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By Chris Maher
Successfully selling your creative work online requires many skills. I will be adding resources here that I think are really useful for people who are serious about building profitable online galleries. If you have come across any resources that you think would be worthy of mention, please e-mail them to me and I will add them to this site. If you have a list of the best sites in your discipline please be sure to send them in.
[Recommended Reading]
[General Web Resources] [Medium
Specific Resources]
SYAO, in association with Amazon.com Books, has set up direct links to the Amazon Book site, where you can read more about each book, and order it directly online.
Publicity
on the Internet: Creating Successful Publicity Campaigns on the
Internet and the Commercial Online Services
by Steve O'Keefe. Paperback, Published by John Wiley & Sons, Publication date:
November 1996.
ISBN: 0471161756 List: $24.95 ~ Amazon Books Price: $19.96 ~
My favorite book about how to promote your site on the Internet. Written in a hands on
fashion, with step-by-step plans, forms, and procedures, Steve O'Keefe shows in detail how
to get attention for your web site. Sample publicity campaigns, strategies for creating
successful e-mail news releases, and stories of what should of worked, but didn't, all
come together into a extremely valuable resource. Highly Recommended
Increase
Your Web Traffic in a Weekend
by William R. Stanek. Bk&Cd-Rom Edition Paperback, 400 pages Published by Prima,
Publication date: August 1997 ISBN: 0761511946 List: $19.99 ~ Amazon Books Price:
$15.99 ~
If you've been wanting to build traffic at your site, but your just not sure how to go
about it, this is the book for you. You really can do wonders in a weekend, if you have a
clear plan to follow, and a expert to guide you. Stanek doesn't add any of the fluff that
so many other Internet books do, but is clear and logical in his approach. Check out the
reviews at the Amazon site, you will find many folks who are thrilled about the increases
in their site traffic after following the step-by-step plan in this book. Highly
Recommended
Words
That Sell : A Thesaurus to Help Promote Your Products,
Services, and Ideas
by Richard Bayan. Paperback, 127 pages Published by Contemporary Books Publication
date: April 1, 1987 Dimensions (in inches): 8.73 x 8.51 x .39 ISBN: 0809247992 List:
$14.95 Amazon Books Price: $11.96
Words can have a magic effect on people, and advertising folks have worked long and
hard to come up the words most likely to sell you stuff. This book is full of words and
phrases that have proven to captivate, motivate and persuade. Although it begins with
slogans that we have all heard before, in the end it proves to be a truly useful source of
words that say things in a powerful way.
Webonomics:
Nine Essential Principles for Growing Your Business on the World Wide Web
by Evan I. Schwartz. Hardcover, 256 pages Published by Broadway Books Publication
date: May 1, 1997
ISBN: 0553061720 List: $25.00 ~ Amazon Books Price: $17.50 ~
This is a well written book, full of stories that illustrate principles underlying the
success of the top commercial sites on the net.
The
One to One Future : Building Relationships One Customer at a Time
by Don Peppers, Martha Rogers Availability: This title usually ships within 24 hours.
Paperback, Published by Currency/Doubleday, Publication date: January 1, 1997. Dimensions
(in inches): 7.25 x 5.02 x 1.28, ISBN: 0385485662 List: $15.95 ~ Amazon Books Price:
$12.76 ~
Mass marketing was never the way most artists and craftspeople sold their work. Now with
the Internet, it's more important than ever to properly communicate with and learn from
your customers. This book is about marketing to individuals, and how to build the
relationships that make your customers buy time and time again.
Microsoft
FrontPage 97 Unleashed
by William R. Stanek (Editor). Paperback, with CD ROM. Published by Sams Publication
date: January 1, 1997
ISBN: 1575212269 List: $49.99 ~ Amazon Books Price: $39.99 ~
If you want a HTML authoring program that will be easy to use and offer sophisticated
features, Microsoft's FrontPage '97 is probably your best choice. I've looked at more that
60 books that claim to help you learn this program , and have decided this one is
the best. It's huge, at over 1200 pages, and full of detailed information to help
you get the most out of the program. It might be kind of overwhelming for complete
beginners, but is written in an friendly and accessible style.
