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Bryant Coffey

8 Years Ago

Does Anyone Read Blogs On Fine Art America?

Just curious, I see the blog tab on FAA and am curious if anyone uses that or not. I have my own blog full of content that I could begin porting over to FAA in my spare time if people did. Thoughts?

Bryant
http://www.bryantcoffey.com/blog

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Abbie Shores

8 Years Ago

Did you look under community...blogs?

 

Abbie Shores

8 Years Ago

http://fineartamerica.com/blogs.html

You have an RSS feed. You could put content from there on your own blog

This for art related, rssed to your own general blog

Just a thought and one I need to do lol

 

Matt Hammerstein

8 Years Ago

I don't read the blogs here because most of them are just people promoting new works and stuff like that; there isn't really any actual content. Your blog is really well done though, maybe it could gain some readers from here.

 

David Bridburg

8 Years Ago

Bryant,

You can use compete.com to see web traffic. You can look up something like 8 different domains
with the service when you join for free, that is 8 per day.

Tumblr and a few others have tens of millions of unique monthly visitors. I have a Tumblr
account, but I can not get any traction or followers. I definitely have not put in anywhere near the effort
or quality of effort you have. I am not a writer, so I just post images. No go for me.

FAA has about 1 million unique visitors per month. That includes over 100k fellow artists every month. Just a round
guess.

People on FAA regardless are not really here for the blog. The FAA blog gives FAA members an idea of how to set up
and run a blog, but you are much further along than that.

Also I would recommend sussing out G+. I think there is a blog format or something along those lines there, if only keeping
a running log of posts. G+ has a flickr like tool for images, but you can have links on the images back to the sales sheets.
Plus you can join groups that are very well organized and cleanly set up and run. You can up your rankings in search etc.
G+ was retooled I think some 10 months ago and now well out ranks Tumblr for uniques. Some 69 million uniques per month compared
to 38 million or so for Tumblr. Plus if you run images and posts and groups known as communities and search etc together
you are much much better off than competing directly with blogs one next to the other.

I have noticed very briefly on Tumblr that folks in the press with a large running head start tend to have newbies fed into their blogs, but
then no one has to follow back. So Tumblr is self propagating for much more entrenched bloggers. At a cost to the newbies.

JMO

Dave

 

David King

8 Years Ago

My only blog post on FAA is a link to my Blogger blog. I really dislike the FAA blog format, it's extremely limited, and also on my AW the link to the blog is under the "Info" tab, which means it's unlikely it will ever get seen. IMO the "Blog" link should be prominent on the home page.

 

Bryant Coffey

8 Years Ago

Lady - Interesting thought, I might look into that, thanks!

Matt - Thank you so much, I'm glad you liked it! I found a blog thread that has quite a few views and replies, thought maybe I would add to that thread when I post new content. Got a bunch of traffic the last few days after I did that so I'll have to look in the analytics and see if it was the actually coming from FAA.

David B. - You rock, thank you for all of the suggestions. I agree with Tumblr, had a few followers after mirroring it to my main blog, haven't really seen much from that, but over time it could drive traffic so I haven't yet given up on that. I knew FAA had 1M visitors, but didn't realize that they were unique. Very cool to see, makes me even happier to be a part of the community. Glad to hear your thoughts on the FAA blog, I agreed with that whole statement, thanks for the nice comment on me being further along than that, I feel so much like it's in its infancy. I'm on G+ as https://plus.google.com/u/0/116067096063320013154/posts but am still trying to figure out traction with that. I sometimes am able to come up with a solution that seems to work, but am learning the tools and interface...and I totally agree with your assessment of Tumblr.

David K - I agree, wasn't too impressed, but I don't necessarily want it to impress me. I like that FAA seems to focus on what we actually need and do it well, and blogs...on this site, don't seem to be of huge concern for me as an artist/seller here. Putting it prominent on the home page would make me rethink my assessment.

Thanks guys!

B

 

Sarah Kersey

8 Years Ago

No, I don't read the FAA artist blogs. I think if I personally utilized the blog feature it would be add notes about a painting. There is so much mention of promotion with FB, Tumblr, Pinterest, Linkedin, blogs, etc... I'm curious if any photographers have explored joining various photography societies for exposure, exhibits, competitions, etc.

