In the Art Marketing Minute Podcast, you’ll learn how to sell your art, how to market your paintings, and everything else you need to know in order to have a successful art career. Each episode answers questions from artists by host Eric Rhoads, author of “Make More Money Selling Your Art,” publisher of several art magazines and newsletters, and author of ArtMarketing.com.

In this Art Marketing Minute, Eric Rhoads explains what it means to “pay to play” and why you should avoid the practice; and the benefits of having an art agent and how to find one.

Listen to the Art Marketing Minute Podcast: Episode 25 >>>

Submit Your Art Marketing Question:

What questions do you have about selling your art? Email Eric today at [email protected] (include your name and where you’re from) to hear your question answered on an upcoming Art Marketing Minute Podcast.

FULL TRANSCRIPT of the Art Marketing Minute:
DISCLAIMER: The following is the output of a transcription from an audio recording of the Art Marketing Minute. Although the transcription is mostly correct, in some cases it is slightly inaccurate due to the recording and/or software transcription.

Announcer
This is the Art Marketing Minute with Eric Rhoads, author of the Amazon best selling book, “Make More Money Selling Your Art.” In the marketing minute we answer your questions to help your art career brought to you by artmarketing.com, the place to go to learn more about marketing. Now, here’s your host, arts magazine publisher, Eric Rhoads.

