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DJ Coffman is a cartoonist who will draw anything for $2.00. I first heard about him through Seth Godin’s post entitled, “Little Bits.” For a mere $2.00 fee, DJ will draw anything you can fit into a 60-character caption and he’s doing a lot of drawing! It’s an interesting model for how people make a name for themselves.
In the case of Will Draw Anything, it makes a lot of sense. There are thousands of thousands of bloggers that would gladly pay $2.00 for the perfect image to go with their blog post. And even though two dollars isn’t much money, every time one of those bloggers posts a Will Draw Anything image, DJ is getting tons of almost free exposure. While I’m sure he won’t be doing $2.00 drawings forever (because someone will discover him and pay him much more), it is a wonderful way to build a huge amount of buzz around his product (his artwork). Here’s why DJ says he’s doing it:
Number one, it’s fun. Number two, it’s practice to make me faster and keep me sharp drawing various things I wouldn’t have thought to draw- Also it’s allowing me to get faster at drawing directly on the cintiq screen, I’m a much faster penciler on paper. Number three, it was originally meant to be a cheap way to give something quick back to donators of the Yirmumah comic. It’s not about making money, as you can tell by the cheap price tag, it’s mostly just for fun. I’ve unexpectedly gotten other bigger paying commission work out of people seeing these little drawings pop up, and some people actually pay me more than 2 bucks and I put a little more time into their drawings… so I guess it’s a happy accident for now. Now the 2 dollar thing just seems very funny to me for some reason. Watch the monkey draw you something for 2 dollars. I’d probably do it even cheaper.
If you’re looking for a cool image to pair with one of your blog posts, head on over to Will Draw Anything and get setup. For a super detailed image, you can donate more than $2.00.
If you’re looking for a way to build buzz about your product or service, you might think along the lines of Will Draw Anything. What would happen if I started offering 10 second videos at $50 a pop? Or $25? What if you would design any two page website for $100? What if you would write anyone a press release for $5? Would these things increase your popularity to the point where you could raise your pricing and have a built in client list, or is all of the traffic driven by a publicity stunt like this merely people too cheap to hire someone at an industry rate? I’d love to hear your thoughts on this and encourage you to take advantage of the $2.00 drawings at Will Draw Anything while they are still available.
What are you doing to raise awareness about your product or service?
