Where to Sell Your Art Online

Recently I've been receiving emails asking me to help people sell their art online or asking what sites can you sell your art online from? Whilst I primarily sell my own art through ebay auctions (I don't have an ebay shop) I have been asked about alternative sites.

Reality First

Before we get onto that, a reality check. Selling your art online can be as simple as deciding on a price for each piece and listing it somewhere for sale. (You may want to put some thought into how you'll send your art through the mail so it doesn't get damaged - and don't forget that the customer pays for postage not you!).

However it's not easy. If I could tell you how to sit back and watch the money roll in I would. You have to do all the marketing and promotion yourself. You may get some sales simply by listing your work on a popular art site but in general you'll need to tell people that you're selling your art. Hence, tell everyone you know, use your social networks, talk to people on forums that might be interested in the subjects that your art covers. Print flyers, advertise in newspapers, have a business card. All of it can help.

Persevere and read everything you can about how to sell your art online. A good site for art business articles (after you've read everything here) is Empty Easel (you may even find one or two written by me).

Receiving Payments

Although not essential it will make your life much easier if you open a PayPal business account. These are free to open and, if you intend to have your own site, will allow you to embed things like Buy Now buttons and accept Credit Card Payments. Even without your own site many art sites pay your earnings into a PayPal account.

Don't believe all of PayPal's bad press. If you treat it like any other financial site, guard your login details with your life and double check you're not falling for phishing scams by clicking on links sent to you in emails you should be fine. I've had a PayPal account for almost ten years and had no trouble yet. (I also use it to send invoices on commissioned art too).

Options for Selling Your Art Online

Your Own Web Site

If you're really serious, get your own web site with a domain name address like www.yourname.com

These days you don't even need to know much about web site design and you can host your own domain name on many free web hosts like 50webs, Webs and Webnode. Just choose a template and start adding your content. The free sites aren't always ideal but if you're just starting out it's good to have as few set up costs as possible. Personally I use 50webs and I bet you never even knew my homepage is hosted on a free web host site until I told you.

Note that your own domain name will cost you an annual fee. It's not usually expensive and is worth every cent. I've yet to find anyone that will just give you a top level domain name for free.

Portfolio Sites and Market Places

If ebay is not for you then the most common site that artists refer me to as an alternative is www.etsy.com. Etsy is a site for selling all things 'hand made' including art, usually through an Etsy Shop. I've never used this site personally but in terms of traffic to their site it should get your work seen.

Other sites I would recommend (in no particular order) are:

www.artwanted.com
www.zibbet.com
www.artid.com
www.deviantart.com (very popular amongst artists)

These kind of sites usually have their own market places for getting your work seen but really what they offer is a place to create a portfolio that you can then refer potential buyers to.

Digital Prints and Print On Demand

An alternative to selling your actual physical artworks is to scan or photograph them and sell digital prints on Print On Demand sites. This can be a much easier way to go as all you have to worry about is promotion and marketing - the sites themselves handle printing postage etc.

Sites in this area include:

www.redbubble.com
www.imagekind.com
www.cafepress.com
www.zazzle.com

And, if you're interested in self publishing books of your art you might like to try

www.lulu.com

Stock Art and Photography Libraries

Another options is posting digital copies of your art to stock photography and art sites. These kind of sites license images for use by various publishers in all manner of publications from web sites to actual printed books. You earn money each time your images are used by a publisher. It can be quite a good avenue for income if the kind of work you create could be used in many different situations.

Sites include:

www.graphicleftovers.com
www.istockphoto.com
www.shutterstock.com

Summing Up

In conclusion you'll notice I haven't described each site in any great detail. I'll leave it up to you to visit them all, find out what they're about and to find out if they're right for you.

These sites are not the only ones out there. There are thousands of sites where you can sell your art. My only advice would be to stay away from sites that have no free account and require you to pay an annual or monthly subscription. These kind of sites are better for artists who know how to sell their work and are likely to be able to cover these costs from their sales.

The best sites, generally, only take a commission from sales.

Hopefully this article has given you some pointers for where to start in the quest to sell your work over the internet. There are plenty of opportunities for artists. Just be aware that you do have to work at it and treat selling your art as an important part of your business rather than a sideline.