Microsoft
FrontPage 98 Unleashed
by William Stanek 3rd Edition Paperback, 1200 pages, Published by Sams, Publication
date: October 1997, Dimensions (in inches): 9.05 x 7.31 x 1.66. ISBN: 1575213494
If you are looking for a really excellent book on FrontPage98, this is the one. Like
Stanek's book on FrontPage97 (see above), this is well researched, well written, and
comprehensive. Perhaps not the best book for beginners, it still is written clearly enough
to allow regular folk to access all the power of the FrontPage98 program. Highly
Recommended.
Small
Scale Photography: How to Take Great Shots of Your Work
by Charles J. Lewton-Brain, Charles J. Lewton-Brain (Illustrator) First Edition
Textbook Binding, 90 pages Published by Brain Press Publication date: November 1996 ISBN:
0969851022 List: $59.95 ~ Amazon Books Price: $59.95
This book and video combination is designed to teach really well how to take magazine
quality drop-shadow slides and photographs of all kinds of small objects: jewelry,
ceramics, dolls, archeological specimens, any object under about two feet across. The
system described costs less than $70.00 to set up (camera and tripod will be more). The
text is clear and concise, the video lecture animated and packed with useful information.
Product
Shots (Pro-Lighting)
by Roger Hichs, Frances Schultz List: $29.95 ~ Amazon Books Price: $23.96 Paperback,
Published by Rotovision, Publication date: March 1, 1996 ISBN: 0823064336
When you need to get serous about shooting your work, it helps to have an experienced
pro show you how it's done. This book has illustrations that clearly show lighting
placement and technique for a large number of outstanding photographs. Subjects range from
jewelry to medium sized products. Not for a beginner, but if you have some photographic
experience, this book can show you how to really get great results.
The
Self-Publishing Manual : How to Write, Print and Sell Your Own Book
by Dan Poynter List: $19.95 ~ Amazon Books Price: $15.96 You Save: $3.99 (20%)
Paperback, 464 pages Published by Para Publishing Publication date: September 1, 1997
Dimensions (in inches): 8.50 x 5.52 x .96 ISBN: 156860047X
This is a great book to get if you think you might want to publish and sell a book of your
own. Considered a bible by many in the industry, it gives step by step advice on how to
produce a commercially successful book.
1998
Writer's Market : Where & How to Sell What You Write (Annual)
by Kirsten Holm (Editor) Paperback book and CD, 1088 pages, Published by Writers
Digest Books, Publication date: September 1997 Dimensions (in inches): 9.14 x 7.02 x 2.07,
ISBN: 0898797926 List: $49.99 ~ Amazon Books Price: $39.99 ~
When you put your work up on the web, you become a publisher. If you aspire to publish in
print as well, this is an excellent guide to places to publish articles about you, your
web site, and your work. More than 4,200 places to sell your words, from book publishers
(more than 1,250) to magazines (more than 2,000) to greeting-card companies, script
buyers, writing contests, and a handful of online markets. You can also buy it with out
the CD ROM, but if you are looking for places that are likely to publish an article about
you or your work, searching the CD can be quite useful.
[Distance Learning] [Mailing Lists] [Organizations] [Promotion Sites]
[Search Engines] [HTML
Authoring Guides] [Web Graphics] [Legal
Issues]
ZDNet University - ZDNet University is an online learning community that offers classes in computer- and Internet-related topics. For a monthly subscription of only $4.95 a month (US), you get full access to the ZDU campus. Take as many classes as you want, at no extra charge. The course instructors are often the authors of the text books you use. (That's where the only real expense is, the cost of the books) But the ability to interact with accomplished authors and skilled programmers in a virtual classroom is a treat.
