Your profile page is your introduction, artist statement, and first impression all in one! Make your page pull in potential buyers by being articulate and informative.

Upload an Avatar

Customers want to connect with you as an artist and a person. Having a compelling avatar will cause buyers to click through to your page and recognize your posts in the forum as well. A photograph of yourself or a small piece of your most popular work is appropriate. Keep in mind that the image must still look great and clear at a small size. It’s good practice to keep your avatar the same as soon as you decide on a good one – it becomes your face on the site. Your fellow artists and buyers will come to recognize it.

These artists have great avatars:

Write an Artist statement and Biography

Your artist statement and biography are how you connect with your internet buyers, but writing about yourself can be tricky! Be sure to describe what you do, your materials, your inspiration… anything that relates to your artistic process.

Some ideas to get you started:

• Make a quick list of the words that describe you and your art. Use this as a starting point.
• Ask a friend how they would describe your work , and include that in your statement.
• What would you tell someone if they had never seen your work? Give an introduction to what they are about to see.
• Think about how you feel when you look at your work and when you are creating it, and what you hope your viewer will feel.
• Write about the materials that you use and why you use them.
• Describe your education, any awards, or upcoming shows, and update it as often as necessary.
• Be yourself! Write in a style that reflects who you are, and what your art is about.
• Do keep your statement and biography short and to the point.

If you are really stuck, you can always ask the wonderful members of our community to help you out! We have a thread on Artist Statements that has a lot of great advice.

Note: If you are selected to be a Featured Member, a small portion of your artist statement and biography will show on the Imagekind homepage, so start your artist statement strong.

Lights Out by Chris Leavens

Chris Leavens has an awesome writeup for his bio.  He covers his history, his artwork, and where else to find him. Perfect!

Power Pug by Michael Sprouse

Michael Sprouse focuses on his life as a professional artist.  An interested buyer would find all the information that they need here.

Post your CV

If you have a CV or Artist Resume, then your biography section is the perfect place to post it. The organized, clean nature of a resume guides a buyer through, and they will probably spend the time to read it. Pare down the information so you only show the essentials: education, important shows, prominent buyers.

Post your upcoming events

Having a show soon? Exhibiting in a coffee shop? Having a sale? Let your buyers know in your profile!

Use keywords to attract search engines

The text in your profile page is indexed by major search engines. Including key terms like “photographer” or “watercolors,” will help searching customers find you. Keep in mind that you need to be as specific as possible, so that you can attract customers who WANT your work!

Check your grammar

Take the time to spell and grammar-check your profile: this will make your information polished. Presenting yourself as a professional will inspire buying confidence from your customers.

Use HTML in your profile

We allow limited HTML to be inserted into your profile. HTML can be used in the text box where you write your bio or artist statement, where you edit your profile. Some ways to use this are to:

• Format your artist statement with line breaks and paragraph breaks to give a polished appearance.
• Use bold or underlines to emphasize and highlight recent accomplishments, and to draw your customers’ eye to the most important information.
• Include your logo if you use one. This will strengthen your brand awareness and personalize your profile page.
• Add links to your blog, personal website, or reviews of your work.
• Let the world know if you have been a featured artist with a link or graphic to the featured artists page.
• Feature one of your favorite, most popular, or best-selling images. You can link to a framed image directly from your Imagekind galleries, or you can make your own graphic and host it from your personal website.
• Limit yourself to just one or two images inserted in your profile, and make sure they are kept to thumbnail size. Try to keep your Recent Images up high on the page, as these will change as you upload. Keep your buyers interested!
• Be sure to keep at least part of your biography or artist statement in good ol’ text format! Search engines cannot index text that appears in image files.

You can use HTML in your gallery and image descriptions, too! You can offer detail images of the pieces, or links to matching pieces. Again, be sure to keep these short so your images are still kept in view!

You can read more about allowed HTML in our forum. Remember, only 3000 characters can be in your Bio section, including HTML code. Also note that any affiliate or pay-per-click links are not permitted anywhere in your Imagekind profile or galleries.

Wildflower Dance by Natasha Wescoat

Natasha Wescoat uses HTML in her profile.  A small image is inserted, and important points are emphasized.

