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Doc Braham

10 Years Ago

Info Needed

Hi,

I have been with you for a year and made no sales, yet my feedback is wonderful. I have lowered the prices across the board and still no sales, I use twitter and facebook and http://www.cancergroup.com to promote my work.

Any advice would be welcomed, maybe I'm doing something wrong, which you could tell me.

http://michael-braham.artistwebsites.com/


Thanks,

Michael

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Roy Erickson

10 Years Ago

Lowering prices doesn't sell - increasing prices doesn't sell - having images that people want to purchase and getting their eye's on it - that sells - and I have no sales either.

I've never been to Israel - and I'll have to admit - your photo's don't inspire me to go there. It appears to me that you will have to concentrate on marketing your images towards Jews or perhaps those "christians" that support Israel or the "holy land". JMHO but it is what it is.

 

Antony McAulay

10 Years Ago

No sales here either.

I'm also wondering if I'm charging too much or if my stuff just isn't good enough?
One sale would be enough to give me encouragement at this time.

 

JC Findley

10 Years Ago

Lowering prices generally doesn't do much for sales unless you start out completely outlandish.

MARKETING will help.

As an artist, half of the work is marketing yourself.

Here are some good links to discussions in our forum and elsewhere about marketing your work

http://1stangel.co.uk/downloads/ Dan Turner's 7 Keys To Selling Art Online
http://fineartamerica.com/showmessages.php?messageid=720538 The Art Of Social-network Marketing Available Online For Free
http://fineartamerica.com/showmessages.php?messageid=908258 How to critique and edit your own work for better sales
http://1stangel.co.uk/fineartamerica/2011/07/12/tagging-or-keywords-and-descriptions Tagging, or Keywords and Descriptions
http://fineartamerica.com/showmessages.php?messageid=377664 Marketing Yourself
http://fineartamerica.com/showmessages.php?messageid=431967 Innovative Marketing for Artists - Challenge!
http://fineartamerica.com/showmessages.php?messageid=420132 Niche Marketing?
http://1stangel.co.uk/fineartamerica/2011/07/11/how-do-i-launch-a-local-art-show How Do I Launch A Local Art Show??
http://1stangel.co.uk/fineartamerica/2011/06/23/press-releases PRESS RELEASES what are they and how to use them
http://fineartamerica.com/showmessages.php?messageid=432109 YOUR Print Quality - Please Read
http://www.fineartamerica.com/newsletters/order-fulfillment-partner.html One of the newsletters with some good info on

Be sure to stay active on Fine Art America: join discussion, contests, etc.

We have an entire Marketing section for you to utilise to help sell your work. Try using those tools to help you.

But the best place to start is telling your friends and family.




MEMBER WRITTEN TUTORIALS

http://1stangel.co.uk/fineartamerica


PHOTOGRAPHING IMAGES

http://fineartamerica.com/showmessages.php?messageid=432109 YOUR Print Quality - Please Read
http://fineartamerica.com/showmessages.php?messageid=284083 How to Photograph Your Art
http://fineartamerica.com/showmessages.php?messageid=199853 How to photograph your Artwork at Home
http://fineartamerica.com/showmessages.php?messageid=200640 How I Photograph Art...
http://fineartamerica.com/showmessages.php?messageid=371117 Let’s Talk Photography
http://fineartamerica.com/showmessages.php?messageid=102801 Photographing paintings
http://fineartamerica.com/showmessages.php?messageid=917008 Rich's Tutorial On Copying Artwork
http://rolfbertramdotcom.zenfolio.com/p545849061/e13632899 Tips & Tricks for advanced painting photography

FUN and EDUCATION

http://fineartamerica.com/showmessages.php?messageid=155502 WHAT IS threads - Index A series of threads explaining different genres
http://fineartamerica.com/showmessages.php?messageid=303835 How to Debate
http://1stangel.co.uk/blog/how-to-critique-someones-work How To Critique Someones Work
http://fineartamerica.com/showmessages.php?messageid=803037 How to ASK for a critique

 

Doc Braham

10 Years Ago

Has anyone sold anything? I just became a premium member. Did I waste my money? How do Fine Arts advertise their clients?

Thanks,

Michael

 

Rich Franco

10 Years Ago

Michael,

Hello and I think you've asked this before and you'll keep getting the same answers. You have only 28 images here, which isn't a lot, or really enough and the images aren't special enough that you can get attention to these images. As before, someone mentioned you have the "old Rabbi", three of them, but one is just a B&W version of the color image. A few of your "Old City" shots have some movement/blurry in them too, which will be an issue if you do sell one of those and FAA may not print those. The images are very flat and have not been edited much and appear dark to me. Your best image, at least to me is the old car mechanic, which I assume is from film and not a digital image.

There are people here that have low numbers of images and they sell, but those images are spectacular and your's aren't. So you need to upload more/better images or accept the fact of no or low sales.

AND, there's the other little problem! NONE of your images have any keywords!!! You will never be seen, ever, in any search if you don't have keywords connected to your images. The titles aren't searchable here on FAA. Google might see them, but a buyer coming to look for Old City images, won't.

You can have more than 25 images uploaded here,without paying the $30, you just can't offer more than 25 for sale, so if you do have more images and they are good or better than go a head and upload them.

