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Mixed media art is beautiful and fun to make, but is it profitable? Does mixed media art sell? Luckily, with the right strategy, you can sell your collage, sculpture, assemblage, wet and dry media, and all other types of mixed media to the right customers.
Mixed media art does sell. To sell mixed media art, it’s important to know and understand your competition on your selling platform, optimize the SEO for your listings if you’re selling online, and look for communities to be a part of that use the mediums you’re using.
To be honest, selling art sounds fun and romantic at first. In reality, it’s REALLY hard work.
I have people email me all of the time wondering why their art isn’t selling. More often than not, when I review their sites, the issue doesn’t have anything to do with their art (it’s usually beautiful!).
The issue has to do with everything else. The SEO, the optimization, the sales strategy. It’s not there. And, I get it! That stuff isn’t fun. It’s necessary though. VERY necessary.
So, the things we’re going to talk about might not be fun. They definitely aren’t as fun as creating the art you love. That said, they are vital to successfully selling your art. In the end, doing these “less fun” things will be worth it.
Let’s dive in!
1. If You’re Selling Online, Optimize the SEO for Your Listings
If you’re selling your mixed media art online, optimize your listings according to the latest SEO principles so that your art has a chance of rising above the competition and being seen by your customers. Pay close attention to your title, keywords, images, and descriptions for each listing.
Time and again, I see artists getting frustrated because their online art listings aren’t getting any views, let alone sales. You need views in order to get sales. And, how do you get views? SEO!
If your listing pops up on the first page of search results, you’ll get a lot more views and a lot more chances to snag a sale than if your listing was on page 30.
It may not be fun, but it’s REALLY important to learn SEO for the online selling platform you’re using.
Your title, keywords, images, descriptions, and tags will make a huge difference in where your mixed media art listings will land in the search results, which will make a huge difference in how many views your listings receive from your customers.
If you’re selling on Etsy, Skillshare has a lot of amazing classes about how to optimize your SEO for your Etsy store. You can get a discount to Skillshare that will let you take all of these amazing SEO classes for free!
If you’re selling on other platforms, I highly suggest letting yourself get lost in a YouTube rabbit hole. There is so much valuable and free information on YouTube covering SEO strategies for almost every selling platform you could possibly be working with.
Once you dive into SEO, you’ll realize that your competition becomes really important. SEO aside, knowing your competition is extremely important for selling your mixed media art.
Let’s talk about it.
2. Know and Understand Your Competition on Your Selling Platform
To successfully sell your mixed media art, you need to understand who your direct competitors are. This will give you a better idea of what you need to do as an artist and sales person to optimize your listings and position your own art in a positive way for your customers.
When you’re selling your art, your competition matters a LOT!
Maybe you’re on an online platform and your listing is below a similar listing that seems to get a lot of sales.
Maybe you have an in-person booth and the booth next to you seems to get all of the foot traffic.
If your competition is getting sales, it’s possible that those are sales that you could have been getting.
Positioning your art in a less competitive niche can help you get discovered by more customers.
For example, if you’ve made a wildlife collage, titling it “Wildlife Collage” might put you at risk of being lost in a sea of ranking. Instead, think about what makes your art unique and incorporate that into your title.
Analyze your competition. Look at their titles and descriptions so that you can get a better feel for what’s working in that niche.
Even though your competition might seem like a bad thing, they also present a great learning opportunity. Think about what your competition is doing that is leading to their success. Is there anything you can learn that you can incorporate into your own sales and listing strategy?
3. Look for Fans of the Mediums You’re Using
When you’re creating mixed media art, you can dip your toes into many different art arenas. If you combine both painting and collage, look for both painting communities and collage communities to reach out to. This will broaden your potential audience and customer base.
When selling art, think about all of the potential crossovers that exist between the art you create and the many different communities you could be a part of.
Join Facebook groups, follow Instagram accounts, make Pinterest pins, attend meetups, and participate in art fairs. Think about all of the opportunities you can take advantage of.
With mixed media, you have SO many possibilities. You aren’t confined to the box of one medium. Take advantage of that!
The more you can reach out to potential communities, the more you can network and get your art seen by your future customers. It can seem like a lot of work to network and build a following, but the benefits can be huge in the long term.
Selling art can be hard. Selling mixed media art is no exception. But, with the right knowledge, tools, and strategy, you can start building a successful side hustle.
Diana has been an artist for over 26 years and has training in drawing, painting, digital drawing and graphic design. Diana’s latest obsession is digitally drawing with Procreate and creating t-shirt designs with Canva. Diana has experience selling her art across a number of platforms and loves helping other artists learn how to make money from their art as well.