Eric Rhoads
In the marketing minute I try to answer your questions you can submit them by email, [email protected]. We’ve been getting a lot of them lately. Thank you for that. Here’s a question from Olivia in Jacksonville, Florida. Who asks, Can you You address pay to play? I’ve heard you mention it, but I’m not really sure exactly what it is. And is it something that could help me get my name out there more? Well, the term comes from a long, long time ago back in the 1950s. There was a practice in the music industry called payola. The record companies would pay DJs to put their songs on the radio. And of course, if they became hits, people would, you know, spend millions of dollars buying those records. So it turned out to be highly illegal and the government clamp down on it. And a lot of people went to jail, including a very famous DJ and there was also another very famous TV host who almost went to jail, but he escaped at that was Dick Clark. anyway. It’s now called pay to play and it happens in other industries. And anyway, it ended up being highly illegal. In the radio industry well pay to play you’re referring to is a little different. It’s not illegal, but some say it’s immoral or unethical. For instance, let’s say that you get a call from someone, and they say, I’m going to give you a story in my magazine, all you have to do is buy an ad. Well, that makes it a lot easier to sell ads. But and people do this all the time. The problem is, it’s not disclosed to the readers. And the readers often assume that you were selected because you deserved to be featured or selected. The problem lies in the fact that many times featured artists have the money but they don’t have the talent. So that means a lot of times, you get stories on artists who are really not deserving of a story, and that kind of deceives the reader. So eventually, the readers catch on to this, the magazine loses credibility and it just kind of backfires. now I own two art magazines, and I own a couple magazines in the radio and TV industry. We have a company wide policy, we refuse to do pay for play, though, it hurts because we do lose some ads to it. We want to be highly ethical. And so we will, you know, give press to our advertisers sometimes, but we won’t say buy an ad and get a story. That’s just not what we do. And we think it’s a deceptive practice. That’s why we don’t do it. And so we don’t want our readers to distrust us. We want our readers to trust us and we think it also can have legal implications. There was a proposed case I don’t think it ever went to court but a proposed case where a magazine had highlighted in artists who had paid them but they did not disclose that the the article had been paid for. And sometimes, you know, you’ll see an article and it says that the top advertorial well they didn’t do that. And most of them don’t do that. Well. The collector was someone who bought Based on recommendations of art magazines and he assumed that this artist was being recommended he wasn’t really somebody who collected it for the love of the art. So anyway, there was a pending case i don’t think it ever went anywhere but you know, there are people who buy based on articles thinking that something might grow in value, but the bigger issue for you as an artist is when people find out it feels a little sleazy a little slippery if people find out that you had an article, you know, let’s say you you send this article out to all your your list and your friends and your collectors and say look at me I had an article on on me in this magazine, and then they find out Well, you didn’t really get that article on your on your own you paid for it. I mean, on your merit, and it just makes you look a little bit slippery or dirty. And people always find out everything. you know our policy. See as everything you do needs to be willing to be put on the cover of The New York Times, because you want to make sure that you’re being totally upfront and ethical. So I just think that pay for play in the, and the idea of getting publicity is probably something that I would discourage. Now, I got to be totally frank with you. I don’t like it also, because, you know, we have competitors who do it. And that does take business away from time to time. But I quite frankly, I hear from collectors all the time who tell me, you know, I started to distrust this or that magazine because they do it. And quite frankly, to my knowledge, there’s only our magazines and one other that don’t do pay for play, and we refuse to do it because we don’t want to be dirty. We don’t want the artist to look dirty. We don’t want anybody to feel dirty. Your reputation as an artist is golden. You have to keep it golden. And though you know, we all desperately want publicity and we all desperately want to be noticed. There are things that you You need to be doing to make sure that you get it and deserve it. So we won’t do it in Plein Air or Fine Art connoisseur magazines. Anyway, there’s also a thing called pay for play in the gallery business. And that’s probably what you’re referring to, but it’s the same kind of thing. They’ll call you. And I hear from artists all the time, I got a call from New York, they want to do a show of my artwork in New York, and they only want several thousand dollars to do it. Well, these are galleries that are basically saying pay us and we’re going to give you wall space, we’re going to give you a show, and we will send a notice out to all of our collectors and you’ll have a New York show. I have not heard very many positive things about that. Now if there is somebody legitimate out there doing it, that’s doing it well, maybe but it kind of it kind of comes down to the same thing. Once people find out that you’re doing it that you paid for it, it feels dirty. That’s a lot different than going and renting a space. You know, you can do a pop up gallery, rent a space, promote it yourself. That’s a whole lot different. So pay for play in galleries I you know really really high quality good galleries My opinion is that they don’t ever take pay for play because they want the trust of their collectors and, and by the way you want to be in a place that’s going to get you in front of the right people, not just a bunch of people who are pretending to show up at a show to get a free drink and never going to buy your artwork. I have not heard artists tell me that in a pay for play gallery that they’ve really been successful selling artwork there. I’m sure there are examples of people who have but you know, the most important thing is learn how to generate publicity. Learn how to get stories. I talked a lot about this in my book, learn how to do these things properly. Don’t try to take shortcuts. Some areas you can take shortcuts but you don’t want to shortcut anything that makes you feel like you’re trying to game the system or trying to to be sleazy that sleazy isn’t good. So just be a little bit careful. You don’t want to do anything that hurts your credibility because people always find everything out. There are no secrets, especially in today’s world. It’s real, real sensitive, just strive to be the best you can be. Our next question comes from Samuel in Mystic, Connecticut, beautiful area. Samuel says, I know it’s common to work with galleries. But I’m curious how do I find an agent rather than a gallery to represent my art? And what is the value of an agent? What’s the benefit of one over the other? Well, finding an agent is quite frankly, the best way to do it is to ask around, I would talk to gallery owners and say which agents do you like dealing with which ones are effective which are successful, which are not? I talked to artists that have agents and do the same thing. You know, you can Google it, but you may or may not find out the quality. You always want to check out the quality by getting references. You know, I think that part of the problem Samuel is that the people who are already in galleries of the people most likely to get an agent, and they’re the ones who don’t necessarily need one. Now, I’m not saying agents are bad thing, agents are actually a good thing. And there’s tons of great agents out there. And there’s probably a few that are not so great. But the reason you want one is that they can help you make more money. Typically, an agent gets 10% of everything you sell, so they have incentive to get your prices up and to help you sell more and they’re going to get you into galleries that are going to sell the best. An agent plays a valuable role. And having one is a really good thing at the right time in your career, helping you bring success, but again, they’re really looking for people who are already successful and try to make them more successful try to get their prices up. So a good agent will find you a gallery they’ll find you buyers, they’ll give you good advice. They might get you into better galleries that you can’t get into on your own, and they will help you get those prices up typically, and help you build a collector base. And that’s good. And the advice is often fabulous in your career, they also can manage your career, and oftentimes your marketing. But if I were an agent, and I’ve had dozens of offers to pay me to be agents for people, I, I declined them because I stopped what I do. But I would only want artists I knew would sell would be easy for me to sell and artists who generate a lot of money. Let me give you an example. Let’s say you have an agent, and you’re selling your paintings for $2,000. While the gallery gets 50% of that at $1,000, you get $1,000. The agent gets 10% of what you get. So the agent gets $100 of that thousand dollars. So let’s say you sell 30 paintings a year. The agent only makes $3,000 on you, that’s 30 times that hundred dollars. commission quite frankly, it’s not worth it. But if they can get your prices to $20,000 now they’re going to make $30,000 on you. Now it’s worth it especially they have 10 artists, they’re going to make a lot of money real money. And of course good agents will get the price up. So agents clearly want people who are easier to sell. People who are well known, have big names, are desirable and easy to get into galleries. Now you have agents who will spot someone who has exceptional ability and maybe they’re newer and unknown and they will try to get you in because they really believe in you. So there are some of those but it’s riskier because their reputations on the line if they go in there and they say I’ve got this hot new artist and then you don’t sell they aren’t going to get into the gallery with the next hot artist is easily so they’re going to be really careful. And also remember all the hard work is done up front. You know an agent gets you into a gallery and you stay in that gallery for 10 years. You’re paying The agent 10% of every dollar that you make for that entire 10 years or 20 years or 30 years, and it’s worth it. But you might get to the point where you’re thinking, why am I paying them Now? What are they doing for me? Well, they did all the work up front for you. And you’ve got to respect that and think about it. But it’s really hard to write those checks at, you know, when you’ve been in a gallery for 10 years, and you’re thinking, Well, what are they doing for me now? Well, hopefully they’re doing things like getting you shows and giving you good advice. And that’s good. So that’s, that’s kind of the story on agents. Now, quite frankly, you can work extra hard and get into those galleries yourself, and work to raise your prices yourself. I talked a lot about that stuff in some of the things that I do, the books and videos and things So, but I like agents. I think if I were pursuing an art career, I am in one gallery. I don’t have time to produce enough paintings to pursue an art career. But if I were I would get the best agent I could get because I know they’re going to get my prices up and get me into some good galleries. Now, a reminder to you that I’m going to be teaching marketing three mornings in a row at the plein air convention this may in Denver, and also at the figurative art convention this October in Baltimore. So if you want to learn more about marketing, and there’s a lot of other resources available to you. Anyway, that’s the marketing minute. I hope it’s been helpful.