Fractal Butterfly by Angel Mist

Angel Mist has inserted an image that highlights her best work framed.  The rest of the description is well organized, and the use of HTML to center the text works very well.

Looking for more ways to market your artwork for sale on Imagekind?

Now you can keep your fans and friends connected to your art on Imagekind with Facebook!

We’ve just launched a new option you have on Imagekind to connect your art on Facebook. If you’re a member on Imagekind, and have a Facebook account, you can easily post your new art on your feed. It’s a simple way to help market your art to one of the largest audiences online: Facebook.

It’s all automatic and there is little you need to do. Just follow the steps below.

To start marketing your artwork for sale on Facebook, follow these simple steps:

1. Login to Facebook.com. Make sure to check the “Remember Me” box at the top before clicking “Login”
2. Login to Imagekind
3. Upload new art to your galleries, join one of the Imagekind groups, or add a member’s image as a one of your favorites
4. A box will pop up that asks if you want to allow Facebook access. Click “Publish”
5. That’s it! You should see the images on your activity feed on Facebook.

After you allow access, here is what you should start seeing show up on your Facebook feed:

• New images you post for sale in your galleries
• Groups you join
• Images you favorite on Imagekind

The opportunity to make a living from their artwork is a dream come true for most artists. A dream Imagekind continues to make a possibility for thousands of artists on the site and around the world. That is why it is a natural fit to team up with Ariane Goodwin Ed.D, founder, organizer and host of the third annual smARTist Telesummit and provide this resource for artists.

This is truly an excellent event for artists of all levels to join and learn how they can take their art career to the next level.

Eileen Bettelheim, marketing director of Imagekind.com says, “Imagekind is excited to team up with smARTist for their third annual Telesummit. The Telesummit presents a great opportunity for artists to take their art careers to the next level. This is what Imagekind is all about – helping artists sell their work online.”

By joining the smARTist Telesummit, artists will learn very helpful and very practical techniques on how to sell their artwork. With a panel of eleven experts, you can be sure every artist will walk away with a head full of knowledge on how to advance their art career.

You can find more information about this joint venture that is sure to benefit all artists, by reading the official press release.

Reminder: This is happening tonight

Do you ever wonder if you have what it takes to make a living as an artist?

At Imagekind, we don’t want to just create a group of artists with no direction. We want to be a resource for artists as well; this is what we think it means to be a community. And when we hear of a great opportunity for our member artists that will help better their art careers, we want to pass it on!

Sign up now for this free event and listen in while Ariane Goodwin interviews Alyson Stanfield, the Internet’s Premier Art Biz Coach on the 10 qualities you need for promoting yourself and your art.

Sign up and discover

When: December 17, 2008
Time: 7-8:00pm EST
Where: Your own phone! You’ll receive more details via email.

This is a special free pre-event in conjunction with Ariane’s smARTist Telesummit 2009. We’ve joined up with the smARTist Telesummit 2009, hosted by Ariane Goodwin to bring our member artists helpful resources to better their art careers. I will be sharing more about this special opportunity in the coming weeks, but for now, reserve your spot in the free pre-event!

Want to know how to get more sales on Imagekind?

A lot of artists do. Many just don’t know where to start.

I was looking through some of the exposure we’ve gotten in the past from around the web, and I came across this interview with one of our many successful Imagekind artists.

Michael Longfellow has been selling his artwork on Imagekind since April of 2007! He was interviewed by Andrew Gibson, from the online photo magazine Magical Places Fine Art, who had the chance to ask him a few tips on how to be successful selling your artwork on Imagekind.

Though the interview has been around for awhile, I think Michael’s responses are timeless, and worth sharing. I especially liked his thoughts on how to promote your artwork for sale.

Here’s a quick excerpt and some of his advice:

Andrew Gibson: What three pieces of advice would you give to a photographer who wants to successfully sell his or her work on Imagekind?

Michael Longfellow:

1. Post your best work. There’s no advantage to volume unless of course it’s all great work.

2. Tell unique and intriguing stories.

3. Choose the best frame or canvas. The “purchase as the artist intended” button can help present the best display solution for each of your photos, so use it.

Make sure to read the full interview and discover more great ideas to help sell your artwork on Imagekind.

I think some of the best advice to help increase your art sales on Imagekind is to be proactive about it.

Nate