What should an artist do in the Internet era?
The Internet makes life easier, no doubt. Social networks provide you with ample opportunities not only to show your art to the world, but to find a buyer for your work, to give the opportunity to sell pictures on the Internet. But first you have to work a little on the use of the new opportunities.
It is very important to competently create an attractive page and online profile. Your profile is your face on the Internet. The information contained in it should be fairly complete, current, regularly updated. Visitors to a profile or page without a long search should be clear what you do and what you offer. Regardless of where and how people learn about you and your art – in the virtual or in the real world, the first thing they will do to find out more about you is to surf the Internet and social networks in search of your profile.
Do not forget to regularly make posts, let your readers expect new posts from you and read them with interest.
When your page is already created, it is regularly filled and updated, do not wait quickly for hundreds of thousands of likes, but you can expect that with the right approach to business you will certainly be noticed.
There are many nuances that are important to consider. It seems that all these little things of online life are like likes, commenting on posts, but they cannot be neglected, this will definitely increase the number of your friends and subscribers. If your page, site, blog are not filled, with outdated information, confusing navigation, then of course there will not be much success from all this activity. Make work with your materials comfortable. Images of your work, if you expect to sell the picture, must be of good quality, and accompanied by a clear and concise accompanying explanation. The more comfortable and professional everything is done, the more favorable impression you will make on visitors, and the more views you will receive.
Learn how to put hashtags. Post it work – mark it with hashtags with the words-characteristics. So your work will quickly find those who are looking for something purposefully. In Instagram, for example, there is an option that shows the number of posts that are similar to the hashtag you set.
Such a nuance is important: in no case should the reader of your page have the impression that you are here in the role of a merchant with your goods and only want to sell pictures wholesale and retail. In this case, your posts will stop responding. People feel fine when their precious attention is distracted by advertising posts, and they lose interest to such friends. In the online profile on the social network, you are first and foremost an individual, with your interests, tastes, and views. Yes, you sell at the same time their work – but this is by the way. Therefore, in the profile, express your thoughts, share your views on various issues that concern you and cause your interest in offline life – about politics, about the weather, about music. The main thing is for friends and subscribers to see that you are a living, ordinary, normal person, and communicate with ordinary, living people, and not customers with wallets in their hands. After all, you are not here solely for the sake of advertising and earnings.
Very cool if you feed interest in your creativity, sometimes posting your photos in the process of working on your new work / project. You can also sometimes upload your old work not only to albums, but also to your own updates.
It is important to “keep a hand on the pulse of life”: you can, for example, in a manner inherent in a creative person, respond to current events “in the country and the world” with art in the light of these events.
Check the statistics of visits to your page, the number of likes, reposts and adding subscribers: the more there are, the more known you will be.
Do not be afraid to join thematic communities in social networks, be active in them. Communities of art lovers attract more readers than individual pages of artists. The synergy effect works there, because you will unite efforts with colleagues, and you will get more chances to sell the paintings: it is easier for a potential buyer to find a community or group on a social network than to seek out the pages of individual artists. Be active in them, comment on posts and post your posts in them. Pay attention to the literacy of your messages and filling your page.
Do not neglect the opportunity to create your website, where your creativity will be presented in more detail and brighter than in the social network. It’s great when there is a link to it in your profile in social networks. Ideally, the site has an English version.
Give an opportunity to visitors of your profile, page, site, it is easy to contact you, provide your contact information. Get ready to chat and chat online, and always be ready to talk about yourself and your work.
And of course, do not forget the main thing that the artist needs is to be himself, to make your work recognizable and original, to look for your unique language and style.
How to sell paintings on the Internet.