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11 Years Ago
Let me preface this with the fact that this is from JC the artist NOT JC the moderator.
I bumped this in light of this comment.
"The only hope I can get to sell one piece at this point would be the recent uploads and if they pick the most popular as the recent uploads, then how will anyone sell."
Sean covered this subject on the email you probably got and hopefully read. If not, you can read it here in chapter 2, though I would recommend reading it all.
There are many ways to sell but if you think you can rely on the search to get started think again.
http://fineartamerica.com/why-every-artist-and-photographer-in-the-world-should-be-selling-on-fineartamerica.html
OK, now that the formalities are out of the way lets get to the meat of the subject. First of all, you do NOT pay FAA to market for you. They will not help individual artists. They don't help the top sellers, they do not help newbs. They DO give you myriad marketing tools to help yourself but using them is up to us.
Now to the subject line. To be honest, my art is generally on the front page in most sandboxes I play in. (read searches)
So why in the world am I on page one whereas new people here are not? Is it because I paid 30/year? No. Is it because I am established in the good ole boy network? No. Is it because I am the chosen one? No. It is because I sell and I sell well here. How I started selling here is summed up here, but there are certainly MANY more ways to do it. . http://fineartamerica.com/showmessages.php?messageid=970972
The reality is that FAA's search looks at a lot of factors, I am not privy to all that but I know some are votes, favorites, key word relevance, and group features. BTW, keyword relevance does not mean FAA checks every keyword against the image but rather how the artist types it in. All other things being equal, a search for "Tall ships" will show images that have "tall ships" as a single keyword phrase in front of those with tall and ship as separate keywords. Other factors MAY include contest wins, views, comments and who knows what else. But the sales on an image AND the sales by a specific artist in general are more heavily weighted.
Oh, that is not fair many will say and then add there is no way to get seen unless you already have sales and you cannot get sales unless you are seen. It seems like a catch 22 and maybe it is, yet many people brake that barrier every day. It is not limited to FAA but is that way in the business world and it is especially that way in other artistic endeavors. Lets look at a few.
Say you are a writer. First of all, just try and get published without an agent and conversely try and get an agent without being published. Yet, there seem to be new authors with brand new books year in and year out. So, lets say you do manage to be published and Barnes and Noble orders ten thousand books. Do you think that you will be in the front of the store in your own display the first day your book is released? NO! you will not be there because Tom Clancy, or Patricia Cornwell or Nora Roberts or some other top seller has a new book out and THEY will be there. Is that fair though, I mean their new books just came out as well and haven't sold a single copy yet either? It may or may not be fair but it IS the way business works.
Using that same example, there are still ways to sell your book though. OK, so you are not on display in the front of the store but you are IN the store. Whereas Tom Clancy is going to sell books because he is Tom Clancy YOU need to hit the street. You need to do book signings. You need to talk about your book on your blog. You need to go to your local bookstore and point out that you will provide the display to go up front and it would look good to have a local writer seen right as people walk in. Your publisher is NOT going to spend money pushing an unknown writer. Your agent is probably too busy to do it. It is up to you. But, if you push that book and it is good and people like it and tell their friends about it you may sell more and more of them. Eventually, if you sell enough, you are up front when you come out with a new one, but it isn't easy. Marketing isn't fun to some artists but it is as important if not more important than creating the art to begin with.
Didn't like the book selling example? Insert music industry. Do you think your garage band's new release will be easily found just browsing on Itunes or be in front of the new Aerosmith CD in Best Buy? No, it will not.
Now, I often read that the search here shows the same images again and again for the same search. I watch them closely and that is not quite true but for the sake or argument lets say it is. I hear people say that it makes FAA look stagnant and potential clients will get bored. Bull pucky. WE may look at a particular search often but clients do not. They do not come here to oh and ah at the work; they come here to buy. What that means is they do a search, they find what they want and they either buy it or they want to think about it a bit and come back and buy it later. Guess what, if your search changed on a regular basis when they do come back, they would not be able to find that image they wanted to buy. (Yes, they could bookmark it but I never do as I know what I searched for and just do the search again and purchase when ready to buy. I would bet others do this too.) Consistency is a sellers friend! Just think about how irritated you got the last time your grocery store remodeled. Seriously, if they switched things up every week would you continue to shop there or do you WANT to know that the product you wanted will be in the same place on your next trip?
