(no subject)

[suzeyy.livejournal.com]

Please forgive me if this is inappropriate to post here, but since you guys give good advice on how to sell, I was wondering if there was any advice on where to sell and how to sell more.

I've moved out and plan on using commissions to bring in some extra cash while I look for another job. However, I don't really know where to sell other than dA, FA, and teenycom on LJ. Does anyone else know of good places to advertise? Where have you had success? (Sidenote: is buying ad space on FA worth it?)

Also, I don't really know what I can do to make myself more marketable and appealing to customers. In general, what can help your selling rate? What makes artwork more appealing? Obviously this is subjective, but I'm certain some things sell more than others.

Thank you for reading! C:

Comments

[kayla-la.livejournal.com]

FA adspace is definitely worth it as far as commissions and such go, as far as I've heard. The problem is actually getting the ad. You have to get it through dragoneer and he's really hard to get a hold of, people regularly wait months just to get a response about their ad.

[grygon.livejournal.com]

I was JUST poking at the "advertising" link on FA and it kept asking me to give wiki my UN and PW.

[mactonight.livejournal.com]

It's broken right now for some reason.

advertising (at) furaffinity.net is the ad email.

[fetalstar.livejournal.com]

People regularly wait months? Really?
I've been getting an FA ad every month for about a year now (can't afford to pay for longer than a month at a time) and I've never had issues with waiting. I think the longest I've had to wait was 1-2 weeks. And the time I had to wait for two weeks, he gave me an additional week for free.

[kayla-la.livejournal.com]

Awesome! But if you l look at the FA forums, there's often threads going 'I sent an email WEEKS ago, and haven't heard anything back yet!'.

[fetalstar.livejournal.com]

Huh! I must just be lucky or have great timing when I put my ad requests in. XD

[crssafox.livejournal.com]

I don't have problems either, it's been a while since I put up an ad (I originally did when I started taking new fursuit commissions) but I usually received a response fairly quick. Sometimes I did have to send a reminder e-mail a week or two later, but never had to wait very long at all.

[tanginello.livejournal.com]

I had pretty good success selling on the Furaffinity Forums recently.

I find that my quick and cheap stuff sells way better than my pricier things. I imagine it depends on the artist, but most of my sales are in the $5-$15 range (aka not enough for this to be a substantial amount of income unless you are wicked fast.)

[sigilgoat.livejournal.com]

FA ad is worth it! It can take a while to get it (If you wait more than 72 hours, send an email to whatever Dragoneer contacts you can find), but it helps a LOT~!

[gaaralover85.livejournal.com]

Ad space on FA is totally worth it, I managed to snag some time from their Black Friday sale last year. And it gave me approximately 7k pageviews from the time it started in late january to when it came down at the end of july. It gave me a LOT of good business. And I plan to buy another ad slot close to when i properly re-open for commissions.

As far as marketing yourself on other areas, it's really hard. I have had to slog for the past 3years to get my name roughly out there. It's a daily thing you have to do, journals, commenting, watching, advertising. You have to keep yourself out there otherwise you'll just drop off people's radar very quickly. I've noticed it since closing for commissions for a little while, and it takes a lot of effort to get started. but once you have it takes minimum effort to keep it going. If that makes any sense?

I wish you the best of luck! <3

[mazz.livejournal.com]

dealers den and furbid might give you some more press.

[frazzled-niya.livejournal.com]

I guess you could sell prints on places like Red Bubble and Etsy or cafepress too o_O...though that's provided you can supply for the masses (i.e. something that lots of people will want)

[fenris-lorsrai.livejournal.com]

Depending on what type or art you do and how appealing it is to nonfurries, now is also the time to try and arrange to sell stuff on commission at local businesses. This does mean you likely have to get prints made to take to them, but if you do something that readily translates to bookmarks or notecards, a loccal bookstore, coffee shop, or smaller boutique may be willing to carry work by a local artist.

[frazzled-niya.livejournal.com]

Oh I don't disagree. It can be a lot of work o_O...But the local coffee shop scene sounds like a good idea too :)

[crssafox.livejournal.com]

Storenvy.com is another great option, it's 100% free and buyers don't need to sign up for an account to buy from it. Big Cartel is another option that offers a free store plan for its users, up to five items I believe, any more than that you can pay a small monthly fee.

