Archive for the ‘Blogging’ Category

Throw A Blog in With That

Tuesday, January 25th, 2011

When you think of an artist website you generally think about a site that showcases an artist’s work, a portfolio site if you will.  With the exponential growth of blogging, many artists are now supplementing their portfolio site with a blog.  Blogging allows artists to share their art and life with the world in a very different way, one that lets people get to know the artist behind the art.  Portfolio sites and blogs are both websites, they just have a different purpose and function.  Portfolio sites tend to be like an online brochure, whereas blogs are more like a diary that allows artists to communicate with their audience. 

If you already have a website you may be thinking about adding a blog.   Artists who wanted to start blogging are faced with a question:  Where do I set up my blog?  There are 3 options:  

  1. Set up a separate blog elsewhere
  2. Integrate a blog into your current website
  3. Build a new website based on a blogging platform

Let’s look at these options.

1. Set up a separate blog elsewhere. 

This is the easiest solution.   There are lots of places you can go to set up a blog.  You can even blog for free if you are willing to live with the design and usage limitations.  The main drawback with this approach is that the blog is not integrated with your portfolio website in form or function.    It has an entirely different look and feel and the format and navigation are completely different.  It leaves visitors with the feeling they are “somewhere else” when they are reading your blog.  Also there is no guarantee that someone who lands on your blog will take a link to your website.

Hosted services are available from TypePad,  Blogger, and LiveJournal.  Duane Keiser is an example:  Website,  Blog

2. Integrate a blog into your current website.

Adding a blogging function to your portfolio website addresses the problem described above.  Visitors could see a consistent design in terms of headers, navigation, colours, etc.  In this case, your blog would appear as a menu item on your website, and when you click on it, the blog looks like it belongs on this website.  Your portfolio header and navigation bar carry through to the blog page. While it  is technically possible to integrate a blog into an existing portfolio site,  these types of projects can be a challenge because of the coding, style and format of the existing website.  This means that most artists would be dependent on someone else to make those changes and the cost of making them could be prohibitive.

An example of an integrated blog is Marilyn Fenns’ website.

3. Build a new website based on a blogging platform.

A blogging platform is a software solution that allows people to easily create and maintain a blog.  Blogging software is getting better all the time.  You can now create a blog that looks like a portfolio site, yet provides the flexibility to also blog.    It all hangs together as one cohesive site.  On some artists’ websites you would be hard-pressed to tell that it was created using blogging software.  Platforms you could consider for a self-hosted blog include Movable Type,  WordPress, and Textpattern.

Becky Joy’s website and blog is build on WordPress.   Says Becky, “I had a website with another company. I quit that and went with WordPress. It gives me more options in my website and blog. I think it is better to have the blog integrated with the website.  Ultimately, I want people at the website.”

 

Tags: ,
Posted in Artist Websites, Blogging | No Comments »

It’s New and Free!

Wednesday, November 10th, 2010

It’s been said that the words “new” and “free” are the most powerful words in advertising.  And there they are together in the title of this article.  Admit it, you were a little hooked by the title weren’t you?  People love to get things for free.  When someone offers something for free many people are moved to action.  They like to get somethin’  for nuttin’.  That could work to your advantage when you are trying to promote your art.

For example,  artist Janet Nelson has a blog called A Planet Named Janet.  She grows blog followers  by regularly offering a draw for free original art. She has been giving away her art since the spring of 2009.  She offers a couple 5 x 7 acrylic paintings at a time.  Rules are simple. Visitors leave a separate comment for each painting they would like to win and they can enter as often as they like within a 2 week period.  Janet numbers the comments and uses a random number generator and pick the winners.  Janet even ships for free. She  considered giving away a variety of artwork in stock just to reduce inventory.  Instead she chose to encourage collecting by offering similar paintings as part of a series.   The series features a pair of items (2 peaches, 2 birds etc) painted on 5 x 7 backer boards. Winners also receive a blank notecard of the same image which she hopes will be sent to someone else.

As a result of the give-aways, her blog followers have doubled.  In addition, some winners have blogged about it. To produce that result she discovered that it was necessary to promote the giveaway, which she did on Facebook, Twitter and Etsy.  Unlike some other Etsy giveways, she made entry simple: just leave a comment.  Some artists require entrants to become followers to enter.

Janet also has a weekly give-away at a gallery where she is represented.  This has resulted in “a large fishbowl of entrants” whose e-mail address will be a valuable asset for marketing.

Other artists who have achieved a high level of exposure also use giveaways. Over 1800 people have joined the Facebook group, d’art Lottery for a weekly chance to win a piece of art by Val’s Art Diary.

I, myself  tried a little experiment on this blog last month.  I offered a chance for a  free  website analysis with every comment posted during October.   I was curious to see if the offer would encourage people to make more comments.  It did.  The average  number of comments per article jumped from 1 to 9.  Significant.  That does not include people who commented by e-mail.  Adding in those comments,  the comments per article jumped from 1 to 16!  The other interesting thing that happened was  a conversation among artists began.  I like that.  I see this blog as a place where artists can share their experiences and ideas about marketing online.  I encourage you to engage in the converations.

