Alimo (both the name of the brand and the artist) was created to share creativity and help bring more happiness to the world. Born and raised in Oregon, Alimo draws inspiration from the ocean to the mountains focusing on people interacting with their everyday selves.
His work can be seen with clients like Patagonia, Portland Trail Blazers, and 10 Barrel Brewing Co. to name a few. We picked Alimos’ brain to learn how he uses email marketing to promote his brand and various art projects.
Tell us a bit about your journey as an artist. What inspired you to pursue this career path?
Alimo started out when I was a rugrat at home with my family, probably around 5 years old. Like any kid, I was playing with crayons, drawing on the walls, eating dirt outside, and using my imagination to create weird characters. The more I grew up, the more I honed in on these skills. My parents helped guide me into many cool creative paths like skateboarding, cooking, photography, and painting. Without their encouragement, I wouldn’t be where I am today.
My brother and skateboard/snowboard culture heavily influenced me. I was blown away by skateboarding magazines on how they put graphics onto a print. I didn’t know what it was at the time, but later discovered that was graphic design. That influence brought me to art school to pursue these explorations and to push my creativity.
Alimo as a brand started in college, but truly went into business years later after I quit corporate design jobs to focus on my fine art. That switch was slow and methodical. I went from freelancing five days a week to two, then snipped it to go full-time.
My entrepreneurial attitude led me to create my own business. I saw so many of my favourite artists creating these amazing projects for themselves and for brands. I wanted to be in this circle to push myself and to help bring more happiness into the world.
What are some key themes or styles that define your work, and what kind of audience do you reach out to with your work?
A common goal in my work is observational. As a daily practice, I use my watercolours to sketch people in their everyday lives. Quick 15-minute studies to braindump ideas, then when I’m back at the studio, I’ll use my sketchbook as a library to source for final material.
As an artist, I’m best known for my curvy post-pop imagery, highly saturated colours, and worlds inhabited by figures arranged on flat tonal surfaces. I use thick line-work to blend both drawing and design with inspiration from the ocean to the mountains that I pull from my experiences traveling.
On top of my work, I explore the blockchain, bridging traditional art and Web 3. Using technology to interact with my work has been incredibly fun.
My core audience is primarily outdoor enthusiasts who love being outside. I find most of my customers are surfers, snowboarders, and travellers. Over time, my audience has shifted as my paintings bring in more dialogue than just a scene, it brings in personality that folks from all over can relate to. That evolution has been really great to see and connect on.
What are your priorities at the moment? What are you promoting?
Over the years, I’ve been exploring blockchain technology, bridging my traditional art and Web 3 (as mentioned above). This relationship has pushed my creativity into more focused collections, a closer relationship with my collectors, and a deeper connection with my work. When I use technology, it opens up new possibilities of how my art can work in both the digital and physical world. Both are incredibly fascinating.
A great example is a project called ‘Japanuary’. This project sold 6 digital NFTs + 2 large physicals. There was a sort of digital gamification where folks scrambled to buy all 6 NFTs in order to get into the raffle for the large physicals. On top of that, each physical had its own NFC chip. This chip has code built into it where it shows historical evidence on the owner (certificate of authenticity), diary notes, pricing, etc. That way I can upload images, sketches, and photos of how the painting came to be just by scanning your phone over the painting.
Using this type of technology has changed my whole perception of my creative practice. Since I jumped into this space, I haven’t looked back. It’s been fun onboarding my collectors into this space as well.
In the wider marketing mix, what role does email play?
Email is a huge part of our marketing. It’s a great way to bring each of our users along my creative journey. This ranges from product releases, show announcements, monthly studio recaps, and simple art shares to bring in some happiness into our customers’ email inboxes. We try to mix up marketing emails with other general art emails so it doesn’t feel so sales-driven.
Email and social media are treated the same when it comes to product sharing. We share the same images to reach a variety of audiences since not everyone is on our email list. We use social to help drive folks to our website, then entice them with a promo code to join our email list.
We’ve found email is the number one way to touch base with our audience outside of DMs or IRL events. Since folks are all over the world, the internet has brought us all together in so many beautiful ways.
How do you keep your audience engaged? Are there any email strategies or formats that resonate well with your subscribers?
Our emails are super basic. The strategy is to share new product launches, along with sharing my creative journey with them. It’s not meant to be sales-driven on every email as that can get overwhelming. It’s meant to share Alimo’s journey on all fronts. This means lifestyle, travel, partnerships with brands, and of course product releases. Mixing things up helps the users want to click on the email vs bounce right away.
We chose EmailOctopus for the ease of use and affordable pricing. It has been a huge contribution to building and growing our brand.
Alimo
What challenges have you faced in email marketing as an artist, and how have you overcome them?
As an artist, I’m juggling a lot of projects. We are still a small brand so lots of hats are being worn primarily by me. Right now, I take care of email marketing so a huge challenge is email consistency. Some weeks we send more than others, then other times there’s a gap in emails sent.
As a brand, we don’t have exact quarter goals since we mix up fine art, merchandise, art shows, and digital drops. This means the consistency is more on the opportunistic route. A new project is ready to share, then we create an email for it rather than a full forecast.
I think some simple ways to improve are forecasting and scheduling emails. Seems easy, but when you’re juggling so many projects it’s hard to keep track. What is consistent is our monthly studio recap email that we do. Love sending that email out.
What kind of feedback have you received from your subscribers, and how does it impact your creative process?
Generally, our subscribers respond to emails saying, ‘Thanks for the update and love everything you’re doing.’ Those emails are super rewarding and encouraging. It’s super vulnerable being an artist, nonetheless sharing everything that is in your brain. Having our subscribers and loyal customers is huge for me and keeping the studio running.
What’s next for you in terms of projects? Will you use email marketing to promote it?
Right now, we are focusing on holiday merchandise, a new group art show that is end of November, and starting to forecast upcoming projects for 2025. Wild how fast a year goes, but we are excited for all the things coming for 2025.
Why did you choose EmailOctopus for your email marketing needs?
For us, it was the subscriber count vs monthly subscription cost. EmailOctopus was the most affordable subscription for what we are doing with our marketing. Other platforms are more expensive, so we opted for EmailOctopus.
How do you typically use EmailOctopus for your campaigns?
We automate and segment our customers into a few buckets and send out similar emails per grouping. We do this to help understand that group, what they are clicking on, and the general bounce rate. There aren’t any crazy theories around this strategy, but works for what we are with our business.
For each campaign, we duplicate and send out per segment.
Are there any EmailOctopus tools or integrations that have been especially helpful in reaching your goals?
Our main integration is linking our subscribers from Shopify to Email Octopus. That way, when a new subscriber opts in, they get added to our main bucket list for marketing
What advice would you give to other creatives considering EmailOctopus and generally email marketing?
Consistency is a great model. We are still working through these pains as well, but it’s huge for customer expectations. I’d also recommend not just product sales emails. Bring users into your creative journey to share not just products, but yourself.
Make sure to check out their work at www.alimofun.com and subscribe to their email list 🙂
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