Artist Conscience

Why the Music Industry Must Change Its Strategy to Reach Digital Natives

2011-02-07T18:29:00.000-05:00

The music industry’s fortunes (or lack thereof) are familiar to most. The CD is suffering one of the longest death rattles in consumer product history, and it is becoming painfully clear that digital downloads are no knight in shining armor about to whisk up the fallen music business and ride off into the revenue growth sunset.

So how did we get here? What happened? The answer is simple: You. You shook off the chains of record label control and decided to listen to music on your own. No more waiting until the CD was in the shops or for the song to come on the radio. With the advent of the PC and the Internet, you could download what you wanted when you wanted, and rip and burn to your heart’s content.

This digitization process put you, the audience, in control. It turns out that the consumer’s perceived value of music was dictated by scarcity or availability: Either you paid what the retailer asked or you didn’t get the music. With Napster and CD burning, high quality copies were available to everyone. But what does digital music strategy now need to do to in order to get out of it’s current stall?

Branding You: 5 Ways to Improve Your Professional Image

2011-02-07T18:25:00.000-05:00

Here are 5 ways to improve your professional image and increase your brand equity in the marketplace.

1. Create an Online Professional Profile

Creating an online professional profile is easy and can be a great way to increase business. One of the most common ways is LinkedIn. LinkedIn is a social network for professionals and a great way to market yourself and your business. After setting up your LinkedIn account, connect with friends and colleagues or join a group like the Arts & Crafts Vendor Group or the Handmade News Group to find likeminded folks and wonderful resources.

Another online solution is to create a Facebook Fan Page for your business. With a fan page, you can promote your products, share images and video and build your fan base to gather feedback and comments on your work…

The key to creating your professional profile is to share what you’re currently working on…customers and potential customers want to know what you’re creating and how you created it, so share the interesting stories and inspiration for your work. And, don’t forget to proofread!

2. Personalize with a Picture

Personalize your online image with your picture. This isn’t mandatory, but it sure does help to connect your customers to your work. Using a picture of yourself builds a personal connection in the online space just as a handshake does at an art and craft fair. One of the main reasons your customers purchase your work is because of you and your story so personalizing it with your image makes that emotional connection to the customer and the sale a little easier.

3. Share your Portfolio

One of the best ways to sell your work is to share your work. One of the best ways to share your work online is through Flickr as well as your website/store. Offline, a great solution is to create your portfolio with a book through Blurb. Blurb offers a fabulous online publishing service that within days can turn into the perfect portfolio book for you to carry to shows and events to showcase your work.

Tips for Selling Art on Facebook: A Sucsess Story

2011-01-28T18:25:00.000-05:00

Great Sucess story form Lori Mcnee's blog

Guest author/artist: Kelli Bickman

As an artist it goes without saying that there are times when one needs to be exceptionally creative to keep the wheels turning. I’ve painted signs for businesses, done murals in peoples homes and businesses, sold existing paintings to clients through gallery shows or online galleries, received private commissions, written grants for public art projects and done illustration for publications (to name a few).

That being said, I am always looking for more ways to promote and sell work because, of course, this is how I make my living.

A few months ago, I started looking to social networking to expand my client base. It is a great way to expand a business. Using facebook as my platform – this is how I did it…

I uploaded several different galleries of my art.
It made sense to me to break them down by price range, under $275, under $400 and under $1,500. Although I have a large body of work in the $10,000 and up range.
I decided to keep the prices to a minimum and offer small canvases and paper pieces that are easy to ship and are accessible to a wide range of people.
I also made sure that the galleries were available to be viewed by everyone, not just friends and family.

If someone was interested in buying a painting they could PayPal the funds to my email address and put SOLD in the comments section. I also offered 50% of the proceeds to help develop art programs for at-risk youth in my community, a project dear to my heart as I am also the director.

***After posting the images, I shared the portfolio with my friends and family and included personal messages to patrons who have purchased art from me in the past asking them to share my art and post it on their wall.

“Within 48 hours I had sold 7 paintings.” ~Kelli Bickman

6 Ways New & Emerging Music Artists Can Make The Most Of Social Media

2011-01-28T18:18:00.000-05:00

1. SoundCloud & the concept of the “social download” - SoundCloud enables fans and artists to quickly and easily upload their tracks, create a music player for their their track or album and then easily share and embed this player across any of their social media channels. The SoundCloud player can also be set to enable people to download the track directly from the player or share the player within their own Facebook page, on their blog or website, or post the link to Twitter. Essentially, the widget can pretty much go anywhere, making it a fantastic tool for enabling people to share an artist’s tracks whatever their social network of choice. Another interesting feature of the SoundCloud player is that once the player is created, people can then comment on the track within the player itself as they listen to the song. Their comment is then integrated into the player and as more and more people share the track more and more comments pop up as people listen– almost transforming the player into a mini-social network of its own. More recently SoundCloud has also developed the concept of the “social download” through a new app enabling artists to distribute their track for free in exchange for a social interaction from their fans. For example, the track is posted by the artist along with sharing buttons for Facebook and Twitter, the fan is then given the option to download the track for free simply by sharing the track on their own social network. This is a fantastic example of the way social media can be used as currency and is certainly a useful way for new artists to reward their fans for interactions and engagement.

2. Blogging via WordPress / Tumblr – As the world of music blogging continues to grow more and more each year, creating and managing a WordPress or Tumblr blog is an absolute must for new artists. Essentially, blogging platforms such as WordPress or Tumblr provide artists with all the tools they need to quickly and easily set up, design and launch their own website, without the need to learn a raft of code or outsource to a web design company. Moreover, blogs are a hugely effective platform to not only engage and interact with fans but also engage with music bloggers and journalists, often resulting in a feature on other blogs or blog posts being shared and re-posted to multiple social media networks. All of which ultimately lends itself to a much-welcomed increase in visibility and a fantastic opportunity for new artists to build and develop a strong online fan base. Additionally, there is also a lot to be said for new artists that link up with tech-savy PR companies to help them take things even further within the world of blogging, as this can often prove to provide a fantastic push onto the radar of bigger blogs.

5 Great Gallery Apps for iPhone

2011-01-27T16:55:00.000-05:00

Your iPhone doesn’t just offer ticked off birds, social streams and clever photo effects, it also offers a window into the world of art, art history and culture, right in the palm of your hand.

Thanks to some excellent apps from some forward-thinking organizations, you can browse a world of amazing art and even go on virtual audio and video tours through exhibitions from all around the world.

If you’ve always wanted to visit the Louvre, or see the Australian National Gallery but can’t because of that terrible distance/cost combo, take a look at these great gallery apps we’ve curated for you.

Music Artist Social Media Marketing Plan

2011-01-24T16:05:00.000-05:00

This plan of action will assume for you to have already got accounts with Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, and YouTube. This sample social media plan also assumes there is already made your accounts personalized and interesting so you can easliy focus right in about the activities you should execute. That also includes automated friend adding for Twitter,Facebook,Myspace,and Youtube.

1. Twitter Friend Adder Elite " Unlimited License" Make it a daily habit to visit 90 to 110 new people every single day. You should filter out other marketers for follow real individuals who have an interest in the niche that you'll be marketing. This type of person laser targeted.

Start employing a site to automate your Tweets like Social Oomph . Twitter no more allows duplicate Tweets however you is able to use the recurring Tweet feature to schedule recurring Tweets with spin-able text making sure that each recurring Tweet is unique.

2. FaceBook Friend Adder Elite "Unlimited License" . You need to basically do exactly the same thing with Facebook with the exception that you almost certainly wouldn't prefer to increase the than about 200 to 400 new friends daily avoiding receving your account deleted. Use a search function to locate those who list your topic as and interest and that are a part of a Facebook group centered about the topic. Broadcast your marketing message through status updates, the same as how you would would using Twitter. Hunt for some applications within Facebook to link your Twitter account for your Facebook account to ensure that the many automated marketing Tweets come through as status updates on Facebook. Avoid using direct messages to Facebook friends for marketing.

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Online Trends 2011: Social Media, Search Engine Optimisation & Online Videos

2011-01-20T14:47:00.000-05:00

Last year saw a remarkable growth in Social Media, the increase in users on the main social network platforms showed no signs of slowing up. SEO serviceare constantly changing to keep up with more sophisticated algorithms and Online Media continues to rapidly evolve.

All signs are pointing to the fact that search engines must pay more attention to the vast amount of social data out there. Social signals such as ‘Like’ buttons may become a key factor in determining the relevancy and popularity of the results we see.

At present, popular Tweets are being instantly indexed, a tell tale sign of what’s to come. This revelation will see the new sponsored Tweets become even more valuable to SEO Services. Real-time search will undoubtedly come into its own this year and become more of an established feature on Google results pages.

We may likely see the end of the PageRank and a new hybrid version that can calculate quality and relevancy to determine value. This may even bring about a decline of duplicate and regurgitated content in the name of rank.

12 step pointers for organising a art show

2011-01-18T16:40:00.001-05:00

Here are 12 step pointers for organising a show of your works, some-one else's works, or a group of artists:

1) have the confidence to do it

2) find a location: pub, bar, restaurant, library, art gallery, artists-led art space, your home, or other - if it costs money then either find somewhere cheap (libraries are quite good for this), some-one's house is obviously free, and there are artists led spaces that are reasonable too or even free (this is if you don't have a big budget, or are concerned about confidence)

3) plan in advance to give yourself time to organise an opening night and design/send out invitations, and of course make the work - unless you already have enough! Find out who will be responsible for invigilating the show - you or the space?

4) ensure you see or know works in advance, visit the place and plan/discuss how to hang the work: will you need help? is there a hanging/showing system already in place for putting work up? if not, will you need help? will that be your responsibility or the gallery's? start asking the appropriate people and/or planning - maybe you could skills swaps, or ask friends or family if you are going to need help

5) carefully select work and decide/think/plan where it will go in the place or will you be letting someone else do the curating?