Here's my small group and you might enjoy it:

http://fineartamerica.com/groups/photo-critique-one-on-one-.html

Hope this helps,

Rich

 

Roy Erickson

10 Years Ago

It may not be that your pictures aren't "good enough" - and you have some really nice photos - and it may not be that you aren't charging the "right price" - it may be, and this is always a tough question - would you hang that picture on your wall, do you think anyone else would? It may sound trite - but go look at what is selling - go to any POD site you like and see what is selling. I don't think "tourist" pictures sell - but that's my opinion - because almost every tourist now carries a camera or "phone" that takes pictures. Sunsets - and I have a few up as well - don't really sell - and why would I buy yours - what makes it unique from the 5,000 others on here? I've quit taking pictures of sunrises and sunsets - I just enjoy them myself. I wish I knew what really would sell consistently - I'd become a "professional" consistent seller picture taker/maker - I could maybe make some money to pay for this site.

 

Doc Braham

10 Years Ago

Thanks for all your useful advice. Here is my website, take a look at the quality and let me know.

Also I was a student of Monte Zucker, I have over 4000 shots to upload at some point.

Anyway, here is the url for my website.

http://yoursimchas.com/

Again, I look forward to all and any responses,

Michael

 

JC Findley

10 Years Ago

The reality is that FAA does not market for you at all.

Think of FAA as a shopping mall. For free, you can have a kiosk. For 30/year you can rent any size square footage store you wish to show and sell your wares. Now, like a mall, people will come to FAA to shop for images but also like a mall, they don't promote any one store.

As rich pointed out, people can and do sell with low numbers of images but they are absolutely spectacular and unique. (example, Dave Allen )

Personally, I am not at Dave's level so I compensate by covering a lot of subjects and doing them fairly well. I sell pretty well doing that.

 

Alfred Ng

10 Years Ago

Michael,
I think the people like your photos are likely not visit the web. your work have a very narrow audience: I have no idea who is the Rabbi in your photos and even he is well known I don't known how many wanted to buy a print of him and hang it on the wall unless they are very religious.and regularly go to a synagogues. if I am you, I would mount a show at the synagogues or a Jewish community center as the first step to promote yourself..
yes, I had five sales here last month.

 

Rich Franco

10 Years Ago

Michael,

Looked at your site and you seem to have the portraits and weddings,etc. covered, but switching to landscapes, nature,etc., doesn't benefit from any seminars from Monte Zucker. You need to begin the process and learn the "vision" part of photography, which is very different from doing portraits, where you are "handed" your subjects and all you have to do is compose them and light them correctly.

Visit other artists here and see how they "see" and how they capture the image, the quality of the light,time of day and maybe a hint of how they process their images. JC sells the heck out of his images, so that's not a bad place to start, and of course, Dave Allen is truly an artist and has great images.

I probably would have saved the $30 until you get some better images up and a LOT of keywords too. This is a great place to put images up, to send links to your freinds to visit, but, the successful artists here know this is a business and demands more than uploading images and sitting back and waiting for sales!

Rich

 

Doc Braham

10 Years Ago

I thank you all for the great advice. I will upload more images of many different topics and scopes

 

Doc Braham

10 Years Ago

I just looked at Dave Allens work. It's very nice, however, he hasn't made a sale in a month, so what hope do the rest of us have?

 

JC Findley

10 Years Ago

Not sure how you came to that conclusion but he sold at least one 8 days ago and at least one since then.

Last 30 day pay period I sold 28 images and the payday for me this Saturday from art sales is ~$2300 and I am no where near the best selling artists on here.

 

Doc Braham

10 Years Ago

JC Findley, your work is beautiful. What program do you use?

 

JC Findley

10 Years Ago

Thank you

Photomatix if I am doing an HDR merge and then into Corel Paint Shop Pro. Paint Shop Pro is I am going straight from a singe jpeg or RAW file.

 

Lara Ellis

10 Years Ago

I've sold some and my membership has always paid for itself. It looks like you haven't been a member for very long as well. It might help you to divide some of your images into galleries and set your galeries page as your 1st page rather than the images. You could for example make a gallery for people, animals, places etc. Don't give up, sometimes it just takes time too.

 

Mike Savad

10 Years Ago

lowering prices will never help you.

change your avatar your face is missing.

you have 28 pictures and they all seem to be walls of some kind.

Photography Prints
the images have a snap shot feel to them, i'm certain i critiqued this in the past, the bar shouldn't be there, the light is uneven and there are tree bits

judging but the views - 16 - your not pushing each image. or if you are, your don't have enough followers. many think that all you have to do is post on twitter and sales flow in. but in reality you need followers to see your posts. and the posts need hashtags that describe what you have. but... you have a very isolated type of image that most people that if they do like it, have it because they were there and got the same exact tourist view you have here.

Photography Prints
like there is nothing that special. the sky is blinding white, the stairs make it a tourist shot again. and there isn't much to the shot that would make it special enough to hang somewhere. there isn't much of a description, and there isn't that many tags either. if you can't describe what we are looking at, how are we supposed to know? 12 views since feb - no one is seeing it.

Photography Prints
like i mentioned last time, he has a nice face but there are like 3 of these. and you have to ask - who is this being targeted too? who would want this on their wall for example.

Art Prints
this guy here is too dark, he's working on something, but i don't know what it is. i know you said it was an engine - but who is this for? would a mechanic want this on their wall?


but in the end you've been here a year and only have 28 images. that's not a lot. if you don't have a specific target in mind nothing will sell. because you have to find your audience and market to them. your bio leaves much to be desired. tell people what you do and what you make, why they should get from you.


---Mike Savad

 

Mike Savad

10 Years Ago

if your a paying member you can upload what you want. sales are made every day, i just made sales yesterday and today. i don't want to count them up since last pay period though since it's not based on normal months.

---Mike Savad

 

Frank J Casella

10 Years Ago



Michael, I'm a big fan of Dan Heller, here is a great article that is a little out dated but still relevant. Item 5.1 especially noteworthy for this thread. Hope it helps:

http://www.danheller.com/biz-audience-pro.html

 

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