Social Media

I came across a clip recently on the advantages of marketing through social media and twitter in particular, The clip is very slow with a little too much bla.. bla.. and if one can stay tuned, interesting... but what struck me was the attention to detail by Richard Merritt an artisan of hand crafted fountain pens. I went looking for Richard's web site for some inspiration only to find that his site is no longer, just goes to show that it's a tough world out there.

I think that one can become overawed by the sheer number of talented artists and artisans marketing themselves and their product online through the social media which in itself is growing with many new app's.  The advantage that one gains with the advent of a new marketing medium or even strategy can be quickly lost as people jump on the proverbial band wagon.

The most successful marketing appears to come down to timing more than anything else, this is not to say that strategies and all the other elements are not important but we all know by now that it's not the best quality product or service that wins out. People have so many choices today and these choices are provided by companies attempting to find their niche and actually hoping for more than one. Large companies will attempt to muscle out any competition and even influence legislation to minimise the choices to the public at large.

In Australia the banks (the big four) have this down to a pretty fine art and are becoming a little cocky with their success, to the point that they no longer follow the Reserve Bank's lead or advice and rather than focusing on growth for the overall good of society and a tidy margin for themselves, they focus on profit and profit alone for the sake of profit. I believe that this is very dangerous as I think about world history repeating and some of the revolutions that have taken place when the greed of the wealthy becomes too much for the poor and disadvantaged to bear.

I see on the world news that there are a number of growing groups that are beginning to gain notoriety and with that notoriety comes support which I have no doubt will develop into a global movement against the disparity between the 'have's' and the 'have-not's'. Unfortunately this disparity is not minor or growing at a slow but steady rate, it is spiralling out of control and on the brink of creating a global financial melt down. The sad thing is that only the 'have-not's' will bring it into check because once greed takes hold, nothing but poverty can bring it into check.

You are probably wondering how I have gone from marketing and the social media to global upheaval in five paragraph's. I tend to think about consequences and ramifications an awful lot and even more so now that I have a little life experience under the belt. I'm well aware that some of the decisions that we make in our lifetime are very serious with dire consequences that cannot be changed no matter what and others can only be changed at great expense. 

Now what once was only one social media application with more pro's than con's is now at least ten social media applications with just as many con's as pro's...... It is no longer possible to utilise them all efficiently regardless of the minimal financial cost, there simply are not enough hours in the day so it comes back to making choices. Which of the social media will be most effective and cost efficient (time as well as financial) to meet my needs? Where do I need to position myself in relation to my financial responsibilities and needs moving forward?

I have created a portfolio for myself on Fine Art America's web site because it is at the top of the google (and other's) search engine. Of course the 46,000 artists who are already registered with their own portfolio's, were instrumental in the site's ranking. The first goal is to get into the top 10,000... and always looking at the positive... I'm currently in the top 50,000:)

I'll start off by linking everything back to that portfolio I think and use Facebook along with twitter to help promote and market my art for a start. In the meantime I'm moving from PC to Mac and Coral to Adobe so I've a pretty big learning curve on the go.