Your Press Releases Should Be Morphing into Informative Notes

Informative Notes

These used to be called “press releases” but that name no longer does the job as these releases don’t go only to the press. Thanks to the Internet you can now send them directly to clients and potential clients, bloggers, colleagues, other stakeholders. Oops, I almost forgot the omnipotent Facebook. These informative notes can actually be used as a sort of newsletter. (This comes under “creative re-use of content.”) So create and distribute approximately monthly “Informative notes” keeping people and the media informed as to what you’re up to. You don’t have to have big news; minor tidbits will do. Constant contact is the thing.

Your Main Website 2/4 — When Is a Blog Not a Blog?

Full disclosure: This post is also an unsolicited plug for WordPress.com which offers a wide range of free services (and some for pay). It's user friendly and works well. End of plug.

When It’s a Website

We’ve already decided you need a professional-looking website, right? Would you settle for a free one which offers dozens of professional-looking templates, a site you can build yourself following simple instructions and then update whenever you like?

If that sounds like a good deal–and I guarantee it is–you should consider creating your website on a blog platform. I’ve always used WordPress.com and like it a lot but there are lots of other options which you can Google.

Your Main Website 1/4

Getting Started with Your Own Site

You’ll need a professional website to function as the Mother Ship where you will link to all of your other “satellite” Web presences, and vice versa. This site should be light and bright and provide an attractive and welcoming atmosphere where visitors can access all of your content plus links to the rest of your online presences.

Unless you’re a web designer yourself you’ll need to pay someone to create this site for you. Don’t be tempted to ride piggyback on someone else’s domain, even though it’s free. A professional look is essential, as is your own domain, and an email account associated with it. Hotmail.com is not considered serious for business use. You’ll have to pay an Internet server to host these services but it’s not much money. Not only does your own professional site lend your business an air of credibility, but it’s a guarantee that your main Internet presence will always be there, while the free collective sites may come and go.

More on your main site in later posts. For now it’s important that you get started on it.

P.S. My favorite Web designer is Toby Stephenson at TRS Design. Toby lives between Granada and the U.K. He’s sharp and his price is right.

What’s a Gallinero? And why would you want to stay there?

Pinterest.com–Another Great Spot to Post Your Stuff

I just discovered Pinterest (I know, I’m late for everything…) and I think you’re going to find it fun and useful.  To me it feels like a community for people who like to make scrapbooks. In the old days this meant gathering together family photos or cutting photos and clippings from magazines and pasting them into albums. Today it means capturing images, text and videos off the Web–or off your hard disk; more about that later–and “pinning” them onto a “board” on Pinterest’s slick little application.

Swap It for Art!

Try It! It Might Just Work

As this blog unwinds you’ll hear me say ever more frequently: “Swap it for art.” This is because barter is a powerful and underused asset for an emerging artist. (If your daddy is rich or you just won the lottery you can stop reading here.)

At our house we have swapped art for oodles of goods and services over the years: eyeglasses, dental work, gynecology, floor tiles, a new roof on my studio, carpets and furniture, clothing, restaurant meals, art supplies, a beautiful Portuguese dinner service, veterinary services and a tax advisor. And years ago, when we were still breeding great danes, we swapped a painting with the owners of our local pet store for a year’s supply of dogfood. So we know it can be done, at least here in Spain, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it would work in your neighborhood, too.

There’s only one way to find out. Screw up your courage and have a go. The system works better at places where you’re already a client and have built up a personal relationship. It won’t work every time, but you’ll be surprised at how often it will. (If you do manage to barter for art and it works, let us know here in the Comment section.)

The other day I was riding in his car with Pepe Munoz, a young painter friend of ours who is currently busy organizing an artists’ cooperative in our town. “Nice car,” I said. “Yes,” he replied. “It’s great. I swapped it for paintings.”

What’s a Gallinero? And why would you want to stay there?

Your Gallery Pages

Get Your Stuff Out There Where People Can See It

One of the basic premises of this blog is that the more Internet exposure artists have the more successful they will be. This includes, of course, all of the galleries where you show your artwork, both online and off. A good place to be present with your work is the Saatchi Online gallery. Although you’re competing there with thousands of other artists the site receives millions of visits. It’s also free.

The photo-sharing sites like Flickr and dotPhoto (and dozens of other like them) might also be considered galleries, as they are ideal places to display your stuff. The same can be said for video sites like YouTube and Vimeo (and dozens more) that incorporate the miracles of sound and movement, and are also searchable. I think I’ve mentioned before that YouTube is the second-most-potent search engine on the Worldwide Web. No working artists can permit themselves the luxury of ignoring it.

Your Social Networking Pages

Go Forth and Multiply

The online social networks can also be useful in multiplying your presence on the Web. The secret here is to choose your networks carefully. Don’t try to cover too many, and keep your contributions on a professional level. Your business contacts aren’t interested in your sister-in-law’s gall bladder operation.

The two essential networks for a professional artist are Facebook and LinkedIn. Some artists will want to add Twitter. Of these LinkedIn, just one of the brain children of networking guru Seth Godin,  is usually considered the most serious, as it’s designed exclusively for business and professional use. We are all aware that the social media are loaded with irrelevant, banal content. In spite of the fact that Facebook is dominated by some of the least interesting people from your old school, its 800 million active users (see other statistics here) make it hard to ignore.

Improve Your Artwork

Would You Settle for a Mediocre Heart Surgeon?

If you’re a working artist–that is one who lives from his or her work–your first concern should be about quality. You have to sell your work in order to live, and to do that you have to be able to compete successfully. Yes, I know, everyone has to compete, but it’s more critical for artists and writers. Almost nobody objects to a run-of-the-mill taxi driver or electrician, but nobody wants to settle for a garden-variety artist or heart surgeon, or read a mediocre book. Art has to be genial. If it’s not, it’s not art. It’s something else for which we won’t struggle to find a name. You know what I’m talking about.

Your News Releases

News Releases are Less and More Important Than You Think

News releases have always been excellent vehicles for getting your news out and, curiously, today they’re both less important and more important than ever. They’re less important because, thanks to Internet, we no longer have to rely on the news-media roulette to publish our information second hand. And they’re more important precisely because Internet gives us a variety of free, direct platforms for getting our news releases out, notably the blogs, ezines and social networks.

Your Studio as Gallery

An Artist’s Studio as Gallery

Your studio should be your first gallery, so when you go looking for one to rent, make it the biggest one you can afford. Nothing attracts buyers and puts them under an artspell like an artist’s studio. So plan on having a couple of open-studio shows each year, as well as other events which will bring people together in your workspace: birthday parties, recitals, May Day celebrations… You get the picture and so will your visitors, once they’re inside you studio and under the influence of the works in progress and the perfume of paint, inks and solvents.