Your art is more than a way to make a living. Your art is your passion and your purpose. It’s why you are here and it’s what you were meant to do.
But, at the end of the day, you still have to keep food on the table and a roof over your head. And that means that your art is still a business and you are still a business owner as well as an artist. Ensuring that your artistic business grows, thrives, and survives takes time and effort.
It requires you to be not only a creator but also a business strategist, chief marketer, and expert customer service provider. That’s a lot of hats for one person to wear, but there is a way for you to fulfill all the roles your artistic enterprise requires while still taking care of both your customers and yourself.
No matter how gifted an artist you may be, no matter how dedicated you are to your craft, the reality is that your career would not survive without your clients. And that means customer satisfaction must be a top priority.
The good news is you don’t have to compromise your artistic vision to ensure that your clients have an exceptional experience with your business. You can offer your customers the white glove treatment through the provision of perks and benefits that the general public isn’t privy to.
The key to understanding what will engage and pleasure your best clients lies in the effort to build rapport with your customers, in taking the time to get to know them, what they expect, what they need, and what they want. Once you understand what drives your clients, you can tailor your service strategies accordingly.
For example, if you have a V.I.P. collector who enjoys networking with other collectors, then you might offer a private viewing of a new work exclusively for a handful of your best customers, affording them the opportunity to meet and engage with one another. On the other hand, if you have a patron who is a bit more introverted and eschews public gatherings, you might offer a private viewing of your latest work at the client’s own home.
Ensuring that you’re offering your best customers the white glove treatment helps you build those lucrative and long-lasting relationships on which your business depends. But that’s only half the battle. You also need to focus on continuously expanding your market reach in order to maintain a steady flow of new customers and prospects.
The good news, though, is that it’s easier than ever for an artist to raise their brand awareness and connect with prospective clients all around the world. Marketing your brand successfully takes time, effort, and strategy, however. It’s best, for example, to focus on a range of media, including blogs, podcasts, and social media platforms. This way, you can engage with an entire global community of art lovers and prospective buyers, showcasing your wares through online portfolios, social media posts, and podcast promotions.
Ideally, a strong digital presence will enable your prospective clients to connect with you more easily, and the more you are able to connect with them, the more you will care about and for them!
When you’re a creative professional running your own business, it can be easy to forget about taking care of yourself because you are so busy taking care of your customers and your art. However, if you aren’t able to maintain your health in body, mind, and spirit, not only will your art suffer but so will your business–and your relationships with your customers.
At the very least, taking the time each day for physical exercise, such as taking a daily walk through a local park or around the neighborhood, is a great way to boost your immune system, build muscle strength and agility, and support cardiovascular functioning. Best of all, when you get your blood flowing and your body moving, you’re going to reduce your stress, clear your mind, and spark your creativity.
Being both an artist and an entrepreneur isn’t easy. However, with a bit of effort and commitment, it is possible to grow your business and care for your customers while also taking care of yourself!
Katie Brenneman is a passionate writer specializing in lifestyle, mental health, education, and fitness-related content. When she isn't writing, you can find her with her nose buried in a book or hiking with her dog, Charlie. To connect with Katie, you can follow her on Twitter.
If you are an emerging artist, you should think of creating a personal website along with profiles on social media platforms. This is very important as online presence is highly recommended if not obligatory for business, art, and sports. To present your art website to the masses, you have to promote and optimize it for search engines. This article explains how you can boost your website ranking and provides more details on backlinks as the most powerful method to achieve that.
Art website: first steps
Before bringing the website to the top of searches, you should create a stable base for it. It is necessary to select a reliable site builder and assign a suitable domain name to your art online platform. This sets up a decent base for future optimization of the website.
Select website builder
While there are many website builders these days, you should rely on the most convenient and credible ones. It is not enough to proceed with the one that appears high on the search results. You should take into consideration the pieces of advice of those people who have also used website builders for creating their art websites. The website building platform should guarantee that your website loads fast, you can select the preferred domain name, and apply search optimization activities without any constraints.
As a rule, most website-building platforms offer a set of predefined templates for art websites. You could select the preferred one and adjust it to your needs at any time.