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Six ways photographers earn income through Facebook

2011-01-14T17:16:00.001-05:00

Facebook is an excellent social media website to develop relationships and keep up-to-date with friends, family, and associates. Many photographers have discovered that it is also a great resource for new business.

Here are some things you can do on Facebook to develop new business:

1. Network with other photographers in your area or across the country to trade leads and referrals.

2. Share your photographs on Facebook. (Watermark them if you have concerns.) People love to see your new work. Each time you display an image, it’s a passive form of advertising.

3. Tag people. Photographers often encourage clients to friend them on Facebook in order to receive a free image to share. Once the client receives the image, it will be displayed on his or her Facebook page. Of course, the next question is: Who is the photographer who took that great image? That leads to referrals.

4. Facebook has become a popular place to advertise. The Facebook advantage is the ability to target directly to your target market demographic, make adjustments quickly, and control your budget.

5. Promote other people related to your industry. When you take the time to promote others, they will remember you and often return the favor with leads and referrals.

6. Create events. Facebook has an excellent event notification system. Take advantage of the opportunity to invite people to your next art show, studio party, or networking event.

Networking and referrals are important to small business success. Start with the people who already trust you on Facebook.

Building a Better Twitter Following

2011-01-14T17:10:00.001-05:00

Interesting examples of how to gain more followers...quality versus quantity?!

The concept of quality over size when it comes to an audience is nothing new, and frankly when it comes to social media, the sermon is getting a little tired. We've heard it plenty of times.

However, Twitter has been sharing some interesting information on its media blog lately that really drives the point home, providing data to back up the notion that quality over quantity is important when building a healthy Twitter following.

Twitter's Robin Sloan has an interesting post on the Twitter Media blog, looking at thescience of the hashtag - a follow up to his "art of the hashtag" post, which is interesting in its own right. The post looks at a hashtag that gained some big momentum last week - #LessAmbitiousMovies - and looks at how that momentum was achieved.

To summarize, the hashtag gained momentum when Lizz Winstead, the co-creator of The Daily Show, tweeted a whole bunch of updates using that hashtag and a similar one - #LessAmbitiousFilms - which was actually the original version. She had about 15,000 followers. One of them was science journalist Alexis Mardigal, who had 36,000 and retweeted one of Winstead's tweets. Barracks O'Bama (15,000), a comedy account, also posted a bunch of tweets using the hashtag, and the combination of these accounts led to the skyrocketing of the hashtag as seen in the above chart.

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Social Media Marketing: Where to Apply Your Effort?

2011-01-12T08:27:00.000-05:00

We all know that the world is turning towards social networking and social media as a source of generating interest for businesses and also for promoting your own brand. Some brands will find it difficult but if it was easy everybody would do it and be successful right?

There are a vast number of social networking sites out there, to name a few,Facebook, Twitter, StumbleUpon, LinkedIn and even MySpace. Of course you may want to target different social networking sites for different types of product, an example being, if your product is music based you may be better hitting a few of the above named sites but concentrating your efforts on MySpace as it is a site for budding musicians as well as social networking.

In other words, instead of looking at social media and social networking as one, segregate them, do your homework and pin point your direction, this way you can concentrate your efforts and not waste time, remember time is money.

Remember just because Facebook boasts 500 million users, it doesn’t mean that they are all active, in fact around half add activities on there daily but as marketpressrelease.com rightly say in their article, not everybody is interested in what you have to offer!

When looking at your target audience, something else to consider is the age group that you will be looking at. There’s no point in hitting a site populated by 20-25 year olds if you are aiming for a different age groups, this all seems obvious but not everyone sees it.

Remember, just because Facebook and Twitter have the most traffic, this doesn’t necessarily mean that they have the best traffic for you.
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Five Ways to Maximize Social Network Presence

2011-01-10T16:52:00.000-05:00

Here are 5 ways to enhance your presence on these and other social media sites.

1. Be personable. Upload your photo (a current one!). If you want to be socially networked, please let us see you face. I am surprised to find many people in ministry on social networking sites who have not uploaded their photos.

2. Be polite. Courtesy is always appreciated. Rude, critical, or thoughtless comments can hurt your image and your organization, and can limit the good you want to do.

3. Be yourself. Authenticity is critical to success. People can figure out soon enough if you are being honest about who you are and what matters to you. No one likes a phony.

4. Be a good listener. Social media is an opportunity to interact with others. The person who listens (reads) and responds thoughtfully makes the best connections. Ask questions in your posts and respond to the answers.

5. Be a good resource. If you are using social media as part of your ministry, be sure to offer your followers and contacts useful information, helpful links, and timely resources regularly. They’ll tell their friends about you and “share” your information on their own social networks. Your influence and your ministry will grow!

Easy way to share files on Twitter

2011-01-07T14:53:00.000-05:00

Different ways of marketing your art via social media include twitter and sharing photos on twitter. But did you know you can also share files? Here's how:

There’s Tweetshare, Filesocial and Tweetcube but they are not something you will see in the average user’s stream.

Twileshare is still in beta and launched just before Christmas but already it’s seen a lot of viral traffic from what I can see. There are now 24,000 mentions of it on Google.

After logging in via Twitter you upload and share images, PDFs, Word and Excel files up to 20MB in size. Almost any kind of file can be shared and PDFs and Word documents are also placed in the page via Scribe’s API so that you can simply view the document on a page rather than downloading it to that pile of other PDFs on your desktop you meant to read but still haven’t. You can also see how many times your file has been viewed and tweeted, comment on uploaded files.

Although they are running Google ads on it, Twileshare’s founders Danny Bull and Ryan Foster are hesistant about charging for a premium service – the jury is out on that. What is more likely is branded channels for organisations.

You can’t yet DM a file link but it is potentially in the plan – which would make this even more interesting, shall we say.

2011 all about the social media strategy

2011-01-05T07:47:00.000-05:00

Developing a Social Media Strategy

With 2010 being all about a growing ‘buzz’ around social media where many people took the plunge to set up and build their first online networks, 2011 is going to be all about strategy and how we can sustain and improve our return on investment. As marketing and relationship building tools, social media platforms are increasingly helping us to promote and grow our business more efficiently and to an ever widening audience. Either as a precursor to making a start or having made that start already, we need to be able to prove its effectiveness and use our experience to convince our clients and colleagues to join us in this new technological world of real time communication.

Preparing for the Next Generation

Over the coming months, as promised to my group members, clients, delegates and contacts, I will be sharing some simple yet essential tips that will help to develop a more organised, productive and proactive approach to building our digital business networks. It is important that we get moving as it will not be long before emails start to become seriously old news and social media will become the absolute preferred method of communication.

The days of searching for messages in backlogged inbox queues or sending leisurely replies more than an instant after receiving them are receding. The conversations we need to be privy too and part of are happening on a minute by minute basis online, particularly on LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook and if we are not there, we are obviously out of the loop. Without a doubt, being out of touch and out of step with the new clients, employees and business leaders of tomorrow [Gen Y] who have grown up with instant messaging, social media, mobile phones and apps, will in no time at all become a dangerous place to be in any line of business.

How to Use Smartphones to Market Your Art

2011-01-03T19:15:00.001-05:00

Use the full marketing potential of your smartphone!

Imagine, a slide show of your paintings being instantly delivered to a potential collector’s Smartphone. By using a “tag” you can make that vision and more a reality.

“What’s a tag you ask?”

Simply put, it’s a barcode that can be placed onanything you do in print! Once it is scanned with a smart phone, it instantly delivers a message. You could link people to a slide show of your art, videos, virtual tours, or a lecture excerpt just by using a tag.

A Tag Reader is a free Microsoft application which available for a variety of Smartphones. Using your Smartphone, go to http://fettag.mobi to download the Tag Reader and try it out with your Smartphone on the tags below.

“How does the Tag Reader work?”

After the ‘reader’ is downloaded, the camera on your phone turns into a scanner. The lens will detect the code which will trigger the information to be displayed – amazing!

With over 2 billion tags already in existence, millions of people have already downloaded the free Microsoft Tag Reader and are using it.
With over 49.1 million smart phones in use today in the US more than 50% of US homes own one or more smart phone and are using this technology to browse, shop and gather information. Consumers are realizing that when they hold their smart phone over the tag, the digital information or video content appears in the smart phone window.
50% of US homes own one or more Smartphones.
Many museums, galleries, art magazines and tech savvy artists are already using these Tags.
No typing a URL or texting, waiting for a response – in an instant your message appears – driving it deeper into the hands of your potential buyer at the moment it makes the most sense.
These tags are helping print media stay current! Over 100 million magazines have carried tags since August 2010.

Is Your Email Marketing Ready for 2011?

2010-12-30T14:28:00.000-05:00

Get ready and up to date to all the new social media trends and tools for 2011...

Persuading readers to share the content of your email content is the key here. This is accomplished by providing content that demonstrates you're in touch with what's important to customers and you provide information that not only solves their problems, but also entertains them and asks for their feedback and participation.

Email marketing and social media are complementary. While email offers a way to directly contact your customers via their inboxes, social media provides new ways to share your content and engage in conversations with networks of people. One without the other is an incomplete solution to your marketing needs.

As you plan your email marketing campaigns for 2011, take advantage of the opportunities to reach new prospects, revive existing customer relationships and recruit new fans who can spread the word about your business.

