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There are three key ingredients that will build a long-term successful art business – planning, marketing and creating. In this post, you will discover how to start an art business in 9 steps.
Start An Art Business In 9 Steps
Starting an online art gallery will be the first step you will take after you have decided to sell art online.
Designing a professional website is easy and affordable with platforms like BlueHost.
The hard work will come after you have created and launched your beautiful artist website.
Building a long-term successful art business takes a great deal of energy.
There will be long hours and emotional ups and downs. Anyone who tells you otherwise is lying to you.
If you are seeking instant gratification, starting an art business might not be in your best interest.
However, if you are willing to put everything into your passion you will be able to achieve your goals.
“To be successful, you have to have your heart in your business, and your business in your heart.”
~ Sr. Tomas Watson
How To Start An Art Business In 9 Steps
- Create art
- Find your niche
- Create a mission statement
- Create a business plan
- Design a marketing plan
- Create an online presence
- Create an editorial calendar
- Take care of your customers
- Believe in yourself and your artwork
Create Art
This is an obvious step but does need to be mentioned.
You will want to have enough art available to promote at any given time.
The more the better.
While you are promoting and selling your artwork you want to schedule studio time during the week to create new artwork.
It is important to produce art even when you feel less than creative.
You can not sell something that does not exist.
Try to find different ways to keep yourself motivated even during tough times.
Tips to help you stay motivated:
- Have your goals, mission statement and vision statement where you can see them every day.
- Read art blogs.
- Look at other art.
- Force yourself to create even when you feel less than creative.
- Join Facebook artist groups.
- Become an art collector.
- Take local art classes or online art classes
- Read how to paint or how to draw eBooks
- Subscribe to art magazines
Find Your Niche
It is important to know what your niche is so you will be able to promote your artwork to people who are interested in what you have to offer.
The people who have a passion for your artistic style are known as your target audience.
You do not want to waste your time targeting and promoting to people who have no interest in what type of art you create.
For example, if you paint “horses” your niche would be “horses”.
Promoting to people who have an interest in horses will greatly increase the chance of you landing a sale.
What do you think the quality of the food will be if you went to a restaurant that had 100 different entries on their menu?
How can a chief be a master of 100 different entries?
It is crucial for the growth of your art business to identify your niche.
Aim to be known as an expert in your niche.
Create A Mission Statement
A mission statement will help you stay focused on what is important for your business.
It will be easy for you to derail and lose focus on your vision as your art business starts to grow.
There will be times when you might find yourself saying, "I should start painting different subjects or use a different medium."
Thinking like this will slow down the growth of your business. I know because I have fallen victim to this.
Stay true to who you are and the message you would like to share.
Writing a mission statement will keep you focused and motivated to work towards your vision and goals.
Create A Business Plan
Set goals for your business. Ask yourself where you would like to be in ten years, five years, and one year.
Research the logistics in the state that you live for running a business in your niche and product that you sell.
Talk to your accountant for information that you will need for your bookkeeping.
Decide on how much income will you need to generate in the beginning.
Your art marketing plan will be the foundation of your art business.
If you do not have a strong foundation, your business will crumble.
Design An Art Marketing Plan
A marketing plan outlines advertising and marketing strategies.
Think of a marketing plan as a to-do list.
- What strategies are you going to implement to reach your goals?
- How much revenue do you need to generate?
- Are you going to sell your art at craft shows, in galleries, or online?
- How mediums are you going to use to build brand awareness?
- How much time can you devote to blogging and posting on social media networks?
Related Post: How to Write an Artist Marketing Plan That Works
Create An Online Presence
Selling is easier than you might think.
All you need is a product or service that people want.
A way to let people know the product or service is available for sale and a place where they can purchase the product.
It is really that simple.
I have even better news to share with you. It is easier to build brand awareness now than ever before.
You have the internet at your fingertips.
You have the potential to reach over 4 billion active internet users around the world.
