Bite-Sized Social Media Insights

Social media can seem overwhelming if you try to tackle too much at once. Better to focus on bite-sized information you can sink your teeth into.

I am lucky to interview people who have plenty of knowledge to help artists grow their businesses. Coincidentally, the three most recent interviews I’ve conducted have been related to social media.
While my clients might have focused on one part of the interviews, I had my own takeaways. Here are my big insights from each of these.

Facebook

Artist Col Mitchell designed a 3-month experiment to test engagement and reach on her Facebook page.
Col Mitchell's Facebook Page
Since Col is a member of the Art Biz Incubator, she agreed to share her findings with members.
I love that Col was deliberate about measuring results.
>>> Big Insight from the interview: I am inspired to try Facebook’s “Boost Post” option for select posts on my business page.
This seemed to make a difference for Col and I’ve been hearing good things about this option from others.
I want to be strategic about it, though. I don’t want to pay for just any post to be promoted. It has to have a lot of value for my page members and potential fans.
So here’s a bonus Big Insight that will become my first action: It would be beyond valuable to create a strategy for my Facebook business page.
A strategy would not only keep me sane when trying to decide what/how/when to update, but it would also help me track what works and what doesn’t.

Instagram

When I asked arts advocate and social media expert Rebecca Coleman what she was most excited about these days, she said, “Instagram.” So that’s what we talked about in an interview for the Art Biz Incubator.
Rebecca Coleman's Instagram Page
>>> Big Insight: Pinterest is for images that already exist on the Web, while Instagram is for putting new photos out there.
That sounds like a “Duh” moment, but it was a way that I hadn’t considered to distinguish two visual sites. Rebecca inspired me to get my account moving again.
Since our conversation I have posted about 25 more images to Instagram – sometimes simultaneously to Twitter or Facebook. This doesn’t sound like a lot, but it’s big progress considering there were 2 photos on my Instagram profile before we talked!

Pinterest

Beth Hayden did a smashing job in last week’s teleseminar about using Pinterest for your art business. I took a ton of notes!
Above all, I was inspired by Beth’s enthusiasm about Pinterest and some of the statistics she shared with us.
>>> Big Insight: Pins with price tags get 36% more clicks than those without. That’s significant and surprising! People know you’re selling something, but they still click on it.
This is an excellent reason to make sure you pin images of your art with prices included and the complete credit line in the description.

And You?

What insights have you had about social media these days? What is working for you? What isn’t?

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9 thoughts on “Bite-Sized Social Media Insights”

  1. I am really loving VINE to be more video interactive. Make a Vine of your work and show off your creativity or promote an upcoming exhibition. It’s a super-creative platform MADE for artists!

    1. Alyson Stanfield

      I downloaded VINE because of your recommendation, Janice. And I have NO idea how I’m going to use it. I should look up your vids.

  2. I am pretty new to marketing my artwork. Actually I’m in a whole new art field for the last year. I got my website up but really don’t have a “following” of folks. I’m keeping up my blog and post the updates to my personal Facebook page. I haven’t set up a facebook page for my artwork yet. My website was made with wordpress.org and I moved my blog over from wordpress.com. Last week it dawned on me that wordpress.com is an active forum and I used to get lots of hits on my blog there where now housing my blog on my server, not so much. So I resurrected the .com blog using the same posts I’m posting on my new site, just a couple of weeks behind and have a “visit my website” with a link at the end of each post on the .com blog. I have picked up 4 new followers in a week!

    1. Alyson Stanfield

      Hmmm. I worry about your having duplicate content. Can you not just do a final post that says “join me over here?”

  3. Thanks for linking to my Facebook article Alyson.
    I’d be interested to see how you get on with a Facebook post promotion. I tried a promotion for my personal blog but as I only have around 200 likes at the moment, I did not see a good return. I plan on giving it a try on my more popular Facebook pages.

  4. I am truely absorbed with the Facebook commentary and the effects for
    creating a productive response! At the moment I MUST re-read today’s notations again so as to understand and utalize it effectly.
    Thank you for all!
    Frank Colson

  5. hey alyson,
    excellent job on this, bite sized it the way to go,
    really really like this,
    hope youre doing well! BTW #FCStudioTour is the weekend of the 22nd & 23rd, come on up if you have the time, would love to see your!
    thanks again!
    amelia

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Get a transcript of episode 182 of The Art Biz (Rethinking Mailing Lists for Artists) followed by a 3-page worksheet to evaluate the overall health and usage of the 3 types of artist lists.

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