I am writing to you today from an open air kitchen in Sayulita Mexico. And this is the second day of a year long trip around the world. As I was preparing for the trip I had an idea that it would be nice to explore the arts and talk to the artists I come across as I travel. And then share with you here on Art Palaver what I discover.

In a way it is returning to the roots of this site because I began many years ago interviewing local artists in Fort Collins Colorado, the town I was living in at the time. Now I will do the same thing but the towns and the countries will continue to change.

I am excited to start again here on ArtPalaver.com and see once again where the path of writing takes me. I hope you will join this new journey along with me.

Daryle

P.S. If you’d like to know more about my trip you can check out my travel blog Dickens Travels or my Facebook Page.

After 6 years and almost 400 posts it is time for me to say “Good Bye” and officially end the Art Palaver project.

It has been great meeting and helping so many artists over the years and this decision was not easy but I feel the time has come. Thank you all for reading, commenting, emailing, and supporting me over the years. I wish you all the best in your artistic pursuits.

Live to Create!

P.S. There are many other great resources around the web to help you better market and promote your art. Here are a few I recommend:

Art Biz Blog - Alyson B Stanfield’s amazing resource for artists of all levels looking to make a career out of art.

Artonomy - A blog dedicated to empowering creative people with skills needed to promote your creative work {online and offline} and survive financially and mentally {the two do kind of go hand in hand}.

Right Brain Rockstar - Inspiration and practical advice, as well as insights from successful artists, to help you make a successful career out of your creative pursuits.

There are three major components to Facebook: Profiles (Timelines), Pages, and Groups.

But for right now I am just going to talk about Facebook pages and profiles as well as why I recommend you create a Facebook Page to promote your art.

Facebook Profiles

The FB profile is what most of us are familiar with because it is designed to be a user’s personal page where they can share status updates, photos, and videos on their wall. This is the official word from Facebook on how profiles are to be used:

“Profiles (timelines) are for personal, non-commercial use only. They represent individuals and must be held under an individual name.”

Facebook Pages

FB pages are designed for businesses, brands, organizations, celebrities, and artists to connect with people on Facebook. The official word on pages:

“Pages are for professional or official use, and allow an organization, business, celebrity or band to maintain a presence on Facebook.”

Most artists fall in between those two definitions. For many artists their art and their art career is just an extension of themselves as therefor seems very personal which is why many probable just use their profiles to promote their work on Facebook. But FB states that it is to be for “non-commercial use only” which would mean an artist is not allowed to promote their work on their profile if their goal is to make a sale.

Which is just one of the many reasons you should set up a separate Facebook Page for your art. Here are other reasons:

Privacy – Profiles connected on Facebook are like a two way street. I see what you post and you see what I post. (using default settings) Pages create more of a one way street which is better for users and therefore make people more likely to “Like” your page.

Limitless – Your profile is limited to 5,000 friends but a page has no limits to how many people “Like” it. Depending where you are in your career 5,000 might seem like plenty. But I know many artists who have hit that limit on their profile and had to go through the hassle of converting those people to a page.

Multiple Admins – Pages allow you to grant access to more than one user. This can be very helpful if you have someone helping your promote your work. Profiles are only allowed one user.

Easy to use – Over the years profiles and pages have become very similar in look and function. So if you already have a profile you will not have any problem using a page.

Freedom – A page allows you to post, share, and talk about your art as much as you’d like because those who have “Liked” it expect that. That is what they want. On the other hand if you did that on your profile page there are some who are connected with you who will want to hear about more than just your art. Profiles are expected to be more about your personal life. You know like what you had for breakfast.

Safe – Facebook has the right to shut down your profile without warning if they believe you are in violation of their terms of service. The same is true of pages but you are allowed to do much more on a page when it comes to marketing and promotion than you are on a profile. Don’t risk abusing a page and losing your right to be on Facebook.

Now hopefully you see why it is you want a Facebook page. Next we’ll talk about how to create a page and how to get it noticed.

Any questions?

[A palaver about getting the most from the social media giant]

Facebook has been in the news a lot lately. Whether it is about the changes to the site design, the company going public, or the founder’s private life, the site is making headlines in every section of your news feed.

And with all the changes and updates to FB I thought it would be a good time to do a series of posts on Facebook for Artists. I’ve done posts and webinars over the years on Facebook for artists that continue to get a lot a traffic but they are now very out of date. Which is another reason I need to do a series of posts.

So over the course of the next month I am going to be publishing bite size nuggets of information to help you understand the ins and outs of Facebook. And more importantly how you can use FB to market, promote, and build an audience for your art.

I’ll cover everything from the basic functions of the site as well as the important issues of privacy, security, and time management.

With over 900 million users (as of May 2012) Facebook has become an online community so large that it can not be ignored. Many companies, organizations, and artists are finding it to be the number one source of traffic and the best way to engage with their audience.

But on the other hand many people find FB to be very confusing, hard to use, and impossible to find followers on. I’ll work to make sure you are not one of these people.

What Facebook questions do you have?

Use the comment form below to share your FB questions and issues and I’ll write posts to answer them.

Case study volunteers?

I am also looking for artists that would like to have their Facebook page featured in an upcoming Art Palaver post. This can be for anyone looking to tips and advice on how to better utilize Facebook to promote their art. Or it could be for any artists that is having success on Facebook and would like to show off their page a bit.