If you’re an aspiring artist, you’ve probably tried signing up with a big, popular art website so that you could sell art online. And why not, it’s easy and free in most cases. However, after a couple of months you realize that there are no sales coming your way and you start wondering if there any other methods you can use to sell your art online.

This may seem as a difficult thing for people who don’t have a lot of experience in selling products online, but it’s really not. Let me put it this way, it’s not difficult, but it’s not a piece of cake either. Once you learn a couple of things and get some experience, you will realize it’s not that big a deal and that anyone can sell their artwork online (if it’s any good).

Instead of just signing up to art dealing websites and waiting for stuff to happen, hoping collectors will magically find you, it’s better to start bringing potential clients straight to you. Besides being an established artist you will also have to be an entrepreneur, and this is something they don’t teach you in art school. Like it or not, you will also have to be a businessman if you want to sell your art and these are some simple ways you can do it.

Build a blog or website

In a modern art marketplace, each and every artist must have a web presence of their own. With a blog or website you will build credibility and give potential buyers more information on who you are, what your art stands for and help them decide to buy your art. Adding a basic shop to your blog or site, using one of the many simple shopping cart plugins, will make it easy for you to sell art pieces to people from all over the world.

This is why you must consider how wide your market should be. If you are looking to make out of town sales, you’ll have to include a return policy, payment options and shipping details. Make things clear to avoid any confusions that may lead to dissatisfied customers and returns.

Have your contact information such as telephone number, social media profiles and e-mail featured on a prominent position on your site. By having an art blog, it will also be much easier to market events or art shows at which you will exhibit your work.

Write better descriptions for your art

Both your website and others that offer your art pieces should include full product descriptions for each and every art piece you try to sell, as well as an artist statement and bio. These paragraphs should be easy to read and free of grammar, punctuation and spelling errors. Furthermore, your descriptions should be search engine friendly, so that they are more visible online. “Search engine optimization” is something you need to get familiar with, but the first step is using the right keywords to describe your work.

The best way to determine your keywords is to think of the words people will probably use when searching for a similar art piece. There are a number of great keyword research tools available, and these will help you find the best phrases to focus on. It’s best to use “long tail keywords”, i.e. phrases containing multiple words, which potential art buyers are likely to use to find what they are interested in.

Besides having a great benefit for online searches, your descriptions can also encourage people to make a purchase while browsing through the store, as it will give them more detailed information about your art. If your art includes handmade goods such as bags or gloves, you should also leave your personal mark and some information on the items themselves. It’s very important to label your work,  so that people can get familiar with your brand, and eventually become brand ambassadors.

Go social

Besides bringing in traffic through search engines, social networking is one of the best tool for increasing artwork online sales.

Facebook – As you may already know, Facebook is the largest and most popular social network in the whole world, and it has some great tools that can help you advertise to get local exposure. You can add people that may have interest in your art, join groups with art lovers or create events to invite people to your exhibits, sales etc. Additionally, you can pay to advertise your art to a specific audience based on their interests, location, gender and much more.

Pinterest – This is probably the best social network artists can use. Pinterest is designed in such fashion that it’s quite easy to “pin” photos of your art and make them visible by all your friends, bu by strangers as well. If someone likes what he or she sees they will re-pin your art and spread it even further. If you are looking to focus all of your energy on just one social network, let it be Pinterest, as it will give you the best results.

Price your art accordingly

When you start attracting buyers and raise the interest of your target audience, you’re only halfway through. To make the most out of your campaign, you will have to find the most competitive prices for your art. If it’s too high, people won’t buy from you, and if it’s too low you will lose a lot of money. If your art pieces are made out of expensive materials, your price should naturally go higher.

The size of a piece affect prices as well – the larger the goods, the higher the price. If your work takes a lot of time and is unique you should also raise prices higher. The market changes, and you should never set definite prices, as there are moments when you should consider product repricing. Try to learn as much as possible about this topic, follow trends that might affect prices and adjust them accordingly to make the most out of your sales as well.

To keep selling artwork online and making a living from it, you will have to establish yourself on the market. This will take time and effort, so find ways to motivate yourself and promote your brand at early stages. Buyers will come to you on their own after some time.

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