Here are five things you can do to create a more social e-mail experience in the new year:

Make every message shareable. Include a Like/Tweet button or a social share bar in every email newsletter. The "Forward to a Friend" feature lets subscribers share your newsletter with another person by email. But by adding social icons at the top of your e-mail, those same people can now share it with their entire Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn networks. That extends your reach to a highly qualified audience of prospects.
Kick-start your social presence using your email marketing list. Invite e-mail subscribers to connect with you on social networks. Include links to your Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn pages in your e-mail marketing communications. Don't forget to provide reasons why subscribers should join you on social media destinations -- and how that experience will be different from your email communications.
Include a "social call to action" in every email newsletter. Don't rely solely on social media icons and buttons to get readers to visit your social media outposts. Entice readers with a link to a hot conversation you want to continue on Twitter (or another discussion destination), or to an exclusive contest or survey you're featuring on Facebook.

4 Social Media Marketing Predictions for 2011

2010-12-29T09:37:00.001-05:00

Artists, here are some predictions for 2011. The smart use of social media is becoming more and more necessary. It helps you promote yourself and, most times, it's free! Try to incorporate social media in your online sales, facebook page, twitter, and more!

1. YouTube Beats Yahoo — Video Will Convert

YouTube is the second largest search engine in the English-speaking world.

That’s right: YouTube is bigger than Yahoo. Zappos, as one example, added simple videos of people holding shoes and moving them around to its sales pages and increased conversion rate from 6% to 30%. When I look at the traffic sources for my book trailer on YouTube, the biggest referrer isn’t my own blog. It’s The Huffington Post. I customized the video and text content to a niche (but sizeable) outlet that didn’t exist two years ago:Huffington Post Books.

With proper targeting and syndication, this 50 second video almost immediately propelled my book from an Amazon rank of approximately number 150 to 30, now stabilizing at number four in all books. We usedRankForest to track this sudden change.

The 50-second length was deliberate and was also later edited to 30 seconds for in-video advertising on YouTube.
At least 30% off all the video views (more than 6.3 million) on my main YouTube channel come from search or organic referrals. By putting up videos, particularly on YouTube, you open up a whole channel for sharing and connecting to the biggest word-of-mouth platform in the English language.

2. The Full Resurrection of E-mail

Groupon has an e-mail list of at least 15 million strong in the U.S. (the company says it’s 30+ million if you include international), which goes to show that a true permission asset can be worth nearly $6 billion on the bidding table.

E-mail addresses are a safer long-term investment than social media features. Think about all the money companies spent advertising their MySpace pages in 2007. Even on Facebook, your direct messages to fans are relegated to a second tier inbox no one reads. This is something you don’t have to worry about happening in e-mail marketing. Among 20- to 35-year olds, at least, their physical addresses change more frequently than their e-mail addresses.

The smarter marketers will budget “social media” acquisitions based on lifetime value (or a set duration, like 6 months’ retail purchases) of e-mail addresses.

FLOWD - Foursquare for Artists/Bands and Fans

2010-12-28T08:29:00.002-05:00

Geolocation and Art seems to be growing, here is another platform that helps you discover art and build communities.

Flowd is a new start-up geolocation application that attempts to build closer relationships between bands and their fans. Flowd is essentially Foursquare for bands, allowing them to update their attendance of shows through real-time updates.

Many bands today are already engaged with their fans through Twitter, Facebook, and Myspace. These social media applications allow bands to directly communicate to fans and provide exclusive information of sorts. Flowd takes those elements and fuses them into one convenient application. Users can update their Facebook statuses, tweets, chat with other attendees, and post pictures of live events. Bands can create profiles, which users can actively follow and receive updates from. Another nice feature lets bands post tour dates, which are integrated into Google Maps. It's a convenient way of finding out where local shows are taking place.

Bands can also host events, which users can check into. This provides opportunities to host contests and other incentives to generate show attendance. Although there is no automated contest hosting feature, bands can check attendee profiles manually.

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Texting and Tweeting Shortcuts for Artists

2010-12-27T15:42:00.002-05:00

I found these great short in artbiz cuts for all social media using artists!

LTA = Love that Art

LTP = Love that Painting/Photograph/Print

LTS = Love that Sculpture

LTJ = Love that Jewelry

(you get the gist)

OMP! = Oh My Picasso! (or whomever your art god is)

WMAOITS = Working My Ass Off In the Studio

PTHOOMA = Promoting the Hell Out of My Art

OBITS = Oughtta Be in the Studio

GYAITS = Get Your Ass In the Studio

SWSD = Stop Whining, Start Doing

MGF = Must Get Food (when you just can’t tear yourself away from the studio)

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Use the "Fan Album" for Legal Facebook Promotions

2010-12-27T08:34:00.000-05:00

Have you discoverd the new facebook profile? It's a great way to showcase your art and promote yourself.

Here are some tips on how to use another aspect of facebook: the fan album.

If you admin a Facebook Page you may not know about the fan photo album. A Fan Photo Album allows any Facebook user who has ‘Liked’ the Page to upload photos, with the exceptions of Page administrators. As an admin you are able to moderate fan photos but not upload photos. It is important to note that you, the admin, cannot create the Fan Album. Any photos that you upload will go into a new or existing album separate from the Fan Album.

The Fan Album can be a valuable asset when running certain photo promotions on Facebook. Two examples of these promotions are incorporating a “fan of the month” photo into a Page’s profile picture, and utilizing an on-site photo prop directing fans to upload their photos to a Fan Page.

Profile Picture “Fan of the Month”

“Fan of the Month” is a great promotion all around:

It adds interactivity and engagement to a Fan Page;

You can really highlight your fans, making them feel valued;

Most importantly, it follows Facebook Promotion Guidelines.

One of many examples can be found at Equestrian Collections Fan Page with their Fan Album just shy of 3,000 submissions. (To see the “Add Photos” button you will need to "like" the page.) Equestrian Collection then selects some of their favorite fan submissions and highlights them within their fan Page profile photo.

Geolocation and Art: A Fresh Way To Discover Beautiful Art and Build Community

2010-12-23T07:24:00.000-05:00

Another great, original use of social media. Helps you share your art, get known and

learn about the artistic activity at a given area.

Here you can read about websites that mix geo-location and a sincere passion for art to build community and help the world.

PaintMap
What is it?
Paintmap is a geolocation-oriented painting sharing website with the following goals:, allowing painters all around the world to physically locate the subject painted by others and learn about the artistic activity at a given area, while also allowing Google Earth users to complement the physical and photographic knowledge of a given area with the artistic descriptions provided by users.
How does it work?
The person wishing to upload a picture should search her/his location at the map. Then the painting is uploaded like any other image (JPG). The user can also add other interesting information: title of the painting, size, technique, a short description of the subject if you will, its availability and your name as the author.
Site’s features
The site is available in English and Spanish. You can follow the site on Twitter, Facebook or add it to your Google Reader. It uses the Google Maps API. Its blog is a good way to learn more about it.
More Examples

Tips For Effective Social Media Management

2010-12-22T09:32:00.000-05:00

Here are some tips and platforms you can use for effective Social Management!

Use Social Media Management software (e.g Seesmic)

There are a number of software that allow a person to control multiple social media site accounts – primarily multiple accounts in Facebook and Twitter.

A good example of such software is Seesmic.

Use social bookmarking websites (e.g FriendFeed)

Websites such as FriendFeed allow a person to automatically update multiple accounts on Facebook and Twitter, amongst others, via feeds. All you have to do is have an account and then post one update that is automatically posted to all the other sites in your list. FriendFeed

Use Analytics

Many social media websites and through a number a tools provide analytics.

You can then use these analytics to draw up reports and look at trends or even use such data to determine which social media websites are more important (in terms of traffic) and thus focus on such sites.

You can also use analytics to determine which websites are used more by your competitors – you can then focus more on these sites

Interact and Communicate

Don’t simply setup profiles or pages on social media sites – interact with users in such places. Post updates or even post a casual statement, a joke or an anecdote. You can even make general comments on anything. Answer questions that users may post and always be curteous.

6 Social Media Lessons from Artists with Klout

2010-12-22T07:51:00.000-05:00

“As artists and creatives we walk a fine line between personal and business. People want to know more about us than just what our credentials are. They are interested and curious about what makes us tick, what inspires us, how life is for us but that doesn’t always translate to photos of the family dog or your kid’s latest tap dance recital.” – @krishanna from Creative Wonk

6 Social Media Lessons from Artists with Klout

1. Inspire – Cultivate a network of people that inspire each other. Artists religiously comment on each other's blogs and inspire each other.

2. Share – Share your daily work, your process. Artists share to learn and build from each other's work (see Artless.)

3. Engage – Artists have lots of "@replies" on Twitter. How many “@replies” are in your stream?

4. Collaborate – Be creative and join with your peers in collective projects that are shared via social media and in real life. (See some of the collaborative projects below.)

5. Cheerlead – Add meaningful comments to your Retweets about your peer’s work. Artists always provide lovely insightful commentary when RTing another's work or commenting on a blog post.

6. Be Inclusive – Welcome new people and be open to people from all over the world.

Read More

Turn Facebook Friends into Fans

2010-12-21T08:11:00.000-05:00

Once you have a fanpage you need some fans! I found these great tips on how to turn facebook friends into fans. Follow these steps and start gettng fans

1. After creating your business page on Facebook (a.k.a. fan page), add content to your wall and photos of your art. It should look active and used—even without a large number of fans—before you start telling people about it.

2. Send private messages to your 10 best friends on Facebook and ask them if they will please “Like” your page. (This turns them into fans.) Encourage them to write a note on your wall. This should make the page look a little livelier.

3. Post a note to your personal profile wall inviting all of your friends to become fans. Do this at least once a week for the first month and then monthly thereafter.

4. As soon as you have 25 fans, you can go to http://facebook.com/username and snag a good URL for your Facebook page. You want something that is easier to remember than the string of letters and numbers that Facebook automatically generates.

5. Add your fan page URL, including the http://, to your short bio that appears in the left column of your personal profile. It won’t show up as a blue hyperlink, but it’s still live.

6. Suggest your page to your friends on Facebook.

7. Get out of the habit of asking people to friend you on Facebook. Instead, encourage them to become fans. Add your fan page link to your website, your blog sidebar, and your signature block.

