Tips and Tricks: Guest Blogging, Part 2
Yesterday, I posted Guest Blogging, Part One, where we talked about the importance of research before you attempt contact. Today in Part 2, we’ll be going over how to make contact with a blog owner.
When contacting a blog owner, you will always want to keep in mind the following:
- Always choose blogs that are up to date and frequently updated. Avoid defunct blogs that appear to have been abandoned.
- Always do your research to make sure the cards you’re promoting are a good fit for the blog in question.
- Always address the blog owner by name if you can find it in the About or Contact section of the blog. Never, ever use “Dear blog owner” or other generic title. You’re contacting them as an individual artist and you don’t want them to mistake your e-mail for the dreaded spam.
- Always reference and/or compliment their blog postings. For example, let’s say you want to promote Thank You cards for doctors. You’re contacting the blog of someone with a medical issue who regularly posts about their health. Reference a recent post (for example, a post they made about the cost of healthcare for cancer patients). Working that kind of information into your first contact e-mail tells the owner you aren’t just contacting them at random. You’ve thought about it and gone to the trouble of familiarizing yourself with their work.
- Always keep the initial contact as brief and concise as you can. State your purpose, the reason why you’d think your cards fit in with the blog, make a personal connection, and ask for further contact.
- Always remain professional in your dealings. Even if a contact criticizes you, insults you, or otherwise offends you, just strike them off your list and walk away. Getting into a dispute or a debate is never worth it.
Below is a sample first contact e-mail:
_________________________
Dear (blog owner’s name),
My name is (your name) and I’m a digital artist who has created a line of greeting cards for (state purpose of greeting card collection, such as “cancer patients”). I’ve read your blog and (pay a compliment, such as “I find myself agreeing with you about ??” or “I really enjoyed learning about ??”).
To address a need for (reference the purpose of your card collection), I’ve created a series of greeting cards. Here’s a link to the collection if you’d like to take a look. I wanted to get in touch with you because I think the readers of your blog might find this collection interesting and I hope you do, too.
Would you be willing to run a guest post and help me spread the word about these special cards? I can provide you with all the material you need. Please get in touch with me if you have any questions or concerns.
Looking forward to hearing from you,
(Your name)
_________________________
On Tuesday, we’ll post the third and final part of this series, which will give you information on what comes next.
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Tips and Tricks: Guest Blogging, Part 1
Marketing your greeting cards is an essential part of becoming a professional retailer. If you truly want to make money, you need to not only focus on your design work, you must also promote yourself to gain visibility with consumers.
You can find general marketing tips in the Artist Resources section. Today, we’re going to specifically talk about guest blogging, or how to approach blog owners to ask them to promote your products on their blog.
Before we get into the various steps, let’s make one thing clear: for every 10 blogs you contact, likely only 1 will say “yes.” Don’t get depressed. This is a fact of marketing you’ll have to live with. Don’t go into this with unrealistic expectations. The only way to succeed is by plugging along with sheer, dogged persistence until your result is achieved. Cultivate a professional attitude. If a blog owner tells you “no,” it’s not a personal rejection. Accept it and move on to the next.
Now let’s go over the specifics:
Choose
First, choose a collection of cards you want to promote. Do not try to promote your entire store. You’ll have much better luck picking a small group of specialist cards that have something uncommon in common—blackboard typography designs for baby showers, cards for cancer patients, etc. Or perhaps you want to promote a collection of retro designed cards sharing vintage images. If all you have are generic cards, consider making some for specialized markets.
Tip: If you’re promoting cards with a singular design in common—like the blackboard style card above and others I’ve recently created with a similar look—check for design blogs that post about paper products.
Identify
Do searches on the Internet to identify blogs that post on topics relating to your card collection. This will require you to at least skim the last few months of postings to get a feel for the blog. If the blog doesn’t have anything in common with your cards, move on to someone else. There’s no need to waste your time trying to promote cards inappropriate to the blog.
Research
Nearly all blogs have an About feature. Read it. You’ll learn about the blog owner, often including their name, interests, etc. This will allow you to tailor your approach.
Tip: Always use the blog owner’s name when contacting them. The personal touch makes your e-mail seem a lot less like spam.
Tomorrow, I’ll post Part 2 of Guest Blogging which will contain additional tips.
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Inspiration Station: Flickr
We’ve talked about how to find inspiration, color palettes, etc. on Pinterest, but another excellent source for design trends is Flickr. I’ve not just found new color combinations, but patterns and other designs that inspire me in my work. You can simply browse someone’s Photosteam or check out their Albums if you want a more organized experience. You can also do a Tag search by clicking the
Here are a few Flickr accounts to keep an eye on:
Helen Dutton
Lots of super trendy colors, patterns, designs, and other nice stuff.
Emma Lamb
I’m linking to her color palette posts … some very lovely combos here.
