Standing up and shouting Hey look at me! doesn't come easily to me - I'd much rather sit back and let my art speak for itself. But if I want to make a living from my art then I realise I need to get people interested, and that means marketing.
And I really want to make a successful career of my art, so some sacrifices are in order.
The first step was setting up this website, which turned out to be easy and "free" (as in, it doesn't cost anything to have the website, but it takes a bit of effort keeping it up to date, doing blog posts etc.).
And I really want to make a successful career of my art, so some sacrifices are in order.
The first step was setting up this website, which turned out to be easy and "free" (as in, it doesn't cost anything to have the website, but it takes a bit of effort keeping it up to date, doing blog posts etc.).
When I first published the website the only way to get there was to type in the URL, and it's a bit impractical and not very cost effective to tell everyone the URL and hope they will go and look! No amount of searching on Google would find the site.
So clearly a bit of profile raising was in order. Fortunately Weebly has some good advice for making the website visible to search engines. So I set to work modifying the website with keywords, internal links, external links etc., to get Google to take it seriously.
Then I signed up with Google and used their Webmaster Tools to register the site.
Adding the blog also apparently helps visibility.
I also signed up with LinkedIn and added a link to my website, and joined the Pastel Artists group and posted links to my website and blog.
The result of all this activity is that the website is now reasonably easy to find on Google (haven't tried any other search engines). Searching on my name with either pastel, artist or similar, and New Zealand will bring up my site at least on the first page if not the first item. Can also find me via the LinkedIn search result.
Of course there are many Jason Kings around the world, some of whom are even artists, although none in pastels as far as I can tell. There's even a famous TV character who kind of swamps Google if you don't use any other search terms!
I also seem to have some followers on this blog - each time I update there is a little spike in hits on the website :). Would be nice if someone would leave some comments so I know what people think of it??? Or some suggestions of what people would like to see?
Of course the other method of marketing is physically showing the work. I have the current exhibition at Artrium, and I am about to enter the Peters Doig Art Awards and the PANZ annual exhibition, both in Blenheim.
I'm about to rejoin the NZ Academy of Fine Arts, and hopefully enter some of their exhibitions.
I've also contacted other local galleries, but it's hard work getting your work in - too many established artists out there already :(
The other major event coming up is the New Zealand Art Show - entries due by 30 March. Need to have plenty of work available for that, which shouldn't be a problem unless sales take off dramatically between now and August :)
So clearly a bit of profile raising was in order. Fortunately Weebly has some good advice for making the website visible to search engines. So I set to work modifying the website with keywords, internal links, external links etc., to get Google to take it seriously.
Then I signed up with Google and used their Webmaster Tools to register the site.
Adding the blog also apparently helps visibility.
I also signed up with LinkedIn and added a link to my website, and joined the Pastel Artists group and posted links to my website and blog.
The result of all this activity is that the website is now reasonably easy to find on Google (haven't tried any other search engines). Searching on my name with either pastel, artist or similar, and New Zealand will bring up my site at least on the first page if not the first item. Can also find me via the LinkedIn search result.
Of course there are many Jason Kings around the world, some of whom are even artists, although none in pastels as far as I can tell. There's even a famous TV character who kind of swamps Google if you don't use any other search terms!
I also seem to have some followers on this blog - each time I update there is a little spike in hits on the website :). Would be nice if someone would leave some comments so I know what people think of it??? Or some suggestions of what people would like to see?
Of course the other method of marketing is physically showing the work. I have the current exhibition at Artrium, and I am about to enter the Peters Doig Art Awards and the PANZ annual exhibition, both in Blenheim.
I'm about to rejoin the NZ Academy of Fine Arts, and hopefully enter some of their exhibitions.
I've also contacted other local galleries, but it's hard work getting your work in - too many established artists out there already :(
The other major event coming up is the New Zealand Art Show - entries due by 30 March. Need to have plenty of work available for that, which shouldn't be a problem unless sales take off dramatically between now and August :)
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