Start Up Business Set to Help Artists Beat Global Recession

2010-12-20T16:23:00.000-05:00

Gallereo, a British start up business run by 24-year-old New York graduate, Emma McMillan, looks set to help artists overcome the effects of the global recession by showcasing their work to the world.

Emma’s new venture provides artists with an easy means to display, market and sell their work online with a professional website that can be created in just minutes.

“Gallereo came about because building a professional website is expensive, normally outside the budgets of most artists. We wanted to change that,” said Emma. “The global recession has caused many galleries to scale back their own operations, with restricted budgets, therefore offering fewer opportunities for emerging artists. Gallereo provides an option for artists to sell their work independently, no matter how long the effects of the global recession continue to affect the art market.”

Gallereo offers well designed, fully ecommerce functional websites for £60 per year, along with the opportunity to become part of a worldwide community of artists who are there to help each other with sales opportunities and career development. All artists need to do is fill in a simple online form.

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Behind the Brand– How Music Artists Utilize Social Media

2010-12-17T07:41:00.000-05:00

Heres an example of how to use Social Media correctly.

Sam Tsui is an up and coming artist who currently is known for his pop cover songs and videos he and producer Kurt Schneider create. He has over 200,000 people who like his Facebook page and over 20,000 followers on Twitter. Sam has only used social media to launch his, connecting with loyal fans. His videos and Facebook page has become viral earning him a performing spot on Ellen this past month. Sam uses each network differently to connect with his fans. He posts his new videos on YouTube and then links them to his Facebook page which allows people to be the first to become aware of a new music video. Sorry MTV, no longer waiting to make the Top 20 Countdown. Tsui fans can listen to his music on MySpace and follow his personal thoughts and connect with fans directly on Twitter. He has used social media to launch his career without any big bucks put into self promotion.

Here is a list of ways Sam connects online:
Facebook
MySpace
Twitter
YouTube
Vevo

Artists reimagine Facebook's new profile pages

2010-12-16T07:39:00.001-05:00

I´m really excited about this, a great and smart way to use the new facebook profiles!

Facebook unveiled a redesign of its profile pages earlier this month that rearranged users' personal info and photos into a streamlined layout.

But some enterprising designers have taken the revamp one step further, turning their Facebook profiles into creative works of art.

Where most users saw a rigid presentation of one profile photo next to five smaller, uniform thumbnails, some saw potential. The website Reface.me has organized a page with some of its favorite profile-page reimaginings, which it calls "profile hacks."

Alexandre Oudin, who works at a consulting firm in Paris, has been credited by many bloggers as the pioneer of this young art phenomenon.

Oudin's main profile picture is of the right side of his face. Each of the five thumbnails are to-scale pieces of his eyes, nose and hair. Together, they form a stunning composite of his face.

Read More

Online Marketing For Artists – Branding Your Websites With Headers

2010-12-16T07:24:00.001-05:00

As an artist using social media you'll find yourself discovering more and more the power of internet marketing and its benifits for your business. Here's an interesting tip for artists who have more than one social profile...

The invention of blogging, membership sites, social profiles, video channels, auction sites and articles sites have dictated that we have dozens of locations where our products and services can be found. With all of those places to manage, you want to try and keep your branding the same throughout.

The permanent header is the solution to branding on multiple websites. On just about all of the above examples, you can dress up a site with a custom header and you can use the same one over and over again to build your name recognition. WordPress blogs have the ability to include a custom header in their templates, YouTube channels can upload a header image as a background graphic and even Twitter can show a custom logo in their background image as well. The Facebook fan page lets you upload a logo. You can include a logo in the checkout section of your online shopping cart, upload one to your eBay profile and even create banners as affiliate marketing tools.

Social Media Marketing For The Artist Community

2010-12-15T14:57:00.000-05:00

Here's a useful article with tips on using social media for artists. Enjoy!

Artists use social media differently than the general population, as it's becoming the premier place for them to build their network, get people interested in their work, and even make a few extra bucks from selling your art. With the power of Facebook, Twitter, artrise, and your blog at your fingertips, you may even be wondering if you need anything else to create your online presence.

Here's are some tried-and-true techniques to making sure you're getting the most out of your social media channels:

1. Set up a Facebook page in addition to your personal profile: Since your business is your art, you may not want to mix your personal life with your professional business. Setting up a Facebook fan page will let you connect with your fans and potential customers without having to censor what you say in your personal life.

2. Develop a custom Facebook tab. You don't have to lose your brand just because you're on Facebook. Create a custom Facebook tab on your fan page that can showcase some of your artwork to your friends without them ever leaving Facebook. This gives you even more opportunity to put yourself in front of your audience.

3. On the same note, make sure your Twitter background is reflective of yourself and your art. Add a few thumbnails of some of your recent artwork and make sure you include the URLs of where else people can get in touch with you.

Read More

6 Free Ways to Promote Your Art Business Online

2010-12-15T07:58:00.000-05:00

Great Ideas from fine art tips

1. Start a Blog

So you’ve got your art website up. The website has information about your art, pricing information,contact information, and maybe a cool video or two. But no one is visiting your website. That’s because they don’t know you exist!

The easiest way for people to discover your website is to start a blog. Blog about things artists care about. Help them solve common problems on their own. Provide useful art tips and tricks . Think about what someone in need of an artist would search for in Google. The key is to make your blog about them, not you.

If you need help getting started with creating a blog, read one of Lori’s recent guest articles, 5 Simple Steps to Start Your First Blog . And for some ideas on creating a great blog post, see 8 Tips to Create a Great Blog Post.

2. Guest Post on Other Blogs

Find other artists with blogs, and ask if you can write a guest post for them. Your guest post will include a brief description of who you are, and a link back to your website. Most blog owners are happy to take guest posts because it increases the value of their blog. And by doing so, you will drive traffic back to your site. This also adds to your credibility as an artist.

To get started, you can submit a guest article, like this one, to Lori’s blog. Also, feel free to contact meif you would like to experiment with guest posting on my blog.

3. Publish Free eBooks

So you’re an expert, right? Why not use your knowledge to publish free eBooks on topics of interest to artists and aspiring artists. By making them free, you exponentially increase the number of people that will read them…free eBooks spread like wildfire online. Remember, your goal here is to build awareness of your art business, not to make a few bucks. Make sure to include your business logo and information in the eBook to remind people where it came from.

For a quick primer on eBooks, check out Why eBooks Are Better Than Whitepapers, and for some ideas and inspiration browse through Hubspot’s free eBooks.

3. Create Videos

Videos are another great form of sharing content. Sometimes it’s easier to show someone how to do something than it is to describe it in words. Videos are also a nice break from the usual blog post. I recommend you upload your video to YouTube and then embed it on your website. The reason is that you will benefit from all the traffic YouTube already gets.

Again, you want to think about what your audience is interested in learning about. For example, if you make jewelry, create a video that shows others how to make a simple necklace. If you’re a painter, show others how to master a particular technique. For some inspiration on using videos on your website, take a look at Lori’s video page. And for tips on creating good videos see How Artists Can Use YouTube Video to Improve Marketing.

4. Participate on Online Forums

Becoming an active member of an online community is a great way to prove yourself as an expert, and drive traffic back to your website. People are always looking for answers online, why not it be you they trust?

I’m a member of several online forums, including a Q&A site for startups [http://answers.onstartups.com/], and it has been a very rewarding experience. It’s a great feeling knowing that you helped another small business owner succeed.

There are tons of forums and Q&A sites. You just have to find the ones that line up with your expertise. To get started, take a look at the list of official StackExchange sites. StackExchange is a network of Q&A websites on a wide range of topics – who knows, you may find one in your area of expertise. For example, there’s a popular one on photography . Two other good places to visit are LinkedIn answersand Yahoo! answers.

5. Submit Articles to Article Directories

Article directories are websites that allow people to submit their articles to them for free. Like with the other techniques, submitting to article directories increases your credibility as an expert in the art community, and will drive customers back to your website. Ezine Articles is the largest, and most respected, online article directory. To see more, a list of the top 50 article directories can be found here.

6. Now It’s Your Turn

I hope some of the ideas and examples I shared will help you promote your art business. The nice thing is that they are all free – they just require a bit of your time. Now it’s your turn to go out there and try!

Tell us, have you had success with any of these techniques? What other free ways have you used to promote your art business online?

MTV Music Meter: Another proof of the power of social media!

2010-12-14T08:38:00.000-05:00

MTV Music Meter, a service that scans social networks for bands generating an increasing number of comments, is available starting today, Dermot McCormack, who oversees digital operations at MTV Networks, said yesterday in an interview.

“We want to re-associate and new-associate the MTV brand with music,” McCormack said. “This is aimed at finding those artists who are rising fast in the social-media conversation.”

A version for devices using Google Inc.’s Android software and Apple Inc.’s iPad and iPhone will be available by the end of January, McCormack said. Music Meter provides music videos and 30-second samples of tracks. Full songs can be purchased at the site and MTV is working with Rhapsody International Inc. to provide full tracks in the near future, McCormack said. Internet radio will be added in a subsequent edition, he said. Clicking a “similar” button provides a list of related bands.

The channel is working with “one or two big brands” on sponsoring the site, McCormack said, without providing specifics. Ads during the first two months will be limited, he said. Companies will be able to associate with a particular genre or place ads next to a particular style of music. With the mobile version, companies may provide coupons or other promotions to users based on their location, he said.

The 3 Most Critical Items on Your Facebook Fan Page

2010-12-13T15:29:00.002-05:00

A facebook page is a great, simple and free way to promote your art! Here are some of the most critical items it should have.

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 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 caption for every piece of artwork you post on Facebook.

Twitter tools (that actually work) for understanding your competitors.

