abstract shapes and doing everything in oil. I remember that, at a local Christmas art fair, one of the vendors' wife came by and saw my work early on. As with everybody I meet at shows, I make sure that I talk to them (Need to do a better job of listening, but working on that part) and be my friendly, charming self. Later that day, her husband came by and said that his wife saw my paintings and that he should take a look. We talked for a bit and he picks out two paintings. His wife comes back later and then, sighs, when she has realized that he picked out my two most expensive paintings. However, it was his Christmas gift and I thanked them as I wrapped them up. So far, typical sales story.

The Day of Rememberance bit comes later. She saw me at this same show the following year. Asked me how I was doing and had to mention that her husband still loves the paintings. Whenever anybody new comes to the house, he talks about how he met the artist, how the artist works from his pen/ink sketches to come up with the concept, and then takes plein-air paintings or photos to compose the painting. He talks about how I showed him my sketchbook to see how it all started, etc.

I realized, that for me, it's my typical way of doing work, but it's incredibly fascinating to people who don't think my way. I also realized that my talking about how I do things is kind of like a "show" for them and they get to relate that story to anybody who questions them about the painting.

For me, it was when I first started mixing landscapes with abstract shapes and doing everything in oil. I remember that, at a local Christmas art fair, one of the vendors' wife came by and saw my work early one. As with everybody I meet at shows, I make sure that I talk to them (Need to do a better job of listening, but working on that part) and be my friendly, charming self. Later that day, her husband came by and said that his wife saw my paintings and that he should take a look. We talk for a bit and he picks out two paintings. His wife comes back later and then, sighs, when she has realized that he picked out my two most expensive paintings. However, it was his Christmas gift and I thanked them as I wrapped them up. So far, typical sales story.

The Day of Rememberance bit comes later. She saw me at this same show the following year. Asked me how I was doing and had to mention that her husband still loves the paintings. Whenever anybody new comes to the house, he talks about how he met the artist, how the artist works from his pen/ink sketches to come up with the concept, and then takes plein-air paintings or photos to compose the painting. He talks about how I showed him my sketchbook to see how it all started, etc.

I realized, that for me, it's my typical way of doing work, but it's incredibly fascinating to people who don't think my way. I also realized that my talking about how I do things is kind of like a "show" for them and they get to relate that story to anybody who questions them about the painting.

Now that I know this, I can see of ways of working it into my sales procedure to make sure that the customer remembers when they purchase the painting. This may, then, lead to repeat sales and another addition to my customer base.