Globally, social media has made it possible for artists to reach out to new audiences. Instagram has shown to be a particularly effective platform for visual artists to grow their fan base and, ideally, attract new collectors.
One billion people use Instagram worldwide, with 120 million of those people located in the United States, according to Statista. There is a sizable audience there eager to engage with your art. But first, you must figure out how to get there.
We’ll provide you with useful advice in this article so you can start promoting your artwork on Instagram.
Use Instagram to market your artwork
There are options to market your artwork and gallery on Instagram, from oil paintings to photography. The software makes it simple to design engaging messages with eye-catching graphics and upload them from any location.
But how do you stand out from the crowd when so much work is published every day? You can start by being a little less rigid with your posting choices.
1. Done is preferable to flawless
People that are interested in your art want to witness the creative process. They appreciate the finished, polished product, yes, but they also appreciate the work that went into creating it. Therefore, even if you don’t think anything is ideal, post it. drawing of the progress. the leftovers from a shoot. a speed-drawing video or wireframe for a character you’re working on. When you share different facets of your work, you’ll be able to connect with your audience better and pique their interest. People enjoy watching the foundations of anything develop into art. For instance, artist Gu Zheng Wei frequently shares updated versions of older works to demonstrate development and inspire those just starting out. It demonstrates that creating art is a process.
2. Make good use of stories
Instagram’s Stories feature is another opportunity to demonstrate to your followers the artist who created the work. They are a straightforward concept—short pieces of content that disappear in a day—but they are incredibly useful.
With photo carousels, you may show off sneak peeks of your most recent project or gallery space updates. You can speak directly to your fans in brief films that have the air of a casual chat so they can get to know you better.
You may become even more engaging by using features like polls and countdowns. Have a forthcoming event? Give your followers the ability to set a reminder for when it ends, start a countdown timer, and announce it to them. marketing prints? What works of art do your fans wish to see the most?
3. Monitor your engagement.
The analytics on Instagram provide you a thorough overview of how each post is interacted with by your Instagram real followers. The number of accounts reached, the number of new followers, the number of posts saved, and more are all readily available.
Pay attention to that data and observe what is generating interest for your profile. What posts receive more likes, shares, comments, and saves? Try to identify what makes those postings unique so you may utilize that knowledge in your marketing campaigns.
It’s not necessary for your postings to all be identically polished pieces but it is worthwhile to see how your followers react.
Engage with your followers on your posts and gain insight into their marketing strategies.
4. Examine utilizing video
ore and more individuals are adopting video as a strong engagement strategy. Instagram is a visual platform, therefore using video there works out really well. Use that as a marketing opportunity for your gallery.
Let’s say your Instagram Live session lasted an hour and some of your followers may have missed it. So that everyone may watch, save it, and upload it to IGTV. For process movies like speed painting, the Reels feature makes it simple to create a brief, TikTok-style videos.
With a video upload, you can slightly reorganize your newsfeed. Consider posting a little time-lapse movie of a character study if you’re an animator and asking folks what they think.
You now have access to Instagram metrics for Reels and live videos.
5. Make your gallery’s feed reflect it
Create a gallery of your best artwork to display in your feed in addition to sketches and ongoing projects. Try out several colour schemes and pattern combinations to give your page a unified, aesthetically pleasing appearance.
Try employing various apps to improve the overall appearance of your feed. For instance, Giant Square enables you to combine numerous squares from your feed into a sizable college. Unfold offers stunning themes that you can use to create stunning Story and feed posts.
This not only displays your best work but also offers your gallery a polished appearance. Additionally, you can add well-written captions that provide context for your work.
6. Employ hashtags and tags
Despite how awkward they often are, hashtags continue to be used on social media. You may help market your gallery so that more people become aware of it by using pertinent hashtags whenever you post a new work of art to Instagram.
Make sure the hashtags you use relate to your artistic work. The algorithm will notice if you post irrelevant or seemingly popular ones that have nothing to do with your brand or the type of work you produce, and you might not get as much engagement. To find out what hashtags are being used and whose accounts are being tagged, look at other artists and galleries with a huge following.
7. Work together
If you can, work together to create something new with other artists and art industry influencers you know. This may be a collaborative Instagram live session, an artwork you both create, or a video you both produce.
When you work with others, you get access to their audience after they share the project on their account, and the reverse is also true.
8. Use advertisements
If you have the money, Instagram has a sizable audience for paid advertising. They provide in-feed and Story ads, and since Facebook now controls the website, users can see your ads there as well.
By selecting the Promote button, you may even turn any of your posts into an advertisement. The Instagram ad platform allows you to target specific demographics for your ads and change how long they run in accordance with your budget.
Publish your artwork
Nowadays, there is a lot of noise in the art world. But if you know how to properly advertise your art on Instagram and are persistent, you could be able to succeed.
To reach a larger audience, share a variety of material on your feed, Stories, Reels, and IGTV. Engage with them, and monitor your analytics to see what’s working for you.
Working with and supporting other artists will make you feel good and may result in them doing the same for you in the future.
Paid advertisements can significantly increase your visibility on Facebook and Instagram if you have the funds for them. Try a handful of things if you’re on a tight budget.