2010-12-13T08:00:00.000-05:00

Twitter tools great for your online business and growth.

Trendsmap

Usefulness of data: Informative. Enlightening, almost.

Tells you what’s trending (being talked about the most) in your city. Good for identifying influencers (by username) and hot topics (by keyword or hashtag). If you chart this over time, patterns (genres) will emerge. This is 14 karat information if your market is 100% local.

The Archivist

Usefulness of data: Crucial if you need to export to Excel. Boolean search, OH YES.

I like the Archivist. It looks great and the development team reply PDQ to email & seem super cool. More importantly, you can do a boolean search (like “@username + special keywords”) and on the desktop app you can export the whole shebang to a spreadsheet (which sometimes, lets face it, you really need to do).

TweetEffect

Usefulness of data: Major league.

Tells you exactly what tweets got you (or anyone else) followed or unfollowed, so it’s pretty darn helpful for tweaking your wording/subject matter on a minute level. May cause uncomfortable cringing as you reread your most boorish, follower-shedding tweets. Can lead to paralyzing narcissism.

Tweepz

Usefulness of data: Useful.

A location search (“loc:yourcity”) will give you a ballpark of the size of your market. You can sort by follower size, if schmoozing the influential is your bag.

Twitalyzer

Usefulness of data: Kinda.

Good for identifying influencers and dominant subject matter (hashtags, topics). Track what’s being talked about most by specific people (influencers or comepetitors). If a user is in conversation with a few of your competitors, you’ve got yourself an industry mover & shaker with whom you might want to get friendly.

Have to log in?No.So you can see competitor‘s info?Yep.

Social Media AND Blogging. Why both are important for your cause

2010-12-10T09:37:00.000-05:00

I found great tips about social media and blogging in socialize your cause. Read them

What would the social media world be like without blogs? Can you really fit all of your cause’s information in just 140 characters?

Make sure you take the time to update the content on your cause’s blog, at least once a week. There were so many great blogs that I saw over the last two weeks that have just fallen of the blogosphere. It was such a pity not to see them updated anymore. If you need some ideas for content, there are some great resources out there.

Here are some of my tips:

1) What time of the year is it? The holidays are a great time of the year to blog, there are so many concepts to write about. Halloween, Thanksgiving, Eid, Diwali, Hanukkah, Christmas, Kwanzaa, Martin Luther King Day, Valentine’s Day, St. Patrick’s Day, see what I mean? Pretty much every month has a holiday.

2) Use current events to find ways to promote your cause. Natural disasters are a great way to remind people to donate to relief organizations. Unfortunately it often takes a disaster for people to realize that charity is needed.

3) Prevention is a great reason to blog. People need to do all kinds of things to prevent something else from happening. Staying organized, mow your lawn, winterize your home, change your oil, donate to causes (so they have enough to distribute), and so on. Think of donating as preventive maintenance- and blog about it.

Art Starts – Bringing Communities together with art!

2010-12-10T09:01:00.000-05:00

Art Starts is a charitable, not for profit organization committed to arts-based community development in the city of Toronto. Their mission is to build healthier communities using the arts.

They are effectivly using the arts as a vehicle to encourage social change in at-risk neighborhoods. They are running a number of awesome projects and we are stoked to have them as this week’s Cause of the Week.

Art Starts brings together professional artists with people from various neighborhoods and create projects and programs in all artistic media, with all ages, with artists and participants from various ethnic backgrounds. They reflect the cultures of the neighborhood and build bridges among them!

Look out for their tweets coming from our twitter accounts this week and make sure to follow them @ArtStartsTO!

Selling Art Online – Do I Need a Blog As Part of My Art Marketing Strategy?

2010-12-09T16:24:00.000-05:00

The importance of a blog, twitter and facebook for a artist.

If I’m selling art online, do I need a blog?

In an effort to maximize your online selling experience, an artist should have a blog. Additionally, they should also have a website, but a blog can be just as powerful an Art Marketing tool if used properly.

Probably the most effective way to use a blog is to update it periodically about events or things that you are working on as an artist. An example, if you recently put on an art show or art gallery presentation, providing photos and writing about it then posting this to your blog keeps potential buyers informed.

Don’t underestimate the power of a few small blog posts a week as a way to attract potential buyers. Supplying photos of your finished work on your blog and talking about each piece creates a connection between you and your buyers that sometimes cannot be created even in person. Talking about the difficulties in creating your art often attracts buyers closer to you, as they begin to feel like they are part of your everyday life. Remember when selling art online you need to make it personal and inviting, avoid alienating buyers by trying to sell to them, just be yourself.

You can also use your blog to enhance your Facebook or Twitter account.

Great tool for all artists to mesure there online buzz.

2010-12-09T07:41:00.000-05:00

Rock N Roll Cocktail explains the benifits and use of Radian6 that gives you a complete platform to listen, measure and engage with your customers across the entire social web! Great tool for all artists to mesure there online buzz.

Imagine being able to track the buzz of an artist in real time across the entire Internet. The information is all out there buzzing through the various social networks, blogs, forums, etc. just waiting to be acted upon, you just need to know how to find and interpret it. If I were the head of a record label or the manager of a band here is how I would use social media monitoring to quantify my band’s buzz.

First you need a reliable monitoring tool that can scour the internet in real time for mentions of the artist. I suggest Radian 6. It can be a bit confusing at first, but with a few quick tutorials it actually becomes quite fun.

With Radian 6 you can very easily track the mentions of your band with the keyword tool and see the conversations that are taking place. It’s like sitting in on a room of music fans and hearing every word they speak about an artist. It is all out there happening in real time, you just need to listen!

Here’s what to monitor for:

1. Who is talking about the band?

2. What are they saying about that artist?

3. Where are the conversations taking place?

4. What are the influencers saying about the band?

For Artists’ Fund-Raising, a Social Network Site

2010-12-08T08:04:00.001-05:00

Great new site in support of artists!

United States Artists, a nonprofit group founded by foundations and wealthy art donors to broaden support for working artists, unveiled a new Web site on Tuesday that solicits small donations from regular people to help underwrite specific artworks.

Part social network, part glossy brochure, part fund-raising mechanism, the site seeks to democratize arts patronage as government support for the arts continues to decline and private sources of financing also shrink.

“What we’ve tried to do is take the good ideas about microphilanthropy and the good ideas about social networking and put them together in a way that people can learn about artists and learn about their projects and how they work,” said Katharine DeShaw, the organization’s executive director.

Posting Videos on Your Facebook Wall

2010-12-07T17:10:00.001-05:00

Promoting your business through videos online is one of the most effective ways to interact with customers. Videos are effective for many reasons. They retain a certain novelty that websites do not carry anymore. Whether for creative or practical purposes, videos can help publicize your industry in a positive light.

You only have to see how YouTube has turned plenty of struggling artists into overnight hits to understand the impact of videos.

For professional reasons though, significance is key to posting videos. The video and its content will ultimately depend on what the purpose of it is and whether it helps your product, service or company to be seen in the public eye in a positive way. So, before clicking that Post button, ask yourself whether you can help attain your company goals through such a video. Will it gain you the much needed hype? Will it give your company the fun element it lacks? Will it help customers learn how to enhance your product's use? Will it differentiate you from other companies? Whatever the goal is, always validate before posting.

Nowadays, YouTube isn't enough to distribute your videos. The social network, Facebook is one of the best sites to embed them in. This is a relatively easy step to do.

Using Social Media to Share Your Music With the World

2010-12-06T08:20:00.000-05:00

In the age of MySpace, Facebook, and YouTube, it should come as no surprise that social networking sites are proving to be the most effective tools of self-promotion for many emerging artists. But how can you, as an independent musician, share your music with the world through the use of social media? By learning how to use these social media outlets, you can reap the benefits of their features and share your music with people not just in your neighborhood, but around the world.

Social media relies heavily on the concept of global community by allowing people to connect to each other through everything from profiles to instant messaging to blogging. Sites such as MySpace and Facebook allow you to create profiles that are representative of who you are. Through a well-crafted space, you can introduce yourself to the world and allow them to get to know everything about you and your music. MySpace, for example, offers users the option of uploading their own music and sharing it with the rest of their "friends."

Myspace has been refreshed and more artist friendly than ever!

2010-12-06T07:47:00.000-05:00

Your artist profile has been flipped to provide all the information you want to share, while still giving artist more customization and promotion than any other online destination out there. Additionally, Myspace has evolved from a social network to a top content destination frequented by more than 20 million visitors monthly. Fans can now “mashup” their Facebook accounts with their Myspace experience. If they “liked” you on Facebook, their gunna “like” you here. Below are some tips & tricks on how to leverage Social Media to best update and communicate with your loyal fans & new fans to be, without having to update a million social networking profiles individually.

From the myspace dashboard, you can update your status on twitter and (a personal) facebook page with a single update. You can embed widgets to help sell products and grow new fans, while combining them with messaging that helps them connect with you.

What to update ???.. The most important thing to remember though, is that your status updates need to help create the culture that you want to arise around your bands. None of your fans care about the fact that you’re eating an apple…

Billboard launches social media music chart

2010-12-03T07:45:00.000-05:00

Another reason why the use of social media can help all artists get noticed and much more followers. And the best part is that it's not based on sales!

A new music chart based on social networking has been launched.

Music fans wanting to order a parcel delivery of CDs can now look to social media to find out who's hot and who's not.

US music chart Billboard has come up with a new way of listing the top artists in the country, and it is not based on sales.

The new Social 50 is based around singers' and bands' popularity on networking sites like Facebook and Twitter.

Artists are ranked on a formula of weekly additions of fans, friends and followers, as well as page view and song plays, as measured by Next Big Sound.

Artrise: New Art Social Network

2010-12-02T07:38:00.000-05:00

Artrise, a new social network for artists! Helping you to connect with other artists .

