Every so often I run into a product that makes me laugh out loud.
I found this in a catalog called "What on Earth."
|
|
People tend to look to leaders in the technology or business world to learn how to use Social Media. But from my experience, it is artists who are the best teachers of all. Some of the things we can all learn from them:
Find inspiration outside your domain. – Talk to an artist and they will often tell you they found inspiration in a book or political event or meaningful place. Artists take ideas from everywhere to foster collaboration and innovation in their own practice. If you are on Twitter, are you just following other people in your field or your region, or the so-called A-listers who everyone else is following?Try broadening your circle, to follow people like @ryantaylor who is using social media for his sustainable jewelry business and @brooklynmuseum who despite being one of the oldest museums in the U.S., have started a 1stFans program to bring art lovers together using social media. Apply what they are doing to your own area of interest.
Article Continued...David Billings • Cherish Flieder • Jen Goode • Heidi Gray • Barbara Harvie • Khristian A Howell • Christine Marsh • Xenos Mesa • Tara Reed • Jamie Stevens • Leyla Torres • Deb Trotter • Libby Unwin
- Your art is on your homepage, and your overall style is represented.
- The manufacturer can find your portfolio in one click from the homepage.
- From the moment a manufacturer lands on your homepage, within 30 seconds, they can locate and view at least 30 images. Use a stop watch and test this on a friend: If they can't do it, then it means either your images take too long to load, are too hard to find, or are on too many different pages. Consider making your images scrollable like in Sara Henry's website below.
- Your contact information is no more than one click away from any page.
- A 10-year-old kid can guess what information your link names will lead to.
- Your site is only for Art Licensing. It is not a mix of 2-3 other businesses.
- Your pages load fast, in 1-2 seconds, because you know slow-loading-pages are the #1 reason people leave websites.
- You don't have spontaneous animation, because you understand not all computers can support the software, and it often slows down page-load time.
- You don't force manufacturers to listen to audio, watch video, or view animation, and you don't expect them to click "skip it" or "turn it off" as a default.
- You don't have text that blinks, moves, or change colors uncontrollably
- Your logo is in the upper left of all pages, and links back to the homepage
- You avoid pdf links, since they require downloads in order to view.
- You have a super-easy way for manufacturers to sign up for your mailing list, such as a form that only requires a name and email address.