As an artist it can sometimes seem like a difficult task to market yourself and your art, but you simply need to think of your art as a small business. That means marketing it the same way you would market any other small business. You need to be online, but you also need to be marketing offline as well.
Online marketing allows you to reach out to the entire world wide web, while advertising locally may still get you some of your best customers, and can even help you get your art into local businesses where many people will see it as well. Remember, even though billions of people are online, there are still people that aren’t.
Marketing Your Art Online
Small businesses need to be online, no matter what kind of business they are, including you selling your art. You should have a website/portfolio set up to start off with. It needs to have a page about you, how you got started, what type of work you do, and anything else you want people to know about you.
You need to have pages for your different types of art. You need to have high resolution
photos of your work, with great lighting so that people can really see the reality of your artwork. Also, make sure that you share links to your social media sites.
Use YouTube, like Park West Gallery did, to share your work with people. It’s a great place to create a gallery tour of your work, and even create how to videos to teach people your technique. You should also be on Facebook, Twitter, and you may even want to consider a business profile on LinkedIN.
Marketing Your Art Locally
Don’t just put your art online. There are great chances of making sales locally and creating some big local fans if you also promote your art in your own area. That starts with brochures and business cards that you can hand out to people and local businesses.
You also want to get your art into local shops, if you have any in or near your area that consign from local artists and crafters. If not, look beyond your own area.
Marketing Offline Beyond Local
You don’t just want to market yourself in your own home town. Take your art with you when you travel or head out of town. You never know when you might come across the perfect store to sell your art in.
Make sure you have business cards and brochures with you no matter where you go too. You never know when you’ll run into someone interested in art.
You’re an artist and you should want to share your creative endeavors with anyone you run into, so make sure that you can share by having proof of your art with you no matter where you go.
Originally posted on January 5, 2016 @ 12:40 am
