Taking it up a Notch

Over the last couple of weeks, there's been a lot more action going on in my tarot life. People have been picking up my brochure and emailing me about sessions; contacting me on Facebook; stopping by my desk at my day job. It's been great!

Success and exposure are also a wee bit terrifying. One of the big questions I've been asking myself during my marketing class is--how big a role do I want my tarot practice to have in my life? Do I ultimately want this to be my day job? What would that look like and feel like? Could I really deal with being self-employed?

At the moment, I'm enjoying my day job and loving my tarot work. So I'm content to have the regular paycheck from the former while I bring the latter into my life more and more.

In our marketing workshop, our teacher Elizabeth has asked us to define our niche--the ideal clients that we want to work with. Her philosophy is that we should only work with these clients, never settling for high-maintenance or difficult ones, of for ones who don't "get" the work we do. (For me, the UN-ideal client is someone who wants me to tell their fortune or to give them easy answers about their life.)

At first I had my ideal-client niche pegged as "writers and other creative people," and I do enjoy working with that population. But lately, I've been realizing that the greatest pleasure I take in tarot comes from helping people--especially women, and especially young women in their 20s and 30s--really come front and center in their own lives, acknowledging and enjoying their responsibility and their power. That is thrilling to me! So I'm reworking my marketing materials to reflect that.

It's weird how marketing suffuses every aspect of daily life. As I mentioned, I've been using Facebook for marketing; my outgoing voicemail greeting also now includes a marketing message; my email signature for marketing is in development. This feels like I'm making myself very vulnerable in a way, like I'm admitting to how seriously I take tarot (though hopefully this doesn't spill over into taking myself too seriously!). It's taken some getting used to, but it's getting me more and more excited about my tarot biz. I like feeling like a professional!