As an artist, you're unlike any other. You embrace individuality. You see things creatively. You are driven to create. You crave collaboration. You network differently. You need your own social networking website.

That's where artrise comes in. Artrise is an artists' portfolio website engaging you with the art network and connecting you with artists, industry professionals and art enthusiasts alike. It's your personalized social networking website - for artists, by artists. Welcome to the art social network.

Jumo, a Social Network for Do-Gooders!

2010-12-01T15:35:00.001-05:00

Great new non-profit platform!

Facebook co-founder, whose social-media campaign helped Barack Obama take the White House, launched a “social network for social activism” website on Tuesday Nov 30, 2010 called Jumo.

“The idea behind building this non-profit platform is to help people discover causes that matter to them and to their friends and, over time, deepen their ties to those causes,” said Chris Hughes.

Jumo is focused on connecting people with aid organizations in areas like poverty, environment, education, gay rights, women's rights, at risk youth, wildlife preservation, and arts.

Jumo means "together in concert" in the African language of Yoruba, and Hughes' nonprofit, non-partisan venture is a bold declaration that the nonprofit world has finally gone social. The site aims to do for charitable institutions what Yelp has done for salons, restaurants and other businesses: put people and their experiences front and center.

At its most basic, Jumo offers an unprecedented hub -- a thorough and diverse online directory -- of nonprofit groups and organizations. Some 3,500 groups representing a wide array of social issues are indexed on the site as of today, and all major geographic areas around the world are represented.

Read More

Twitter Tools For Sharing your Music

2010-12-01T14:50:00.000-05:00

If your a upcoming artist and need more ideas on how to share your music here's how! Use social media, specifically, twitter and get more followers!

TWTfm

This Twitter app allows you to tweet a track page that looks like your Twitter profile page. Just log in, search for an artist and track, and click "Preview." Once the page is created, tweet it and your followers can listen to it.

BLIP.fm

BLIP.fm provides a real-time stream that is similar to Twitter for music but also enables you to share tracks with your followers. This tool also helps you find friends with similar music interests.

Tinysong

TinySong shortens URLs for music. This easy-to-use application allows you to enter the web address for the song that you would like to share and provides you with a shorter version of the URL, making it easier to tweet your song within the 140 character limit.

SoundHound

SoundHound is an ingenious tool that can help you find music with your portable electronics including Windows Mobile, iPhone, iPad, Android, and Symbian devices. You can conduct searches by speaking your search or by actually humming the tune. The application will find the song you are looking for and provide you with lyrics and artist information.

Read More

New Artist Pages!!

2010-11-30T14:03:00.000-05:00

For all recording artists: I found this news about a new relase on Bing:

This week we are releasing improvements to help you to discover, explore and experience your favorite recording artists.

Whether you’re looking to discover deeper cuts, in the market for tickets to the next concert, brushing up on your favorite lyrics, buying a song or finding out whether the lead singer was arrested, Bing now organizes the most common things associated with your favorite artist in a new user interface.

Songs and Albums: Looking for a song? Now you can search, find, listen and buy it right from Bing. You can even sing along with the lyrics.}
Images and Videos: Are you visual? Peruse the latest artist images and videos in one spot.
News and Events: Is your favorite band making news? Get headlines at a glance. Where are they performing next? See a list of appearances and tour dates alongside their music.

Watch Video

Music Video TV Goes Social With Dazzplay on Facebook

2010-11-29T15:32:00.002-05:00

I found this great article about a new facebook music app. Good for sharing your music posted on your youtube channel with all your friends and fans on facebook!

Dazzboard has reinvented the music video for the YouTube generation, integrating full video playback into its new Facebook music app, Dazzplay (http://apps.facebook.com/dazzplay).
Simply search for your favorite YouTube music videos to create a brand new A.V. experience to share with friends on Facebook. Any public YouTube song or major artist's music videos can be built into a video playlist and shared to friends in full length, right from your news feed or profile. Any song or video can also be instantly purchased and downloaded from the accompanying 7Digital music store, and videos are seamlessly integrated into music playlists, merging them as playable content visible to anyone on the Dazzplay network at your option.

Social Media Resources for Artists and Designers

2010-11-29T09:29:00.000-05:00

I've published a lot of information on how social media makes an artists life easier . Here are some tools I found to perfect the use of social media in your art and inspiration.

Once a foreign concept, digital art can now be seen in galleries, shops, and even the cover of the New Yorker.

While artists have had access to computer-based tools for years, we’ve also collected some resources for portable platforms including the iPhone and Android devices that have opened up a whole new suite of powerful, portable tools.

This list of over 75 resources can get you up and running regardless of your artistic persuasion.

17 Fresh Web Tools for Working with Colors
We know you like working with colors, who doesn’t? These 17 web tools can help you get that perfect color for any project, large or small.
7 Awesome CSS3 Techniques You Can Start Using Right Now
You might not think “artist” when you think “CSS3,” but these techniques can help take your designs to the next level.
5 Works of Apple-Inspired Art
Take some inspiration from these five works that blend art with Apple in sculpture, digital art and even oil paintings.
Top 10 Resources for Design Inspiration
Whether you are starting a new project or stalled on an old one, this list can help you discover the best sites when you’re in need of a creativity jump start.
8 Best Android Apps for Photo Editing
Got a photo you need to edit on the go? Anyone, from pros to beginners, can use these eight apps to transform your Android into a mobile photography studio.
6 Tips For Experimenting with Web Video
Live out your dream of becoming the next Stanley Kubrick with these six tips for creating video on the web.
Top 10 Beautiful Minimalist Icon Sets
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8 of the Best Chrome Extensions for Web Designers
Showing a little bit of Chrome love with this set of eight resources to add some pop to your web designs.
10 Amazing Musical Instrument iPhone Apps
Instruments on a portable device? It might sound like child’s play but it was good enough for Lang Lang’s iPad. See you at the symphony.

How social media can help your band become succesfull

2010-11-26T16:49:00.000-05:00

Here are some interesting tips to help make your band succesfull!

Create a myspace account. Here you can upload songs, write some info about your band and inform your fans about upcoming gigs. And most importantly, get connected with other bands and potential bookers. If you help them, they will help you!

Next step is facebook. Create an account for your band and then send invitations to your facebook friends. Now your friends will know for sure that you were'nt kidding about that crazy band talk!

You can upload songs, pictures and videos on facebook. Do this and let everyone know that you did! Write about your bands progress and upcoming events. Be sure to put links between your facebook and myspace pages, cause the fans alvays wants to see more!

If you got a musicvideo you should put it on youtube. You can start an account and then create your own chanel for your band. Once again, be sure to link to your facebook and myspace pages so the wievers can get more info about your band.

Top Twitter tips from top twitter stars

2010-11-26T10:22:00.001-05:00

I wanted to share this great article I found in Laurie Mcnee's blog.
She asked twitter stars to share there best tips and secrets to help suceed and be known on twitter. Great for any artist who wants to get noticed:

AskAaronLee Listen. listen, listen and engage engage engage. You can’t go wrong with that. ” how is that?

Name: Aaron Lee
Location: Malaysia
Web: http://AskAaronLe…
Bio: An average Joe but with an extra-large social media addiction, Competitive by Nature, Positive Minded, Full Time Marketing Student, Part time Internet Marketer

TheTop10Blog Get stuck in! Be yourself! Interact & engage! Make connections & value them! Be patient! Read & learn! Don’t be shy! http://bit.ly/bBruNl

Name: Tony Hastings
Location: UK
Web: http://www.thetop…
Bio: Top 10′s and more. I find great Twitter people and ask them to share their favourites with you.

Best Practices for Selling Art Online

2010-11-24T11:59:00.002-05:00

Look at all these great tips for selling your art online!

Hope you enjoy:

More artists are selling their work online.Have you ever thought of just making some art that people might like to buy (the kind you mother wishes you would make) and sell it on Ebay? Who knows it could be a lucrative second career! Or perhaps you just love to photograph or paint anything and everything and you are are talented. People like your work. Well, why not sell it on the web?

Commissions

Any commission from an online website is determined by the Terms of Use contract that you agreed to. Different sites charge a different percentage of a commission. Anywhere between 1-5% is normal; 10% is on the high end. Other sites charge a membership fee to cover their overhead. The reason that their commission is not as much as a gallery in Chelsea is that online galleries’ overhead is much less and they do not promote your work as much as a gallery who represents you.

Is it Original?

Some “art” that is sold online is not “original” by the traditional sense. Instead of buying canvass and painting on it, some artists print images of their paintings on canvass. If this process involves numbering the work as prints, it could eventually have value but not as much as one original painting. Some artists choose to sell work this way to make ends meet. The people who buy it are not concerned with authenticity, they just like it and want it.

Promote Your Work

ArtBistro is not set up for retail sales of art from artists, however as aportfolio site you can certainly use our space to sell you work. You may want to put prices on your work or state in your profile that works are for sale. Also it should be said to contact the artists directly for sales. The buyer will have to contact you directly for all sale and shipping arrangements. This is a common practice on ArtBistro.

The 3 essential "B"s of Social Media for artists

2010-11-22T16:46:00.001-05:00

I think that these 3 "B"s are a great example of why social media is so useful and how to use it to you advantage

Social Media for Industry – Artists and Illustrators

Be Known

No business ever suffered from networking. LinkedIn is a social network for professionals, allowing you to build relationships with peers as well as allowing you to earn introductions and referrals to companies that might require your services.

Be An Expert

Separate yourself from the rest of the pack with a microblogger like Twitter in which you offer advice to budding artists, amateur or professional, with tips of medium and technique. You can also offer insights into your own work, or start a more in-depth blog on a site like WordPress in which you chronicle your jobs. This will enable potential clients to see what you’ve been doing, as well as understand that you’re a professional.

