Social Networks Basics for Artists

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Cafe Philosphers
Social Network sites are one of the keys to being successful artist online. They give you the ability to directly communicate with others, not just potential customers but other artists from whom you can learn.

I’ve said it before, the key to selling your art online is marketing.  You should be spending half your “Art” time (or more) getting your art in front of people.  In the online world, one of the key ingredients to your marketing recipe is the Social Network.

I’m sure you’re familiar with at least a few of them, but there are MANY of them out there. For this article, I’m not going to talk about a particular social network.  Some social network sites are well known: Facebook, Twitter, Google+, etc..  However, what you may not know is that there are many web sites that you never thought about that are, in fact, social network sites.  You see, the online social network is what in the software engineering business we call an architecture, and it’s a common one that websites are built upon.   Pretty much any site where you have an account that you log into and where you can communicate with other account holders is built on the social network architecture.

For example, many of the POD sites, let you follow other artists, get a notification when they post new works, message them, and comment on or “favorite” their works.  This is exactly the same as you “Friending” people in Facebook, seeing their updates in your feed, texting them in Facebook messenger, and being able to comment or like your friends posts.   You’ll find this architecture everywhere, and there are some informal rules and tips you should know about this architecture for using it to your advantage to market your art.

Friending, Following, Subscribing to, etc

Key to the social network architecture is the ability to somehow associate yourself with other users.  Just about every network seems to have a different name for it, but the effect is pretty much the same: you get to follow that other user’s activity on the site, and possibly they get to follow yours.

Sometimes it is a two way connection where you request the association from another user and they must accept it.  The best example of this is “Friending” in Facebook.  Once this associate is made, you are able to see each others activity on the social network.

More commonly however, the connection is only one way.  You select another user on the network to follow.  You will receive updates of the other user’s activity, but they will not see yours. However, they will probably be notified that you are following them.  The best example of this is following someone on Twitter.

When it comes to marketing your art, you want as many such associations as you get.  These are your audience, the people you are marketing to.

Also, in the case of the one way connection, it is considered good etiquette when someone follows you, to follow them back (effectively making it a two way connection).  This is known as reciprocity.   In fact, you should keep this in mind to gain followers of your own.  Seek out people who you think will like your art on the network and follow them.  Often, they will follow your back.

Liking, Favoriting, Recommending, etc.

Another major aspect to Social networks is the ability to somehow indicate that you like or support another user’s activity.  Whenever someone posts some sort of entry, other users will have the option to express their support of that post by clicking on a link or icon, such as a “thumbs up”.  Generally, when one of your posts receives such a commendation you are notified.

The effects of these can be varied from site to site.  On some, they really don’t amount to much, but on others they may elevate the status of your post in some way, allow the “liker” quick access to return to your post, or even act as one of the one way connections mentioned in the above section.

As in the section above, reciprocity is good practice.  If someone endorses one of your posts, you should endorse one of theirs, assuming they have some.

Private Messaging

Most social networks allow you to send messages directly to another user.  These are like email in that only sender and recipient know the contents of the message.

Commenting

Most, but not all, social networks allow users to comment on one another’s activity.  Reciprocity can apply here as well.  If someone comments on one of your works, you might want to comment on one of theirs.   At the very least, you should thank people for their comments.  It’s good form and also gives you another opportunity to let them know that you exist.

One word of warning though about comments.  Everybody viewing your posts, including your potential customers, will be able to see them.  Immediately hide or delete any negative or critical comments (even if it is constructive criticism).  You don’t want any potential customers to see anything that gives them doubts about buying your work.  Also, it is bad form to make critical comments of others’ posts in such a public way.  If you want to offer constructive criticism to another user, send them a private message.

Re-posting

Another great feature of social networks is the ability to re-post another user’s posts.  If someone re-posts one of your works, their friends/followers will get to see it, and perhaps they to will re-post your work, and so on.  If you are lucky, this will set up a chain reaction of re-posting that will get large numbers of people to see your initial post in what is known as “going viral”.

Just as in following, commenting, and liking, here reciprocity is good etiquette. If someone re-posts one of yours, you re-post one of theirs.

Groups

One more major aspect of social networks you should be aware of is Groups.  These are where multiple users on the network can join a forum that caters to a particular subject.  These can be a marketing gold mine if you produce works that fall under the theme of the group.  Members of the group are expecting and looking for just your kind of art, so join the group and tell them about your work.  However, be an active member of the group, comment on others posts to the forum and participate in the discussions.  If you just post your art, and don’t do anything else, you will likely get banned from the group for spamming.

So it was a bit of a long article, but this is really stuff you need to know about Social Networks if you plan to use them in your marketing – AND YOU SHOULD.  In future posts, I’ll be going over actual examples, but I’ll refer back to this one as the foundation for it all.

Regards,
Daniel
P.S.

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