Selling Art Online With Your Artist Website

Mermaid by Kyla Art (2010)

As the internet has advanced to be as it is now, an integral resource for consumers of all kinds, more and more artists are recognizing the value of having an artist website to start selling art online. However, the process is a lot more complicated than simply putting up a website with your pictures, pricing and your contact details in the hope that it will immediately start selling art online.

In order for your website to be successful in selling art online you need to understand the key components that will ensure internet browsers will find your site, stay to learn more about you and your art and keep coming back to visit your artist website. A lot of it is about good simple website design and well written information taking into consideration things like keywords, meta tags and search engine optimization.

Now if you’re an artist you most likely won’t be interested in learning all about HTML code, search engine optimization and keywords. I understand that what you’re really interested in is how you can be selling art online in the quickest and easiest way. This is why I’ve written this article, to help fellow artists with setting up their own website and optimize for selling art online.

Keep the design and layout of your site simple

There’s nothing worse than going to a site that isn’t immediately clear how to best navigate the information contained. For selling art online it is ideal to have the following pages:

• About the artist – with artist statement and influences behind your work
• Full portfolio – containing all current and previous work that are relevant to the work you’re selling
• Upcoming/Work in progress – buyers interested in your work like to see what work you have in the pipeline and the processes with which you create your work.
• Gallery/Sales – where people can easily purchase your work
• Contact – with your contact details or an inquiry form for people to get in touch

These 5 pages are the optimal number to keep your visitors interested as well as to keep your site popular with search engines. The best ways in which you can help your viewers to navigate your site is by having a simple menu below your sites main header with simple labels like:

• Home
• Portfolio
• Upcoming Work
• Gallery
• About [artist]
• Contact

Use your own domain name

While it is tempting to use free site domains like blogger or wordpress, having your own domain name for your site will give it more credibility with search engines which will increase the traffic sent to your site. Your own domain name will also give you more credibility with viewers and will help with selling art online.

Incorporate keywords into your text

Another key aspect of websites that artists need to understand in order to be successful selling art online is the need to include keywords and good amounts text. Search engines do not recognize images, only text. What this means is that when people search for artist sites in a search engine they are likely to search for terms like “abstract art for sale”, “original art in Australia” or “oil paintings”.

In order for your site to come up as a result for these searches the search engine needs to be able to relate these keywords to your site. You can do this by including descriptions of each of your pieces that include keywords you would like to have related to your site. Another option is to include “alt text” with your images, which will relate each image with the keyword. When you upload an image, you will be given the option of adding an alt tag or alt text to the image.

Just getting these three aspects of your website up and running can be a time consuming and challenging project, however, will be very useful in selling art online through your new site. This is just an overview of a few ideas to optimize your site for selling art online, there are a lot more intricate details and tools you can use to ensure further success for your site.

For more tips and ideas for selling art online through your own artist website check out http://sellingartonline.info