Be Seen

The Internet is a visual medium, which is great, because you sell a visual product! Get your photos online for people to see and be impressed by. Flickr is a great image sharing site, enabling users to browse your galleries and leave comments. You can create a Facebook Page too to showcase some of your work, and join a site like DeviantArt where users can showcase their work in galleries, as well as browse and comment on others’s galleries.

Musician's Social Media Pyramid

2010-11-22T08:39:00.000-05:00

We found this great musician's social media food pyramid, really easy and helpful!

Remember that chart they brought out when we were in 2nd grade to show us how to eat well-rounded meals? I have re-tooled it for you so you can now participate on Social Media healthily! And you won’t even have to think about it – just follow along…

You wouldn’t eat only bagels all of the time. They are a treat once in awhile, but they are not healthy to eat every day – and a diet of only bagels would be boring!

Most artists are only serving their audiences bagels all of the time. Plain bagels. Over an over again.

Uninteresting.

We want a burger, or a giant green healthy salad, we want some candy, give us protein!

But you keep serving bagels, bagels, bagels!

These are five things that when used in concert with one another can help you ratchet up your social media effectively and manage it easily.

How To Promote Your Band Using Social Media

2010-11-19T12:33:00.000-05:00

As all of you know by now social media is the "buzz of the town" everybody talks about it, whats to know more and how to use it.Why? Because its the best, most efficient, fast, and generally, free tool you can get !

Here’s how to promote your band using social media.

1. Keep your Myspace- Even though Myspace is becoming the “ghetto” of the internet asStephen Hammil from Creative Loafing put it yesterday, it’s a valuable base point for bands. Many already have a strong fan base on Myspace and it’s a good place to put your music to be easily accessible for the public. How to use Myspace with the new social media platforms, point your fans on Twitter or Facebook to Myspace to listen to your music. Get your old fans on Myspace to twitter and facebook. How?

2. Offer exclusive content- Put content on your social networks that only people visiting these sites can get, such as a exclusive mix on the Myspace or a secret show location on your Facebook or Twitter. Cross promote! Have a reason for people to visiting these sites, you can also start a UStream chat with fans before a concert that the link you can only find on the Twitter or Facebook page or play a concert in studio via UStream just for your fans and take requests over twitter using a hashtag just for that event.

3. Stay professional- Have a nicely designed website for your band, think of this as your PR agent. It’s the face of the branding of your band or image online, it’s also the information hub for your fans, press and media sources that are searching for your band.Keep it updated with tour dates and press releases, bios and press photos. Make sure you have the contact info for how to book you for a gig…this is important. Don’t forget your social media integration, have buttons on the front for your Facebook, Myspace, and Twitter pages. Again, if you don’t know of a website designer or photographer and are broke… use twitter and network. You may be able to find the help for cheap or free.

The Artist & Social Media

2010-11-19T09:01:00.000-05:00

In simple words why artists need social media...

In today's creative market place an artist must keep up with the ever-changing climate in order to survive. This is not a new concept, it's what all artists throughout time have alway's had to deal with. An artists ability to change and create in ways that have never been defined before have always been qualities that has set him apart from the rest of the world. Art has and always will constantly redefine itself over and over again and it is the artists that are responsible for this very important task. Our current generation of artists are in a unique environment that just like our predecessors before us were in when new mediums such as manufactured pigments were introduced or the discovery of light sensitive film changed the world forever. We are in the transition to the digital computer era. The computer has become an all in one tool. It can be used in every aspect of the modern eras artists process. from copying existing conventional
artwork to marketing, conception, creation, and networking artwork, digital or conventional! It can be a minor or major part in every artists role. If you are not using the computer in at least one aspect of your process chances are you are being left in the dust and labeled a dinosaur.

14 Art Business Tips from the Top Pros on Twitter

2010-11-18T11:12:00.004-05:00

I found this great article in Lori Mcnee's Blog! She did a interesting social experiment and it worked! I hope you enjoy these tips as much as I did.

First she sent a tweet to some of the most respected art business stars on Twitter. She asked “will u share an art biz tip in 140 characters 4 an upcoming twitter art star post. u can add a link if u want & i’ll link 2 u”

And it worked!! This is a clear example of the power, notability and range of twitter.

Top Art Business Tips from the Pros on Twitter:

@ArtMktgMentor Art Mktg = series conversation btw you + your art + your audience. Purpose = credibility, visibility, desirability. http://bit.ly/feGRb

Name: Aletta de Wal
Location: Northern California
Web: http://www.artist…
Bio: TeleClasses, on-line programs, personal coaching for emerging, mid-career, established artists to master art marketing to build better art business and life.

@clintavo 1. Make Remarkable Art 2. Have Conversations with Fans 3. Send email newsletters 4. Repeat http://bit.ly/ayyiV4

Name: Clint Watson
Location: San Antonio, Texas
Web: http://clintavo.com
Bio Former art gallery owner, Software Craftsman and Art Fanatic – web apps and marketing ideas for artists

@AnnieStrack Always write your estimates! If u tell your clients your price range, they will only hear largest sizes & smallest prices.

Name: Annie Strack art
Location: Louisiana & Philadelphia
Web: http://www.AnnieS…
Bio: Professional Maritime Artist, Writer for Art Calendar Magazine, Artist Workshops Instructor, Official Authorized USCG Artist, Author and Art Business Consultant

Online portfolios make an artists life a lot easier!

2010-11-17T13:01:00.002-05:00

As we all know art takes many forms, not only paint, music. But also graphic designers, web designes, photographers, and illustrators. So what does social media offer to make it easier for them?

Online portfolios: Social media allows artists to conveniently showcase their work to millions of employers and clients all around the world. Here are some examples of online portfolio websites:

FigDig.com – Free online portfolio for illustrators, graphic designers, and photographers. They also have the option to showcase their work in HD by creating their own flash website for free.

Carbonmade.com – Free online portfolio that’s easy on the eyes, light, and fun. If the individual is indecisive about showcasing their work, they can try the free demo.

Creativeshake.com – Online portfolio for graphic designers. Offers a limited free membership. The website offers a list of jobs. Website has special deals too. If the designer contributes tips and articles, they can win an extra four months free membership. Only if they (tips and articles) are published.

There are many online portfolio website to choose from, but these three are the most popular.

Don’t Beg – Engage

2010-11-16T17:30:00.001-05:00

Looking for more news and tips for artists I found an article about the "1000 True Fan Theory". Although the theory is quite interesting I decided to share with you a few tips and facts that, I think, are essential for a artists social media success.

Don’t Beg – Engage

As you are spreading the word about your music, don’t beg – engage. Have you ever gotten a call out of the blue from a friend who has joined a multi-level company. You don’t hear from them for months, or years, and now that they have joined a company and they call because they are recruiting you. Even worse is when you are sitting down for dinner and a telemarketer calls. Doesn’t feel right, does it? Isn’t that the same as inviting people to a concert whom you never engage with? Admittedly, at some point there is a “tipping point” where your engagement with all of your fans has to change. You’ll know when you reach that point, but until then you need to engage on a personal level!:

Hold acoustic house concerts, so you can meet and talk with your fans
On Twitter, follow your followers, Retweet their messages, Direct message them if you have something helpful, or funny to say. Don’t use third parties or bots. Check in a few times a day with the intention of engaging.
On Facebook, “Like” their comments, comment on their comments, if there are other bands, attend their events, meet their fans.
Be approachable. Hang out with fans for a while after your concerts are done, or at least go and visit during your break if you have one.
Create a newsletter where you offer specials, and exclusive announcements about impromptu concerts, and jam sessions with other musicians
Release new music, and other art for your True Fans
Look for ways to serve, not just be served
Post pictures, videos and podcasts

E-mail

The forgotten step child of online marketing is e-mail. There’s something about people allowing you to invade their e-mail inbox on a regular basis. I think they are saying that they trust you a little more if they agree to be added to your e-mail list, so don’t forget to include invitations to join your e-mail list in your marketing tool-box, especially for true fans (see wufoo.com for a free and easy online e-mail sign-up form). Many of the online programs built specifically for musicians have e-mail tools to help you sign up fans and send e-mail i.e. bandcamp, ReverbNation, and Fanbridge.

Success Story of social media and a indie artist

2010-11-16T10:29:00.001-05:00

Jennie Walker, indie artist, got a record deal thanks to the use of social media.

In a interview she gave to music dish she talked about the powerful impact of social media, which led to her getting a record deal with Maddie Records. She explained how social media could be successfully used by sharing her own experiences as a new artist in her 40's, and talked about dropping her debut album "Night Flight to London" in February, 2011.

Here are some highlights of her interview:

Walker talked about blogs. As we all know, a lot of musicians are blogging. For anyone who owns a blog, here is an effective way of utilizing it: write it, tag it "properly," and post it online. That allows the artist to maximize the potential for people to find the blog. You can have a wonderful blog that would capture the interest of both fans and music industry insiders, but if people can't find it because it's not tagged in a manner that is conducive to search engine optimization, that's a problem.

Walker then began talking about social media sites, such as MySpace, Facebook, and Twitter. The number of "user friendly" MySpace users has been decreasing, and now it is the half of what they used to have. Facebook is really now the biggest social networking site. And, the number of people who "tweet" has been increasing. So what's the theory behind utilizing those sites? It's essentially about interacting with people. Regarding Twitter, she said, "It is a matter of communicating with your followers and people who you follow. There is a public conversation. Also, you can re-tweet what they tweet." Walker wanted a new web site when she started Twitter. She was curious if she could meet someone on Twitter who could design a web site for her. Then, what happened? She ended up meeting a web designer who was willing to work for her. The end result was that she had a professional designed website that was personalized to fit her style and brand. Walker, who had about 2100 followers, said, "There are real people behind the Twitter accounts most of the time." It's definitely worthwhile as "real" people who have similar goals or are interested in what you are doing can connect with you. It's quick, to the point, and personal.

