by Rebecca Sciullo | Oct 14, 2020 | Artist Blogging 101
You did it! You started or added a blog to your artist website. Congratulations!
Now, you may be asking yourself, “What do I post?”
What you post first depends a little bit on your situation. The truth is, first posts don’t matter that much. The good news about this is that not many people will see your blog at first. I advise artists not to share their blogs until they have ten to fifteen posts under their belts. Unless you already have a large email list or large online following, your traffic will probably be light. That’s okay! Take solace in this fact and don’t put too much pressure on yourself. The important part is to start.
Where to begin?
Are you an established artist with a devoted following, or are you new to marketing your work? This may alter your conversation a bit with your readers, but generally speaking, consider the following:
What is interesting to your audience?
If you are an established artist with a following, you will probably want to share new work. You might want to take the opportunity to share the process behind your work. Or, introduce outlets where people can find your work, if not purchasing from you direct.
If you are new to selling your work, you will want to start sharing work that best gives your visitors an idea of who you are as an artist – the work that is most representational of what you do.
If you are a teaching artist, looking to grow your following, you should consider the questions your students commonly ask you. What are the things they get stuck on? These will be great first topics for you.
Tell your story.
You can never go wrong providing the who, what, why, when, and where behind your art.
Who are you an artist?
What kind of work do you create?
Why do you create this work?
When did you get started, and how?
Where direction are you headed in with your work?
Just Start
The most important thing in this process is to start. Blogging is an evolving process. The more you write and post, the easier it becomes. As you grow and work with your plan, post ideas will become more evident.
For more help with your artist blog, sign up for my Create! Sell! Newsletter.
by Rebecca Sciullo | Sep 18, 2020 | Artist Blogging 101, Learning
Dilemma One: Who is My Target Audience?
Your artist blog should offer content that interests an audience that you can grow a relationship with over time. Because of this relationship, they will take action, such as enroll in a workshop or purchase your work.
When I present my Blogging for an Art Business program, a concern I hear from artists is that they aren’t sure of their audience. Who are they, and how to connect with them? Who are the people that will be interested in the artist’s work?
Have you identified a target audience for your artist blog? Who will benefit and be most interested in following you? In other words, who is the target market that you wish to attract with your blog? Before you start posting on your artist blog, you need to understand who your blog will be serving. Understanding who that audience is will help you to create content that keeps them visiting your site.
Why Can’t Your Artist Blog be for “Everyone”
First of all, if your goal is to sell something – such as a piece of art, a piece of jewelry, a commission, or a workshop – you have to accept a universal law of sales – if you are selling to everyone, you are selling to no one. If you are trying to target “everyone” with your content, you will likely interest no one. You need to understand who will be interested in your work and your message, and then fine-tune your site and message accordingly.
Once you have done this, it is much easier to determine which marketing channels you can use to best find and connect with them.
How to Identify Your Audience
Here are a few strategies to figure out your target audience.
Look at Your Existing Customers
If you’ve are already successful at selling work, one of the best ways to do this is to analyze who has purchased work from you in the past. Write a description of your typical client.
Do they come from a specific geographic area?
Do they have any common interests?
Who are the people that attracted to your work?
Are there topics and questions that they like to discuss with you?
The answers to these questions will give you insight into who your audience is and what kind of content they will want to hear from you. Once you’ve analyzed this group, take some time, and see if you can expand on the group. Are there any common denominators that will help you to grow the audience.
Identify a New Audience for Your Artwork
If you are new to selling your work, you may have to work a little harder to come up with your audience. There will likely be some trial and error involved in this process. Take time to develop one or more buyer personas. Hubspot offers a succinct explanation of buyer persona here.
If you haven’t started selling or found an audience, can you put yourself in someone else’s shoes? What would you want to know about your work? What would you like to hear about your work? Who do you think will be interested in this work? A buyer persona is simply working to build a profile of a potential customer, identifying the same qualities, and you would if they were an existing customer.
Does your subject matter appeal to an audience with a specific interest? I’ve explained in prior posts about how I started working with my father, artist Robert Yonke. In his case, the subject matter was an important detail that led us to a niche. Repeat this process to find an audience within any interest group.
Could an audience connect with the emotion behind your work?
If creating functional art, is there an audience that could utilize your work?
Figuring out your target audience is going to take some time to brainstorm. Then, there may be some trial and error involved as you work through this process. Stick with it, though, and you will eventually identify an audience that could have an interest in your work.
Should I wait until I’ve figured out my target audience to start blogging?
While it’s good to start thinking about this and have some idea about who you want to target, it’s unnecessary to have this in mind to build your blog based website. The first thing to do is tell your story and show your work, and you can do that with or without a target audience. You can start blogging before you’ve identified your target audience. Writing about your work may even help in the process of identifying them.
What’s Next?
Once you have identified that audience, your next step will be to figure out how to reach them. Stay tuned for the future post, Dilemma 2: How to Reach My Target Audience.
Would you like to be notified of future posts, events, and more? Please join my Create! Sell! Newsletter.
:Photo by Jonas Jacobsson on Unsplash
by Rebecca Sciullo | Sep 12, 2020 | Artist Blogging 101, Learning
When setting up an art marketing system using blogging, there are undeniably some technical components that you must include.
Did you know they are some less tangible but equally important elements that are critical to your success? I like to boil them down to three key ingredients you should strive to include in your blogging efforts.
Three Important Ingredients for Your Artist Blog
These three things impact how useful your artist blog will be in marketing your business.
Show up.