Internet Sales Discussion List - The I-Sales list currently goes out to over 7,350 subscribers in more than 65 countries. As a moderated list, the quality of the posts is very high, and the participants are very giving of their expertise. A great resource, from which I have learned a great deal.
National Endowment for the Arts - They have been online since April 1996 and have a tremendous store of articles and features.
Maher's Practical Guide to Promoting Your Web Site - This is my own creation, the accumulation of all my research on the promotion of web sites. Every time I find a new trick or resource that can be really useful I add it to this site. Especially valuable are the the tips I've discovered that can help you get a good relevance ranking when you list your site with the top search engines.
The Art Of Business Web Site Promotion - This is a great site on promotion by one of the Internets real promotins experts, Jim Rhodes.
HotBot - This is one of the fastest, most powerful search engines on the net. With more than 54 million web sites indexed, you can can do some wonderful research here. Thinking of putting up a gallery of your tie dye shirts? A quick search of HotBot shows will give you links to 4234 tie dye sites that you can check out for ideas.
GeoSystems' MapQuest This is the premier free mapping site on the web. It has many useful features, including an excellent way to plan your hotel stays when traveling to art fairs. Just enter the address of your show (or the nearest intersection of two streets) and it will create a map of the area, complete with icons of points of interest. You can have it find hotels, restaurants, local attractions, and display them on your map. It will even let you print out door to door directions to get to your show!
10 Big Myths About Copyright This is a great review of copyright issues, put in a form anyone can understand. People have all kinds of reasons why they feel they can take what someone else created, but guide shows how rare it is that work can be copied without permission.
World Wide Web Design Resources This is a compilation of links to on-line resources, ranging from beginners HTML guides to advanced software authoring and human interface design sites.
The Lady's HTML Tips and Links A wonderful selection of HTML resources on the web.
PhotoImpact Software by Ulead. This is a fantastic graphics package for many reasons. It has some wonderful tools, called WebExtentions, that allow real time compression of jpeg and .gif files. Two windows pop up, uncompressed on the left, compressed on the right. You just drag a slider and watch the effect of the increasing compression on you image. Actual file sizes are displayed as you work, so you know exactly what you are getting. Transparency, color bit depth, and pallet are a click to change. Makes all the other compression programs look lame by comparison. It has great type tools, image tracking software, and a host of image manipulating tricks. This is a wonderful program to build the graphics of a web site with. Visit their web site to download free demos. Highly Recommended.
Preparing Graphics for The Web This web site is designed to help artists and graphic designers make informed and intelligent choices regarding which image file format to use (GIF or JPEG), and how to optimize their graphics specifically for publishing on the World Wide Web. The advice here will help you create the fastest-loading image of the most reasonable quality.
Optimizing Web Graphics This article will show you how to minimize file size and dithering for Web graphics.
Scanning Photos for the Web A fairly technical article by one of the original online photographic pioneers, Philip Greenspun. Discusses standard formats like jpg and gif, as well as the uses of PhotoCD and flash-pix.
A few scanning tips This site offers scanning tips, hints, and fundamentals as well as other general information to help beginners get off to a quick start with their scanning.
Accurate Image Manipulation for Desktops A nice page that has test images you can use to calibrate your monitor. This will help insure you site visitors will see your graphics as you do.
Baskets, Etc. - Welcome basket makers -- advanced, intermediate, beginners, and basket maker wanna-be's. This site has been established for Internet exchange of tips, questions, and general knowledge about splint and reed basket making.
Basketry (Main Menu) -- Native American Art - More Native American information, another great site!
NativeTech: Native American Technology and Art - Native Tech Site (THE best site with Native American basketry information).
Ganoksin.com - One of the gem and jewelry world's foremost information resource sites on the Internet.
This page last updated: 09/02/04
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If you would like to contact me directly, e-mail me at advisor@1x.com
Your comments are always welcome.
Designed and written by Chris Maher
PO Box 5, Lambertville, MI 48144, USA
Phone: 1-734-856-8882
Copyright 1999 Chris Maher, All Rights Reserved