Well, this has been the art marketing minute with me. Eric Rhoads. My goal in life is to eliminate the idea of the starving artists to help your dreams actually come true. So if you want to submit questions, simply email [email protected]. And to learn more about marketing ideas, you can visit Artmarketing.com. Thanks for listening.

Remember to Submit Your Question: What questions do you have about selling your art? Email Eric today at [email protected] (include your name and where you’re from) to hear your question answered on an upcoming Art Marketing Minute Podcast.

In the Art Marketing Minute Podcast, you’ll learn how to sell your art, how to market your paintings, and everything else you need to know in order to have a successful art career. Each episode answers questions from artists by host Eric Rhoads, author of “Make More Money Selling Your Art,” publisher of several art magazines and newsletters, and author of ArtMarketing.com.

In this Art Marketing Minute, Eric Rhoads explains the best way to know your buyer / market / target audience, and how to stay motivated to focus on both painting and the business side of art.

Listen to the Art Marketing Minute Podcast: Episode 24 >>>

Submit Your Art Marketing Question:

What questions do you have about selling your art? Email Eric today at [email protected] (include your name and where you’re from) to hear your question answered on an upcoming Art Marketing Minute Podcast.

FULL TRANSCRIPT of the Art Marketing Minute:
DISCLAIMER: The following is the output of a transcription from an audio recording of the Art Marketing Minute. Although the transcription is mostly correct, in some cases it is slightly inaccurate due to the recording and/or software transcription.

Announcer 0:02
This is the Art Marketing Minute with Eric Rhoads, author of the Amazon best selling book, “Make More Money Selling Your Art.” In the marketing minute we answer your questions to help your art career brought to you by artmarketing.com, the place to go to learn more about marketing. Now, here’s your host, arts magazine publisher, Eric Rhoads.

Eric Rhoads 53:38
In the marketing minute I try to answer your marketing questions you can do you can touch on anything. There’s no limit. Just email them to me [email protected]. Here’s a question from Aaron in Chicago. By the way Chicago has an excellent plein air painters group Say hi to everybody there. Hi everybody in Chicago Aaron says, What’s the best way for me to know my buyer? You talked about it in one of your webinars, but how does that help me sell my art? And how do I get to know them? Well, Aaron, there’s a marketing foundational principle, foundational principles are big. This one says, You have to know your market. You have to know who your market is, who is your target audience, and what do they need most. And the best way to do that is to ask them. Now, selling art is a little bit different than selling shoes or selling any other product, but art tends to be a little bit subjective and have individual appeal. But yet, if you were to look at the demographics, most art is purchased by people between 40 and 60 years old and the majority between 50 and 60 years old. That tends to be where the money is, they’ve got they’ve got money at that time. You know, they’re Kids are starting to be out of college and and they will, they’re more interested in art than ever in their spending. But there are people, of course, all age groups. So 40 to 60 year old is broad, it’s a family reunion, but it still tends to be, what the buying where the buying takes place. And you also want to understand, and this is not trying to be sexist. And anyway, most art buying is heavily influenced by women, if there’s a couple, and that painting is going to hang in the house, and typically not always, that woman will maybe be the one who’s in charge of decorating, and may say, look that that paintings not hanging over my purple couch. So they do have influence. And of course, that’s not true of all kinds of couples, but it could be true and so get to know your audience. What I like to do is I like to understand who’s buying my paintings, and why they’re buying my paintings. And so if I get an opportunity, for instance, if I’m at the gallery during a show, somebody buys it, I’ll meet the buyers, I’ll try to learn a little bit about them. Where do they live? Where are they from? What kind of business are they in? What kind of jobs do they have? What kind of homes do they live into? They have vacation homes, you know, those things, give me clues. And then I also ask, you know, what is it about this painting that spoke to you? And And oftentimes, I’ll hear patterns and people say, Well, you know, I really like the colors. The one I hear a lot is it reminds me of XYZ, something nostalgic usually, you know, oftentimes, I’ll hear you know, that reminds me of where I grew up or reminds me of a place we lived when I was little. So look for those kinds of things, because those might give you clues on what to paint but also things that you can say because if you’re in a an opportunity to influence people do you can you can say, you know, does that painting remind you of anything like it, you know, place that you grew up or something like that. So, use those triggers. Also look for commonalities in the people who are buying things because it’ll tell you kind of where to reach out. I’ve noticed lately with my paintings, I’ve been getting a lot of buyers who are doctors, and those doctors all happen to live in the local community where my gallery is most of them. And so would that give me a clue as a marketing opportunity, maybe a way to, to reach doctors somehow or way to invite doctors, all the doctors in town to an opening or something just kind of use your brain. And those things those commonalities will point out things in your marketing.

