"Bird On Plum" - Jane Dwight

As we prepared the copy for yesterday’s featured artist column it came as a blinding flash that in finding and choosing Kazuki Takizawi a classic social marketing sales process for art had been revealed to us.

Lets look at what happened and then we’ll break it down into essential components and steps.

Kazuki followed us on Twitter about a month ago and shortly after re-tweeted two of our tweets. As we reviewed our twitter-feed we were intrigued by his icon image – it was bright, colorful, and unusual! So we clicked through to see some of his recent tweets – and they were authentic and interesting. Our attention piqued, we then visited his website and found a wealth of interesting work and a clear artistic vision and direction. We were hooked and wanted more!

We now recognize that process as classic “Twitter Art Marketing 101”. Every step in the process was very important and had to be there or we would have stopped taking further action. Lets now break it down and see how it worked.

Step 1 – Follow People & Organizations That Could Help Your Art Career

Following Art Marketing Secrets was a smart choice by Kazuki. As an art marketing information resource it makes sense that we would have content that he could learn from. Kazuki didn’t know that we were looking for our first featured artist right about the time he followed us – that was serendipitous – but a good example of what can happen when you make smart choices.

Along those lines it’s a smart idea to follow galleries, museums, art coaches, and other people who you would like to be seen by.

Step 2 – Re-Tweet High Quality Content That Interests You

It’s amazing that many people don’t realize that re-tweeting is one of the big secrets of visibility on Twitter. In our case, Kazuki retweeted us and so he showed up in our twitter feed – suddenly he was on our radar. We don’t auto-follow so a re-tweet is a great way to get our attention.

You can do this with any gallery or organization you are following. A word of advice though – only re-tweet content that you genuinely find interesting. I can’t explain why but it’s always transparent when someone retweets just to get attention. And honestly – if you can’t find something genuinely interesting in the tweets of an art organization or gallery – they’re probably the wrong target for you.

Step 3 – Choose Your Twitter Icon Image To Get Attention

The first thing that got our attention in Kazuki’s case was his twitter icon. It was very visually interesting and we felt compelled to click through to his twitter page. The obvious take-home for you (the artist) is to choose an icon image that will get attention and also represents you or your work in an authentic way.

Step 4 – Write Authentic Tweets That Represent Your Artist Brand

It sounds obvious – but it’s not that common! When we clicked through to Kazuki’s Twitter page we were pleased to find that we actually enjoyed his tweets. It wasn’t that he was tweeting lots of high-brow art content – not at all. What was important to us was that there was a nice mix of personal and art content. You could actually feel something of the artist in his tweets. Some of it was fun, some was serious, some was about lunch and dinner! But what came through was something of an ongoing artist statement in 140 character bytes.

Perhaps I can sum this up very simply – be authentic and tweet about what motivates you. At any given time that might be van Gogh or it might be the color of your friend’s shoes or someting your children did or what you had for lunch. Reveal who you are in your tweets!

Step 5 – Your Art Website Must Communicate You

The next step in our progression with Kazuki was that we clicked through from his twitter page to his art website. His website is very simple but effective in saying a lot about him. We liked the quality and choice of the art he displayed and we also enjoyed his artist statement and bio. Each element was adding to our impression and understanding of Kazuki in a very congruent way.

Here are some important suggestions for your art website:

• The showcasing of the art (layout, background colors, etc) is extremely important
• Choose only your very best work for display on the website. If you don’t feel 150% happy with it then don’t have it on the site!
• The art should be photographed by a professional or using equivalent professional techniques
• The navigation (menu) on the site needs to be consistent (same on every page)
• Avoid anything that will draw attention away from the art – you want to showcase the art – not the website. For this reason, we generally recommend against many of the flash website designs used by some artists.
• Be really authentic in your artist statement – it says so much about who you are as an artist

As a result of the process above we selected Kazuki to be our featured artist of the week. If we were a gallery or a potential patron the same process may have led us to look further into representing him or acquiring his work.

So – follow these five essential steps and take yourself seriously in your quest to sell art online!

If you are looking for a great artist website now or in the future, please check out our sister site, Beautiful Artist Websites.