Why doesn't SEO work for artists trying to sell art online?

SEO is often misunderstood by artists. Real SEO isn’t just adding meta descriptions and fancy URLs hoping Google will magically find you. True SEO is regular, consistent marketing where you build links year-round through PR, individual outreach, and ongoing efforts. Almost no artists do this actual work. More importantly, SEO doesn’t align with how art actually sells. People rarely wake up, search ‘abstract art’ on Google, and immediately buy. Instead, they discover artists through various channels, start following them, learn their story, get bonded to them, perhaps make a smaller purchase first, and then buy larger pieces down the line. Art buying is a relationship-building process, not an impulse search-and-purchase transaction.

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Asked by synthesized from teaching · Answered by Patrick Shanahan · art-marketing-podcast · 2023-11-02