CraftsbyChrisOnline
Offers the “color palette a week” project which I’ve linked to here.
Greeting Card
I did a generic search for “greeting card” – here are the results.
Do your own searches on Flickr and have fun!
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Dash of Inspiration: New Year Cards for 2015
A Dash of Inspiration, A Cup of Creativity by Doreen
New Year Cards for 2015
The Holiday Season is well on it’s way, so hurry and get those New Year’s cards updated for 2015! If your 2015 updated card is showing up in the below 2014 search, then you may not have updated all the necessary fields.
Remember when you make these updates to:
- Update your Card Title, Keywords and Artist Notes.
- Take the time to update your CUSTOM cards to the new year to increase their marketability.
- If you have Chinese New Year cards which DO NOT reflect the ‘year of the horse’, then update those as well.
If you want to sell your cards for the upcoming New Year season, then best get busy with those updates or your cards will be left behind. Let’s help GCU pull off a professional front when promoting our New Year’s cards by showing potential customer ONLY CURRENT cards.
Off I go to make my updates, see you on the New Year’s 2015 pages!
So until next week … Learn … Create … Inspire!
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Critique Clinic – October 31-November 2, 2014
How does it work? For three days a week (Friday-Sunday midnight), I will open the clinic to any artist who wants an honest peer review and critique of a card which gets plenty of clicks but no sales, so something’s probably not quite right, or you’ve got a new design you want to test drive, or you’re unsure about the marketability of a card. Or perhaps you’re a newbie who isn’t sure if a card is up to a marketable standard. Anyone is welcome to participate. In fact, I encourage everyone to at least look at the cards in question and read the critique comments – you may learn something. The purpose of the clinic is to help artists improve the commercial appeal and marketability of their cards.
THE RULES
- ONE card per artist only.
- Card must be intended for sale at Greeting Card Universe.
- To submit a card for critique, post a link to the card at GCU in the comments section of this clinic post. Allowances will be made if you’ve had a card declined, or made a new design you’d like advice on before submission. Give us the link where we can see the card, such as your private gallery, Flickr, Tinypic, etc. If you do give a private gallery link, be sure your private module gallery is ON. Please do not post links to your Manage Cards section – do you really want strangers tinkering with your cards? And please don’t ask us to critique a card that’s pending review – we can’t see it until it’s approved.
- Any artist is free to comment and/or give a critique of a submitted card. HOWEVER, post-and-run comments like “great card” or “you suck” will not be tolerated, nor will abuse. Criticism should be constructive, not destructive. Play nice or you will be banned.
- I also won’t tolerate temper tantrums if you decide your “artistic integrity” is being stepped on because you asked for a critique, and someone told you the photo you’re using isn’t in focus. If you can’t take honest criticism, don’t submit. Once gets you a warning; twice and you’re banned from submitting in the future.
- Artists who critique may do so by giving their opinion, posting an example of another card, or pointing the submitter to a video, on-line article, or other helpful suggestion.
- Don’t forget that artists who are giving you tips and helpful advice are volunteering their time and trouble. Be nice. A link back to their store on your website or blog is appreciated (but not mandatory).
- You are free not to take any advice offered. There’s no guarantee any card will be a bestseller, so don’t come into the clinic with unrealistic expectations.
- Rules may change as we go along and we see how things turn out, okay?
So without any further ado, I declare this week’s Critique Clinic open!
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Inspiration Station: Kwanzaa
The African-inspired holiday, Kwanzaa, takes place over seven days: December 26 through January 1. Like Christmas and Hanukkah, Kwanzaa has its own unique colors and themes. Consider including Kwanzaa designs in your work—below are some resources that will help you tackle this time so special to African-Americans.
COLORS OF KWANZAA
The colors of Kwanzaa are black, red and green. Black represents the African people themselves, while red symbolizes the blood of ancestors who came from Africa and green stands for the lush, abundant country. Here’s a suggested palette, feel free to adjust to suit your designs.
THEMES OF KWANZAA
Kwanzaa Candles: Seven candles—one black in the center, three red on the left, three green on the right in the seven-branched kinara (candle holder)—represent the Seven Principles of Kwanzaa. Each night during the celebration, a candle is lit.
Africa: Images of the continent and African inspired designs such as those found on textiles and art.
Symbols: The unity cup; fruits, nuts and vegetables; kinara (see above); seven candles in the Kwanzaa colors; ears of corn.
Check out Kwanzaa to learn more about the celebration.
The Official Kwanzaa website is also worth a look.
KWANZAA INSPIRATION
Pinterest is the place to go to find the inspiration you need to create beautiful Kwanzaa designs.
Kwanzaa Cards, Etc.
Kwanzaa Celebration Cards
Kwanzaa Cards
Not a lot in these boards, but there are some very nice designs.
African-American Christmas Cards
There are some Kwanzaa designs here, too.
Have fun!
