Art marketing is an essential part of being an artist. From creating a killer website to social media best practices, you have to put a lot of effort into showing people what you can do and why you deserve payback.

Contrary to most inexperienced beliefs, promoting your art isn’t just a simple case of “Here my art – please buy it -you will love it”. There’s much more to it than that. But you know this already.

The problem is that once you’ve scratched the surface of how to market your art, you can often find yourself, kind of, well, overwhelmed. That’s why we stick it all together here in one handy small post to help you make the most of the world around you and market your creations successfully.

Establish your artistic goals

Just because you’ve already made a name for yourself as an artist doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ve established your goals.

Think about your deepest needs, what you want to achieve. Beyond financial health. Do you want to share your art styles? Or do you plan to improve your creative skills?

Write down specific things you want to achieve or improve upon, like watercolour painting, portrait painting, colour mixing, digital art or perspective drawing. Whatever it is – write them down. This gesture, believe it or not, makes them more real, and as a result, you are more likely to put them into action.

One of the best ways to keep yourself responsible for your dreams is by keeping a record of your progress. By doing so, you will be more motivated and more eager to reach your goals. The more intention you have behind your goals, the further you will progress.

Start art marketing with a stellar online portfolio

Creating an online portfolio is a crucial first step in successful art marketing. Whether you are applying for a project, networking with a new contact or submitting your work for an art competition, you must have a place where you can direct people to see your best work.

It doesn’t matter what type of art you are marketing: if you want your efforts to be seen, an online portfolio is a must.

Get to know your marketplace

We define “art marketplace” as the place where your work can be displayed in the public eye. These are three very important, distinct groups:

Public exhibition spaces-Such as museums, public art galleries, competitions.

Commercial gallery spaces – Such as local or international framing galleries

Direct access spaces – Such as your studio, art fairs and your website.

The more you learn about your marketplace, the better off you will be when planning your work and marketing strategy.

Get to know your audience

Do you know who your best clients are likely to be?

What type of audience will become some of your greatest and most raving fans? It’s a particular gender, age group, class, or race?

Does your audience have particular interests, such as gardening, bright colours, wildlife, human interest stories?

The more you know about your audience, the easier it will be to connect with them and market to them. Imagine your ideal customer, what they love, and why they are attracted to your art.

Create a unique website and a logo

Save yourself time and effort and use an online portfolio platform to build your website. Choose a template and layout that are attractive and easy to navigate; when it comes to art marketing, you want something that echoes your brand and immerses the audience is in your digital endeavours.

A logo should not miss from your website either. Whether it is something modest like your signature or a full-on logo with bells and whistles, you need something that screams talent. Something that you easily attach to your persona, your art and yourself.

The only thing here is that a logo must be unique. Something that’s immediately recognizable as yours.

Share quality content

To market anything online, including your beautiful creations, you need to sell your brand. That means you need to share written content about the store, collection and product descriptions that will bring people closer to you.

Writing product descriptions may seem tedious for a visual artist, who obviously isn’t a writer. The point is that engaging with your audience is critical in marketing, and if you don’t have the means nor the knowledge to do so, you can outsource all of your marketing needs. Specialized virtual marketing assistant services like Viralent help artists drive traffic to their stores by creating impactful content for websites, social media posts, emails, newsletters and more.

Join artists organizations

Besides offering plenty of networking opportunities, these organizations often provide resources, workshops, artists promotion, advocacy, and more. Sometimes artist help can be difficult to find. However, these organizations provide backing for artists, so they can spend less time focused on the non-artistical aspects of their craft and more on the craft itself. Artist organizations provide support to professional artists who would otherwise spend time funding or marketing their efforts.

Place your art in a TV or Movie project

Some artists make a living creating artwork that appears in TV shows or movies. This can be anything from an artwork that will be hanging in the background to a business logo or a shopfront.

If you manage to get your art into a movie or TV show, this will bring a lot of eyes to your work and your name. You can do that by contacting local production agencies or local film and TV students for collaboration.

Paid advertising

Paid advertising doesn’t necessarily need to be on socials like Facebook, although that’s where the most curious eyes live. Look into Google or Bing ads. This will ensure your art is displayed at the top of search results.

No matter how much we say, it doesn’t just need to be on social channels, that one is certainly worth considering. Your socials and most websites operate with what we know as cookies. These cookies make sure that the advertising and information that you’re shown is relevant to you. That, however, is an advantageous feature in marketing that most early-stage artists fail to see.