Test Your Art Marketing Efforts for Better Results

Have you been promoting your art the same way for years without seeing better results? Allow me to remind you of this quote.

Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

It first appeared in 1981 text from Narcotics Anonymous and has been misattributed at various times to Albert Einstein, Benjamin Franklin, and Mark Twain.

If the quote is true, are you nuts?

Being Persistent and Consistent with Your Art Marketing

You are undoubtedly investing a lot of time and resources into your art business: websites, blogs, social media, videos, newsletters, postcards, and more. That’s terrific!

I’m a big fan of persistence and consistency—in doing the same thing over and over again—in marketing. You must commit to certain repeated marketing tasks before you can judge their effectiveness.

At the same time, I believe in tweaking aspects of your marketing as you go along. As an entrepreneur interested in earning money from your art, you want to understand what’s working and what isn’t. This is why it’s critical to track your numbers.

You should learn something with each new artwork, email, newsletter, or blog post, and you need to use that knowledge to get better results in the future.

Every marketing effort should be a test. Nothing in your routine should be considered sacred because you want increasingly better results.

What brings you the most clicks?
What blog post is attracting the most attention?
What results in more subscribers?
What leads to more opportunities?
What has given you the most engagement on social media?
What did you send that encouraged immediate responses from recipients?

Use the lists below to adjust, test, and repeat for improved results.

14 Things to Test and Adjust on Your Art Website

Your goals: more visitors, more page views, more clicks, more time on your site, more sales.

1. Increase the size of the image.
2. Decrease the size of the image.
3. Crop your photos differently.
4. Make the font larger.
5. Make the font smaller.
6. Make the font a different color.
7. Switch to a different font.
8. Add more space around the text.
9. Shorten the paragraphs.
10. Lengthen the paragraphs.
11. Add more bullet points.
12. Add more white space.
13. Move the paragraphs above, below, or beside the image.
14.  Simplify your navigation menu. (I’ll never encourage you to add more to it. Most artists’ website menus are too complicated.)

19 Things to Test and Adjust in Your Artist Newsletters and Emails

Your goals: more subscribers, more click-throughs, increased action from recipients.
To the above list for website design, you can also add the following that are email specific.

1. Put a banner at the top.
2. Put only your art at the top.
3. Leave the top blank.
4. Add links within your text.
5. Add links only below paragraphs.
6. Use buttons instead of linked text.
7. Make the background light gray.
8. Stick to a white background.
9. Write longer articles.
10. Send only short updates.
11. Use more images of yourself.
12. Use fewer images of yourself.
13. Feature just one image of your art.
14. Show multiple images of your art.
15. Change the day of the week you send it.
16. Change the time of day you send it.
17. Send it regular mail instead of email.
18. Use your name in the subject line.
19. Use a different subject line each time.

16 Things to Test and Adjust on Social Media Platforms

Your goals: more followers, more shares, more traffic to your own site, more sales.

1. Tell more personal stories.
2. Be more mysterious.
3. Write longer descriptions.
4. Write shorter descriptions.
5. Use more hashtags.
6. Use fewer hashtags.
7. Change the days of the week you post.
8. Change the times of day you post.
9. Show personal photos.
10. Stick to photos promoting your business brand.
11. Share your blog posts.
12. Share only original content.
13. Share other people’s content.
14. Share inspirational quotes.
15. Add quotes to images of your art. (Not my favorite idea!)
16. Never use quotes.

What have you discovered in your experimenting?

This post was first published on October 2, 2014. It has been updated with original comments intact.