Ivy & Chris Newport's Make Your Mark Workshop is Great!

I have been taking Ivy and Chris Newport's "Make Your Mark" workshop and it is mind boggling how much information they packed into this workshop. I also took their "Lights, Camera, Art" workshop but I will save that for another blog post. 

I am an extremely right brained person and on top of that, those of you that follow me know, I have neurological issues due to a chronic illness I live with. So if Ivy and Chris can put all this technological information across in a way that I can understand and put into practice I am guessing you can do it too. Having said that, it has been challenging for me and I did have to take a few days off from working in my studio to get all my social networking sites set up with all the info Chris is teaching us in the class. But now that I am making some real progress I getting pretty excited about seeing my audience and views increase. 

So here is just a tiny fragment of what I have learned. How to add SEO (search engine optimization) info to my site. The major importance of Alt Text tags on all your images and tips about how to add them and what NOT to do when adding them. That part took the longest for me because my website has hundreds of images of my silk paintings, silk scarves and my more intuitive acrylic paintings. I learned how to link my Facebook account and Website's ad tracking and analytics. Also a lot of info about branding and things you must and must not do in designing your website. There really is so much information packed into this class and I am only about half way through it as I write this post. There is still lots more learning and implementation to come for me and my social media sites as I work my way through the rest of the class. 

One of the changes I made that will be most noticeable to my followers is that I created a banner with my logo, a flying crow carrying a silk scarf, using consistent fonts for all of my social media sites. Here are 3 screen shots below with the new banner on my Website, Blog and my Etsy Shop. I really love how the new banner carries my brand from one site to the next unifying them. Each photo has a link under it that will bring you right to that site so you can see the changes I have made throughout each site. 

https://www.crowhousestudio.com

https://brattleboro-muse.blogspot.com

https://www.etsy.com/shop/LindaMarcilleArt

In the promotional material for the class Ivy writes;

"Bring Your Followers On A JourneyMany of us artists feel pretty uncomfortable with marketing, BUT we need to change this way of thinking and redefine our relationship to sales. Marketing is (when done artfully and authentically) is simply a form of storytelling. Your marketing efforts will lead them on a journey and allow you to share your wonderful gifts and passions. The steps in this class will teach you how to build an amazing marketing campaign that will lead your followers to your website and become your most loyal customers! ~Ivy Newport"

Ivy's Links:
Facebook: Ivy Newport Artist
Website: Ivy Newport
Make Your Mark Workshop