And the winner of the free website analysis is………. Ron Vickers!

Posted in Blogging, Increasing Traffic, Success Stories, Uncategorized, Your Art Offerings | 1 Comment »

Tar Artist Corrals Old West Historians

Tuesday, September 14th, 2010
 

When artist Neil Klassen first created his website  in May, 2009 there was little traffic.  He had worked hard to get  his website ready for some shows, including his Outlaws show at the Board of Directors in Toronto.  Initially, his site received 5 to 7 hits per day.  By advertising his site on promotional literature and cross-promotion with the Queen Street Art Crawl, his traffic increased to 40-50 hits/day.  As he contemplated what steps he could take to increase traffic even further,  his strategy was driven by the nature of his work.

 
Neil’s media is tar, an oil bi-product, and his work shows “the stern faces of the Old West, drawing comparisons between these rebels and the Big Oil culture we experience globally”.  He began reading blogs that focused on the old west and posting comments which included links back to his website.  In one case the author of a blog called Western Americana: History of the American West wrote a feature article about Neil and his art and for about a month the traffic to Neil’s site soared to 200-300 hits/day.  More significantly he made 2 sales to people who had discovered his site this way. 
 
Neil notes that you can reap more traffic by posting comments on blogs that have a strong readership, although it may not be possible to find out how many readers they have.  This is the case with Western Americana: History of the American West but anyone can see they have a pagerank of 3/10,  meaning it is a site of substance to Google.   Neil’s tracking system allows him to see where in the world his visitors are coming from.  Interestingly, the article drove traffic from Europe and Australia to his site, not just from the US.
 
Neil says, “Prior to the Internet it would be difficult and time-consuming to get this kind of press coverage.  By commenting on other blogs you can make your presence known quickly and easily.  Sometimes nothing will come of it but other times you will strike oil.  We are in a very competitive market and artists should be ambitious about getting onto blogs.”
 
So where should you start?   Well, first learn how to search for blogs that relate to a subject.  You can search for blogs on Google as you would  search for images or maps.  Using the Advanced Blog Search you can look for blogs that have specific words in the blog title.   So for example, if you like to paint scenes of Algonquin Park  you would discover that  Algonquin Outfitters  has a blog just waiting for your blog comments.   Maybe you could refer to your waterlily paintings on the water-garden-blog or your wonderful portrait of a clown on Evolution: Faces, a blog advisory for clowns.  I think you get the picture.
 
If you have had some similar experiences in generating traffic to your website by posting comments on blogs, please share them with our community of artists by posting a comment here. Just click on the title of this posting and scroll down. 
 
 
 

Posted in Artist Websites, Blogging, Increasing Traffic, Success Stories | 2 Comments »

Gallery Show About Art and Social Media

Monday, July 19th, 2010

It is refreshing to see galleries who “get it” when it comes to the Internet.  The Diane Farris Gallery in Vancouver is one of those galleries. This spring they presented a month-long show, Twitter/Art+Social Media,  “a juried exhibition of work by artists using social media for inspiration, production and presentation of their work.”  The concept for the exhibit evolved from an idea by Mia Johnson, who completed a PhD on the emergence of the Internet as a vehicle for artists.  The show consisted of over 80 works from 43 unrepresented artists.  All works were priced under $1000.  The gallery also hosted a panel discussion titled How Is Social Media Changing the Practice of Visual Artists?

The call for entries was posted on “The Alliance for Arts and Culture” website, an artists resource in British Columbia.   The content of the show was  influenced by digital media in many ways.   In some cases the works themselves were influenced by content on the Internet. One artist sketched police photos of criminals who used the Internet to perpetrate crimes. Another artist who tells stories with her work, used blogging, email and Facebook as a way to collect stories.  A photograph hung beside an oil painting based on the photo, stirred the debate about copyright protection online. Other artists use social media as a way to conduct business by submitting work to designers, blogging and maintaining a social media presence.  Curator Lili Vieira de Carvalho sees social networking as a platform for collaboration and support among artists and as a way to organize shows.

Many of the artists promoted their participation in the show through their blogs or other social media in advance of the show, thus tapping into the social networks of many artists to promote the show. The Gallery also has a blog and they updated their blog throughout the show.  There are 7 pages of content about the show on the blog with details about how the artists’ life is changing because of social media.

Broken Window by Kristofir Dean
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           

I spoke with artist Kristofir Dean  about his participation in the show.  He began blogging about the show about one week in advance. “The show was so eclectic, which was very much reflective of the artists who use social media to promote their work and talk about art that they like.  In that respect, the show was an accurate reflection of that diversity. Participating in this show on social media was a great opportunity that I came across unexpectedly.  I like how an emphasis on social media moved the materiality of visual arts into a more electronic realm.  For example, blogs can show imagery of art without using paper; invitations for the show were exclusively sent in electronic format; and there is a whole dimension out there in which artists are creating new dialogues about art with people who they would not have met other than via the Internet.  That’s pretty incredible!   I think in the end, like-minded artists connect in new ways that have never been experienced before through social media.”

