How To Advertise Your Art In Art Magazines
Image Caption Goes Here
Today we look at the subject of advertising in art magazines. This
article is an updated version of one
I wrote several years ago.
In today's environment, most people ignore magazine advertising. In
fact, it's widely accepted that "Print is dying" and being replaced
with online publications.
However, I think that makes taking a second look at the medium of print
even more compelling, especially for original fine art. Opportunities
are often found by looking not at what everyone else is doing, but by
looking at what everyone else is ignoring. That is the reason that
Warren Buffett says, of investing, "Be greedy when others are fearful
and fearful when others are greedy." And print magazines, while
reaching less people, reach very targeted audiences. Think about it -
these are people willing to pay to see beautiful art and artists in
print.
I once attended an art gallery panel discussion and one of the topics
was advertising in art magazines. Every single one of the five gallery
owners agreed that advertising in art magazines is "important" because
it "develops name recognition" for the gallery. They all seemed to
agree that a gallery should advertise repeatedly "as much as possible"
to increase the "reputation" of the gallery. That's a lot of money to
throw at something to simply to increase your "reputation"! Especially
when most galleries ask their artists to split that advertising cost
with them. I say there is a more disciplined approach that is more
results-oriented. . .
Those of us who've advertised in print publications have all been told
(usually by the publication's salespeople) what they think we need to
do to be successful with our advertising. When we whine about not
getting results, salespeople are quick to say that we must advertise
repeatedly to get results. Those who sell ads want us to sign contracts
to advertise on a consistent and repeated basis. I don't agree.
Don't misunderstand me, consistency is great....if you are getting
results. However, if an ad does not generate results, my experience has
been that simply running it again is a waste of money. Remember
Einstein's definition of insanity: doing the same thing over and over
again and expecting different results. Yet that's exactly what many
salespeople advise...for you to be insane. I recommend a different path
and am a firm believer that every single ad should generate measurable
results ... not necessarily immediate sales, but there should be some
real, measurable results. Let's walk through what I propose.
Step 1 - Identify the right publication
The first mistake artists and galleries make is not carefully
identifying the best places to run their marketing messages. While the
best place is always going to be their house mailing lists, one needs
to think carefully about which publications would be most likely to
reach their target audiences. When moving to print publications, much
more thought should go into the where. I recall reading once about an
artist who planned to advertise in local newspapers. That smells like a
huge waste of money and time. Newspapers are not targeted to people who
buy art. A better plan would be to find publications that have art
collectors as subscribers and, better yet, try to find publications
that are most likely to have the type of people who have bought his
artwork in the past.
Step 2 - Design a compelling ad
Most artist and gallery ads all look alike: Name at the top, a current
image, some contact info at the bottom. Boring. No compelling offer or
message, and every ad looks like all the others. Essentially, unless
someone just loves the one image the ad is displaying, they flip right
past it. I know, I do it all the time. It's almost like the art
magazines have become "catalogs" with each advertiser paying for one
page in the "catalog" This problem stems from the fact that most people
think "Run Ad, Sell Painting." And that's the wrong strategy.
Here's the correct strategy: The purpose of running the ad is to get
contact information of potential collectors. I suggest artists and
galleries think about how to structure their ads to capture the contact
information of those people who would be most likely to buy their
artwork.
Perhaps this could be a small free gift that the collector could get by
going to the artist's or gallery's web site. Perhaps it could be
inclusion on an exclusive list of people who will have first shot at
purchasing work in the next show. The idea is that it should be an easy
"baby step"....a free or low cost step, mainly to ascertain interest
and get contact info. After all, if I see a Mercedes in a car magazine
I don't pick up the phone and say "Put it on my credit card." No, I
order more info, get a catalog, go see it at the dealer, get on a
mailing list, etc.
