Promoting Your Artwork Online, Courtesy of ArticlesFactory

Good 'ole Dog by Leuckit

Reprinted with Permission from ArticlesFactory

Promoting Your Artwork Online

Marketing Articles | March 28, 2005

You are a budding artist but if you don’t promote your artwork, you would probably have a hard time selling. Internet is one of the easiest and cost effective ways of promoting art. This article shows you how.

Web site:

Have a web site of your own. You can put up photographs of your art work, be it sculpture, painting etc, provide a short write up about yourself and your contact information. Hosting the website and promoting it can take some effort, which is where professional art web sites make it easier for you.
These web sites display your art work for a small fee (some even do it for free). Art dealers, private collectors and galleries regularly visit these sites looking for good quality art work. One such site is
EyeoftheArt.com

Art communities and forums:

Become a member of art communities and forums. They provide numerous resources for artists and bring artists and buyers together. Besides, it gives you a platform to make friends with fellow artists.

Email promotion:

Do not miss any chance to collect the emails of prospective buyers. Any time a prospect mails you showing interest in your art work, make sure to add him/her to your address book. Also, collect email addresses while displaying your work at the various shows. Once you have a sizeable email database, all it takes to announce the sale of your new paintings, upcoming shows etc is just a simple email !!!

Search Engines:

Getting listed in the search engines enormously increases your web presence. For example, you can submit your web site at yahoo under the “Arts” category at http://dir.yahoo.com.**

Spend a little time (atleast 15-20 minutes) everyday promoting yourself and your work. If you do it regularly, you will notice that it’ll become effortless and be very effective.

Source: Free Articles from ArticlesFactory.com **Submit to Yahoo for Free HERE.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Chiruvan has been writing articles on ways of promoting various business online.

Etsy Users Should Be Using HandmadeTop10's FREE Exposure!

Have you tried this site---> HandmadeTopTen? It's almost like an "ETSY VOTER" site, I love it, it's addicting and fun to play with.

It's free exposure for your Etsy items!

What's more, if "a list is open" you can add up to 2 items in your own shop to the list for free! Others looking on vote on your items  and during the voting process people get to SEE your item driving more exposure and hearts to your shop.

There's every possible catergory you can think of, from supplies, wedding, soaps, team lists, vintage, and pet accessories only to name a few. I love it!  I have to say I've been secretly checking it every chance I get, and added a few bags from LizzieCaye to the handbag list.  Anyone out there sell purses? Add yours now!
 
Here's the latest supply list, you can view the list by clicking here and please vote for my glove molds !!!! Here is what the list looks like! 




And just who brings us this great site? None other than Timothy Adams of Handmadeology.

Project Wonderful : Anything to Raise Team Funds

Perhaps some of you have noticed some of the ads from sponsors on the sidebar that are always changing. Today, there may be no ads, tomorrow some, then poof gone again. The ever changing ad boxes are the works of Project Wonderful.  I am honestly tired of trying to sell direct advertising for our blog, when we have so much else to do and I'm sure you know time is limited!   So, I handed the ads off to Project Wonderful for the time being.

At first they were free, so a lot of people tried them out. I have now put a cost associated with them, some from 3 cents per day to 10 cents per day.

I am not sure if any of you use this service, but I have actually a few ads out there myself though it.  It's cheap advertising, but if you do your homework sometimes you can find a niche site that works for you.  Ultimately if you sell handmade , advertising on a site like Handmadeology for $50 for 3 months will get you a lot of views.  If you don't have $50, you may wish to try a smaller niche site for say, $5 and see what happens.

Get your Ads in Gear with Human Body in Motion by sevilyadesign

I want to reiterate that things aren't going to fly out of your shop, (I'm on Design Sponge and I'm not selling out) so.....this is for people who want to put $10 or $20 into an advertising account and test the waters. Find a niche.  For just ten cents a day, $20 may last you some time! What's nice is you have reports --if you research and read them you can find something that works for you.  You can search for blogs  (both business and personal) that fit your keywords.  Some blogs have a lot of page views, others are growing .....A crochet seller may have very good luck advertising on a yarn site and get advertising results for less , than if they were to advertise lost in a sea of ads on a larger much more read big-boy site.  You really have to do your homework and search by keywords. The best part is you can cancel it at any time and you are not committed.

