Your Online Resource Centre
Sell Fine Art
By: Tara McGovern
Over the past few years the practise of selling art online has become increasingly popular as sellers have found the online marketplace as competitive and profitable as the traditional bricks and mortar one. Of course, the primary reason why it is so much cheaper selling fine art online is that in the virtual world your picture doesn?t take up any physical space hanging in a gallery, so a part of its sale price doesn?t go towards subsidising the rent or paying the gallery staff. And galleries are naturally restricted to traditional opening hours and dependant upon reputation, word of mouth, customer loyalty, marketing campaigns and the passer-by on the street, whereas your online presence reaches a global audience twenty four hours a day every day of the week, including weekends and bank holidays! So you not only save money by cutting out the middle man, but you can also reach a global audience of art collectors and enthusiasts. However, as with all things in life, some methods of selling online are more successful than others.
To start off with it is advisable to learn as much as you can about the art you intend to sell in advance, including determining its provenance and historical significance. Look into the circumstances surrounding its creation. Was the year in which it was produced a particularly significant one in the artist?s life, or did the subject matter hold any special importance for them? Is there any additional documentation about the art, such as it being mentioned in the artist?s correspondence or meriting special comment in a contemporary exhibition? And if the piece of art was not produced by a well known artist, is it emblematic of a particular school or period, or does it depict an event or location of especial historical significance? Perhaps it could attract a niche interest, such as classic car enthusiasts or mountaineers or lovers of the French countryside. It is important to identify anything about the artwork that could be a selling point and is worthy of mention in the description, because any or all of them might be the deciding factor that sells it, in addition to being a guide as to how much it should be priced at.
Which brings us to the issue of how best to describe and present the artwork you are selling. First of all, the appropriate use of keywords to describe the artwork is essential, because it is only through the title description that buyers are tempted to click and read more about the art and view images of it. Also buyers often search for the pieces they want by putting keywords into a search engine, so it advisable to second guess what they are looking for by deciding what the biggest selling points of are. For example, a title line for a painting of the Grand National at Aintree by a minor artist might attract more viewers if it reads ?Grand National Winner Painting By Local Racing Artist? rather than ?Grandstand View Of National Winner By Joe Bloggs?, and remember that abbreviations, conjunctions and prepositions are irrelevant as far as search engines are concerned.
Once you have chosen the right keyword title to attract potential buyers, the next thing is to have a good photograph of the piece. To avoid the glare of a flash, this is best done outdoors on a clear, bright day with the artwork propped up at one end and the light diffused so it doesn?t fall directly on the canvas. Place the camera on a tripod and check the edges of the painting are parallel with the edges of the viewfinder. Alternatively, it is a good idea to scan the artwork if it is small enough to fit on a scanner, because the quality of a scan is higher than most photographic reproductions.
After you have posted the image of the art work, you will need to write a full description of it, including its provenance, ownership history and any other details you consider necessary, such as a full description of the painting?s condition, measurements and whether it approximates the image of it that you have posted. Other critical factors to decide include the opening bid and reserve price for the picture and the time the auction closes, should you decide to post it on a site such as eBay. Be realistic with the low opening bid price and reserve, because you want to attract custom and generate a good number of bids, and choose a weekend closing time or an evening early in the week when most customers are likely to be online. Another factor to decide are the surface and air P&P rates for shipping to various parts of the world, whether shipping insurance is necessary and what your returns policy is. And be sure to welcome any questions and answer them in good order to ensure against misunderstandings arising at a later date.
If you have produced the artwork yourself there are numerous online auction collectives that list the artists they represent and display art for sale and links to the artist?s website so the buyer can buy directly from the artist themselves. Bear in mind that artists who belong to collectives are generally considered more reliable and trustworthy by buyers because they follow standard ways of shipping, pricing and handling returns of the pieces they have up for sale in accordance with the rules of the collective of which they are a member. A collective will also be able to handle any emailing requirements to give notification of any special offers or new artwork you have posted, which is a great deal more cost effective than the traditional method of direct mailing whenever a new show is opening.
Potentially the best method of selling art online falls between selling the art directly and employing an artist?s collective, with its stringent rules and regulations. This is to use a commercial online art trading website which will handle the business of promoting and marketing your pieces but lets you decide how you wish to handle any transactions and shipping requirements. Effectively, you?ll be renting a shop window in the cyberspace version of Bond Street that isn?t reliant on the passerby on the street and those in the know for your custom.
But how can you be sure your picture gets the profile it deserves and will be seen by enough potential buyers? Well, let?s use the example of Artbank.com, the UK?s premier fine art trading website. Artbank takes the job of connecting its sellers with potential buyers very seriously indeed, and uses a good percentage of its budget to this effect. With its extensive knowledge of the art world, Artbank places advertisements in various key publications that are read by the sort of buyers you?ll want to attract. And that?s not all, because Artbank understands how things work in cyberspace too, and uses this knowledge to advertise in the right places on the web, in addition to understanding the art of search engine optimisation, so the site will come high up in the list of search engine results when a contemporary artist or prominent figure from the twentieth century is keyed into Google or Yahoo. In fact, after a quick browse online, you?ll discover that Artbank is difficult to avoid. And what do they charge for this kind of exposure? Well, you?ll be pleasantly surprised to discover they only charge a fixed fee for renting wall space in their virtual gallery and that any profit from the sale is yours, just as the conditions of sale are also yours to decide. An additional feature of Artbank is that it can secure your anonymity up to the point that a buyer needs to contact you to enter into negotiations over a piece you have for sale.
Now the thing to do is start researching the piece of art you are considering selling, before ensuring you follow all the steps laid out in this article including investigating the means of selling the work, although we strongly recommend you give Artbank careful consideration. The very best of luck, and may your efforts attract the interest of a Saatchi or Guggenheim!
Artbank is an online fine art gallery and trading website where quality art is sold by art galleries, art dealers and private/corporate individuals and collectors. Artbank provides a platform where artists can display, promote and sell their art. |