Read more about the show at here.

Tags: , ,
Posted in Art as a Business, Blogging, Marketing Communications, Social Networking | No Comments »

Barbara Muir’s Art Goes Global With Skype

Monday, June 28th, 2010

Barbara Muir is a Toronto portrait artist. When her son moved to Korea she naturally wanted to stay in touch, so she installed Skype, a software tool that allows people to have free voice and video calls over the Internet.  Little did she realize that that decision would ultimately lead to an appearance on the Oprah Winfrey show, where 20 million people watched as she sketched Oprah.

How did that happen?  Well,  Barbara began by sketching her son while they were talking on a video call.  Soon some of her friends found out that she was on Skype and they began to communicate that way.  Barbara did sketches of them too and posted the sketches on her daily blog.  Sometimes she would paint  full portraits from the sketches and Skype screen shots.  Her Skype sketching caught the attention of freelance journalist Howard Wolinsky, who interviewed her on Skype and posted the video interviews on YouTube (Part 1, Part 2). This led to an invitation to sketch guests at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nevada, and finally to her being invited to sketch Oprah on her show.

Above: Barbara Muir during a Skype conversation with blogger Howard Wolinsky

Click here to see the sketch she did of Oprah on her show and her account of the experience.

“Oprah Winfrey”
Skype Sketch
willow charcoal on Canson Mi-Teintes paper
11 1/2 x 13 3/4 inches

To be clear, Barbara didn’t start Skype sketching as a marketing initiative. She explains, “I was found. I blog, I look for something to draw, and that’s how it happened.  The Oprah team liked my work.  The slideshow paintings on my blog showed them that I was a pro portrait painter, and could do the drawing of Oprah in the 45 minute live taping of the show.”

She began to experiment with a technology, one thing led to another, and very quickly she established a global presence.  She has been interviewed on City TV and written up in the Globe and Mail.  Her portraits appeared on HGTV’s Pure Design, on City TV’s Breakfast Television, and on Real Life CTS TV.  She presented her paintings at the Florence Biennale last December and showed her work at the Amsterdam Whitney Gallery in NYC last month.

The genesis of this fascinating story is that this artist was willing to learn how to use an Internet technology that was new to her.  That led to an intersection of art and technology which was novel, and novel things can go viral on the Internet, fortunately for Barbara. She now attributes her Skype exposure to the constant demand she enjoys both for Skype and more traditional portraits.

Related Stories

Other artists now see Skype portraits as a way to further their business.  In 4-6 hours,  Ian Bruce in London, England will paint a portrait from life, of a sitter posing anywhere in the world.   Ed Marion  lives in rural New York state, but that presents no geographical limitation to connect with his portrait customers who could live anywhere.  He charges $400  which includes up to four one-hour online sessions.  To see how a Skype portrait would work,  here is a 1 hour video of artist Susan Carlin, in Texas, painting an oil portrait of  Barbara Muir, in Toronto.

Posted in Blogging, Success Stories, Your Art Offerings | 1 Comment »

Blogging for Artists

Tuesday, June 1st, 2010

Many artists who have already created a website are asking themselves what step they should take next to marketing their work online.  Many are choosing to start a blog.  The reason artists are attracted to blogging is because it gives them a different way to communicate with their audience and a way to provide the reader with an insight into their world. This is an important part of marketing because many purchasers buy because they have a connection to the artist, and blogging is well-suited to developing this connection.

The typical portfolio website is a one-way street.  It provides information about the artist and shows some of their best work.  On the other hand, a blog allows visitors to comment on the posts and artwork, in a conversational way.  There is a 2-way interaction between the artist and the visitor. 

Most blogs have the capability for visitors to become ”followers” of your blog, either publically or privately.  You will be able to see those people that have a public subscription, and interact with them.  This is quite an advantage compared to visitors to your portfolio site that remain anonymous.

A blog contains a series of communications on a particular subject, organized chronologically.  For artists, this often involves showcasing recently completed works or works in progress.  But you can also blog about the things that inspire you, how you develop your works, what it’s like in your studio, what you are interested in, what you are learning, what you are working on, your materials and so on.  We are not so interested, however, in what you had for breakfast!

Blogging is an opportunity to let you hair down and reveal more about who you are.  It is a less formal environment. You can write like you are talking to a friend.   Tonya Vollertsen  has been blogging for 4 years.  Her blog is subtitled, “Photos of my paintings and entries on my working processes, progressions and sometimes the lack thereof.”  When you scroll through her blog you get a sense of her as a real person. Perhaps that is why it is not uncommon for a dozen or more people to comment on every post she makes. 

Unlike a static website, a blog requires a commitment to make regular posts.  If you are painting regularly, you will have no problem keeping your blog active with current and interesting content.  It’s free, fast and easy to start a blog.  If you are not blogging already, you should consider it.

Posted in Blogging | 2 Comments »