You can really do research for free before committing to Project Wonderful.

It took me awhile to find the right place to advertise my vintage shop via Project Wonderful.  I found some places really cheap just weren't a good fit for my vintage shop.  One vintage site wanted $11.13 a day to advertise, I must say they were a widely read blog but if an ad is going to cost me that much I'll go to Design Sponge!   I found a spot that worked for me, but over time my click though rate cost me about 60 cents a click so I dropped it. Now I'm on a site that costs me about .18 cents when they visit my shop.  What that means is , a vintage reader who loves vintage is costing me less than a quarter to visit my site.  Would YOU pay a quarter to get a new customers in your niche to visit your Etsy shop and look around?  The best part is you can set a spending limit like "Drop me when I used up $5".

You can easily get lost in the WWW full of advertising. This pendant by Girl Geek Boutique!

Project Wonderful is a bid system.  You bid the most you will spend per day on any given ad. I "park" my bid and leave it up. Today, I may be the winner and featured for a few days for .10, but Wednesday comes and someone bids .12 and knocks me out.  They then leave on Saturday advertising elsewhere and I'm back in because no one is bidding against me.  So, it takes me a heck of a long time to blow though $20.

Ironically what you can't see is the fact it targets four country zones. People reading this from Canada may see ABC Calendar's shop wherein someone in the states may be seeing XYZ Supplies.  It is based on target audience. 

Project Wonderful makes their money when you deposit funds from your paypal in there, taking small service fees.   A lot of people say to me, "I have not had any luck using Project Wonderful."  I say to them, did you do your homework and really read the reports, and if not, how do you really know?  Someone who clicks though today may come back and buy tomorrow.

Advertising can be confusing.

I'm putting together more compiled results in Advertising in the future, but for now I thought I'd tell you that I'm letting Project Wonderful handle our blog advertising from now on.   We may not get rich quick off selling these ads, but over time we should have some money deposited into the team shop funds.

So please support and visit our sponsors!  They will be constantly changing :)

Follow Etsy Recyclers On Twitter use #Wastenot So We Can Find You!

CALLING ALL TWEETERS!

 Please "Follow Us" on Twitter, our Twitter Team Name is EtsyRecyclersGT .  We use the tag  #wastenot in some of our posts --if you list any items from your shop we encourage you to use that tag as well. That way Heather and I (slowly learning the tweet ropes) can retweet your posts when we see the tag. 

What are we tweeting?  Blog articles, Treasuries that may feature your items, some products from some of our team member's shops, retweets of the #wastenot tag, articles that may be helpful, and Etsy-related things you may like!

Why ?  Etsy makes it easier than ever to tweet items from your shops now, it's free and fun, so why not do it? There is a share button on the side of every treasury, and every single item in your store. We'd be crazy not to gain exposure for our team.

Special thanks to Heather for kicking my butt in gear on this.  Perhaps an old blog dog can learn new tricks...

Official Etsy Recyclers Guild Widget from Widgetbox

Not sure if I ever told you this, but I did create a widget some time ago at Widgetbox that allows you to embed (in any size, or color you choose) a small window showcasing the Etsy Recyclers Guild posts. Share the team posts on your blog with this cute and colorful widget! Here's an example of what it looks like :



When you visit Widgetbox you can get this for your blog or website for free. All you need to do is select what color and style you want then "Get embed code."

The code is a "script code" so if you are using Blogger, you'd install as an HTML/JAVA SCRIPT Gadget.

Selling Tip:  You can even make one for your shop, just like the "Pocketshop" widget.

What are you waiting for? Get yours free today!

Her Two Cents : A Talk With Cindy Caraway of CarawayCache on Etsy About Social Networking and Running Multiple Shops

Cindy Caraway is an award-winning artist, who has three shops on Etsy right now.  This is called "Tea Rose Garden Party" incorporating several techniques.