With a traditional artist website or even artist blogs, the prevailing thought is that all you have to do is create it, and it will bring you business. Many artists build websites with the expectation that people will either find you by you giving them the link in some form of marketing or through an internet search. The reality is that you need to offer people a compelling reason to visit your site, whether it is a traditional site or a blog. Now, a blog is going to entice them, even more, to view your work as the content is likely more exciting and dynamic. However, this is not all that you need. You need to show up with your blog in the places where your audience hangs out.
When I worked with my artist father, Robert Yonke, to develop inroads in the bluegrass music industry, I went out and found an interested audience and presented him to them. I didn’t wait for them to discover him. Showing up means you find and present yourself to an audience, rather than waiting for them to find you.
Make a connection.
The best way to connect with an audience is to find common ground. Strive to build relationships with people that have an interest in some level with your work. It could be that you’ve met them at a prior event. You may share a mutual hobby. They may be interested in learning more about something that you are doing.
Work to find an audience that naturally connects with your work. Use stories, thoughts, and images to grow the connection. Artist Cory Bonnet instantly makes a connection with people who have a love for his hometown of Pittsburgh, as he weaves his knowledge and love of the town’s heritage into his work.
Once you identify your connection with your audience, make sure that it shows up in your blogging.
Be authentic.
Your work is authentic to you because you have created it. Write and present yourself in an accurate manner on your blog. Post content that is true to your work and your vision. Write in an authentic voice. Rather than worrying about writing a literary masterpiece, write as if you have a one on one conversation with your reader. Your audience can sense whether you are authentic or not.
Read Mara Carlini’s Mara’s Mandalas Blog, and you instantly understand that each piece is unique and authentic.
Make sure that your blog has all three ingredients to give yourself the best chance of moving your business forward.
Would you like to create a dynamic blog for your art business in thirty days? Join my new program, 30 Days to a Dynamic Web Presence, starting October 1, 2020. We go into all three of these elements with specific actions that you can take to make sure your blog has them!
Photo by Calum Lewis on Unsplash
by Rebecca Sciullo | Jun 17, 2020 | Artist Blogging 101
In preparation for a new series of blog posts that will feature exceptional artist blogs, I’ve been reviewing many websites. One thing that I’ve noticed is that artists often use small font sizes on their blogs.
Don’t Overlook Typography on Your Artist Blog
To make your site easier to read, ensuring that your visitors stay and read your posts, make sure you are using a font size of 14 or larger.
Also, keep it simple with one or two font styles.
How to Change Your Font
Most templates will come with default font styles and sizes. You should have the ability to change them.
If you’re using self-hosted WordPress, you can change your font size under your dashboard’s Appearance section. Below are links to tutorials on how to change the font in other common web platforms.
Change your font in WordPress.com
Change your font style in Squarespace
Change your font style in Wix
Change your font in Weebly.
Show Off Your Blog
Do you have a blog that you would like to show off on Artisan Advantage? Send me a link to your site at becky@artisan-advantage.com, and I will consider it for a featured review.
Photo by Alexander Andrews on Unsplash
by Rebecca Sciullo | Jun 10, 2020 | Artist Blogging 101, Learning, Productivity
Since many people are working at home now, there are many articles and information on social media about productivity. It can be challenging to work from home under the best circumstances. Throw a couple of homeschooling kids and other homebound family members in the mix, and it is tough to avoid distractions. You need to understand how to manage your time and resources efficiently.
This situation might be old news for you if you are a working artist. You are probably already used to working on your own. If not, you wouldn’t get anything done. One artist I know wakes at 4:30 a.m. to get a start on his day. He knows that this is the golden time when he can create and work in the studio. I find that early mornings are best for me, although I can’t say I rise that early!
Starting an Artist Blog Takes Time and Focus
If you’ve recently started a blog, adding this task into your daily routine can be a challenge, and you might need a refresh on some productivity ideas. Here are a few ideas that I’ve used to manage my situation.
1 – Figure out what time of day works best for you to focus on different tasks. When do you find your energy best suited for writing or focused at your computer, brainstorming ideas?
2 – Once you determine the best time of day for this work, regularly block it out on your calendar daily or weekly. Do not deviate from your schedule. Treat this time as though it is an appointment outside of the house.
3 – Avoid things that suck your energy while working in your block or zone. The usual culprits include email, television, and social media.
4 – Create a pleasing workspace.
5 – Last but not least – take some breaks. use a Pomodoro Timer. I like to get outside for sunshine and fresh air.
Maintaining an artist blog is not just about technical know-how and writing. There is an art to staying on track and growing your site. Find and stick with strategies that help you to do this.
If you’d like more idea on how to maintain your artist blog, please sign up for my regular newsletter.
by Rebecca Sciullo | May 4, 2020 | Artist Blogging 101
With your artist blog pages complete and a basic understanding of the structure of a blog post, its time to start posting.
Just Do It.
Don’t stress too much about getting your blog posts started. If this is a new habit for you, the best thing to do is to start writing. Keeping your vision and goals in mind, begin crafting posts for your blog.
Here is a list of ideas on what to post.
Tips to Get Started Posting on Your Artist Blog
Just write. Then write some more. The more you write, the easier it will become for you to generate content.
Be authentic. Write in the same way that you would speak to your live audience.
Set a goal of ten posts before you start sharing your blog with others via email or social media. Most platforms will allow you to set your blog so that it does not show up in search engines until you are ready for it to be public.
Give Yourself a Goal
Set a realistic goal of writing a specific number of posts this week. Set some time on your calendar and get writing.
Stay tuned to Artist Blogging 101. As you develop a writing habit for your blog, future posts here are going to help you with the writing process and developing a strategy for your blog.
