Gaining followers for your blog posts
Quite a number of photographers also run a blog or a portfolio site – partly, I’m sure, to have a place to put their best work in front of potential buyers of prints or downloads, and partly to build a following that is interested in their work. I’ve been doing that here in two distinct ways. On this site, I write for photographers and on BackyardImage, I try to write solely for people that aren’t photographers but could be in the market for a print or piece of wall art at some point in the future. As I have written in the past, I’ve been trying to boost the visibility of my print works and focusing more on that than on stock photography. It will be interesting to see how my stock sales fare with fewer new images being uploaded!
Whenever I read articles from other artists about boosting your sales, it always seems to boil down to creating content about your work that will excite your followers and attract new followers to your blog. Of course, many of those articles are from photographers who do sell prints of their own work, but probably (and I’m guessing), make more money from other photographers than they do from the sale of their photos. Their aim is to build a following of other photographers and I believe it is much easier to do that than find a following of lovers of your work.
I’ve been thinking about my own fine art site and why it is so difficult to get people to subscribe. After six months I think I have perhaps 8 subscribers and most of those are photographers! I’ve come to a conclusion (right or wrong) that gaining followers works best when the audience you are seeking is looking for advice and guidance and education perhaps on a topic where they think you are an expert.
When it comes to selling prints though, this seems to fall down. Buyers aren’t looking for an expert to follow to learn things from. If I had a certain artistic style and that was what made people love my prints, then I can see that it would be possible to find that audience and keep them interested in new work that I had produced, or in the background thinking process behind some new work. I can see how a website about that would work and how people might sign up to hear more about my style or my niche. But as a travel-oriented photographer primarily interested in selling nice images of places, it is hard to think of what would interest someone who bought a print of San Diego to want to sign up to hear about my latest work in West Virginia. Someone might have seen and loved my work from Kauai, but they are unlikely to want to see what I did last month in Cornwall. There doesn’t seem to be a common factor that an audience would coalesce around.
I’ve begun to think that a better approach would be to regularly write interesting articles, illustrated by my photography, about the different places I have visited. These would be aimed not at photographers (although they are the easiest to write for), but, instead, they would be aimed at someone who is interested in that place. They may live there (or were brought up there), they may have vacationed there, and they might be interested in getting some tangible reminder of that place. Selling memories, in effect. So, my website (BackyardImage.com) is now focused on those destination stories and relatively small links to where you can buy a print are inserted in the captions of the images. I do have a subscription prompt, although it has not been very successful so far, and I’m wondering whether I should “downgrade” that and simply aim to continue to create interesting stories and aim to get some Google traction on those so that I am found more from searches and links from other sites rather than from an email to subscribers.
So, at the end of this long wordy post, I leave you with the thought that the approach of seeking subscribers absolutely works for certain types of artistic ventures. However, there is a broad group – photographers and painters perhaps who are aiming for realistic and evocative art based on locations around the world, where it is difficult to define a specific audience or group of people who would be interested in the wider scope of that work. In that scenario, something other than aiming to talk to them regularly via email is needed to build an audience for that work.
I’d be interested in your thoughts or experience in building an audience for your work that is broader than other photographers!
Yes I think the key has to be to write posts on subjects that someone will be Googling. Iconic places and sites are in that category. So are some wildlife subjects. It’s fun to make other photographers laugh with a post, or to give them something helpful. I try to do that now and then, but of course it doesn’t advance my sales. That’s ok.
Thanks Jim – I do include bits about the technique in my articles – written to be understandable to a potential buyer as well as a photographer reading the story. I think that does give a nice balance.
Hi Steve, when I first got serious about photography, I started a blog and it was basically a travel photography blog. I would write about locations and how I photographed them. I would then post on Facebook and invite people to visit my site. I still have the site but haven’t posted in over a year. Eventually I hoped to drive people to my website and they would buy prints, etc. People buying photos from my site just about never happened. But I enjoyed writing about my travels and people would respond that they enjoyed reading it. I have been following your success with stock photography with amazement. Writing about your travel photography is a great idea although it might not create demand for photo sales. I would start out slowly and see how it goes. The main thing is to get enjoyment from connecting through your blog.
Thanks! I will continue down this track and see how it develops – it isn’t hard to create these stories and it does put my photos into context, and hopefully it might persuade someone to visit my online portfolio to see the images I talk about!
I have had very little success with people signing up for my site updates, but I haven’t tried very hard. I suspect that, unless they have some interest in buying prints, the fact that they have been lured into signing May be irrelevant to sales. Once in a while I get inquires about prints through my blog but most don’t result in any sales.
Yes, I think that is an issue we all face, and it is somewhat annoying for other professional photographers to suggest this as the holy grail. I think it is if you are attracting photographers as you immediately have something in common and an interest in learning more. With art prints – less so!
I participate in a arts marketing group where there are many painters, they relate that they have these collectors who are interested in their process, brushstrokes and studio, and that these people actually buy repeatedly from them. I think nobody cares about what I do or how I do it, except for photographers. None of my customers has bought more than once from me, but to be fair, only in the last year have I started this effort.
I hear you! I thought that people would be more likely to follow a painter – whereas travel photography is aimed at someone interested in one specific place, not everything I visit and photograph.
I’m not sure landscape photography only appeals to those who have been there. I don’t see that many people interested in the artistic process of taking photos of botanicals, ocean one dreamscapes. I’m starting to think that sales wise the blog is a fabulous waste of my time.
