A Taboo Subject?

The real part is selling. Unlike keywords, the more you sell here it moves you up in the rankings. Call friends and family

So by that Kevin, buying your own work would make it seem more successful therefore moving you into a position where a prospective buyer would find you then allowing them to make a purchase.

brian... i believe the story goes purchasing your own work does not advance you in the rankings.

Thanks for the clarification Tom. Much appreciated.

Promote, Promote and Promote some more.
Only way to beat the compitition.

when i increased my prices i sold more. there is a certain perception high price means quality, and based on the fact shipping doesn't go down, it should be more than shipping.

to be found you need lots of work in many niches. the niches should be something there are few search results for. you have to advertise and it takes time. there isn't anything taboo that i know of.

you only have 24 images. any store in any place will have more products than that. and the subject matter is all over the place. part of the secret to selling is having stuff people want, and having plenty of it. always upload your best, tell people your here. if you've been sitting around and waiting - that won't work. you have to build up lists in twitter and such so people can find you. it's a lot of work.

i have around 2500 thing or so, and i'm still uploading new things.

---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

Yeah Mike I'm still working on the subject matter from Photos to Pastel and I know I need more but I don't want to just place items for volume, I do have many more images that paintings and I'm trying to strategize the best route for sales. I have opened up a Pinterest account as well a Stumbleupon and already have twitter. So we'll see what happens here.. Thanks A lot

upload more content, that's step one. whatever you have that looks good post it. don't use it as filler, but while your waiting, your not selling them. it can take months before someone decides to buy it. twitter will help. pinterest is a the land of confusion. and stumble is a total waste of time. they only send people here if they are bored. it's a randomizer.

---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

@ Mike ok. I will upload a lot more content and I appreciate it very much!

I try and keep up with Savad in prices and image count

"God" helps those that help themselves - and prayer doesn't work - work works.

any way, there is little known about how the search works exactly, other than you have to sell to be seen. you have to bring people in, but you have to have work people like and enough of a selection for people to want to stay. adding story content to your descriptions will keep people in the page longer and you want that. you should have more keywords. more than 2 things in a gallery. people shouldn't have to back out that often. i think your prices are way cheaper than they should be.

looking at it, the prices fluctuate too much


this one has too few keywords and it needs commas. your large sizes should be more money.


i don't know why your underselling yourself with the photos. this will sell higher, though the noise in the fog should be blended in more.

your bio should be a description of what you make. and not add a bunch of words that customers don't care much about. " Brian's artwork has an abstract impressionistic and ethereal / serendipitous atmosphere" i don't think too many people will be able to read that in one breath. use the first person, it's more personal.

selling is about a bit of everything, but mostly it's about the work. the quality and the amount. people get bored fast so you have to entertain them. but mostly it's telling people your here.


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

Mike your insights have been most helpful and I do appreciate the information and that goes for everyone else as well. This is a work in progress and need all the information I can get. Thanks again your knowledge won't be wasted.

Brian, from what I have read by everyone that sells here is it wont count if you buy your own work, but anyone else will. Maybe they can see by your IP address or something. I have read discussion after discussion here from artists that have been on here for three years never to have a sale. The advice they were given was that the only and best way to move up in this search is to sell your images. Then for some reason you move up in search only then.

Its the holidays, so weigh your odds and time. What will it cost you to sell a few things to friends or family that have always wanted one of your works verses hours and hours a day, week, and month to work on search criteria that wont raise you in the search.
Ask Mike, he knows how it works.

the main issue when people come in and say they've been here years without selling - there is usually a reason. the work is bad. no keywords, no descriptions, no advertising, didn't tell a soul about the site, joined twitter but doesn't have followers.

usually its either bad work, or good work that doesn't have a central theme. it was made just however the artist felt like. and it made it hard to market for. many don't put in the hours it takes to either make really finished looking work. or finding places to put your link in. or to even spend time uploading and adding all the words to help people understand what they are looking at.

of course there are others here that have been here for a few months and started selling right away. even a few days...