So, easy, you want to show up in the first page, sell, and sell hard!
(Again, JC the artist here, NOT JC the moderator.)
Reply Order
11 Years Ago
Very good post JC...
from Beth the artist
Shops change the layout for a good reason.
They do it as many people, once they know where something is, walk directly to that one thing.
Shops move things around regularly so that you search for the thing again and, in the meantime, see things you did not realise you needed until you saw it
Good marketing is good marketing
11 Years Ago
Well said, JC and Beth.
Our individual pages are in reality, " Our Stores " and not just a parking lot or warehouse for our images. We have to go to the store frequently to dust the shelves, improve the inventory, add new inventory or just move things around to give our front window a new look.
I do these things on a regular basis, I try to market in as many ways as I can and I am always trying to improve my images or create new ones. I do not sell everyday, but I do sell fairly regularly with an increase each year since joining in 2009. Quality images, correct keywords and even some creative "old-fashioned, real-world" marketing done by each and everyone of us will ultimately lead to an increase in sales.
11 Years Ago
Well said! I'm surprised by how many threads I read that suggest search is unfair or that more people should be represented at the front page of a given search, etc. First, it's a business, not a club. I love the idea of an egalitarian world, but ultimately this is a business. You wouldn't presume to tell a shop in the mall they should be required to show new and unproven merchandise in front of the merchandise that sells? I might wish I was on the front page, but I don't expect it for $30 a year.
I didn't decide to open a shop at FAA because I wanted to be on the front page of every internal search anyway. What people seem to miss sometimes is that FAA has great search engine placement. If I've added a piece of work here, titled it well, and given it a good description, my chances are far better at being found out in search engine land (i.e. Google for most people) if they search for artwork that fits my description. I would be unlikely to get that kind of lift on a search engine on my own site (even though I do maintain one).
And it becomes a kind of feedback loop in the end. In less than a year, there are searches that I am on the first page for now. There are others that I'm not (like New York City and Paris - gosh, everyone and their brother has work from those places). Yet, I have still made sales for work here in both categories. Did they find me via Google? Or another tag I used? Hard to say, but it shows that you can sell even for highly competitive subjects.
11 Years Ago
JC, you're *not* the chosen one?
I'm so disillusioned . . .
Seriously -- good post! :-)
11 Years Ago
Mike the bunny here.
i find it funny that people with 10 pictures with very few if any keywords, expect to be on the first page. and they are shocked when they can't find themselves at all. especially when they use words they don't even have.
---Mike Savad
11 Years Ago
As always great and smart post...JC - Thank You - @-@ Mo - The not native speaker artist :) ps. which means this is really great and clear post :D
11 Years Ago
I finally made a sale!! Woohoo! And it was by getting out in the real world and *gasp* talking to people (extreme introverted hermit... not kidding). I'm not a very good salesperson, in that I am not able to sell ice to eskimos. My approach is being friendly and sooner or later art comes into the conversation. I carry around business cards and a few greeting cards, and cross my fingers. For the moment, that is working. Of course, there is no time to relax, I have to find my next opportunity and I have to be willing to try new approaches -and still get paintings completed.
Thank you very much for the post JC. And gigantic thanks to all members that take the time to share tips.
11 Years Ago
Thats what I'm talkin bout, Jack the sales of my artwork at the winery I work at are a direct result of me and one other employee promoting and marketing the art to the customers. If you don't promote and market you don't sell.
11 Years Ago
A great post JC, well written and informative. Thanks especially for the link to Sean's article, I didn't receive it as an email but that too made for thought provoking reading.
11 Years Ago
You know what, Ricardo? I've never put the artwork title in the keywords box. I put my name in there, though. Do other people put the title of their work in the keywords?