The next question comes from Darla Hey, Darla! It’s kind of like saying hey, darlin, darlin Flagstaff, Arizona. Darla says, I know I have to be productive to sell my art, but sometimes I just don’t feel motivated. How can I stay focused on both painting and marketing? Well, you’re probably not going to want to hear this Starla there’s a lot of answers to it. And and I guess it really does. depends on what’s really important to you and what’s not. If it’s not about a need, you know, in other words of selling paintings is not meaning you’re going to have to pay the mortgage. It’s just extra money that you’re going to have, it probably isn’t important to you. And so I like to think in terms of goals and priorities. Let me give you an example. I set annual goals. I have three top annual goals. And then I have three tops for three top goals for each month. Some of those goals relate to the top three goals of the year, in terms of the projects that I have to do to reach those goals, and I have weekly goals and so until my top three goals are met for the week, I don’t leave the office, you know, I don’t push them off into the following week, because if I don’t get those done, I’m never going to get anything done. So every goal relates to the top goals now, if I’m not working on things that don’t reach my goals, it’s mostly coming pleat waste of time. Now there’s things you have to do. You got to take out the garbage, you know, you got to pick up the kids, you got to deal with, you know, health issues or whatever. But I try to keep most of my time focused on those goals, because it’s really easy to go, Well, I should do this project, or I’ve got this idea, those shiny objects will get in the way of your success. I know I’m the shiny object King Success Magazine even said that about me. And I’ve had to learn to overcome that because those shiny objects kind of get in the way of my success. And so if if it’s a financial thing, let’s say for instance, you know, you have to generate, I’m going to use this number because it’s easily divided. Let’s say, you know, you have to survive and you have to generate 120,000 a year, or you can’t survive and pay your mortgage and your bills. That has to be one of your goals. If your monthly goal will then be 12,000, right? Or 10,000 10,000 because you’re you got 12 months, so 10,000 and then you divide that by four weeks and you know, that’s 20 $500. And then you might even want to break that into a daily goal. And you just tell yourself, I’m not leaving here today till I figured out how to sell that. But it depends on how motivated you are daily goals keep me motivated. I know that I have to do certain things each day to survive, and that I don’t leave the office till they’re done sometimes means a long day. I also sometimes will break my week into a plan. So if I tell people, I think you ought to spend 20% of your time on marketing, so if you’re working five days a week, then you got to spend one day a week on your marketing or you got to spend so many hours a day on your marketing and pay attention to it and force yourself to do it. And sometimes that’s what it takes to be motivated. Now, there are days when I’d rather sleep in and not work, I’d rather not go to work. I’d rather play my guitar go painting or, you know, just chill, but I don’t do that very often because it always puts me further before I think routines are critical. And no matter what I stick to my routines, I get up every day at the same time. I get up, I feed my kids, I drive them to school, I go to the gym for an hour, I come home, I get ready for work. I meditate, I read the Bible, I do the things that I try to do every morning. And so gym is critical for me. Because it raises my dopamine levels it gets my health keeps my health good. But also it makes me feel like working. So if I’m in a down mood, if I can get myself to the gym, or at least to take a walk, it puts dopamine into my system makes me feel better. And that’s helpful. So look for a routine motivation is everything. Also ask yourself what happens if I don’t do this? And let’s say you don’t have to make that money, but you want something so everything can be tied to something. So let’s say you’re telling yourself Well, I don’t have to sell paintings because my wife or my husband has a job, but I’d like to get a new car and to be able to get a new car, I got to come up with $30,000 and to do $30,000 I gotta you know, I want to get one in three months. Well, okay, so now you got to do 10,000 a month, you got to get busy and you got to focus on that. So break everything down, start with a big goal, break it down into little bitty pieces. There’s also another trick that applies. And that is a trick that I use when I’m writing the old adage was if you can’t think of what you’re going to write, just sit down and start writing anything. It’s jibberish writing a note writing a letter anything and and that warms up your brain and next thing you know, you kick in and you’re able to write well, I I think that the same would be true for anything, you know, if you’re, if you’re not feeling like marketing, just force yourself to sit down and do your marketing, it will make a major difference because you’ll eventually just kind of kick in and then you’ll kind of forget you weren’t motivated. Anyway, I hope that helps. That’s been Marketing minute.

