Tracy’s website is tracyverdugo.com.

You can find her online courses here.

She also can be found on Instagram.

You are welcome to join her Facebook Group called Abundant Creative.

Here are some great takeaways from our conversation:

1. Tracy was involved in a big event that took place in Fiji last year and was to be in Vietnam next. Because of the uncertainty in traveling, they’ve decided to hold it in Australia and mainly promote it to Australians. Switching your retreats to a more local location may give you a stronger chance of pulling them off.
2. Well, here’s a suggestion when you’re able to do distance teaching again. A few years back, Tracy got some retreat classes lined up in California. She announced this to her online community, and a few of them asked if she could teach at their location too. Soon she had workshop dates set up so that she could do a teaching tour. It’s a great idea to book a few classes together so that you just travel once to do many classes.
3. Even with online courses, the students can still interact with the instructor. For Tracy, she sets up a Facebook group for each class, and she also has an alumni group for anyone who has taken any of her classes.
4. She will add bonus tutorials in the Facebook group as well to give additional class content to her students.
5. The Facebook group will exist beyond the original time of the class, it just won’t be as active. But anyone who purchases the class later can go back through the group and see what others have posted.
6. Students are able to purchase her classes at any time so that they can do them at their own pace.
7. It’s nice to give those that have signed up for your email list extra things. It might be they are the first to know about a sale of your art, or a launch of a class. It might be that they get a discount for purchasing a class. You should treat your email list as your special fans and reward them accordingly.
8. A great way to find out what your students want in a class is to just ask them. That sounds so simple, but sometimes we don’t think of this. Talk to your community on Instagram or Facebook and find out what their needs and desires are when it comes to online classes.
9. It’s good to explore different materials to see what you like and what works for you. You also want to try things at different price points. You may be using a cheaper paint or a cheaper brush, and you just can’t get the result that you want. Try a new art supply – it may be the quality of the materials and not your level of skill that’s giving you trouble.
10. Sometimes when you’re not satisfied with a piece of art, you just need to put it away for a while. Pull it out a few weeks or months later, and you may discover just what it needs to be completed.
11. Right now, while we still have travel restrictions, if you’re shipping your art out of your country, speak to your customer to find out about the shipping rules in their country. Some countries aren’t accepting shipments by air right now, so you may have to save some orders to mail at a later date.

Susan’s art website is: susannethercote.com

If you would like to be one of the first to hear about her newest art for sale, join her Collector’s Club by signing up for her email list through her website here.

Her education website, where you can find her online classes, and later, her in person classes is: susannethercotestudio.com

Her podcast is called the Susan Nethercote Studio Insider Art Podcast. You can find it on most podcast apps, or from her website here.

Susan is also on Instagram.

Here are some great takeaways from our conversation:

1. When Susan makes her botanical abstracts, she often paints over and around shapes to bring things out from the background. Painting over something that you like is a bold move, but it will often result in something that you love.
2. When using oil pastels in your mixed media art, you’ll need to spray a fixative over it so that it will adhere.
3. Susan advocates for painting as a practice, meaning, you need to paint a lot to develop your own visual language. The more you paint, the more you’ll notice that there are certain marks and shapes and colors that you go back to and have become your style.
4. If you want to explore something new with your art, why not set up a challenge on Instagram so others can explore it with you? That will encourage you to keep going and will engage your artist community.
5. Susan tries to trust the process when she paints, and this works for her. She also did that when she was deciding on the topic for her first online class. She worked in a nonlinear way, and just trusted the process. As a result of hosting a challenge on her Instagram, that allowed the idea for her class to form.
6. Working on paper rather than canvases is a less expensive way to try new things and create a large body of work. Plus, they don’t take up much space when you’ve created dozens of them.
7. As you’re learning art techniques by taking classes, you have to practice your art enough so that you get beyond the stage of copying your teacher. You need to keep working toward your own style.
8. When you create online classes, it’s important to add a community aspect to it. Often, a Facebook group will be set up for the class so students can engage with the instructor and other students.
9. Susan has a podcast called the Studio Insider Podcast. Listening to podcasts are a great way to get art business tips and learn from other artists.
10. Susan has a unique way of dealing with the anxiety that comes with having deadlines: She doesn’t give herself deadlines. That takes the anxiety out of the picture, but she’s still able to get her projects done.