| As we all adjust to the new normal after having been sequestered in our homes, we're all finding alternate ways to make the most of our time.So let's ask ourselves: How can we use this time to get better? How can we be of service and use?
I know, without a doubt that great art is being created around the world at this very moment. Perhaps by you! Our entire team is focused 100% on whatever we can do to help you market and sell more art.
With that in mind, we're focusing FineArtViews on sales and marketing ideas more than ever before. The following article was selected from our archives as it seems quite timely in the current situation and provides ideas we think you can use to improve your own art marketing.
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In the same way that sound isn't music, traffic isn't audience. - Jason Fried [source]
I read this in my Twitter timeline a few days ago and, thought, "that's true", dutifully hit "Like" and moved on.
However, I haven't been able to stop thinking about this concept. For anyone trying to accomplish anything online, from eCommerce to affecting political change, this is a deeply important concept you must internalize and understand. Of course, this general idea is something I've been asking artists to understand for a long time.
But I've never expressed this idea as clearly and succinctly as Jason's Tweet and, I've learned, if you want someone to truly internalize an idea, being able to express it simply, clearly, and succinctly is the key.
Here's an example: When I was younger, like many, I hated flossing my teeth. So I often kinda went through the motions half-hardheartedly. One day I went to a new dentist. He asked me, "Do you floss your teeth?" I said, "Most of the time, I always get the ones in front, but sometimes skip a few in the back."
His one sentence reply instantly changed my thinking, and my behavior. And I've flossed carefully and completely, every single day, ever since.
He said, "That's OK, you only have to floss the ones you want to keep."
As the leading provider of professional artist websites, the most common question we are asked at FASO is "How do I drive traffic to my website?"
I understand why people ask this question, but it's misguided. What they really want to know is "How do I use my website to sell art?" Which requires something rather different than "driving traffic." And now we have the words to cut to the heart of the matter and explain this concept more clearly.
From now on my response will be something like:
You don't sell art by driving traffic. You sell art by building an audience. And in the same way that noise isn't music, driving traffic is not building an audience.
Hopefully, that response will cut deeply through commonly held misconceptions and, like my experience with the dentist, change artists' thinking and their behavior.
We want artists to let go of this notion of "driving traffic" and begin the real work of building an audience. Then, and only then, will they actually sell art.
Until next time, please remember that Fortune Favors the Bold Brush. | 