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Make A Living As An Artist
Essential information if you are an artist thinking of setting up your own website to promote your artwork.
As a practicing artist who has just spent over a year getting this website off the ground, I have learnt a huge amount during that time. I want to share some of that experience with other artists, because, if I were starting again now with the benefit of hindsight, I would go about it very differently! Hopefully you can have an easier time than I did.
Web Hosting for Artists – There Is No Safety In Numbers
If someone searches for you by name, they may well find your web pages on these websites. This is fine if you are fortunate enough to be world famous, but I know that no-one is going to search for me by name because no-one knows who I am. Even if someone finds the gallery site by a more general search for art or artists, the chances of them then finding your page among all those other artists are still extremely slim.
What you need is for someone to search for ‘abstract oil paintings’ (or bronze sculpture, or whatever describes your artwork) and be taken straight to your work. You want someone who doesn’t know you exist to be able to find your artwork by searching for the kind of work you produce. The only way you are likely to achieve this is by having your own site with your own domain name.
Website Design and Web Hosting – The Hard Way
When I started building this site, my knowledge of website design was absolutely zero. I had no idea about building a website, choosing and registering domain names, finding a web hosting service, marketing the website, how to show up in search engine rankings, or anything else for that matter.
I had to learn everything by scouring the web, following tutorials, trying out different bits of software, reading blogs and webmaster advice (usually full of sound advice that was completely contradicted by another ‘expert’). Most of all though, I learned by my mistakes. On more than one occasion I had to re-do all my website pages, after discovering something that should have been done differently at the start.
I also spent weeks trying to figure out how to get search engines to acknowledge that my site existed, or (to my absolute horror) why my site would start getting decent rankings, then suddenly disappear off the radar.
My site now ranks very well for my chosen keywords, but it has been a long, slow, often painful process, involving many, many hours of work. Every hour you spend pulling your hair out in front of a monitor is an hour less spent creating your art.
What I Wish I Knew When I Started
It is fair to say that when I started down this road of website design and web hosting, I had no idea what I was getting into. All I was thinking about was the physical design of an artist’s website, not realising how many other related areas of skill and knowledge were an essential part of this. You can design a website that looks fine, but if you haven’t considered all these other areas it will never bring you any visitors that do not already know that your website exists.
Your site must be designed FROM THE START with search engines in mind. If it isn’t, you’ll just have to do it all again when you realise your lovely new site is getting no visitors. This is known as search engine optimisation (SEO). This is a huge industry in itself – not least because so many people design their website just based on what it looks like, and then have to pay for expert help to get any visitors to it.
Whatever standard programme you use to build your site, including the ones that say you don’t need to learn HTML (HyperText Markup Language), sooner or later you can’t do everything you need to without a reasonable grasp of HTML and CSS (Cascading Style Sheets). For anyone not technically minded, this doesn’t bear thinking about!
The biggest thing I wish I knew before, is the extent to which you can ‘monetize’ your website, and that this also must be considered FROM THE START. If your website is designed, built and promoted properly, there is no reason why you shouldn’t be able to earn enough from your site to make a healthy profit, even if you don’t sell any artwork! It’s true! Your website should be an income in its own right - not a drain on your resources. Using adverts and other affiliate programmes you can get a monetary benefit even from the people who come across your site and decide it doesn’t have what they are looking for. This is very important and you don’t need to compromise your artistic integrity to do it!
Having said that - there is a ton of stuff on the net about how to make a fortune from your website – usually selling some vital ‘secret’. Don’t be misled – there are no shortcuts – and no substitutes for a quality website with content that people find of interest.
Web Hosting For Artists – Don’t Make My Mistakes - Do It The Easy Way
Assuming you are an artist, your main business and interest is in the production of your art. You need to be able to concentrate on your artwork without having to become an expert in several new technical areas. You don’t want to spend ages learning HTML or experimenting with different domain name registrars and web hosting services.
What I’d recommend to any artist interested in getting their work onto the web is to create your own website using a web host called Site Build It, which is unique in providing everything you need to design, host and promote a successful artist’s website. The reason this system stands out is that it isn’t just about website design or web hosting or search engine optimisation, or how to make money from your website, it is a totally integrated system that covers all of these things and much more besides.
There are no magical quick ways to get a good website. You can certainly throw lots of money at it by getting a website designer to do it all for you, though there is still no guarantee your website will get any traffic. Site Build It includes tools to select the best domain name, the cost of registering that domain name, the cost of hosting your site and all the support you need, with clear step by step instructions to create a quality website which, crucially, WILL ATTRACT VISITORS.
Site Build It covers everything you need and saves hunting all over the web for scattered information. You could easily pay the same or more by sourcing domain name registration, web hosting and design software, etc separately. More importantly, though, you would definitely take much, much longer and almost certainly get a poorer result.
While Site Build It is a very useful tool, it is not a miraculous way of producing a perfect website with no effort - there is no such thing. You will need to put time in and work through the process, but the difference is that you are guaranteed a quality website for your art at the end of it, and the time you put in will be so much less than doing it on your own. The real beauty of a good website is that once it is done properly, it will continue to bring visitors, business and money for years to come, with little extra effort.
If there is another system that does what Site Build It does, I haven’t yet come across it. If you look into it, you will see that there are loads of delighted customers already out there, who rave about it and happily testify to its effectiveness. This isn’t some new scheme – it is well proven. In fact 62% of sites built with SBI are in the top 3% of all websites in terms of traffic popularity. If you look at their website you will see that there are no unrealistic promises.
The system is built on the sound premise that your website needs to have good quality content (that’s you and your artwork), which will in turn drive visitors to your site, and that those visitors can then be turned into income, even if (Heaven forbid!) they don’t buy your artwork.
Anyone can build a basic website and find a web hosting service – building a site that attracts a lot of traffic and turns that traffic into money takes something more. As an artist, you have already got the interest, the passion for what you do, and a product to sell, all you need is the vehicle to help you reach that huge market place. And it really is huge.
None of us starving artists can afford to take financial risks, and you don’t with SBI, as they offer a full refund if you are not happy with it.
They do a short Video Tour on their website which is quite a useful introduction to the system.
Good luck, and I hope my ramblings on Web Hosting for Artists helps to make your learning curve a bit shorter and smoother then mine!