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Tips and Tricks: Christmas Vectors
Looking for jolly commercial free holiday graphics resources? We’ve got a few of the many offerings available for you to use in your designs. Below are some examples + links where you can find the downloads. In some cases, the TOU are on a different page – we’ll let you find those except in one case where we really had to search).
Links below each image.
Have fun!
NOTE: Please check the TOU/licensing information before you download and use these graphics in your work, designers sometimes change their terms. Be sure you make a record of the URL of the file and the URL of the TOU if on a different page, you’ll need to include this information in your Notes to Reviewers.
9 Whimsy Christmas Trees Vector Pack by littleboxofideas
Vector Christmas Backgrounds and Tiles by VectorJungle
Holiday Greetings E-Card Vector by Vector4Free
Christmas Vector Art Characters by Pixieden
Christmas Themed Sketchy Vectors Pack by Spoon Graphics (TOU here)
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Dash of Inspiration: 2014 Spooktacular
A Dash of Inspiration, A Cup of Creativity by Doreen
2014 Spooktacular
Halloween is this week, I’m sure many of you are busy with activities associated with All Hallows’ Eve so I’ll just pass on some fun links to keep you in the mood to design those Spook Season cards while the season surrounds you with inspiration – it’s a real heads up for next year!
Elements for your designs:
Grunge Textures by ImaginaryRosse
Autumn Leaves Gradients by MysticEmma
Dirty Grunge Splashes – Vectors – great for blood spatter
Halloween .SVG Vectors – if you can open this file type, then here is a link to some fun Public Domain vectors;
Note: Here is a link about: SVG Scalable Vector Graphics File
Tutorials:
Candy Corn – Inspired Text Effect by Textuts
Halloween Photoshop tutorials: 13 masterclasses for horrifying art, designs and type – By Digital Arts Staff
13 Halloween inspired Adobe Illustrator Tutorials – by vectorgraphit
Fonts:
Spinebiting font by NAL
Black Casper – Randsom Note Font
If you are just tuning in for the first time, don’t miss these previous posts featuring some great Halloween design goodies (please keep in mind these are links to old posts and not all links within these posts may still be active).
So until next week … HAPPY HALLOWEEN … Learn … Create … Inspire!
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Critique Clinic – October 25-26, 2014
How does it work? For three days a week (Friday-Sunday midnight), I will open the clinic to any artist who wants an honest peer review and critique of a card which gets plenty of clicks but no sales, so something’s probably not quite right, or you’ve got a new design you want to test drive, or you’re unsure about the marketability of a card. Or perhaps you’re a newbie who isn’t sure if a card is up to a marketable standard. Anyone is welcome to participate. In fact, I encourage everyone to at least look at the cards in question and read the critique comments – you may learn something. The purpose of the clinic is to help artists improve the commercial appeal and marketability of their cards.
THE RULES
- ONE card per artist only.
- Card must be intended for sale at Greeting Card Universe.
- To submit a card for critique, post a link to the card at GCU in the comments section of this clinic post. Allowances will be made if you’ve had a card declined, or made a new design you’d like advice on before submission. Give us the link where we can see the card, such as your private gallery, Flickr, Tinypic, etc. If you do give a private gallery link, be sure your private module gallery is ON. Please do not post links to your Manage Cards section – do you really want strangers tinkering with your cards? And please don’t ask us to critique a card that’s pending review – we can’t see it until it’s approved.
- Any artist is free to comment and/or give a critique of a submitted card. HOWEVER, post-and-run comments like “great card” or “you suck” will not be tolerated, nor will abuse. Criticism should be constructive, not destructive. Play nice or you will be banned.
- I also won’t tolerate temper tantrums if you decide your “artistic integrity” is being stepped on because you asked for a critique, and someone told you the photo you’re using isn’t in focus. If you can’t take honest criticism, don’t submit. Once gets you a warning; twice and you’re banned from submitting in the future.
- Artists who critique may do so by giving their opinion, posting an example of another card, or pointing the submitter to a video, on-line article, or other helpful suggestion.
- Don’t forget that artists who are giving you tips and helpful advice are volunteering their time and trouble. Be nice. A link back to their store on your website or blog is appreciated (but not mandatory).
- You are free not to take any advice offered. There’s no guarantee any card will be a bestseller, so don’t come into the clinic with unrealistic expectations.
- Rules may change as we go along and we see how things turn out, okay?
So without any further ado, I declare this week’s Critique Clinic open!
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Font Frenzy: Fontacular Sale
Fonts.com is having their annual Fontacular Sale, when for a limited time, you can get deep discounts on some very fabulous fonts that would normally cost an arm and a leg. New offers will continue to be made each day for the next three days.
Below, you’ll see a sample of just one of the fonts available. If you’re in the market to pick up a few new fonts for your designer’s toolbox, now’s a good time to browse!
GCU Community 