---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

I did re-edit my pricing. Im trying to add more keywords, remade my bio and I'm new on twitter so I guess ill try to get some followers now...

To piggy back on what has been said above, you have to think of Fine Art America and / or your Artist Website as your store. YOU have to bring the people in. And that's the "work work work" described above. If someone happens to stumble over your stuff through the search engine here, fine and dandy. But it's going to be YOU displaying the images in as creative a way as you can ... from tweeting your fingers off ... to entering contests here ... to FaceBooking your poor followers blind ... to being savvy about keywording ... to blogging your brains out ... to stapling a pdf sheet (that FAA kindly supplies, by the way!) to the community board at the grocery store ... to casually slipping a pretty business card onto the desk of your real estate agent ... or the guy at Starbucks ... or at the doctor's office ... it's work.

Work, work and work. IŽll try it.

I just get my work out there. Because I do abstracts most of my sales are of large size. As to pricing depends on how important sales income is I think my prices are high but I sell ok.

Yep ... and once you're successful, like David and some others, the sales probably do come your way without all the stuff I described above. But until you are and they do ...

Hi Daniel,

Mike made a comment about your pricing... I agree, it's too low.
I'm not a big seller but I took Mike's suggestion a while back and sold 3 prints shortly thereafter.
His theory worked for me.

Good luck,
Donna

Keywording is not a guarantee, there are a million(?) artists or millions of work of art at FAA (either way it doesn't make a lot of difference unless you find a niche but someone has to be looking for it!). See the post I am about to put up on marketing your artwork, it is by a pro artist who knows how to market, take into consideration the video is 1 1/2 years old, Facebook is probably still number one for marketing.

Off the subject but have you ever played pro-ball? You look like you could be a linebacker and in good physical shape.

1. Lots of quality work that people want to purchase - know your market - understand your customer
2. Keywording and descriptions
3. Promoting your work outside of FAA and creating a following (see #1)
4. Time - it can take years to build up a business.
5. Exploring other markets for your work, creating local buzz.

" to stapling a pdf sheet (that FAA kindly supplies, by the way!) to the community board at the grocery store"

Speaking of those PDF sheets, what are some of the other ideas people have come up for using them? I really think they are pretty cool but I am not sure I have figured out how to best use them.

Currently I use them as a bounce back piece in every package I send out from sales I make through other sites. I also carry a folder full of them and pass them out and put them on a bulletin board occasionally.

On another subject, if you have a Costco in your area, they do allow for local merchants to promote there wares inside Costco. They have an area where you can put up a poster and have a bunch of brochures for people to take.

If you have a lot of finished work, you can actually put up a kiosk in the store and sell framed artwork.

Trying to work your way to the top of the search through keywords, likes, comments, groups, contests and the normal ways that go back to the early days of FAA is a lost cause.

Unless you have been here for 3, 4, 5 years you are already so far behind it is impossible to catch by doing those things. The heaviest weighing in the search is sales. Which puts you in a chicken or the egg situation. You can't make sales into you get ranking in the search but you can not get raking until you get found in the search to make sales, right? WRONG!

The only way you are going to even have a small chance of catching up with those that have accumulated, tens of thousands of views, likes, favorites, comments etc, etc is through sales. Keep in mind some of these people have 10,000, 20,000 and ever some have 100,000 images. All of those images are still collecting likes, comments, etc., etc.

To earn those sales you have for get wasting your time on those things. You need to promote and advertise your ArtistsWebsite outside of FAA.

All the rest of that stuff will follow. The views, likes, comments etc, should be a result of you sales. They simply are not going to lead to sales. Not may anyway.

None of those things mean a thing if you can get your prospective buyers to your AW. You are the only artist there. All that other stuff is meaning less.

I am not saying to ignore the keywords all together. You need to do the best you can at keywording and good descriptions with as many search terms you can legitimately squeeze in. But one that is done, you need to focus your advertising and marketing to the greater overall art market outside of FAA and direct buys back to you AritistsWebsige. That will create sale and that will get you search ranking much faster then likes, favorites, views or any of that other stuff.