July 28,2009 

The ACE Newsletter 

Kim Santini, our ACE contributor, has compiled a useful key for describing and clarifying
some of the more important terminology of the many terms that we see as we surf the
Internet or read an article. These are the most useful terms that we may see, yet not
actually absorb them or even understand them in our daily browsings! But if an artist is
serious about running a business, an online presence is a must!

Learn the basics. Things change in cyberspace as we speak. New ways to market, new
ways to communicate. In all of this though, don't let the task overwhelm you! A strong web
presence in a few areas is better than too many with too little time to attend to them all.
Now, here is Kim's article

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Defining a Web Presence

The internet has made it possible for everyone to have a presence. Social
media sites like Facebook and Twitter allow for a virtual stream of
consciousness. YouTube and podcasting provide video visuals to back up your
thoughts. Blogging brings your journey front and center on everyone's
monitors. And the omnipotent website remains a staple to the internet
experience.

As a business owner you have a responsibility to create an internet presence.
The web is a tremendous tool that cannot be overlooked.

As an artist, you have a greater responsibility to build a website that
showcases your artwork and your studio's mission clearly and beautifully.

Utilizing social media, blogs and other sites will allow you to showcase your art,
share your vision with like-minded individuals, and recruit new clients. The
internet can drive your business – internet sales make up for 90% of mine
(there are a lot of conversations happening on a number of different forums
and groups I belong to which makes me wonder if there are particular factors
that come into play with respect to successful internet sales – something I
would love to research further and report on at a later date).

However, the internet can also be mind-boggling. Here's a rough breakdown of
the vocabulary and internet topics that you should familiarize yourself with.
Next time I'll start with a rough outline of how to structure your own studio
website.

DOMAIN NAME: The physical address that makes up an internet address.
Domain names are bought and owned by individuals/businesses. Typically a
domain name matches your or your studio name. For example, my studio name
is TurtledoveDesigns and my domain name is www.TurtledoveDesigns.com
(capitalization added for emphasis – it does not impact functionality of the
address at all).

[Theresa's note: An artist or craftsman in any medium should also always try to obtain the
domain name in the format of how you sign your work. Buyers have short memories but,
for example , I sign my artwork as M Theresa Brown. I also have that the domain name of
MTheresaBrown.com. Our vehicle has graphics displayed with the domain name
OnRoadArtists.com for it's quick viewing simplicity for drivers driving down the road and that
domain simply points to our website. But it is easily remembered by a viewer who cannot
write it down!]

DOMAIN HOST: A company that hosts or allows a domain name to be published.
Businesses typically pay a subscription fee to a host provider company in
exchange for their hosting the business's domain and providing other domain
related services (like webspace, file transfers, email, etc). Domain hosts will
define the amount of webspace allocated to your domain name. They also wil
l define how much traffic is allowed to your site, along with other services like
email hosting. You'll have a better time choosing a domain host once you
assess your website needs.

EMAIL: Typically provided by your internet provider, emails can also be
piggybacked onto domain names (for example janedoe@bell.com vs
janedoe@dickandjanestudios.com). There are great benefits to having an email
address that matches your domain name, because this allows electronic
communication stability while giving you flexibility to change internet providers.
For instance, you upgrade from your Bell dial-up service to a faster connection
with your cable company. Now that prior bell.com email account is obsolete.
You have effectively severed ties with anyone who has that email as your
contact information (including people who picked your business card up at an
event years ago, meaning to contact you but haven't yet). I highly
recommend investing in an email package when you set up your domain
hosting.

INTERNET PROVIDER: A company that allows individuals/businesses to connect
to the internet. Some common internet providers are Yahoo, cable companies,
AOL and WOW (I am not endorsing any of these, by the way! Just listing for
clarity's sake).

WEBSITE: HTML code which, when published to a domain name, allows internet
users to view information specific to a company/individual. A website can
consist of a home page (meaning the first page you view or land upon when
loading up a domain name) along with many other pages, all linked together
through a navigation bar or coded links.

HTML: stands for “Hypertext Markup Language,” which is a computer language
used to create webpages and dynamic content most commonly used on the
internet.

SOCIAL MEDIA: These are websites that allow people to follow along with
others' conversations (also called convos) and facilitate the sharing of
information, including hyperlinks, photos and text. Some social media sites are
Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, and LinkedIn.

BLOG: A type of website that is formatted similar to a journal or diary.
Information is organized in dated “posts”. Blogs are wonderful tools in that
they are updated regularly, packed with keywords, and typically link back to
relevant websites. They also allow visitors to get to know you, the artist,
better, hence building a relationship that supplements and supports sales.

SEO or SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION: The concept of writing/buildi
ng websites specifically to maximize on their visibility to search engines. A
simple Google search for “search engine optimization” will provide you with
weeks' worth of reading along with some fascinating articles on how to
logically approach SEO and maximize your own website.

SEARCH ENGINES: Spiders that crawl through the internet, ranking pages
based on their relevance to various keywords. Some more popular Search
Engines are Google, DogPile, Ask.com, Lycos and Bing.

KEYWORDS: Vocabulary words specific to your studio business – perhaps they
are media based, or deal with subject matter, professional affiliations, etc. If
you define your own keywords based on your personal/studio mission
statement and use these properly within context as often as possible when
writing content for your website/blog, you will see an increase in your rankings
within various search engines.

LINKS or HYPERLINKS: A position on a webpage, that when linked, loads up
another webpage. This webpage could be loaded on the same screen that the
link previously existed on, or could be opened in a new tab or window.
Hyperlinks can be embedded in photos or text or listed separately. Typically
when they are embedded in text, the text is displayed in a different color.
Links can exist on any number of a variety of pages – blogs, company
websites, social media sites, emails, etc.

PAGE: Used in reference to screen views, similar to a book page, with the
exception that the data/image loads up at once and can extend beyond the
confines of your computer monitor (check for vertical/horizontal scroll bars).

Kimberly Santini

 http://www.artcareerexperts.com

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