Good post JC. How come I'm not on the front page? (just kidding...)
11 Years Ago
I include a lot of keywords with my images but I still don't feel like I'm doing it quite right.
I include the words from the Title in the keywords separated by commas.
I put the words from the Description in the keywords.
I put the most important keywords first.
I put both singular and plural forms of words.
I list elements in the image in the keywords.
I list the most common colors.
I put my name, website address, location of photo and so forth.
What am I missing / what am I doing wrong?
11 Years Ago
City state combos.
eg, Miami, Miami FL, Miami Florida,FL,Florida,MIA
(I also like the airport codes.)
11 Years Ago
I thought the word combos (not separated by commas) were taken by the bots as separate words. For example, "train, railroad, iron horse," is picked up by bots as "train, railroad, iron, horse".
11 Years Ago
i've been taking out iron horse, since it comes up as horse in the search. the search here doesn't know about phrases - or i should say words in phrases. type in horse, and you get trains. it's just confusing.
---Mike Savad
11 Years Ago
"type in horse, and you get trains. it's just confusing."
The only confusing thing to me is WHY artists put so much time and effort into search. It has only ever SORT of worked. Not just here, but everywhere. Google. Bing. Yahoo. That's the nature of computer search and it isn't going to change.
Here's where the search obsession is leading: Away from artists freely shooting and painting what they want and toward "working for the search engine." Holy cow. That's like being a commercial artist except with no clients and no fat pay checks. If you're going to work for someone at least get paid — up front, before you lift a finger or flick a brain cell. Once you have the money, then you can shoot and paint to a set of specs.
Dan Turner
Dan Turner Fine Art
Dan Turner's Seven Keys to Selling Art Online
To Enjoy Dan Turner's Pinterest Boards, Click Here
11 Years Ago
Heck, I typed-in "barns" (w/o the quote marks) earlier today just to see what would come up in the search, and the first page was mostly painted animals, such as roosters, and such. Not one barn was in that particular person's gallery.
11 Years Ago
Good points, but I do have a bone to pick with FAA and that' s that "full rez preview" box. 99% of what I have here has been printed and prints very well, but those previews are pretty sucky in terms of pixellation and/or blur. And if a potential customer opens on of those up, the combination of that lousy resolution along with my processing techniques will kill any chance of a sale.
I have no idea what print size those rez boxes are at, but they are not a good selling point for those of us who add textures and styling.
11 Years Ago
A legitimate subject Louise, but could you open a new thread on it?
It will get your point more visibility and some folks with more knowledge on it will see it and comment.
11 Years Ago
dan - this is how i find people looking for stuff. i don't have to find them, they find me. and they have to use the search engines. if you have ways on pushing people here, that's great. but i don't do that, don't have time for that, and it's a waste of time for me to try. it's better to simply advertise your presence by working with those search engines, thus far it has worked out very well for me.
---Mike Savad
11 Years Ago
that barn search confuses me. i understand barn yard animals, but barns with an S - that shouldn't be there. but i'm not sure what we can do about it, since that person hasn't been alive for a while.
---Mike Savad
11 Years Ago
So...I should include the words in my titles in my list of keywords? Such as "spur,your,imagination"?
As for the "sell and sell hard" stuff...how,exactly?
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9 Years Ago
It doesn't matter how much you promote promote promote, although I do, if they aren't looking for something and if they don't love what you have they won't be buying. I don't like the fact that you can't see what IS working, what DOES bring traffic to your site? What search engines do they use? What keywords did they use? If we could see that, it would help us better understand how to improve. I am convinced no one sees my work unless I am promoting it on here, all of my "fans" see my work but on here, only other members see it. Great but uh, they ain't buyin it! They are selling their own so how does that help me.
I sell on another site and I can see the keywords, search engines, what sent them to my site. It's extremely helpful and the more views you get, the more popular you are, the easier to get to the first page. I am on the first page for many of my items on the other site but have yet to make a sale here and yet to actually see how my work comes up.