Well, this has been the art marketing minute with me. Eric Rhoads. My goal in life is to eliminate the idea of the starving artists to help your dreams actually come true. So if you want to submit questions, simply email [email protected]. And to learn more about marketing ideas, you can visit Artmarketing.com. Thanks for listening.

Remember to Submit Your Question: What questions do you have about selling your art? Email Eric today at [email protected] (include your name and where you’re from) to hear your question answered on an upcoming Art Marketing Minute Podcast.

In the Art Marketing Minute Podcast, you’ll learn how to sell your art, how to market your paintings, and everything else you need to know in order to have a successful art career. Each episode answers questions from artists by host Eric Rhoads, author of “Make More Money Selling Your Art,” publisher of several art magazines and newsletters, and author of ArtMarketing.com.

In this Art Marketing Minute, Eric Rhoads explains the best practices for selling art prints, and if it’s a good idea to give away your art for auction fundraisers.

Listen to the Art Marketing Minute Podcast: Episode 20 >>>

Submit Your Art Marketing Question:

What questions do you have about selling your art? Email Eric today at [email protected] (include your name and where you’re from) to hear your question answered on an upcoming Art Marketing Minute Podcast.

FULL TRANSCRIPT of the Art Marketing Minute:
DISCLAIMER: The following is the output of a transcription from an audio recording of the Art Marketing Minute. Although the transcription is mostly correct, in some cases it is slightly inaccurate due to the recording and/or software transcription.

Announcer 0:02
This is the Art Marketing Minute with Eric Rhoads, author of the Amazon best selling book, “Make More Money Selling Your Art.” In the marketing minute we answer your questions to help your art career brought to you by artmarketing.com, the place to go to learn more about marketing. Now, here’s your host, arts magazine publisher, Eric Rhoads.

Eric Rhoads 0:02
Thank you Jim Kipping. And thank you for joining us today. My goal is to eliminate the idea of the starving artists. So let’s get right to today’s questions. Here’s a question from Sam in South Dakota actually has two questions. Sam says I’m considering selling my prints of my work. What are the best practices in selling my prints? Well, I think the print market is a great way to multiply yourself and get money out of something you’ve already painted. First, you want to make sure that you reserve all the rights in case the painting was sold. You want to make it legally known that you own the reproduction rights. This is a copyright discussion you have with your attorney. Secondly, the print market has a little bit of a stigma less so these days, but some galleries don’t want to carry artists who sell prints. others see the value and want to sell prints. So you’ve got to kind of work that out. If you have a gallery, you got to figure it out with them. You can have different kinds of prints. Of course, you can have a canvas print called a cheek play. You can have a print on paper, and there’s a lot of different variations you can offer framed, unframed, etc. But of course, if you don’t have a gallery, you don’t need to discuss that you sell it on your website, a lot of artists do it and a lot of them make a little bit of money. Some of them make a lot of money, and you probably want to do limited additions to make them a little bit more special signed, limited editions numbered. I think the old stigmas going away but you do want to make sure that you don’t flood the market. You want to make sure that if you do have a gallery that they’re on board, the other thing is you might license your painting sir companies who sell prints and give you a commission they do a lot of volume so your commission won’t be as high but they will sell Thousands and you’ll probably get a decent check and your work will be out there. That’s pretty cool too.