Develop a strategy to build an online presence and start showcasing your art to your target audience.
A notable example of two artists who built a successful online presence would be Melanie and Nicholas Beall.
I stumbled on Melanie and Nicholas's website by simply doing a search on Google for “original horse oil paintings”.
Ranking number one in the search results was Melanie and Nicholas Beall’s artist website Melanie & Nicholas Horse Paintings by Commission.
Melanie and Nicholas's site does not rank first in Google’s search results by accident.
They have spent a tremendous amount of time and energy on their website and blog.
The work they have done has helped them to outrank 1,300,000 results.
There are a couple of points I would like to mention about their site.
Melanie and Nicholas have done a wonderful job making their site easy to navigate and find detailed information about their services and procedures.
The other point I would like to highlight is their daily artist blog.
They understand the importance of creating content that will attract their target audience.
Ranking number one in Google's search is proof that they have become masters at building an online presence.
I am sure that if you visit Melanie & Nicholas Horse Paintings by Commission you will be inspired and motivated to learn more about digital marketing.
Related Post: 4 Ways to Expand Your Online Presence - Art Marketing
Create An Editorial Calendar
Create an editorial calendar for your artist blog.
If you have done any research concerning marketing, you have probably heard the phrase "content marketing".
Joe Pulizzi the founder of CMI is a master of content marketing.
Joe describes content marketing as:
Content marketing is a strategic marketing approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly defined audience — and, ultimately, to drive profitable customer action.
Take the time to learn everything you can about content marketing.
Artists like Melanie and Nicholas have become successful because of their willingness to learn about content marketing.
You can become as successful as they are as long as you are willing to put in the time and effort.
Creating an editorial calendar will help to keep you focused on your mission.
The calendar will make it easy to review what you have already published and what you should be writing in the future.
Related Post: How to Write an Editorial Calendar That Will Generate Traffic
Take Care Of Your Customers
Everything above will be a waste of time if you do not take care of your customers.
Your customers will be the people paying your bills.
Give the best customer service that you can. Your business and reputation depend on them.
Related Post: How to Get Customers to Refer Your Art
Believe In Yourself And Your Art
There will be many emotional roller-coaster rides that you will be taking.
You will have great weeks and you will have slow weeks.
Work on creating more art and learning about online marketing during the slower weeks. Everything you do today will be rewarded in the future.
Believe in yourself and your artwork.
Work towards your goals every day.
Conclusion:
Successful art businesses start with art business plans.
It has been said that 50 percent of small businesses fail within the first 2 years.
The most common reason so many businesses failed was that they didn't have a plan.
This post will help you to develop a plan that will help you to succeed.
How To Start An Art Business In 9 Steps Overview:
- Create art
- Find your niche
- Create a mission statement
- Create a business plan
- Design a marketing plan
- Create an online presence
- Create an editorial calendar
- Take care of your customers
- Believe in yourself and your artwork
Now that you know how to start an art business online is time to take action and get started.
Popular Art Marketing And Sales Tutorials
Below are some of the most famous art marketing courses that will grow your online art business:
Most Popular – How to Make a Living Selling What You Make by Megan Auman
Most Popular – Build a Successful Creative Blog by April Bowles-Olin
How to Build a Business While Learning Your Craft by Megan Auman
Pinterest Marketing for Makers & Designers by Megan Auman
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Dave Nevue,
Thank you for the informative article. You have helped me see that I may have started out right but i still have a long way to go. The most important thing i learned from your article is what you did not speak to specifically, the time spent doing everything you say most be done. i have started an art business many times in the past but floundered each time at one given point or another. After many years I now see that there is no place along the way at which I can say “I did it!” It will evermore be “What is next?” again and again.
Thank you, David and I am happy to hear that you got some value from this post. The exciting part of selling art online is discovering that you have implemented a strategy that shows growth but after that excitement has worn off it is back to the drawing board to implement a different strategy that will produce even more positive results.
Best wishes on your success!
Dave