As you all know, I'm pretty active in social networking. For the winter I spend a lot of time promoting my products, writing articles, blog posts, tweeting this and Facebooking that, and I've often wondered if it would be easier just to spend that time in my Etsy shops.  My one shop is neglected, and I often wondered about the pros and cons of keeping more than one. So I asked a fellow Etsian, Cindy Caraway, her thoughts on the subject, for she is a pro with three shops on Etsy!

Cindy's main shop is her vintage shop on Etsy, CarawayCache , has been open since June 2008. It has over 1000 sales. A year later she debuted her handmade jewelry shop (CindyCaraway) is on her way to 30 sales, and this contains some of her award-winning designs and jewelry creations. She is a Beadweaver who uses several techniques in her work and incorporates upcycled or repurposed items in her designs.   Add on Cindy's Garage Sale, which offers low price great destash finds that just opened in September of 2010, and she's almost at 50 sales. .She also has a destash shop, that she is unsure if it will remain.

Cindy titles her jewelry shop by her name, proud of her creations such as this Chameleon Necklace, $650.00

THE CINDY CARAWAY INTERVIEW

: Many of us are struggling with one shop much less two or three!  Do you really think this is worthwhile and if so, how do you manage?

:My first wish is that we could have a personal hub from which we could run multiple shops - where I could just sign in and access everything from one page. Blogger works that way - you can run several blogs from a central account. That would make it SOOOO much nicer. As it is, I have gotten used to jumping from one shop to the next and have a decidedly imperfect system of dealing with the 3 storefronts. I have a vintage shop and then a shop for my handcrafted jewelry and beadwork. The third is destash shop which has only been open for a short time - I haven't decided if it will stay or not.

As of now, her 3rd shop is still open and has great bargains!

: Do you think that you need multiple shops because there's just not enough categories to do it all out of one? 


:The problem of categories could be slightly alleviated if they would let us have sub-categories*** I probably wouldn't need separate shops for my jewelry and vintage if there were the possibility of sub-categories. I do agree that MORE categories would be a nice option but I find my biggest need is for sub-categories.

SOAR Necklace by Cindy Caraway, $30, here!

For instance, in my jewelry shop I struggle with how to organize the categories (by color, type, size of piece, theme, ???) as I want to help people find what they want easily. It's hard because you have to pick just one. So, it would be nice if under "Necklaces" we could sub-categorize by color, or type, or material. I realize the tags should take care of that but...


***(It should be noted I talked to Cindy in December, and Etsy has initiated "sub categories" to help with the listing process, but not with the sections/materials like we are talking about...)  

Pushing Luck Bead Statement Necklace, has so much work and is lovely. See it here.

: I have a hard time when an item fits into two top categories, like an item that is vintage yet it is a supply item.... : I used to sell vintage on eBay (and I am NOT a current fan of that site by any means but I did make a nice living there for several years) and liked that I had the option of listing in two categories if I really wanted to. The extra charge was worth it if it helped the item to sell. On some items, I would be happy to pay an extra 20 cents to list in more categories. Cheer Up Cards by CarawayCache, $5 : I know you have a blog, and I'm wondering if social networking has helped grow your stores? :  I have often wondered about the effectiveness but nothing beyond that. I am an inactive Facebook and Twitter member. I link my blog posts automatically to them and don't visit very often. When I do it is simply to respond to friend requests and the like. I can't honestly say that I have made any sales from Facebook or Twitter. I also don't think my blog has brought traffic to my shops or sales but I enjoy the community aspect of blogging and find it worthwhile on a personal level. I also think it's important to have a web presence of some sort. The first thing anyone does when trying to find someone or something is do a Google search. My personal opinion: if you aren't online, you pretty much don't exist. Cindy is an award winning artist! : Thanks for the honesty Cindy! What else do you want people to know about you?   :  I am an artist, musician, actress, mighty fisherwoman, purveyor of vintage goodies and collector of cool stuff from Dubuque, Iowa!  As an award-winning bead artist whose jewelry has been featured in juried shows and galleries across the US, I specialize in bead embroidery and also enjoy bead weaving. As a musician, I perform as one half of an acoustic duo with my guitarist husband. We enjoy playing at wedding ceremonies, private parties, coffee shops, wineries and art galleries. As an actress, I am usually busy learning lines for my next appearance in a community theater production. As a mighty fisherwoman, I spend many hours out on the Mississippi River sacrificing worms to the fish gods in hopes of snagging the "big one"! As a purveyor of vintage goodies, I drive my husband crazy with my inability to part with anything beautiful, handmade, or which might be useful for something someday. You never know what you will find in Cindy's Garage Sale!  This whole lot is only $1.99 plus shipping! : Catch up with Cindy here:

CarawayCache Vintage Shop on Etsy
Cindy Caraway Jewelry Designs on Etsy
Cindy's Garage Sale Destash Shop on Etsy

Cindy's Website
Cindy's Artful Living Blog

The Etsy Treasury , Tips for Making it To the Front Page...Selling, Exposure for Shops

From our very own  Leuckit, Fill me with love.....

 We've been talking a lot about the *free* Etsy Treasury tool lately.  Our team requires one per month, and I know plenty of you do them more than that. *BIG THANK YOU*  If we have 200 members, making 200 treasuries a month, featuring 16 items per month, the chances of your shop being in it is pretty great--do the math. *If you have three shops you can simply make your quota of 3 treasuries out of one store if you wish.*

Cornerstop offers these cute I love Etsy Tags!

PROOF IN THE PUDDING:
Here is proof of what a Treasury can do for a team.  This one, posted by the Vesties, hit THE FRONT PAGE of Etsy and almost all the items have sold.  That is amazing. That's what WE NEED.  The Vesties have found a way to make it to the front page several times recently.  

They are reading the Storque, and articles such as THIS ONE FROM MERCHANDISING DESK talk about what Etsy is looking for for the given month.

If you make it to the front page, your item will get lots of close-up views. This bow by JenLucasDesigns.

Once a treasury I was in hit the front page, and that day I had over 700 views to my shop and sold a crapload of items later that week. Some of those customers still shop with me now.  I find that even if people don't buy right away, they may add you as a favorite shop and come back again and again. You can find out if your item ever made it to the front page  by using this cute Craft Cult tool here. It's all about the FRONT PAGE!

To get our team to the front page here's what we need:
a) Good pictures only!
b) A Title or Target from this STORQUE ARTICLE,
c) Lack of yourself or any of your shops in the article.
d) Helpful Hints by Heather HERE
e) Use this Whale Shark Tool to put it in your website or blog.

  Even if we don't make it to the front page, a treasury is a FREE TOOL FOR:

a) Bringing exposure to the items featured.
b) Allowing you to show off your curating skills to Facebook, Twitter, and share to other places
c) Helping your Team Members get item views, hearts, and perhaps some new lookers!

Hey, stop reading and start treasury making...
Enjoy this one in the meantime by one of our lovely Team Leaders aka Forums Diva:

'Hearts on Fire- A Valentine Treasury for Etsy Recyclers Guild' by Retreauxgirl

Just a little love................

Art Sculpture Robot Valentin... leuckit $110.00	Cherry Red Beaded Knit Top H... TranzendentalA... $65.00	Hoot NobleUpcycling $25.00
Dragon Heart Necklace - Recy... islandgirlzjew... $9.95	Red Gray Black Dress Off Sho... Brokenghostcou... $64.00	Red Sweatshirt Fingerless Gl... ohzie $10.00
Eco Passport Cover with Red ... wrapcycle $16.00	Shabby Chic Shelf Red prettydarncute $24.00	Super cute Valentine Gingham... mattiereidchic... $15.00
Be My Upcycled Valentine SerendipiT $5.00	Upcycled Crazy Love Valentin... rekindleme $15.00	12 Upcycled Hearts Playing C... PaperPicker $5.00
Flower Power Button Brooch P... RetroChaletStu... $22.00	Vinyl Record Bowl- The Harts... thesmurtis $7.00	Valentine Fairy Mushroom Gar... WanderingLydia $30.00

Treasury tool is sponsored by Lazzia.com A/B image testing.