Select domain name
To reinforce the optimization efforts for your website, set a clear and recognizable domain name. There are lots of services like GoDaddy and Namecheap where you can verify whether the preferred domain name is available. Also, you can buy the domain you like and reserve a place for it on the hosting platform.
The introduction of the .ART domains in 2016 was an ingenious way for artists to differentiate their websites, from the average website domain, and to emphasize their artistry. To search .ART domains, click HERE.
Art website advancement
As your art website is designed, created, and tuned up, it is the right time to apply SEO techniques to it. In particular, you should consider investing much time and enough resources in link building.
Gain backlinks
The fastest way to make your website highly visible on the web is to gain backlinks from other online resources. Various techniques allow you to do that in different modes, though the objective remains always the same.
One of the primary methods for link building is outreach to other websites via email or other communication tools. That might not always be easy, though you establish cooperation with different instances that way.
Another popular backlink-gaining procedure is by using an automated link building service on the web. Find a credible provider that has a large database of various online platforms and websites that would gladly link back to your website.
If you are keen on writing an article, you can also gain links via guest posting. This is a reliable approach to gain traffic to your art website as well as to increase awareness of your art brand.
Control on-page SEO
Besides link-building practices, it is also crucial to guarantee that your website functions properly. Use dedicated tools for controlling the page load speed on your website, cleaning up your website code, and checking other technical characteristics. This will help to make sure that users stay on the website for long after they find it on search results and follow it.
Analyze website performance
Your website ranking progress can’t be properly estimated in case you do not use proper analytic tools. One of the most popular and effective ones is Google Analytics, which is free to use. There you will be able to see all the characteristics and user behavior statistics on your website, Based on that data, you would be able to derive what could be done better on your website to boost its ranking further.
Create e-shop
Even though the art website optimization is crucially important, you should also consider creating your small representation instance on world-known platforms for selling art objects. These could be Etsy and Artspan - the art marketplaces offering creative people the possibility to set up their online storefronts.
Art platforms for creators have embedded optimization mechanisms that allow your art products to be visible on the web by embedding certain keywords. Also, you can insert backlinks to your website from there, thus linking back from credible resources and improving your website ranking.
Mary Hunter is a successful American freelance lifestyle blogger with advanced writing skills. She is currently working for linksmanagement.com. Mary has experience in editing, marketing, and her works appear in different publications and website articles.
Read more helpful art career and marketing articles in our archives HERE.
The Light Space & Time Online Art Gallery is pleased to announce it has launched a new archive website to host our past exhibitions.
As many of you may know, over the last several weeks, the LST website has been experiencing intermittent slow loading and downtime. This “intermittent” has become more frequent after our hosting company migrated our site to a newer, supposedly faster, server. However, as a result of the continued issues with the website, we have changed hosting companies and created an archive site as a complement to the main Light Space & Time gallery website.
As one of the longest running online art gallery websites, the LST site has hundreds of exhibitions and, as such, is a very large, image heavy site. Websites with the sheer amount of content and number of images as we have can sometimes become unstable and experience issues.
After extensive consultation with our web development and technical support team, it was decided that moving older content to an archive website would help ensure we could preserve our older exhibitions and continue to provide artists with a place to showcase their talent long into the future.
Prior to Fusion Art purchasing LST from John Math in 2018, the oldest exhibitions were already being purged in an effort to make room for the newer exhibitions. We did not want to continue to do this, and have artists lose elements of their portfolios, so the solution was the creation of an archive website to host these past exhibitions for the long term.
Therefore, all monthly and special exhibitions, solo art exhibitions and artist showcases prior to January 2022 will now be hosted on our new archive website – LightSpaceTimeArchives.art.
In order to access any exhibitions prior to January 2022, just add the word “archives” to the current URL of your exhibition. It will then take you to the archives site and directly to the exhibition you are looking for.
Alternatively, you can visit the main LST website and click the LST Archives button in the menu bar at the top of every page. This will take you to the archives site and you can find your exhibitions in the applicable section.
All other content, including current art competitions and exhibitions (January 2022 and beyond), art marketing articles, artist news and testimonials remain on the main LST site.
For over 12 years, the Light Space & Time Online Art Gallery (LST) has been an advocate for artists by helping them to market and sell their art online and around the world.