Eric Rhoads 2:04
Sam had another question. He says I’m giving away my artwork for art auction fundraisers. Is this a good idea? I think it’s a great idea, Sam. But I think you need to have strings. Now you may have a charity that you really, really love. You really want to help and you don’t want to have any strings. That’s okay. But I would do you know, six or eight charity auctions a year, maybe more in your local town because charity auctions tend to attract who affluent customers and who do you want affluent customers. So you can brand yourself very well with these things. So I’m all for helping a charity but you may want to consider what you can get in return for the investment you’re making. So I have an in depth piece about this on my blog at artmarketing.com. And I talked a lot about it in my art marketing in a box product. But here’s the essence of it. You can kind of say to them, Look, I’ll give you this $3,000 painting, but in order to do so I need something in return because typically it takes Training isn’t tax deductible for value, I can only deduct my materials that may have changed. Check that with your bookkeeper or accountant. But you say, Look, I’m willing to, to donate this painting for you. But in exchange, would you be willing to make a make the painting a featured item on your marketing for your mailers in your website using my image image of the painting my name, the name of the painting, but you mentioned my name on stage as a major donor or introduced me publicly, in front of everybody do something special? Will you share the names with me of all the people you marketed to so that I can follow up with them and maybe send them my newsletter or something, of course, I would get your approval on anything I sent. And I of course needed a ticket for to to the event and that special introduction on stage. And also, I’d like to get a list of all the people that bid on my piece. So I can of course, purchase them about other paintings on an ongoing basis. And again, I’ll be tasteful about it. But you’re first off a $3,000 gift is usually a pretty substantial gift or a painting is considered a premium. And most charity auctions don’t have a lot of premium. Sometimes they do. So look for a way to get premium recognition and maybe some signage, you know, maybe a big sign next year thing with your picture on it. So that’s the kind of thing you want to try and do. And I do this when I do charity auctions, whenever possible. Once in a while I’ll donate one to somebody I really like and don’t need all of that, but that’s just a good way to get a little more out of it. Well, this has been the art marketing minute with me. Eric Rhoads. My goal in life is to eliminate the idea of the starving artist and to help your dreams actually come true. So if you want to submit questions, simply email [email protected]. And to learn more about marketing ideas, you can visit Artmarketing.com Thanks for listening.

Remember to Submit Your Question: What questions do you have about selling your art? Email Eric today at [email protected] (include your name and where you’re from) to hear your question answered on an upcoming Art Marketing Minute Podcast.

In the Art Marketing Minute Podcast, you’ll learn how to sell your art, how to market your paintings, and everything else you need to know in order to have a successful art career. Each episode answers questions from artists by host Eric Rhoads, author of “Make More Money Selling Your Art,” publisher of several art magazines and newsletters, and author of ArtMarketing.com.

In this Art Marketing Minute with Eric Rhoads, learn how to get a good price for your paintings even if you live in a “bargain” town, and why it’s worth your time to set up at small art shows.

Listen to the Art Marketing Minute Podcast: Episode 19 >>>

Submit Your Art Marketing Question:

What questions do you have about selling your art? Email Eric today at [email protected] (include your name and where you’re from) to hear your question answered on an upcoming Art Marketing Minute Podcast.

FULL TRANSCRIPT of the Art Marketing Minute:
DISCLAIMER: The following is the output of a transcription from an audio recording of the Art Marketing Minute. Although the transcription is mostly correct, in some cases it is slightly inaccurate due to the recording and/or software transcription.

Announcer 0:02
This is the Art Marketing Minute with Eric Rhoads, author of the Amazon best selling book, “Make More Money Selling Your Art.” In the marketing minute we answer your questions to help your art career brought to you by artmarketing.com, the place to go to learn more about marketing. Now, here’s your host, arts magazine publisher, Eric Rhoads.

Eric Rhoads 0:23
Thank you Jim Kipping. And thank you for joining us today. My goal is to eliminate the idea of the starving artists. So let’s get right to today’s questions.

Eric Rhoads 0:35
Here’s a question from an anonymous listener who says I live in a market with a Walmart mentality. How can I get a decent price on my paintings? If everyone is looking for a bargain? Well, there’s several answers to this question. Tony. First, every town has a Walmart mentality. There’s a certain percentage of every town that is looking for a bargain. We’re all looking for bargains, let’s admit it, but there are fluent towns, and there are Walmart mentalities and even affluent town. So for those who are shopping at Walmart, I have a saying, stand in the river where the money is flowing. Most towns, there are affluent neighborhoods with doctors, lawyers, business people, business owners, somebody owns all those businesses in that town. And they live in good neighborhoods, typically they have places they go like country clubs and social clubs, and maybe that doesn’t exist in your town, but it does, in most even a lot of small towns. So you need to work where the money is flowing. Go where the money is flowing, stand in the river where the money is flowing. Secondly, if the money isn’t flowing in your town, don’t waste your time. Go where the money is flowing your choices, either discounting your paintings, and if you don’t feel like you’re getting the price that they’re worth, and you need to get the money they’re worth. Then go to a place where you can get your worth that’s trying to get into a gallery In a town where you can get your price. Also, money flows to known brands, no matter who you are, if you’re not known, it’s hard to get your price. You’d be surprised how much more price you can get, even from people looking for a bargain if they know who you are, they know about you, they think about you. Fourth, I think every artist needs a dual strategy meaning a local strategy and a national strategy as a hedge against problems. So I grew up in a small town in Indiana, and there was an affluent community there. But you know, the the main manufacturer in our town all of a sudden left, and it was employing most of the people and it really put the town in difficult times for about 20 years until it got its act together. If all of your businesses in one place and something like that happens, you’re gonna have a problem. So have a local strategy and then have a national strategy as a hedge against problems. You might also consider a regional strategy right? So like maybe another town nearby or maybe Other town in your state is a really good place for you to be selling and building your brand. If it’s not in your town, it doesn’t have to be in your town, you just have to figure out how to sell paintings. So this is a good way to give you people who are buyers on a national level who collect paintings who are going to be reading magazines like plein air magazine, or Fine Art connoisseur. Or you might, you know, you might target them in other ways. Also, usually when people tell me there’s no money in their town, I tell them, it’s there, you just have to find it. You got to hang with the right people. You got to remember that you may not be hanging with the same people who are you’re going to you’re going to be your clients. You know, if you’re struggling financially, if you didn’t grow up in a fluent neighborhood. That doesn’t mean it’s not out there. There are wealthy people everywhere. Even in small farm towns. I mean, sometimes there’s a wealthy farmer, you know, you just never know who’s going to buy a painting and put it on their wall. So you just got to find out where they are. You got to spend time around them. You got to brand yourself around and we got to get exposed around them and do the best you can because there are people who love and buy art you can build a list of those people locally, regionally, nationally, etc.

