Welcome back! Once you’ve created some art, the next step is testing the waters and selling it! In this blog post I will talk about sharing your art on social media, a basic overview of pricing, and the importance of diversifying your income.

Setting up your social media accounts

The very first step is deciding what social media platforms you’d like to use, and then create accounts for your artwork. When doing this, it’s important to think about your target market, and where they usually spend their time. For me I focus on Instagram and Facebook, but there’s so many places to share your work like Tiktok, Threads, Pinterest and more. I think it’s best to focus on one or two platforms (at least to begin with) and start accounts that are dedicated to your artwork instead of using your personal social media. If you’re unsure which are right for you, you can register user names on all platforms, so you have them if you need them in future. Once you start posting, please don’t be discouraged if you don’t get a lot of interaction to begin with, as it takes a while to build an audience. Using social media is about the long game – think about your customers coming to your account in a years’ time and what you’d like them to see – lots of beautiful imagery of your works in progress, final art, information about your process, sharing what inspires you, etc. There’s endless social media advice online, so it’s worth checking out some Youtube videos and blogs on the topic, as well as also taking some time to learn how to make good social media content too (photography, reels, hashtags, videos, etc). There’s also really great marketing advice for creatives on the Biz Buds podcast, here. You’ll also benefit from following social media accounts that inspire you and/or share good advice (here’s one I follow on Instagram).

Although I’ve said above not to use your personal social media accounts, it is however recommended to share your face and a bit about who you are too though. Your audience will want to know the person behind the art, and it will create a better connection with them if they can see who’s creating it. You are your brand, and you can be the differentiator for setting your work apart from other artists. Don’t be afraid to show your process too, as behind-the-scenes content can be interesting for people to see, and give them a deeper appreciation of your art.

Selling on your social media accounts

Share your work online, and start offering pieces for sale – the sooner you begin, the more confident you’ll become, so it’s best to start doing this well before going full-time. It can take a lot of time (and money) to build a website, so using social media to begin selling work is a great start. By doing this you can see what sort of response you get, and most importantly, see what people buy. It sounds simple, but as an introvert, saying artworks were for sale was something that I found quite scary and personally needed to be persuaded into doing. Not everyone has someone ‘pushing’ them when they’re nervous about something, so please take this as my push to you to be brave and give it a go (do it!). Make sure your content is mostly informative or interesting posts, and only a small portion mention things are for sale, as it can be a bit of a turn-off if someone’s posts are too often ‘sales-ey’. Initially, just make sales by exchanging payment and contact details through DM or emails, until you’re busy enough to justify building an e-commerce website. My recommendation would be to sell your art for at least a year (on social media and then a website if that’s also possible) while still working either full or part-time at a regular paying job. This is so that you’re able to try lots of things out without fear of not being able to afford to live. Selling art can be seasonal too, so it’s best to see how your sales go up and down over the course of a year, and then use this information to forecast possible future income. In today’s economy (2023) things are a bit tough for everyone, so you may want to consider doing this for longer than a year if necessary, or until things start to pick up again.

Pricing your work

Don’t overthink the pricing too much to begin with, as it doesn’t need to be perfect on day one - you can (and should) adjust your pricing every year or so (or possibly more frequently to begin with), so it’s important not to let pricing your work stop you from starting to sell. Begin by using a spreadsheet to keep track of your cost of material, and hours spent creating, etc, to determine the absolute minimum amount you should charge. There’s a lot of factors that go into pricing, but a few key things to keep in mind are that a large amount of your overall time is going to be spent on admin and other business related tasks, so you need to be selling your art for a profit to be able to make a living from it. If you’re intending to sell in galleries, be sure to also allow for 40-45% commission, as well as postage and packaging costs to re-stock them, and some buffer for damaged artworks/prints (both in transit and in galleries). Also do some pricing research by looking at what other artists of a similar standard are charging in galleries, and look at some online resources to help you too. There’s a great podcast series on pricing art by NZ gallery owner Neville Parker here, along with some quick tips by renowned artist Carla Grace, here.

Diversify your income

It’s important to have a few income streams, and not just rely on one source. I started off with taking pet portrait commissions, which is a great way to have forward-booked work (just be sure to write out a basic agreement/contract and take a deposit to confirm each order!). I also create my own original artworks (often taking multiple months each), so I also started making limited edition prints*, which is a great way to get a more regular income, and this will also allow you to cater to different budgets too (ie. an A1 size original can be offered in 4 or 5 print sizes and therefore a very wide price range). I also diversified the way I sold these and promoted them, through social media, on my website and in a variety of local and national art galleries (and in my case, bird sanctuaries too). Many artists also sell at markets and art shows, so try different things and see what works for you. Some artists will sell exclusively through galleries and exhibitions, however this more traditional business model for artists is less common now. Depending on what your target market is and how you want to position your art/brand, you may want to diversify your product offering, with related goods such as clothing and other products which you can print your art on. The important thing to remember is that trying different offerings and sales channels is like everything else – you need to try what you think might work, review if it was successful (or looks like it will be successful), and then try something else if it isn’t. It can be expensive to enter art shows and markets, etc, so try one thing at a time, and also be sure to calculate beforehand how many sales you’ll need to make from a certain activity, so that you can check if you are likely to make a profit.
*Note on prints: if offering prints, you’ll need to decide whether to make them limited edition, open edition, or a mixture of both. If you’re selling limited edition prints, record all the artwork numbers on a spreadsheet, so you can keep track of what ones you’ve printed and sold, so that you know what edition numbers are still available. There are many pros and cons for each approach, so is a topic worth researching online. If you’re interested in limited editions, here’s a great short video (by Carla Grace) to get you started.

Summary

Just as you’ve spent years developing your art skills, learning how to set up and run an art business isn’t going to happen overnight. This is fine, and the important thing to remember is to just keep taking steps in the right direction, keep learning, keep trialling things, and embrace failures along the way as part of the necessary process to find out what works for you. Although there’s no ‘recipe’ for success, if you can establish a good social media presence and start selling your work at a suitable price, and then diversify your offerings and sales channels, you’ll give yourself the best chance of success.

I hope this blog has been helpful, and please leave a comment if you have any questions or feedback. Next week I’ll be expanding on the topic of transitioning into your art career, with some practical advice on how to make that work.