They never paid! How to hold clients accountable, pick your career path, and discover your competitive advantage with Jake Parker, Lee White, and Will Terry.

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Long-Standing Payment Problems at Cricket Media

KEY TAKEAWAYS

An art career is a balance of pleasing your market and pleasing yourself.
You don’t have to come up with some crazy, new style; you just need to find something that’s working and add your unique spin to it. That’s your competitive advantage.
Don’t be ashamed to negotiate a better deal or hold clients accountable to the terms you set. You’re a legitimate business and should carry yourself as such.
Today’s focus and work will provide for tomorrow’s experimentations and side projects.

QUESTIONS

An anonymous listener wrote saying Cricket Media owes them for an illustration. Our listener emailed Cricket repeatedly until they heard back that Cricket is experiencing tight cash flow and will reach out when the payment is scheduled to process. Their contract did not specify a due date for the payment; is there anything our listener can do to ensure they get paid?

Unfortunately, Cricket has a history of issues like this (as evidenced by this article). The best advice we can give is to keep petitioning for your payment. The squeaky wheel gets the oil, so don’t stop emailing, and certainly don’t feel bad asking for what you are owed. Illustrators often apologize for expecting their clients to live up to their agreements, but the truth is, you’re just as legitimate a business as any other. You provided a service for which your client promised to pay you; you have full right to insist they follow through.

Unfortunately, contracts do not always provide the level of protection you would hope for. You should always use a contract, and you can remind your client of the terms to which you both agreed, but it doesn’t ensure you’ll be treated fairly, especially with smaller jobs. If Cricket offers you more work in the future, decline it unless they pay you upfront.
Marc asks, “Is cartoon style still in? I struggle to know where my work fits.”

First, do a little market research. Go to Barnes and Noble or the kids’ section at Target and note any cartoon work you see. What kinds of books and products display that style? Look up the artists for those products and find their representation on LinkedIn; those agents could be great for you, too.

Cartoon-style work is still in, but it has to be contemporary. Make sure your portfolio is up-to-date and just a step or two ahead of current trends. Observe what’s popular and see how you can improve it or add your own unique twist. Discover your competitive advantage.

Vojtěch asks, “I love making many types of art, and I can’t pick just one to pursue full-time. Do you have any tips on how to choose a career path and not look back on the other options you’ve left behind?”

Here’s the deal: if you want to make art for a living, you have to get good enough at one thing that you can be paid to do it. That means starting your career with a season of focus. Assess your goals: do you need insurance? A stable income? Certain fields, like animation, offer these benefits more readily than freelancing or children’s books. If those are necessities for you, get a job in a studio that will pay your bills while you develop your artistic skills.

With this stable foundation, you’ll have extra time to dabble in other art forms or develop side projects which could eventually become your main gig. You don’t have to leave anything behind; you just need to put distractions on pause temporarily until you’ve created a solid foundation for yourself.

LINKS

Svslearn.com

Jake Parker: mrjakeparker.com. Instagram: @jakeparker, Youtube: JakeParker44

Will Terry: willterry.com. Instagram: @willterryart, Youtube: WillTerryArt

Lee White: leewhiteillustration.com. Instagram: @leewhiteillo

Daniel Tu: danieltu.co.

Lily Camille Howell: lilycamille.com

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