As a subsidiary of Fusion Art, the gallery’s mission is to promote artists though online art exhibitions, our extensive social media and marketing networks and through our combined newsletter subscribers list of over 35,000+ subscribers. Our extensive mailing lists includes gallery owners, corporate art representatives, art collectors, art consultants and decision makers in the fine arts field.
Through both our online art galleries, Fusion Art and LST provide one of the most advanced and widespread art marketing packages offered by any other online gallery.
As we are constantly searching for new ways to promote and provide marketing and sales opportunities for our artists, LST is thrilled to announce we have new awards and marketing benefits that will launch this summer.
Cash Award to Overall Top Winner
The gallery is pleased to announce that is will start awarding a monetary cash prize to the Overall Top Winner of its monthly online art competitions. In order to be more competitive, we have decided to offer a cash award to the Overall 1st Place winner of each exhibition. The amount of the monetary prize will be determined by the number of entries that are received in each competition.
Newly Updated Art Marketing Success Manual
Our previous Art Marketing Success Manual was getting outdated so we are working on a new updated version to encompass our more recent and most up to date information and recommendations for artists to market, promote and sell their art. The updated Art Marketing Success Manual will be available starting with the awards presented in September.
Discount for .ART Domains
We have always encouraged artists who are serious about their art, want to advance their art careers and increase sales, on how important it is to have a have a modern, professional, up-to-date website to display their art. The introduction of the .ART domains in 2016 was an ingenious way for artists to differentiate their websites, from the average website domain, and to emphasize their artistry.
Through a new partnership with the .ART domain registration service, we are going to be able to offer a discount to our top award winning artists who want to take the next step in their art careers or even upgrade their current website and brand to include the .ART affiliation.
Discount for Artspan Art Marketplace
We have now partnered with Artspan Art Marketplace to offer our top winning artists discounted plans for their platform. Artspan was the first artist-specific website builder company, formed in 1999. Particularly for artists who may not be computer or tech savvy and may want an easily designed website to showcase and sell their art, Artspan is a leader in the market.
Artists who sign up will receive a personal branded website, which is also integrated into the Artspan marketplace, thus giving artists two venues to use in selling their art – their own individual sites and the Artspan Marketplace. Similar to our partnership with Artwork Archive, Light Space & Time's top winning artists will receive special discounts that are higher than is offered to the general public.
All of the above new awards will be offered starting with the August competition, the 6th Annual “Patterns, Textures & Forms” competition, which launches on July 10th. As a means to defray at least some of the costs for these new awards, the gallery will be increasing entry fees slightly, starting with the June competition. To see the current competitions that are accepting entries, visit the LST home page.
Many of the partnerships we are forming with companies offer affiliate referral programs. We have waived and/or drastically reduced affiliate commissions in exchange for offering higher discounts and more benefits to artists who are referred by Fusion Art and LST.
These new awards are our way of saying Thank You to all our artists for being part of the Light Space & Time Online Art Gallery, for sharing your talent with us and allowing us to help you promote and market it to the world.
As an artist, you probably cringe a little when someone says the word "marketing." It just sounds so sales-y. But even if you think of yourself exclusively as an artist and not a marketer, there's no denying that marketing and selling are interconnected. Thus, if you're desperate for a marketing approach that is not sleazy or shouty, you should consider delving into video marketing. In this article, we'll share some tips to get you started with this strategy and help you get over your fear of marketing. Let's dive in!
What is video marketing, and why do artists need it?
Video marketing is utilizing videos to promote or market a product or service. In the case of artists, you can leverage videos to display your work, connect with fans, and, most importantly, convert them into regular clientele.
People love watching videos on the internet - whether it's for entertainment or educational purposes (or both). Not only does it allow you to share your work with the world, but it also builds a connection with potential fans and customers. So if your goal is to promote your art online in hopes that more people will see it and buy it, then video marketing should be part of your strategy.
Popular video content types of marketing your art
If your opinion about video marketing is complex because it’s challenging to develop content ideas, worry no more! Here are some video content types that you can use:
1. Meet the Artist
Introduce yourself and explain why you love creating art. Let your viewers know you as an artist and learn about your process. You can also share some exciting facts about your life that aren't directly related to art, such as where you grew up and why you started painting in general terms.
