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FineArtViews Newsletter
Straight Talk about Art, Marketing,
Inspiration and Fine Living
For Artists, Collectors and Galleries
(and anyone else who loves art)
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Don't Worry About Google...
Too Much
by Clint Watson
TODAY:
we sincerely want you to focus your energies where they are most
effective at helping you market and sell artwork. After all, your
latest page view counts don't put bread on the table....sales put bread on the table. . .
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Tuesday, October 16, 2007
San Antonio, Texas
IN THIS ISSUE
* Don't Worry about Google...Too Much
* The Final Varnish, Revisited
* COLLECTOR'S DISCOVERY SALON
See the latest works by our artist members!
* The Bookshelf
* From the FineArtViews Blogs
The Latest Ruminations from our artist members.
* Focal Point: wabi-sabi
Your Truth is Just Different than My Truth
We met an interesting lady at a party this past weekend. We were sitting around a campfire...campfires seem to put people in reflective, philosophical moods . . . and this particular lady decided to share her views on life with us.
"I believe in a lot of truths" she started, "I believe in God, the Universe, forces that we can't see, re-incarnation.....I definitely think I've lived other lives..."
"But most of all, I believe that your truth may be different from my truth." She paused and then continued, "In fact, I couldn't tell you that your truth is WRONG, any more than you could tell me that mine is wrong.....your truth is just DIFFERENT than my truth...."
Hmmmm. Your editor may be a bit dense, but this seems like the sort of humbug that doesn't really work anywhere else except in the recesses of one's own mind while sitting around a campfire with a good beer buzz.
Of course, we didn't want to ruin a good buzz, so we kept these thoughts to ourself and simply nodded as she spoke as if we were deep in thought.
But now, reflecting more on this idea, it seems rather elementary. If something is true....then, necessarily, anything else that contradicts the true fact must be untrue. Isn't that just basic logic? Perhaps we are just too simple.
It seems to us this sort of thinking is just a good excuse to not have to actually deal with the truth, or perhaps to get away with something while pretending we think it is the truth.
And actually, that may be why perhaps, ..... just, perhaps the theory has it's usefulness.
We hear our wife calling us, so we must go. She is claiming that the trash needs taking out and that the lawn needs mowing.....
Hmmmmm. We think that perhaps HER truth is just different than OUR truth....don't you agree?
== Highly Recommended ==
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Announcing:
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Estimated First Issue Sending: October 23rd
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Art by Bill Oplinger
Today's Selected Commenter
http://www.billoplinger.com/
YOUR artwork could be pictured here tomorrow
just comment on today's article before midnight,
and your artwork could be in front of thousands of people
tomorrow.
Don't Worry About Google . . . Too Much
By Clint Watson
Dear {{FirstName}},
We seem to come back to this theme repeatedly: Focus on ideas that
really work for artists and don't get too hung up on search engine
marketing.
We've addressed this idea many times in past posts such as What if Google Went Away?, Google Alone is Not Marketing, Less is More, and in our Web Traffic Driver series (which is not finished, by the way).
We don't harp on this because we have anything against search engines, heck we love search
engines (if you're reading this, Google, we LOVE search engines). But,
we sincerely want you to focus your energies where they are most
effective at helping you market and sell artwork. After all, your
latest page view counts don't put bread on the table....sales put bread on the table.
We think it's worth reprinting the quote from Matt Cutts, a senior engineer at Google:
[Google] also counsels that sites shouldn't become overly reliant on traffic from searches and should find other ways to get visitors,
such as by setting up user forums. "We have to keep improving our
algorithms and giving the best search results," says Google software
engineer Matt Cutts. "We can't promise that if you're No. 1 today, you'll be No. 1 tomorrow." (emphasis added)
It seems we're not alone in our ideas. We ran across a post on the popular blog, Copyblogger, which is currently ranked number 36 on Technorati's
top 100 list (which, for those of you who are not into following tech
sites this means, essentially that it is the 36th most popular blog on the
entire Internet). The post is entitled, Here's How to Stop Worrying About Google Once and For All by Brian Clark, and, among other things, Clark makes the following point:
Believe it or not, my strategy since the beginning
of Copyblogger has been to pretty much forget search engines exist.