Well, I like reading your stories!
Thank you. It’s worth the effort for networking, making friends and learning new things in photography and other subjects. Just the sales I think it doesn’t help.
Hi Steven. I have an old blog dedicated to the Albufera Natural Park in Valencia, Spain. Forgotten by me for years, but still visited, it has between 500 and 700 visits per month. In the blog I wrote about the natural park, news and events, all illustrated with my photographs. I’ve been wanting to update it for a long time, but I can’t find the time. It is true that it may be a good idea to insert a link to my print shop, since, although the photographs on the blog are illustrative, they are at least thematically related to some of my shop
Yes, I certainly do get views on my artwork from putting the links under the photos on my site. My hope is that these stories will pop up when someone is searching for a particular place or subject and someone will like what they see! I think it is worth linking that old post to your current images.
Direct marketing is hard for anyone and for an individual photographer who is just starting and has no specific targeted audience, the cost is hard to manage. Those who sell quite a bit can benefit from the larger “scale” of their operation. Luckily for many, their photography is more of a hobby or sincere interest rather than a necessity. I enjoy photography and I enjoy writing my blog posts it so I move forward.
I agree Steve, I do enjoy reading what you write and I think much of what you include proves inspiring for others as well as a much needed reality check; Thank You!
Thanks Jeff, for your very kind comments. I think there is a virtuous circle that the more you sell, the more you are likely to sell. Partly as a result of more people seeing your work, but also because the search engines of PoD sites are weighted towards popular results and what is more popular than one that sells. Similarly, to stock agencies I guess – get one good seller and it becomes a best seller! As you say it is important to enjoy what you do otherwise it becomes simply a chore!
Steve, your post struck a chord in me – big time. When I first started my blog and opened my galleries over on ZenFolio, it was for the purpose of telling the story behind the photographs. But then I realized how expensive my work was on ZenFolio, a website that is geared more towards wedding and graduation photography and bookings than for landscape or night photography. So, I shifted my blog to WordPress and opened galleries on Fine Art America.
I admit that I am floundering now, not sure how to best use my limited time to promote my work. (I realize that you only get out what you put in, but working a full time day job takes away a lot of available time for marketing my work so I need to be more efficient with what I’m doing). Like you, my followers on social media are mostly friends, relatives, and photographers.
I am now leaning more towards getting back to blogging about my photographs, whether it’s landscape, travel, or night photography. I enjoyed the creative side of writing and pairing it with my love of photographing beautiful vistas and I was losing that excitement with the daily drudgery of feeling obligated to post every day to the different social media outlets. I’m hoping to get back to what I wanted to do to begin with.
And I think I’ll start using the blog just not as a photography blog but as a general purpose blog. I do have some non-photographer followers there, and their topics on their blogs are of interest to me and kind of my style of writing. I’m hoping to start referencing both artists and non-artists blogs to my own blog. Not for the purpose of gaining followers necessarily, but for the joy of it – a sharing of interest content with a base of beautiful art (and photography!).
I’m glad the post gave you something to consider that hopefully will prove useful! I’m more convinced that this is the right way for general photographers (as opposed to ones with a specific style that people look forward to seeing the next one). Make the posts interesting, make them appropriate for all sorts of audience perhaps and rely on Google search to bring in people interested in that topic.
Selling fine art, wall art is hard online. There is a huge amount of competition. It can take years to gain any real traffic. I’m too lazy these days to do multiple blogs. As such posts are a mixture of those aimed at potential buyers and stuff for other visual artists. Most of my fine art marketing efforts are put into social media. Specifically posting to Facebook groups, Instagram and Twitter with the occasional post on Pinterest and Linked in. There is only so much time in a day and as I still work 3 to 4 days a week, my time for making images and promoting this is limited.
I hear you – I have a very specific audience for this particular site and I keep posts focused on that audience. My other blog is for the more general articles you are describing. I must research some more Facebook groups though – I think those could be worthwhile.
I’ve been trying to post to some FB groups as well. Some will allow photographs from photographers as long as it’s not excessive. For the ones that don’t allow me to share a link from my business FB page, I’ll upload a photo with my signature on it (web address) so that at least people can see where I am if they’re interested.
Steve, Good post, as usual. I think that a photographer looking to get OTHER photographers to subscribe/follow, can be a “Sisphusian” feat! Assuming the visiting photographers are on the same level as your self, then the “learning” aspect becomes harder to do and achieve. An easier method might be then a “traveling” site, new locations that others might want to visit or are planning on visiting and want to see some images.
That then puts another load on the blog owner to produce new locations, or if a place like Yellowstone or the Smoky Mountains, then new locations within those parks.
A whole different can of worms.
Rich Franco
richfrancocars.com
Yes, I’m aiming at the second one on Backyard Image – separate articles on locations, illustrated by my best pictures.
Good post, I try to write a blog that is location oriented, and I won’t stray too far from that goal. The locales that are more well-known i.e.: national parks and landmarks will likely get more views, but local places of interest are still going to get their fair share. I too will illustrate the blog with a few photos linking back to FAA.
Very informative post. My blog is very new and am thinking is it really worth all the effort but will keep going at it.
It is a difficult decision to be honest. I have given up on getting followers for my BackyardImage site and concentrating on posts that Google might find interesting!