2. How-to Create Art
If you have a knack for teaching, this video content fits you. You can create a tutorial on specific art mediums (watercolor, acrylic, oil) or different styles (abstract, realism, etc.) and provide tips on creating a masterpiece.
3. Art Demo video
This video is a perfect opportunity to demonstrate your artistic techniques. Film yourself in action and post a time-lapse video for your audience to get a glimpse of how much hard work you put into your pieces.
4. Art history/theory lectures
If you are an art history/theory enthusiast, do a famous artist/movement course. You can introduce your favorite artist and how impactful their influence is to you.
5. Behind the Scenes
Filming behind-the-scenes will give viewers an inside look into your creative process - from inspiration, sketching ideas all through production time until finished work is displayed at galleries/exhibitions, etc.
6. Q&A Session
Allow viewers into a more personal side of you by doing a question and answer session where you talk about anything and everything. You can answer questions about your artwork, hobbies, or anything else that comes to mind.
7. Tools/Art Supplies review
Introducing the art supplies or tools you use can be valuable for artists looking to purchase new materials. Showing how you work with different mediums and tools can influence people in deciding what might work best for them.
8. Documenting exhibitions or events you are participating in
Attending gallery openings and exhibitions is a regular occurrence for many artists, so why not film it and turn it into a video? Doing so gives viewers a virtual experience of what it's like being at one of these events while indulging them with the inside story of the featured art collection.
9. Artist talks/interviews
Get insights from other artists about their creative processes and inspirations. You could talk about how they got started in the industry. If two people are working together (like a collaborative piece), interview each other, and discuss how they combine efforts for the project.
Video creation tips for effective marketing content
1. Choose a topic relevant to your artwork and create content that adds value to your target audience.
2. Make videos that are short and sweet. The attention span of internet users is shorter than ever, so you want to capture their attention within the first few seconds.
3. Include interesting visuals. Don't just rely on talking head videos. Display your artwork, studio, tools, etc., to keep viewers engaged.
4. Include a CTA (call to action). Ask your viewers to do something after watching your video. It can be anything from visiting your website or social media page, subscribing to your channel, or leaving a comment.
5. Be yourself! The way to connect with viewers is to be genuine and authentic in your content. Let them see the real you, and they'll be more likely to stick around for more.
6. Make sure your videos are high quality. It means editing your footage to get smooth and free of glitch videos.
7. Use keywords in your description box when uploading videos to YouTube so that they'll have a better chance of being found by the search engines and people who are looking for content related to those topics.
How to share your videos online?
Once you've made your video, it's time to share it with the world! Here are some tips for promoting your art through social media and other platforms:
1. Facebook
There are a few methods to share your videos on Facebook. You can post a link to the video on your timeline, post it as a status update, or share it in a group or page.
2. Twitter
You can post a link to the video, embed it in a tweet, or post a video tweet. Use relevant hashtags so that your video will show up in searches.
3. YouTube
Uploading your videos on YouTube can get more views since it's the second-largest search engine in the world. Plus, including links to your videos in blog posts and other online content contributes to driving traffic your way.
4. Instagram
To share a video on Instagram, you can post a link to the video, embed the video in a post, or post the video as a story. You can also use relevant hashtags to help people find your videos.
In conclusion, you can use video marketing to share what you're selling online and encourage individuals to appreciate your art (and ultimately buy them). An artwork is an end-product of hard work and talent; thus, it deserves a formidable marketing strategy. And video marketing can be your passage to growth in sales over time instead of just getting some one-time customers.
Roxanne Panibio is a PR Outreach Specialist at VEED.IO. She's an avid reader, mostly found with a book in her hand. When not reading, she enjoys watching crime mystery movies to satisfy her inner detective.
Every day we get inquiries from artists asking us how they can get their art noticed. If you are like most artists, there doesn't seem to be enough time to create, promote, market and sell your art. We, at Light Space & Time, believe that there are some relatively easy ways for artists to promote their work on a daily basis. Here are some ideas and tips that should make promotion easier and more effective for any busy artist:
Nothing to post? Find an interesting art related article and post that. See who comments and shares. Connect with them and their followers. The artist who does this every day will build a network of followers and get their art noticed quickly.
