As a working freelance illustrator I need to have clients, customers, an audience. Having an audience quite often can create clients. Whether it's someone who shares similar interests or just someone who really likes your work or a combination of the two.
Being active on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram has produced new clients for me. That has been an awesome development from social media. I wish all of these platforms had been around when I first started freelancing in 1984.
It has also given me the ability to put my work directly in front of people who I might not have been able to reach years ago. The piece above was a relatively quick caricature I did of Trace Beaulieu and Frank Conniff from Mystery Science Theater 3000, one of my favorite television programs ever. When I finished this piece I tweeted it to Conniff and to the official Mystery Science Theater Twitter accounts. They both liked it. Instant access to people who not only have meant something to you in your life but also may be future creative collaborators keeps me creating new content for all social media platforms.