As much as I love Etsy (and presentation is big big BIG there, you have to have good photos of your work to be recognized enough to get people to +fav your items) I don't care too much for their double-dipping; they charge twenty cents to list an item, then a small percentage if you actually make a sale. Some months I end up paying anywhere between $30-$50 on Etsy fees alone. :\

[spiffystuff.livejournal.com]

Depending on where you are, you could also try going to local cons and art shows
Usually artist alley is free (fur cons) or cheap (indy [relevant interest] cons) and art shows are free
To cut down overhead you might be able to volunteer to get free attendance - I don't know too much about doing it and how much it'd clash with running a table but I thought you only had to volunteer for a couple hours so it seems like there'd still be plenty of time to sell at a table
Also, if it's far enough that you can't stay at home, but are still wanting to do the con, roomshare and rideshare!

[neolucky.livejournal.com]

Ah I've never been to a con (furry or not) with a free AA. Which ones are you talking about? Heck I've never been to -any- convention with a free aa or dealers hall.

[spiffystuff.livejournal.com]

Oh? AC has a free AA, MFF has a free AA... I guess I rather thought it was standard for furry cons to have free AAs, though I haven't tried any others.
Never been to any con with a free dealer's hall. But some aren't too expensive, like $40
One kinda general con (balticon?) I think I got a free or super cheap table for webcomic artists because they were trying to promote that. It's good to network with fellow makers in the area and then you hear about stuff like that; I wouldn't have gotten the offer if I hadn't been going to webcomic meets.

[neolucky.livejournal.com]

Oooh! I didn't know it was free, but with how crazy the "lottery" system is at some furry AA's, I generally don't bother. And Rainfurrest I believe has a AA fee this year. But yeah I know what you mean now!

[spiffystuff.livejournal.com]

Yeah the AC artist alley lottery is kind of a pain in the butt, but I've done it in the past and it's not too bad (I just feel like a putz since I'm just doing it for fun and don't bring a lot / stay too long, and I know other people are treating it more as a job)
The nice thing is that they do keep trying to expand the AA to fill demand, so most people do get picked, and I believe if you don't get in for one day you automatically get in for the next day. Or something. They keep changing it a bit every year though XP
Maybe now it's a day-before signup.

[crssafox.livejournal.com]

Not all furry artist's alleys have a lottery system. I hate hate HATE that idea, and wish they would just do the "pay less than the dealers, get only half a table" thing that anime cons do.

Some fur cons have a free AA. Megaplex, FWA, and I believe RCFM are all free to find an open space to vend. FWA's AA is open 24 hours, which is kinda cool. But fur cons definitely operate differently from anime and gaming cons; I've come to prefer the anime cons since you can at least guarantee your spot there.

[leahtaur.livejournal.com]

FA adspace is very much worth the money, but I really recommend you get your ad and money together sooner rather than later. A friend of mine actually had to wait a month... A MONTH... for Dragoneer just to respond to her and put her ad up. She also put up an ad for our folio group, only to have the image be broken for quite a while before it was fixed. I imagine she'll be compensated for the downtime but I don't know for sure.

In other words, it's worth it, but expect to be frustrated.

[ogawaburukku.livejournal.com]

I am speaking from experience that's probably ten years behind the times, but I did commissions on ebay in 2002-2005 and made pretty good money. Not to sound insulting to buyers, but a lot of people didn't realize I would be posting commissions again whenever I was finished with the first sale, so if I had a starting price of $20 I would sometimes make $60, $90, and once I made $300 by a guy who thought he'd pay in advance for art he never ended up asking for! In 2005 I started using DA and stopped working through Ebay, but Ebay was a gold mine for a while. I'd still do it but I'm in Japan, and most of my clients paid in dollars, and the dollar is no longer stronger than the yen... That's really killed my overseas business XP

[jurann.livejournal.com]

FurBuy is an excellent place to get your art and commissions seen, it's currently the fandom's most active auction website. They also run ad banners for a lot cheaper than FA and there would be no wait whatsoever in getting your banner up and running. They have a special where they will give you the rest of the current month free if there are no other ads currently in a section - and right now the homepage banners section is open. Find out more here:

http://www.furbuy.com/docs/adbanners.shtml

[cappucola.livejournal.com]

There are a lot of people who hold auctions for commissions in their FA journals. I have done so a couple of times myself, but I'm curious if getting an account set up and whatnot for furbuy would be a better idea, or would it be just more of a hassle?