9 Years Ago
Christina - have you put google analytics on your artistwebsite? If that is the site you are promoting, you can see if what you are doing is getting any attention there.
I'm assuming you're pushing that site when you market your work and not FAA/Pixels in general.
9 Years Ago
the only way to be seen - to promote your work - is to promote your name and use it in the title or tags as well as the description - Otherwise - unless you are already a pretty good seller in that category or tag word - you are beyond sight. You can promote your AW site more and tone down your promotion of the FAA site (and probably Pixels as well.).
9 Years Ago
That's a good point Heather, I will add it. I still don't understand how to read it well. I don't see what keywords are used but your right, I will know a lot more. I also haven't really promoted my website, just my images on FAA.
Is the description very important? I see a lot of people don't have a description at all. I should repeat my keywords in my description?
9 Years Ago
the description is important to some buyers, but mostly google doesn't like pages unless there is content. you can mention keywords, but i like adding a nice story if i can to each one.
---Mike Savad
9 Years Ago
Heather, I use StatCounter but it can only be placed on your bio page. So you have no idea how people are arriving at your hundreds of individual pages if they didn't go through your bio page first. Every time I make a sale I check the location and compare it to StatCounter. I have yet to see the locations match up, which means all my sales have come through a different route. Not one buyer has gone through my bio page before buying a print. They have apparently found the individual page by other means. But since I can't add StatCounter to individual pages I have no idea how they're getting there. I guess my point is Google Analytics or StatCounter or anything like that is pretty useless on FAA if we can't add it to all our pages.
9 Years Ago
Mike, you have a very interesting profile, I love your gallery cover photos. I will have to look through your shop when I have more time from my PC.
9 Years Ago
I should post one of those dreaded sunrise pictures - be an eye opener - like the opening of a new day - get to work - promote your stuff
7 Years Ago
My work isn't on the front page for two reasons - one - and the big one - I don't make Sean enough money by my work selling, and two, apparently they like other folks work better, and I don't have the money or know those that would put it on the front page if I paid them (enough).
7 Years Ago
RD,
I really don't think it has anything to do with saleabilty, it has to do with printability.
To me, FAA prefers to deal with those members that have a track record of printable images.
It becomes a pain in the ass to them to have a sale denied because of the image to their standard is not printable
7 Years Ago
On the Pixels home one requirement is having BLUE in the image. Goes with the theme of the home page.
7 Years Ago
Good Question Jessica. It looks like a table got screwed on the server, I hope they will fix it.
7 Years Ago
"I really don't think it has anything to do with saleabilty, it has to do with printability."
But Roger, FAA doesn't even look at or consider printability until the image sells. You area putting the car before the horse here. There are millions of printable images on FAA that never sell.
7 Years Ago
i'm guessing he bumped it and erased the bump, since i think this question came up in another thread.
---Mike Savad
http://www.MikeSavad.com
7 Years Ago
Roger - nor did I say it had to to with sale ability - it has to do strictly with sales and how it or the artist photographer is selling.
7 Years Ago
Because as Mike said I bumped it and erased the bump and can reopen any thread I deem worthy of reopening.
Do you really need to know the how and why of everything Jessica?
7 Years Ago
David K
RE:.."But Roger, FAA doesn't even look at or consider printability until the image sells. "
That is EXACTLY why FAA would rather deal with well vetted members, pushing them ahead of all the rest.
Members that FAA feel reasonably sure that any image of their's will pass the printability test.
We have no idea, how many initial sales , FAA has to tell the buyer," We're sorry, you can't have the image you want, because it doesn't meet our printability standards"
7 Years Ago
I find it really easy to get on the front page of search... Just find a place no one else has shot yet :). Or even a location or landmark within a popular city that doesn't have much representation. A lot of my early sales were of places that only had a page or two of competition here.
7 Years Ago
Kevin started a thread about if having an image on the home page or at the top of search impacted sales organically. IMO waking this thread up was a good companion to that discussion.
