The best way to get your art online quickly and free these days is to create a professional PAGE on Facebook — a.k.a. a Fan Page.
Facebook pages are public and are indexed by Google. Think of them as another website.
“I don’t have time to mess with another website!” you might say. Of course you don’t. No one has time. You make time.
You make time because you know that Facebook has over 400 million users. You make time because many of those 400 million people using Facebook prefer it as their primary online connection.
I love Tim Bradford's short description about his art.
All artists’ fan pages on Facebook should have three critical elements.
1. A short descriptive sentence or two about your art. This isn’t your bio or about your family. This is about your work. Remember that it’s a fan page for fans of your art.
Try out different words from time to time. Be creative!
2. Images of your art under Photos. If we go to an artist’s fan page, we expect to see art. Don’t make us search, click off of Facebook, or scroll for it.
Facebook has nice-sized thumbnails, so we can get a good overview of your work by looking at Photos.
3. Credit lines!
The main problem with the main photos page on Facebook is that there are no titles under the images. Scroll down and you lose the artist’s name.
For this reason, it’s critical to have a complete credit line below each image. Enter this information in the description for every piece of artwork you post on Facebook.
I looked at 10+ artist pages that I thought would have this information before finding it on Lisa Call’s fan page.
When you have a complete credit line as Lisa does here (as you should whenever you post any image anywhere online!), your name is with the image whether the reader scrolls or not.
Lisa Call uses a complete credit line under her images in her Facebook photo album.
Note that a credit line isn’t just a title, but also includes the dimensions (HxWxD), media, and your copyright. Savvy artists will also use the copyright date.
But Lisa goes a step further and also includes the credit line when she features images on her wall.
Lisa Call also adds a complete credit line next to any image she posts on her wall.
Too many of you are uploading images with no information next to the art. Sure, it may be in the image description in your photo album, but that doesn’t show up in thumbnails or on your wall.
Want credit for your art? Post it, yes! But finish the job by adding the complete credit line. Just as you wouldn’t hang your art without a label, you shouldn’t post it anywhere without this information.
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