Eric Rhoads 4:10
Next question is from Jeremy. Jeremy says, I’m new to the market and I’m just starting to sell my art at library shows and shows where I can’t sell something worth my time. Well, I think it depends on what you consider a waste of time is building awareness of your name, your brand, in your community, a waste of time, is having your name and places where people can see and fall in love with your artwork, a waste of time. You know, when you’re starting out as an artist, you need to do anything and everything you can to sell finished works or to expose finished works. And it’s definitely worth your time for the learning experience of mounting a show and getting used to doing that kind of thing because you’re going to do it your whole career. And you’re going to learn something by talking to people at the show if you have an opening You get a chance to talk to people, you get a chance to practice talking to people about why you painted tell your story. You know, talk about your art, find out what their needs are, learn and engage people and start conversations around your artwork. And the better you get at doing that, the better you’re going to have throughout your entire career, you’re going to be connecting your artwork with potential collectors. And just because they say you can’t sell at the library show doesn’t mean you can’t sell. You know, if somebody says, Hey, can I buy this painting? Are you gonna say no, you’re gonna say, Here’s my card, contact me and we’ll work something out. And also, it’s a great way for you to build your list, you know, put a thing in there when everybody comes to visit the show, ask them to write down their name and their email address. And happily send your, your newsletter to them. And of course, you can, you can find other ways to get names, you know, exchange business cards, and so on while you’re there, but I think everything is worthwhile. Everything’s a learning experience. And no, maybe you’re not going to Sell direct right away. But I think you want to kind of get in the habit of learning how this process goes, it’s gonna help you a lot. also build lists, build brands and get publicity. You know, could you get your, your name in the local media, local websites, local newspapers, etc. for doing this show? Can you get pictures of your stuff out there? It’s going to drive people to your website. Don’t forget about that.

Eric Rhoads 6:21
Well, this has been the art marketing minute with me. Eric Rhoads. My goal in life is to eliminate the idea of the starving artist and to help your dreams actually come true. So if you want to submit questions, simply email Ericartmarketing.com. And to learn more about marketing ideas, you can visit Art marketing.com Thanks for listening.

Remember to Submit Your Question: What questions do you have about selling your art? Email Eric today at [email protected] (include your name and where you’re from) to hear your question answered on an upcoming Art Marketing Minute Podcast.

In the Art Marketing Minute Podcast, you’ll learn how to sell your art, how to market your paintings, and everything else you need to know in order to have a successful art career. Each episode answers questions from artists by host Eric Rhoads, author of “Make More Money Selling Your Art,” publisher of several art magazines and newsletters, and author of ArtMarketing.com.

In this Art Marketing Minute, Eric Rhoads shares advice on focusing on one medium and style versus several, and how to develop a small town’s market for art.

Listen to the Art Marketing Minute Podcast: Episode 17 >>>

Submit Your Art Marketing Question:

What questions do you have about selling your art? Email Eric today at [email protected] (include your name and where you’re from) to hear your question answered on an upcoming Art Marketing Minute Podcast.

FULL TRANSCRIPT of the Art Marketing Minute:
DISCLAIMER: The following is the output of a transcription from an audio recording of the Art Marketing Minute. Although the transcription is mostly correct, in some cases it is slightly inaccurate due to the recording and/or software transcription.