Read More

5 Social Media Tools for Artists

2010-11-15T16:19:00.000-05:00

I´m constantly trying to look for good information to help out unknown artists with social media tools in order to gain more relevance and popularity.

Here are 5 of the basic media tools all artists should use:

1. Create a Website to Display Portfolio:

If you are in any kind of business, you should have a website. Artists should have a website, so that they can display their work. A minimalistic web design, preferably in white or black, is the best way to show your best work. There are so many great portfolio web designs that it should be no problem finding one. The one I recommend is one where the main image is the center of attention. Be sure to include social media buttons, like Twitter, and Facebook, so that people are able to share it with others.

2. Get a Flickr Account And Use It:

For $24.95 a year, you can share your photos and videos (under 90 seconds) with the world. You can also create Flickr groups, so that you can make it easy for others to share photos of your creation as well. The best example is Banksy. He has a Flickr group that makes it easy for others to post images of his work that they have captured around the world. Crowdsourcing is always a plus, and I am glad that artists are using it as well.

3. Tumblr is a Great Extension to Your Website:

Tumblr is a great extension to your portfolio website. Your able to send your aggregate your feeds on it, so if you have multiple sites with your work, you can show them all here. Ren Bostelaar has a great photo blog of his photographs. The great thing about Tumblr is that it’s easy for other to reblog your posts, and to love it. Also, it’s easy for anyone to find your Tumblr and follow it.

4. Vimeo is for Video Artists:

Vimeo is known as the video service for high-quality videos. It isn’t like YouTube where ANYONE can upload whatever. Vimeo is definitely geared towards artists. I have seen some beautiful video creations here. If you are a video artist, then this is the place to be.

5. DeviantArt is a Great Place to Show Your Work and Meet Other Artists:

DeviantArt is a great tool for artists. The great thing about DeviantArt is that it isn’t for just one kind of artists. You will find the works of artists using different techniques. I have seen some amazing works on there, and tons of artists have been discovered.

5 Viral ways to promote your art

2010-11-15T09:07:00.000-05:00

This weekend I found this article about 5 different ways to promote your art. The viral tendency is here to stay!! And with it great ways to get noticed and help you, your career and your art. Enjoy!

1)Use Digg, StumbleUpon, Reddit, etc. to your advantage
I’m a big fan of social networking news sites. I’m also surprised more artists haven’t caught on to using these pages to create a massive buzz for their art. A front page story on Digg.com easily sends tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of unique visitors to a page. And the communities of these sites love creativity, it is such a natural fit. If you can get your art into the hot sections of these sites, you win.

How you create something unique and compelling enough to become popular on social news sites I leave to you, the artist. The only advice I can give is to become active on them and really see what makes them tick. Then see what you’ve done that you think is a fit, and go for it.

2) Use video
If you checked out the Digg links, you probably noticed the first one takes you to a video of the song on YouTube. You’ll notice that video had 1.6+ million views. When was the last time a message forum post you created hit that many views? Exactly my point…break out of the niche sites and get some of your content onto the hot areas of the web such as video sharing sites.

3)If a label won’t sign you, do it yourself
Chris Anderson over at The Long Tail has a great example of the power of this – and it even led to the band getting signed with a real label. The tools exist to put out your own music without needing an external agency. I did it with the release of my latest album and found it an incredible enjoyable and simple process. Additionally, now I know exactly who purchased and how I can follow-up with them for my next release. Note that I never spammed any of them, nor used advertisements to sell copies – all 100% oraganic.

4)Connect with another type of artist or content creator.
I already posted on the runaway success of Brazilian band CSS due to Nick Haley’s use of one of theirs songs in his Apple iPod commercial. The commercial was actually written by Haley just for fun, but was so effective Apple’s marketing people just had to pick it up and use it as a TV spot. Here’s the commercial once again, which was entirely user generated content:

The two ways to get your song in a place like this would be to either:

A) Team up with someone creating high quality user generated content – one way to do this is by sending a nice email with your song attached to popular YouTube content creators asking them to consider using some of your original, unheard of music in one of their videos. If you’re completely unheard of, they may even be more open to using your content because they once came from (or are still in) the same place.

B) Pick one or two of your songs, and just give them out free – encourage people to copy/share them, spread them on p2p and social media. You can never get used in viral videos unless your music is actually out there!

5) Give some out free
I just hinted at this in my last point, but it is important to at least give some of your content out there free. It’s such a great tactic, even for a no-name artist. Yes, Trent Reznor and Radiohead get a firestorm of press for it, but it is something that works for everyone. Use the file sharing tools and networks to your advantage. You can’t sell any albums or get booked at any events without demand for your music. And there is no demand for music and artists no one has even heard of. Even if you’re making music in a niche genre, you still need to reach your niche. Get some of your art out there!

Of course…this is all for not if your music isn’t remarkable in the first place. That needs to be step one in this entire process. There’s such a staggering amount of art out there that none of the viral promotions will work, at least long term, unless your content is truly exceptional. And the True Fans concept doesn’t work at all unless you have an incredible passion for your work. These two go hand in hand.

ECard website launches creative platform for artists

2010-11-12T09:36:00.000-05:00

Surfing the web we found a new platform for artists called Studio to promote and market self-expression. It's a new and interesting concept.

"Studio facilitates users to express their art by creating electronic greetings cards from photographs, videos, paintings, music, poems or any other articulation and posting them on the 123greetings platform," a company spokesman said.

"This is a brand new concept that integrates creativity and expression on a readymade platform that reaches out to 91 million visitors across 192 countries," he added.

The e-card, upon approval, is prominently displayed alongside the website's own e-cards.

Once users start sending these e-cards, the artist rises up the leader board.

'Studio' has a system that tracks the number of people who view a card and how many are using them, with the statistics made available to the artist.

"With Studio, we are providing anyone with artistic ability a readymade audience. If a member posts something that has wide appeal, his creation will get an immediate recognition," said Arvind Kajaria, founder, 123greetings.com.

"The highlight of the 'Studio' is that the creator will own the copyright. Based on the popularity of the artwork, prospective buyers may buy the artwork and enable the artist to make money as well," he added.

Artists can log on to http://studio.123greetings.com to access the feature.

Ping: a new link between twitter & itunes ... great opportunity for artists!

2010-11-12T08:35:00.000-05:00

Twitter announced yesterday that it will link with Apple Inc's new oriented social network!

A good opportunity for musical artists to get a lot more followers on twitter and get noticed!

This is what Reuters had to say about "Ping":

Apple announced the Ping social network in September. It works within Apple's iTunes music program and lets users follow artists and recommend songs to their chosen circle of friends.

Twitter said its more than 175 million registered users can now connect their accounts to Ping, allowing them to put song previews and links to buy music from the iTunes store directly in their messages, which are known as "tweets."

Twitter's deal comes after Apple failed to strike a Ping partnership with social networking leader Facebook, which has more than 500 million users.

Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs told the All Things Digital blog in September that Apple had held talks with Facebook about a deal related to Ping, but the discussions did not produce an agreement.

Facebook declined to comment on Thursday.

Cupertino, California-based Apple's shares were down 88 cents at $317.15 in afternoon trading on the Nasdaq.

5 reasons why Artists need Social Media!

2010-11-12T08:18:00.001-05:00

Hello everyone it's been a long time since I wrote. I've decided to make it my mission to write about one of the topics I care about the most: upcoming and unknown artists and how they use social media to promote themselves. Achieving awareness and generating a Artist Conscience.

So why is it so important for artists to use social media? Thanks to fine art tips we found 5 main reasons:

Social media isn’t a fad, it’s a fundamental shift in the way we communicate. But, many artists still are intimidated or scoff at the idea of joining in on the Social Media Revolution. In fact, there are many artists out there who still don’t have a website or email! Well if it’s working, more power to them! But for the rest of us artists who are challenged by the economy, it is time for us to ‘think outside the frame’ or studio! Here’s why…

Keep Your Finger on the Pulse:
- Remember, artists are the movers and shakers of the world. We need to stay informed and on the cutting edge.
- We should be aware of new trends in design, decorating, fashion and technology and how it influences your art and sales.
- Even if you are a traditional artist, like me!
- In this challenging economy, being a successful artist not only consists of creating great art, but it is also about creating a strong business.
Build Your Brand:
- Using Social Media is the quickest way to build brand recognition for you and your art business.
- Solid brand identity differentiates you from the pack.
- A strong brand is invaluable and serves to communicate credibility to your prospective customers and business associates.
- “Americans are eager to deepen their brand relationships through social media,” said Mike Hollywood, director of new media at Cone. “It isn’t an intrusion into their lives, but rather a welcome channel for discussion.”
Marketing:
- If you don’t have a website you are invisible. Not just hard to contact, invisible. A website is a must, a blog even better.
- Social media is already changing the rules of the marketplace.
- Americans feel different about a brand that they can interact it with via social media. 56% said yes that they feel a stronger connection with a company they can interact with via social networks and 57% say that they feel better served.
- American’s don’t want sales pitches on social networks, but they do want to interact with their favorite brands. They will become a more loyal consumer if they can interact.
- That said, I have sold art off of my website and Twitter.
Networking:
- Being an artist is solitary occupation, but with social networking, you’re not alone!
- Reach beyond your niche and attract new customers.
- Get instant feedback on your latest painting or blog post.
- Ask for a critique on your art.
- Learn from other artists and business leaders.
- Gain inspiration from others.
- Become more business savvy.
You Don’t Want to be a Dinosaur:
- It is clear that those who do not join in will go the way of print media.
- You have to jump in even if you don’t yet understand it.
- You’re a rebel and don’t want to ‘go with the flow’??? Well, just like with art – First, learn the rules & then you can break them…
- Yes, there will be another ‘new thing’ someday. But for the foreseeable future, this is the world so it’s best to learn how to live in it!