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Build Awareness. Selling your art is not an easy task. A simple search on the internet will find millions of images for sale, and plenty of galleries offering a huge range of subjects, styles, originals, prints, posters, sculptures, & art related gifts.
Sales and marketing options will vary depending on whether you want to sell original works, reproductions (prints or posters) , publishing rights, or a combination. In this introduction we will cover general options, whilst later articles will focus on specific target markets, such as selling original work through galleries.
Given the vast amount of competition , the fundamental issue is the same for all artists, in that you need to make prospective buyers aware of your work. Then you need a mechansim for them to view , and hopefully buy your artwork.
How do you make people aware of your work? Well, typical options include having a website, using an agent, social networking (twitter, facebook etc.) and of course traditional routes such as getting your work into art galleries, exhibitions, and art competitions.
Art Galleries. Many galleries will market your work on your behalf, for a fee. In the case of original works, and signed limited editions , the gallery may take payments , and you will be responsible for shipment. Some have a physical gallery as well as an online presence, and will exhibit your original work, and promote it online. they will typically deal with the whole process from marketing , payment processing, and shipment. We will look at this in later articles.
Your own web pages. Depending how comfortable you are with the internet, you could create your own website, perhaps using one of the template options available. Templated options are provided by many web hosting companies. Essentially the look and style of a site is chosen from pre-prepared options, and you add your images, text and contact details. We’ll look into this in later articles.
Use of online art galleries, and ‘print-on-demand’ sites. This is perhaps the easiest route for those producing prints and posters, These are businesses that offer to host your images and information for you, and typically they will take orders, process payments, print the work, typically on canvas, and fine art papers, and ship your work to the customer
However , marketing your work is not simply about placing the painting, image or information in lots of places. In our next article we will look at how to build interest in your work.
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