 

Joseph C Hinson

8 Years Ago

A lot of blogs here are actually press release wanna bes, someone selling Nikes or merely links to offsite blogs. I was trying to write them, but haven't lately

 

Bryant Coffey

8 Years Ago

Interesting thought Sarah, I haven't gotten that far yet...on my list, but I've got limited time right now...baby steps. :) I have done artist shows though which are pretty fun and attract a pretty unique audience that might otherwise not come across your work.

B

 

Bryant Coffey

8 Years Ago

Joseph, I noticed a lot of spam comments on my personal blog and after doing some research, it doesn't surprise me one bit that they are linking on FAA as much as they can to their spam.

 

Frank J Casella

8 Years Ago

I use my FAA blog, and I also have a WordPress.com blog and a Tumblr blog. They are all for different content as they have different audiences. I use my FAA blog for posting my group features and it works very well. I share it in my weekly FAA email campaign newsletters as well as tweet each new post, and post it on my LinkedIn company page. Seems to get many views but like all marketing here you have to share it and not just post and let it sit.

 

David Bridburg

8 Years Ago

Frank,

I have learned a lot from you. I am learning the technique of asking folks to subscribe to my email list, although I use Mailchimp elsewhere on my main website. So I
link them to the main site.

I am only at one email per month.

Bryant, Frank knows how to reach people through his campaigns. He has gathered plenty of email address etc....

The main point of a blog should be outreach to gain not only followers, but email addresses.

What is it Frank? If someone sees your art 6 to 8 times they are far more likely to buy?

oh and Bryant, I ran a separate thread on Pinterest and Blogs yesterday. Pinterest feeds blog activity more
than any other internet source. There is no close second.

Dave

 

Frank J Casella

8 Years Ago

Thanks, Dave, for your kid words. The email list is known as permission based marketing and, yes, asking for email subscribers is not about the sale but more about developing relationships. Through my email newsletters I share value that causes the subscriber to take action. The reason I share my group features on my FAA blog, and then share my FAA blog on my email posts, is that once my followers brows my FAA blog then the 'images' and 'gallery' tab is right next to it. You see, I noticed the more I share my blog and don't sell, the more that people clicked on the tabs on my art website and shopped. So yes, Bryant, people do use the blog tab .. and I suggest you also do what Abbie said ... feed it to your other blogs.

I do as of this post ( don't know months from now but ) here it is ... click as scroll to the bottom https://frankjcasella.wordpress.com/

 

Mike Savad

8 Years Ago

i don't know if anyone reads them, but they add extra keywords for google to find you, and that's the only reason i make what i make.

---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

 

David Bridburg

8 Years Ago

Frank,

As a mod you have 232 followers in a matter of 2.5 years. That is a hard act to follow. Also many
folks who have dropped out are in that count, just like with my count. People come and go. So the
numbers are iffy.

You have mod interests, so using the FAA blog is part of your overall process. As you are saying
pretty much the same info is then put on your WP blog. What I like about your WP blog are
the links below the fold. All of those image links are very immediate to me at least. I very quickly
clicked on a link. Your work impresses me. Your avatar and profile shot on your blog do not match up,
go with the profile pic. JMO

Frank, do you pay for the WP blog?

Bryant, WE need to study the Pinterest relationship to blog activity. I would like your feedback on how it
works for you. I am not a writer and am behind you in the development of blogs. So please let me know
how it works for you.

Dave

 

Frank J Casella

8 Years Ago

You're right about the followers, Dave, many bookmark me as a mod .. .I'm sure once I'm done being a mod it will drop off. My WP.com blog is totally free ... including the subscriber email widget. Several who follow my email list end up following my blog, and the other way around.

 

David Bridburg

8 Years Ago

Frank,

Will that widget work with Mailchimp?

thanks for saying the word free, it just became so attractive. LOL

Dave

 

Frank J Casella

8 Years Ago

MailChimp has a widget for WordPress I just don't know if it will work with WP.com only WP.org. I think .... check your tools at MailChimp. WP.com comes with its own email subscriber widget and WP.org does not.

 

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