Let's move on to the image shown. People always think it has to be an
available image. That stems from the incorrect "Run Ad, Sell Painting"
mentality. What you want to do is figure out which image was the most
popular painting that you ever created. You know, the one you could
have sold 25 times in one night -- that's the one. Display your most
popular image with a message that reads, "Come to my site and register
for exclusive preview access of my next show". Always try to pick the
image with the most appeal, rather than one that is simply "available."
By limiting yourself to an "available" image, you often don't offer the
most appealing image possible. And, even if your most popular painting
ever is available when you create the ad, it's always sold by the time
the ad comes out anyway (due to the two to three month lead time when
placing an ad).
A good way to measure your results is to provide s unique URL specific
to this one advertisement. The site visitor could only access the
exclusive offer at the specific URL. This is so that you can actually
count the number of people who came from this specific advertisement.
I also recommend including a phone number. Serious art buyers often
want to call and ask questions. Phone contact has the added benefit of
allowing you to learn a bit about the person. You can discern how
serious a prospect the person is and, even better, what types of images
are most likely to appeal to this person. Be sure to take notes! And be
sure to get their permission to add them to your mailing lists...both
email and snail mail. Phone responses are much richer than an anonymous
email address given online.
Now you have an ad that you can measure. You know how many subscribers
the magazine has. And you can count how many people register from each
specific ad that you run.
Step 3 - Refine and Repeat
The next step, once you've targeted the right publication and have
designed an ad that is producing results, IS repetition (The magazine
ad salespeople should love that!). At this point, you might try
adjusting various aspects of the ad. The free offer might be adjusted.
Try out a different image (if it's potentially more appealing), etc.
Once you've figured out the "best" combination that pulls the most
people per insertion - run it as often as you can afford, making your
ad rep very happy indeed. In fact, we have done this in promoting our
service, FASO Artist Websites . Since our clients are
artists, we've run in magazines aimed at artists, not art collectors,
but the idea is exactly the same. We can look back on each ad and tell
how many people signed up for the free offer and how many of those
people went on to become paying customers. We usually make an upward
adjustment when thinking about if the ad was "worth" it, because paying
customers tend to refer other paying customers. So, for example, if you
get five buyers for your art work from a particular ad, you might
ultimately garner anywhere from 5-25 more buyers if you handle getting
referrals correctly (but that's another article).
Step 4 - Nurture Your "House" List
Now that you have a list of potential buyers (known as a "house" list),
you can do so much more than just "make a sale." You can do all kinds
of stuff on a regular basis until you convert as many of those
prospects as possible into buyers (and ultimately regular buyers) of
your artwork. You can segment your new "house" list into original
buyers and print buyers. You can offer note cards, books, posters to
those who can't buy originals. You can also provide free information on
a regular basis to "nurture" this group. If some part of the list
happens to be artists, instead of blowing them off with the "artists
don't buy" mentality (which is wrong by the way), you can save those
names until the point that you have a workshop to teach, or a book to
offer artists.....you get the idea.
If all of this is done, then frequency and consistency will pay
off....and the artist's or gallery's "reputation" will be built with
those people who really matter - the people most interested in buying
art work.
However, if the ad isn't compelling, if the image isn't appealing, or
the ad is in the wrong magazine, then no amount of frequency or
consistency is likely to make much of a difference in sales.
Sincerely,
Clint Watson
Software Craftsman and Art Fanatic
PS: When I was part-owner of a national art gallery, what I have
outlined here is not what we did. Our ads looked pretty much like
everyone else's. I wish I knew then the things I know now . . . .
PPS - The image at the top is the cover of Southwest Art magazine. I
don't think they'll mind if we use the image, especially if we provide
a backlink: if you think your work might be a good fit for their
magazine, we encourage you to contact Southwest Art
and ask about ad rates.
Comment on this article
Sent from:
{{FASO_DOMAIN}}
{{AM_COMPANY_NAME}}
{{AM_COMPANY_ADDRESS}}
{{AM_CSZ}}
{{AM_COUNTRY}} Artful Mail by FASO
Learn More about ArtfulMail
unsubscribe from this newsletter