I have a shop on Etsy but it seems I don't get much traffic there, and it's not much of an interactive experience. Then I saw this ad banner on Swap-bot for an indie marketplace I hadn't heard of before, called Art Fire. So I looked into it, found this fun blog with a review of Artfire vs. Etsy. I decided to plunge in. I hope it's worth it. Here's another review from a current Artfire seller--excuse me--artisan. I like that. And the staff seems to be very responsive to what artists want in an online marketplace. Here's some pros and cons pointed out by blogger Crafty Equine. Then there's this discussion of a bunch of online marketplaces that I don't have time to read. Go read it for me. Maybe I can have a personal assistant do it. My bank called me today and tried to sell me personal customer service for$5.99 a month, and I wanted to slap him. It was one of those "Okay, so we'll sign you up and then if you don't want it you just send your firstborn and your masters thesis in triplicate and we'll simply cancel the subscription!" sells. I just said no.
What was I talking about? Oh, Arffire. Now, see, that's going to be a problem. I keep typing Arf instead of Art. But other than that, it seems good. I don't have a lot of time to market myself, and I'm not looking to find a huge income source, but I do like making things and selling some. So I've got a store now on Arf. Fire. Artfire. There's only one item (my zine) in it at present, but hopefully I'll get more in there soon. I don't know if I should just take the stuff off Etsy now or let the listings expire first...
Oh, oh, and if you, that's right, YOU reading this, decide to join Arf, could you be nice and say I referred you? If you do I might get a free subscription and that would be great. For me. For you, it would be, um, good karma? So if you register, do it thought the link below. Thanks. I love you. No, really, I do. Just not that way.
Register on ArtFire.com
Okay, I finished up some ACEO's that I'd been working on, so I now have enough items to fill a little store window. See it over there on my sidebar? Isn't it cute? And really what you visit is my "studio" which I think is really cool. It encourages me to make more art, so I can fill up my STUDIO. Yeah!
Posts
4 comments:
I'm on etsy, have sold one item in about 4 months. But I do hear that you have to market like crazy. I'll probably keep it for awhilem though I'll check the article you mention. I love redbubble, which is a t-shirt site I have stuff on, it is much more straightforwar (at least to me) than etsy.
Oh, I'm going to check this out. And when I get to work I'm going to check all these links. I love what you've done to your blog; there's a lot of great information, and it's purdy.
Hi there,
I just wanted to say "Welcome to ArtFire"! We're glad you took the plunge. :-)
Thanks,
Kirsten
Director of Member Engagement
ArtFire.com
Carrie the Great, I came home from work feeling yutsy, and have read these articles and I am going to sign up right now. I'm hoping there's a place where I can note you as the referencing party. I don't even sell my work yet! But I do want to.
Thanks for the head's up!
Post a Comment