10 Ways To Get More Sales in your Artist Shop

You've made your homepage look awesome, tweaked your shop’s SEO, and set up all of your social media accounts. Now What? Her's a summary of ten ways you can fuel your shop’s sales from our 10 Answers to the Question "How Do I Get More Sales?" Creative Resource.

1. Design around topics and themes that are trending right now.

Immediacy is key. Take advantage of trending topics while the internet is still buzzing about them. Creating designs around topical memes, references, or social movements opens you up to a wider audience. It also gives you opportunities to promote your designs using trending hashtags on social media.

2. Rally around a cause.

Through Threadless Causes, you can donate a portion of your proceeds from the sale of any design in your shop to a Cause and charity of your choice. This fundraising initiative is a way for you to spread good around the world with your art and it can also benefit your shop in a variety of ways, including driving engagement. Additionally, the more Causes designs you add to your shop, the more likely you’ll earn a feature in Threadless promotions (your shop must be opted into the marketplace).

3. Stick to a consistent style.

Most of the top-selling Artist Shops have one thing in common—a distinct, instantly recognizable style. If a new customer loves a design of yours enough to visit your shop, they’ll most likely want to find more designs that have a similar aesthetic and tone. We’ve seen that consistency will not only help sales, but also make your brand more easily identifiable.

4. Post high-quality content as often as possible on social media.

It’s easier said than done, but you have to post more than just once every few days to stand out in social feeds. Keep in mind, posting often doesn’t mean you have to share a new piece of art every day. That would be impossible. Instead, focus on making content that humanizes your brand and shows your audience things they’ll enjoy. Showing work-in-progress, posting polls, and sharing images of followers wearing your merch are some ideas for driving engagement and keeping your audience interested in your feed. Whenever you post about your Artist Shop, don’t forget to tag Threadless for a potential repost.

5. Participate in Design Challenges.

Design Challenges are a way for you to step out of your comfort zone, overcome creative blocks, and test your skills. Plus, each challenge is an opportunity for you to receive additional earnings. Even if you don’t win, submitting designs can help drive traffic to your Artist Shop. Hundreds of Threadless community members view and score submissions every day. If they really like your art, there’s a chance they’ll want to purchase your designs and seek out more, regardless if you win. Design Challenges are a fun way to discover artists!

6. Keep the new designs coming.

There are multiple benefits to adding new designs to your Artist Shop on a frequent basis. It gives your followers a reason to continue visiting your shop to see what’s new and keeps them from losing interest and stopping checking back. Secondly, if you’re opted into the Threadless marketplace, adding new designs on a frequent basis will make your art more visible in marketplace searches filtered by “New.” Be sure to properly tag all of your designs with relevant keywords so it’s easier for potential customers to find your designs and discover your shop. Thirdly, every new design you add is another excuse to reach out to your followers on social media.

7. Don’t be afraid to ask for feedback.

If your designs aren’t selling, consider visiting our Threadless Artists Discord group or forums to ask fellow Artist Shop owners for advice. Our upcoming server on Discord will also be a place where you can have discussions about our art. Keep an eye out for more details! Our community is full of artists who are willing to help you figure out what’s not working. It’s also useful to get ideas directly from your followers. If you post about a new product and your fans give you feedback like “I wish this was on a blue t-shirt,” make it happen! Also, don’t forget to reply to their comment with a link to the product they asked for.

8. Grow your audience.

The bigger your following, the more people you can direct to your Artist Shop to generate more sales. Growing your audience isn’t easy, but you can do it a lot quicker than you might think with the right strategies. Here are just a few tips: Reach out to bloggers and influencers, collaborate with other artists, create contests and giveaways, or run Facebook Ads to microtarget the users who are most likely to purchase your products. Always keep in mind, marketing your shop to the wrong audience won’t get you more sales. As you employ these strategies, always consider your core audience. Identifying who you’re selling to is key in deciding everything from lifestyle photo themes to hashtags you use to bloggers you reach out to.

9. Further establish your brand identity.

Fans of your art want to get to know you better and figure out what you’re all about. You don’t have to reveal your entire life story, but sharing glimpses here and there will humanize your brand and help foster longtime supporters. In addition to adding an About Page to your Artist Shop, having a blog for your brand is a great way to showcase your personality with fun posts, style guides, shop updates, and other forms of creative content.

10. Don’t ever, ever, ever give up!

Just like with any business, running a successful Artist Shop involves lots of trial and error. Just because your shop isn’t raking in the dough right now, doesn’t mean it never will. Not everything is an overnight success. In a previous Creative Resources post, Justyna Dorsz described how she went from not getting any sales to making $1,000–$4,000 a month at Threadless. That process took time and patience, but she stuck with it and became a successful Artist Shop owner. In Justyna’s words, “…don’t ever, ever, ever give up.”