Artists' Websites – An Overview
I was trying to decide whether to add this content to the online documentation for e-eAsel or to the FAQ section, and (obviously) have decided to add it as a feature "article". The following is some basic information about websites as they pertain to artists.
Why Should I Have A Website?
For an artist, one of the best things about having a website is the potential of having your portfolio available to anyone who can access the internet. This is a great way to give potential clients and other interested persons a "first glance" at your work before inviting them to your gallery or studio.
A website won't do all of the work for you though. You must recognize that it is a tool, and your chances of sales and discovery are relative to how much traffic you try to send to your website. If you don't tell many persons about your site and don't submit it to any relivant websites to have it listed, no one will know about it or visit it.
You may also want to read the article Creating and Marketing an Artist's Web Site or Why Every Artist Needs a Blog.
Why Should I Manage My Own Website?
Managing your website is becoming increasingly easy with the availability of Content Management Systems and Blogware. These allow persons with minimal knowledge of computer coding and minimal desktop/website-design capabilities to create and maintain websites which look professional. Many CMSs and blogging software are also available for free thanks to the Open Source movement.
The cost to hire a person or company to create and maintain a website is often prohibitive for artists (who often have a "day job" to fund their artwork). A basic website can cost hundreds of dollars, and even basic websites with quality low enough to interfere with the integrity of your artwork can cost more than what you would pay for someone to install a CMS for you.
Using a CMS is like using a word-processor and imaging program, whereas hiring a website designer is like hiring an advertising company. With a CMS, you have total control over what is created, and you can make updates and changes as frequently as you like. With a website designer, you will usually need to pay for the initial setup of the site and then a fee for each change made to the site (which may result in a stagnant site if the fee for changes is high).
If you are considering hiring a website designer, make sure you do much comparison-shopping. You will want to know how much it will cost for the site you have in mind, and what they are charging for changes. Also, visit some of the websites of their current clients to see whether they are what you want. A search for "website design price" will give you an idea of how much website design cost. Beware of the designers whose main selling point is the cost, because the quality is usually much lower.
How Difficult Is It To Manage My Own Site? I Don't Know Much About Computers.
With the use of a good CMS, managing your own site can be as easy as it would be to use email. Most CMSs have many themes/skins/layouts from which you can choose to get the look you want for your website. To add content, all you need to log into your website and create a new page. The editing of the text is done in a way similar to composing an email (and some CMSs include advanced text-editors which work much like a word processor and allow you to format your text without knowing any code). After you add the text, the software does all of the coding and puts it onto your website for you.
The most difficult part of using a CMS is the installation. But as long as you are willing to keep an open mind and to learn something new, you'll probably discover that it's not as difficult as you may have expected. If the installation process is simply too mind-boggling, you can consider other options for managing your own site.
Getting Someone Else To Install A CMS
The content management systems offered by e-eAsel have been customized to make their installation and configuration as user-friendly as possible. Although the use of an installed CMS requires computer-skills on par with the use of email (for the most part), the installation can be a bit baffling for persons who just aren't comfortable with anything more advanced.
If you fall into the latter category, you can obviously still use the CMS if you can get someone else to install it for you. Here are some of your options:
- Get the developers of the CMS to install it for you.
For Geeklog, see this page to have the developers install it for you. - Find a website host which includes Fantastico in their hosting packages. Fantastico is a more user-friendly auto-installer for open-source software. Note that depending on the version of Fantastico being used, you may not be installing the most current version of the CMS available. Some persons have also reported less-than-optimal performance from a CMS installed with Fantastico.
- Find a website host which has the CMS pre-installed for you. To find such hosts, you can do a simple search for the terms "pre-installed" or "hosting" with the name of the CMS you want to use. Be sure to contact the host to confirm that they will install it for you, rather than require that you use Fantastico.
- Find a company which specializes in the hosting of blogs or other types of CMSs. Some well-known hosts of blogs include:
How Do I Promote My Website?
- Submit your website to search engines. Most search engines have an "Add My Site" link either on their front page, on the search pages or on their help pages. Be aware that some search engines require you to create an account with them before you submit your information, and others (and some websites which specialize in search-engine submission) charge a fee for submission.
- Submit your website to websites related to your artwork. There are many directories available which specialize in the work of artists. Ensure that they are sites which accept link submissions, and are not merely providing a small website for you within yours. Also, some of these sites require that you link back to them; be careful to not overwhelm your website with links to sites which aren't relivant to the purpose of your website. Some artist-directories are listed here.
- If you are a member of an artist's society, find out whether they have a website with links to members' websites. Many societies do and, because adding a link requires little effort, most do not charge an additional fee for a link to your site.
- Include your website address at the bottom of your email. Most email programs and web-based email providers have the option of including a signature with all of your outgoing email. Contact the vendor or provider to find out how you can add a signature to your email.
- Include your website address on your business card.
- Tell people about it. If they are interested in your work, tell them that they can see it on your website (this is particularly useful when your work is not currently in a gallery).
- Tips can also be found in the article 7 FREE Ways to Promote & Sell Your Art Online