[jurann.livejournal.com]

The problem with holding auctions in your FA journals is that 1) FA is not setup to provide the sales community to support sales/auctions, 2) they do not have an AUP and staff dedicated to making sure transactions go smoothly, 3) nor do they have a feedback and sales rating system.

People go to FurBuy because they are looking for things to buy, people go to FA to look at artwork and read journals. The purposes of the two sites are completely different. Artists who list an auction on FurBuy and then link to it from FA get a double-bonus because they are getting bids not JUST from their watcher pool on FA, but also from the people with money to spend who just go looking on FurBuy. And on top of that, FurBuy is a well-established auction and sales site with over 11 years of history and feedback on buyers and sellers already, with an abundance of useful features geared specifically towards sales, reputation and responsibility. Plus we have staff that care about your experience and will help mediate any problems that may come up during your use of the site.

Setting up a new account is fast, simple, and completely free. Bidding is always free, and selling is free within rather generous limitations. An affordable $18/year subscription enhances a seller's account and adds more features, but is not necessary for most sellers to use FurBuy adequately.

[cappucola.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the reply. I will check it out and consider it.

[neolucky.livejournal.com]

Honestly, just hosting them in your journal is less of a hassle. I've had a much better audience (And heck, its all my watchers so a bit more people too) then my usage of Furbuy. Frankly I'd stick with FA journals.

[cappucola.livejournal.com]

yeah, the main reason I like using journals for it is that anyone can bid. although as jurann stated above in his reply, it still leaves the chance of non serious bidders. I haven't had that problem yet though and I don't think I will, so we'll see for future auction journals I guess!

[neolucky.livejournal.com]

Eh I've never had that problem, and I've done a lot of them! Generally most people understand that to bid is to be serious. It's just more flexible and you get a lot more folks in your journal (Also questions can be answered a lot faster) Either way, I just like journals either way!

But I'm not here to play salesman for FA *lol*

[cappucola.livejournal.com]

ahah no worries. I do agree with you though.

[spiffystuff.livejournal.com]

FWIW jurann is the founder/head honcho of furbuy.
Not that you can't listen to him! Just some context.

[korth-dono.livejournal.com]

My FA banner was well worth it and actually I didn't wait at all.. I think it was up in less than a week after I originally e-mailed? I was holding some quicker sales to do pre-orders for AC so I needed it up ASAP.

[fetalstar.livejournal.com]

FA banner is totally worth it.
I joined FA mainly to get commissions, because people on DA don't really commission you unless you have over 500k pageviews

The day my ad went up, I had enough commissions to make up for the ad, AND pay my rent and bills for the month.

So yes, totally worth it. :3

[candycornsnake.livejournal.com]

Do you have to make the FA banner flash yourself? And do you host it or just email it to Dragoneer? I think I want to try this!!!

[fetalstar.livejournal.com]

You do have to make the banner yourself, but it's not flash, it's just a gif.
And you just send the banner as an attachment when you apply for an ad, and he takes care of everything else.

The only issue I've ever had with that, was he accidentally forgot to upload the banner that I had provided (it was a new one, that was advertising my summer sale), so I sent him an email and he immediately fixed it and gave me 10 extra days for free. :3

[crssafox.livejournal.com]

Echoing the others that say FA banners are worthwhile. They're inexpensive and generate traffic to the page you're advertising. Even if you don't necessarily get immediate commissions from it, you'll gain watchers for sure, who may eventually turn into customers at some point. It's all about generating traffic. :)

I agree with the comment above about getting into local art shows/conventions. Look into anime or multi-genre fandom conventions - cute animals sell pretty well at those cons, especially if you offer pre-made items like key chains, stickers, magnets, cell charms, and prints. They're usually pretty reasonably priced for artist's alley spaces, around $50 or so for the weekend. Also consider on-campus conventions; some anime events are hosted at college campuses and they run two or three days, with inexpensive or free admission to attendees, leaving them with more money to spend on artists and dealers. Those are usually pretty inexpensive as well; I'm doing two on-campus cons over the next six months and paying only $50 at each for good spaces.