Announcer 0:02
This is the Art Marketing Minute with Eric Rhoads, author of the Amazon best selling book, “Make More Money Selling Your Art.” In the marketing minute we answer your questions to help your art career brought to you by artmarketing.com, the place to go to learn more about marketing. Now, here’s your host, arts magazine publisher, Eric Rhoads.

Eric Rhoads 0:23
Thank you Jim Kipping. And thank you for joining us today. My goal is to eliminate the idea of the starving artists. So let’s get right to today’s questions. Here’s a question from Lydia Fellard of Poway, California, Lydia says I like urban sketching, watercolor and sometimes oil. Do you think I should concentrate on one medium to get excellent at one style and one medium? I think if you’re asking the question, you’ve already answered the question. I first off, I can tell you that I love to dabble in a lot of things. So I did I dabble in watercolor. I do. soil, I play with pastels and do it a little bit of sculpture, you know, it’s, it’s fun, I also do a lot of drawing. But in terms of what I’m presenting to my gallery, if this is about selling artwork, I’m trying to establish myself as an oil painter. And that’s what I want to be known as. And so I think that excellence in whatever you’re doing comes first. So master something get really good at it. It doesn’t happen overnight. So even though you may want to continue to do urban sketching, or watercolor oil, pick one of those things that is your thing that you become known for. Because you don’t necessarily want to confuse the audience. Now you will have artists like Susan Nicholas Gephardt who just mentioned that she does pastel she does oil, and she doesn’t both really, really well. And so she’s able to kind of walk that line but you just got to be ready to know what you’re capable of. You also want to make sure that you kind of get known for whatever whatever it is. Do you want to get known for you know, that could be portraits. It could be landscapes, it could be a certain type of landscape. But you don’t want to confuse the market too much when you’re first getting established. As you’re more established, it’s probably okay a little bit, but I remember a story about a lady who contacted me and she was advertising her portraits. But when you went to her website, all you saw were her landscapes and you had to really dig deep for the portraits, it just didn’t make a lot of sense. So you want to just make sure that you’re congruent. A lot of artists are doing multiple mediums. Some of them are selling well in both or three, but pick something that you can be really good at and get known for collectors and galleries look for excellence and consistency and you don’t want to confuse them. Right.

Eric Rhoads 2:46
Okay. Next question is from Robert ward of Cape Girardeau, Missouri. How do you develop a small towns market for art? Small Town, his town has 35,000 people well You know, a lot of people don’t know about art. Art is an education process. You know, there are a lot of people that I’ve helped turn into collectors just by exposing them to art. And a lot of people who pick up art magazines have become art collectors. So I think the idea is just get your art out there, you know, wherever you possibly can, there are people who are going to see it, they’re going to like it. And you know, so it might be an exhibit at a local gallery, it might be an exhibit in a local restaurant. I think the idea is you want to get people thinking about art. If you want to develop a market for art, then you probably want it to be more than you. You want to develop a little artists community, maybe figure out how to put together a bunch of artists and get get your own little gallery together so that you can put your work out there together, make sure the quality is high and then look for options for local art shows, art in the libraries of public institutions to showcase these artists because of the more Even though it seems counterintuitive, the more people are interested in art, you know, they’re not all gonna love your art but they might love somebody else’s are but you want to get people thinking about and learning about and growing and developing art and of course, anything you can do to work with a local community. I spend my summers near Saranac Lake New York and they’ve done a great job in the arts community by developing a little local gallery. They’ve developed a little Community Arts program. They’re doing a lot of our planning our events once a year and things like that. And so this is a way that you develop the community, get the community thinking about the arts, turn your area into an art destination, so people who maybe I don’t know how far you are from another bigger city, but maybe people will come to Cape Girardeau from Chicago to see the art there. You know, and so, look for ways to work with the merchant associations, local Chamber of Commerce do events that can be showcased in an effective way to develop your market All right, said help. You know, there are a lot of people even in a town of 35,000, people who can comfortably afford to buy art and so get to know the people, local business owners, local doctors, maybe put your art in the hospitals, you know, there’s a lot of things, a lot of ways to establish yourself and get out there. Social media gives you the opportunity to target locally and you can also, if there are a little local magazines, a local community magazine or something, you can get your art in there and start getting people thinking about it. You know, they got to see it. They got to think about it before they buy it.

Eric Rhoads 5:31
Well, this has been the art marketing minute with me. Eric Rhoads. My goal in life is to eliminate the idea of the starving artist and to help your dreams actually come true. So if you want to submit questions, simply email [email protected]. And to learn more about marketing ideas, you can visit Artmarketing.com Thanks for listening.

Remember to Submit Your Question: What questions do you have about selling your art? Email Eric today at [email protected] (include your name and where you’re from) to hear your question answered on an upcoming Art Marketing Minute Podcast.