Useful Tips for
Selling Art Online
There are many things that are the same as selling offline.
But many are different. Unlike the offline world, a potential
buyer does not get to see your work in person. They do not see
you in person. But that doesn’t mean that selling art online is
harder. In some ways it is easier. This is a very broad subject
to cover in one sitting. But if you remember to use the
following tips you are guaranteed a leg up.
Be completely honest about the work that you are presenting
for online sales. An art purchase is a very emotional buy. It
is almost at the same level as buying a house or a car. Of
course the potential buyer has to feel an emotional attachment
to the piece if they are going to purchase it- this is not the
place to create that. If a buyer is emotionally attached enough
to the piece to buy it and then receives something that was not
exactly as expected- your buyer will be unhappy and probably
ask for their money back. If not I guarantee they will not be
buying any additional art pieces from you. You can’t risk this
because someone who collects art is just that- a collector.
Future purchases are highly probable. Make sure they know
exactly what to expect. Be honest about condition, provenance,
and artist background.
Be completely descriptive about your art for sale. Make sure
that you have stated all of the important information about the
piece. Give the art buyer as much information as possible about
the piece. This will reduce the amount of questions and help
qualify the potential buyer. These small but important facts
will do a lot of the selling for you. Make sure to include
price, medium, size, type of paper/ canvas, framed/ unframed,
subject matter, and date. Don’t forget to include; your
motivation for choosing this subject matter, what it means to
you, challenges when working on your art, and why you have
chosen to express these ideas in this manner. This is where you
create an emotional attachment. An art buyer becomes attached
as they begin to feel they understand the piece and the artist
behind it.
Make sure that you are able to accept credit cards for the
purchase. If a potential art buyer has to take the time log off
their computer, pick up the phone, write a check, and then
reach for an envelope you reduce your chances of finalizing the
sale. Although they may still want the piece it is not hard for
consumers to procrastinate as other things in their life need
to be tended to also. The sale is lost. It is in your best
interest to make the sale as easy as possible. The only job the
art buyer should complete is deciding which piece they cannot
live with out. Believe me that is hard enough. Once they have
decided on the purchase they must be allowed to pay for it
immediately. If you do not know how to do this you can easily
accept credit cards through http://paypal.com it is free to sign
up.
Don’t forget to include all documentation that goes with the
purchased piece. Art documents have value and they also
increase the value of the piece. On some level the buyer will
view them as valuable as the piece itself. These papers will be
passed on with the piece and guarded the same as their
insurance policies and bank statements. If possible be sure to
include an artist statement, artist bio, press releases,
promotional materials for you as an artist (post cards or
brochures), history of the piece, and an appraisal statement
for starters. Provide these to your customers in a folder so
that they can easily be kept together and nicely displayed. Be
sure to include contact information perhaps in the form of
several business cards.
Retain the contact information of the buyer so that you may
contact them again in the future. If the buyer liked you once,
there are strong chances that they will buy from you again.
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