Don't get me wrong. . . I'm not doing anything to annoy them, and I
certainly don't turn away visitors from search engines. I just don't
depend on them for traffic.
While people work hard to attract
links to rank better in search engines, you've got to realize that some
of the highest quality traffic comes directly from the links.
Pretend like search engines are not even a traffic option, and instead
focus on repeat traffic and referral sources that no one can take away.
(emphasis in original)
And that, dear artists, is the essential point that we have been trying to make - the highest quality traffic comes directly from the links.
Sincerely,
Clint Watson
Software Craftsman and Art Fanatic
PS - At the risk of pointing out the obvious, this article illustrates
why habitually garnering inbound links to your site (from other good
art-related sites) should be one of your top online marketing
strategies.
PPS - If you are interested in learning about tomorrow's master artists today, don't forget to sign up for our new sister publication, Informed Collector. We are planning to send our first issue within the next two weeks:
http://informedcollector.com
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This article is reproduced with permission.
Copyright 2007 - Clint Watson.
To get more of Clint Watson's insights into art, marketing, inspiration and fine living, check out his blog at:
FineArtViews Blog by Clint Watson:
http://www.clintwatson.net
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Editor's Note: Each day we republish selected comments and artwork by artists who comment about the previous day's article. If you would like to share your thoughts, artwork and views with thousands of artists and collectors, (not to mention getting a valuable inbound link to your website) be sure to post a comment on today's article at the following link. To be considered, be sure to provide your comment through the link NOT by simply replying to this email. Make sure to comment before the end of the day to be considered for inclusion in tomorrow's newsletter:
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The Final Varnish, Revisited
Bill Oplinger Wrote:
I was surprised to read that "A watercolorist would never consider her
work completed without a glazing to protect it." I have never heard of
a watercolorist using a glaze to protect the painting unless they were
not using glass in the framing. Is this a common practice with many
watercolorists---to glaze the painting AND use glass?
And does the use of "her" imply that most watercolorists are female? I would have used "their" to avoid insult or sexism!
Editor's Reply:
The word "glazing" means "glass." We used to be picture framers and sometimes fall into using the "proper" lingo. So, to say a watercolorist would never consider a work complete "without glazing" means "without glass," not something in addition to the glass.
Regarding the use of "her:" We still believe in the old rules: It is grammatically correct to use "his" or "her" when one means "both sexes." We feel that most people reading such a passage realize that we obviously don't mean to imply that most watercolorists are female. And certainly we didn't mean anything insulting, any more than someone naming a ship, or a hurricane, or anything else means to insult any specific individual or class. Sometimes one just needs a pronoun for the idea to work and often, attempting to use a pluralized or neutral form results in awkward sentences or just plain awkward reading. As such, and to avoid "butchering our beloved language" (as a previous reader wrote in to take us to task for), we may continue using "his" or "her" from time to time. We do attempt to make a 50/50 split on the frequency that we use "his" and "her."
More Comments:
http://fineartviews.com/466
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COLLECTOR'S DISCOVERY SALON:
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The Bookshelf:
Convenient links to books recently discussed in FineArtViews:
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Your
templates have allowed me to have a first class website with very
little work. It is easy to upload images and to maintain the
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- William A. Schneider, OPA PSA
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FOCAL POINT: wabi-sabi
wabi-sabi - (pr. WAH-bee-SAH-bee) "Wabi-sabi is the quintessential Japanese aesthetic. It
is a beauty of things imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete," wrote Leonard
Koren in his book Wabi-Sabi: for Artists, Designers, Poets &
Philosophers. It is a beauty of things modest and humble, and of "things
unconventional." Peripherally associated with Zen Buddhism, wabi-sabi values
characteristics that are rustic, earthy, and unpretentious, involving natural
materials which are used neither representationally nor symbolically.
Want More FineArtViews Right Now?
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